He was an unearther of dark secrets and mysteries. But he was also a great wonderer and a great quester. Gandalf the Grey was charming and quirky he was everybody’s friend and advisor. He has passed through the fire and the abyss, and they shall fear him. But we have One, mightier than they: the White Rider. “Do I not say truly, Gandalf,' said Aragorn at last, 'that you could go whithersoever you wished quicker than I? And this I also say: you are our captain and our banner. For now though, as I did with my review for The Fellowship of the Ring, here are a series of ten points to explain exactly why I love this particular book: I’ve been meaning to tackle it for years, and it will likely take me even longer to get through, but I know it will be worth it. I’ve read most of his works, so I’m starting with those first before I move on to the few I haven’t read (there’s not many).This is all preparation, and a readdress of his writings, before I delve into Christopher Tolkien’s twelve book The History of Middle-Earth later on this year. I’m on a mission, a mission to review everything written by Tolkien. He died in 1973 and is buried in Oxford where he spent most of his adult life.Īnother Tolkien review? Yep, I’m putting out another Tolkien review. But his literary work did not start and end with Middle-earth, he also wrote poetry, children’s stories and fairy tales for adults. Alongside his professional work, he invented his own languages and began to create what he called a mythology for England it was this ‘legendarium’ that he would work on throughout his life. After the war he pursued an academic career teaching Old and Middle English. He graduated from the University of Oxford in 1915 and saw active service in France during the First World War before being invalided home. He came to England aged three and was brought up in and around Birmingham. Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa, in 1892 to English parents. His illuminating lectures on works such as the Old English epic poem, Beowulf, illustrate his deep knowledge of ancient languages and at the same time provide new insights into peoples and legends from a remote past. Tolkien was a professor at the Universities of Leeds and Oxford for almost forty years, teaching Old and Middle English, as well as Old Norse and Gothic. He illustrated many scenes from The Silmarillion, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, sometimes drawing or painting as he was writing in order to visualize the imagined scene more clearly. He excelled at landscapes and often drew inspiration from his own stories. Tolkien was an accomplished amateur artist who painted for pleasure and relaxation. Through this secondary world Tolkien writes perceptively of universal human concerns – love and loss, courage and betrayal, humility and pride – giving his books a wide and enduring appeal. Tolkien’s most popular works, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are set in Middle-earth, an imagined world with strangely familiar settings inhabited by ancient and extraordinary peoples. His creativity, confined to his spare time, found its outlet in fantasy works, stories for children, poetry, illustration and invented languages and alphabets. Known to millions around the world as the author of The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien spent most of his life teaching at the University of Oxford where he was a distinguished academic in the fields of Old and Middle English and Old Norse. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien: writer, artist, scholar, linguist.
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