The Tolkien Reader

The Tolkien Reader is a compilation of some works by the author and philologist J. RR Tolkien that were first published in 1966.

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The Tolkien Reader begins with an introductory essay by Peter S. Beagle entitled Tolkien's Magic Ring . The first story, The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm's Son, is structured like a play. This is followed by an essay by Tolkien entitled On Fairy-Stories , the two short stories Leaf by Niggle and Farmer Giles of Ham, and a collection of sixteen poems that are summarized under the title The Adventures of Tom Bombadil .

Some of these works had previously appeared in print, but not in paperback format, with the exception of Beagle's essay and the story of Beorhtnoth. This publication was intended to show the other side of Tolkien's activity that was not directly related to Middle-earth. So the essay are fairy stories and the story Leaf by Niggle in 1964 in the book Tree and Leaf ( tree and leaf included). Farmer Giles of Ham was first published in 1949 in a limited edition and The Adventures of Tom Bombadil , illustrated by Pauline Baynes, was first published in 1962.

Tolkien's The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm's Son first appeared in print in 1953 in the journal Essays and Studies by Members of the English Association and in 1966 in Tolkien Reader , but it was not performed as a play. It is based on the fragment of the Anglo-Saxon poem The Battle of Maldon and tells of a battle in 991 between the English (led by Beorhtnoth, the Duke of Essex) and the Danes who invaded the country to occupy it. Due to Beorhtnoth's overconfidence, the Danes eventually won the battle and Beorhtnoth was killed.

literature

JRR Tolkien: The Tolkien Reader . Ballantine Books, New York 1986, ISBN 0-345-34506-1 (first edition: 1966).

Web links

The Tolkien Reader. on tolkienlibrary.com
The Tolkien Reader. on goodreads.com (reviews)

Individual evidence

↑ J. Case Tompkins: The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm's Son. Tolkien as a Modern Anglo-Saxon In: Mythlore. Volume 23, No. 4, Issue 90, October 15, 2002 ( dc.swosu.edu PDF, review) and reprint of the text in: The Tolkien Reader. 1966 - csun.edu ( Memento from September 23, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF, accessed on February 9, 2016).

[1] J. Case Tompkins: The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm's Son. Tolkien as a Modern Anglo-Saxon In: Mythlore. Volume 23, No. 4, Issue 90, October 15, 2002 ( dc.swosu.edu PDF, review) and reprint of the text in: The Tolkien Reader. 1966 - csun.edu ( Memento from September 23, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF, accessed on February 9, 2016).


Fiction	Songs for the Philologists (1936) • The Hobbit (1937) • Blatt von Tüftler (1947) • The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun (1945) • Bauer Giles von Ham (1949) • The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm's Son (1953) • The Lord of the Rings (1954/55) • The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and Other Poems from the Red Book (1962) • Tree and Leaf (1964) • The Tolkien Reader (1966) • The Road Goes Ever On (1967) • Smith of Wootton Major (1967)
Posthumously published fiction	Santa's Letters (1976) • The Silmarillion (1977) • News from Middle-earth (1980) • Mr. Bliss (1982) • Bilbo's Farewell Song (1990) • The History of Middle-earth (12 volumes; 1983–1996) • The Lost Road and Other Writings (Volume 5, 1987) • Roverandom (1998) • The Children of Húrin (2007) • The History of The Hobbit (2007) • The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún (2009) • King Arthur's Fall (2013) • The Story of Kullervo (2015) • Beren and Lúthien (2017) • The Fall of Gondolin (2018)
Academic works	A Middle English Vocabulary (1922) • Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Middle English text, 1925) • Some Contributions to Middle-English Lexicography (1925) • The Devil's Coach-Horses (1925) • Ancrene Wisse and Hali Meiðhad (1929) • The Name Nodens (1932) • Sigelwara Land Parts I and II, in Medium Aevum (1932–1934) • Chaucer as a Philologist: The Reeve's Tale (1934) • Beowulf: The Monsters and Their Critics (1936) • The Reeve's Tale: version prepared for recitation at the "summer diversions" (1939) • On Fairy-Stories (1939) • Sir Orfeo (1944) • Ofermod and Beorhtnoth's Death (1953) • Middle English "Losenger": Sketch of an etymological and semantic inquiry ( 1953) • Ancrene Wisse : The English Text of the Ancrene Riwle (1962) • English and Welsh (1963) • Introduction to Tree and Leaf (1964) • Contributions to the Jerusalem Bible (as translator and lexicographer) (1966) • Tolkien on Tolkien (autobiographical) (1966)
Posthumous academic publications	Sir Gawain and the Green Knight , Pearl and Sir Orfeo (translations into modern English, 1975) • Finn and Hengest (1982) • The Monsters and the Critics (1983) • Beowulf and the Critics (2002) • Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary (2014)