Tolkien and the Great War: The Threshold of Middle-Earth - Hardcover

Garth, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0007119526 ISBN 13: 9780007119523

Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd, 2003

Synopsis

A new biography exploring J.R.R. Tolkien's wartime experiences and their impact on his life and his writing of The Lord of The Rings. The period of Tolkien's life in which he fought in The Great War has remained largely unexplored and unresearched by his many and various biographers - this volume concentrates specifically on this period of his life and relates it to his creation of some of the world's best-loved literary works. Written specifically for a general audience, and not just Tolkien fans, this book allows Tolkien's life, work, inspiration and success to be viewed from a new and exciting viewpoint. Having lost many of his friends from school and University in the First World War, this, coupled with his time spent as a signaller in the Royal Lancashire Fusiliers, had a profound impact on him. As did, it would seem, the writing of G. B. Smith, a close friend who was sadly lost in the War. Invalided home from the Somme,Tolkien was able to reflect on his life, and John Garth agues that, far from being a flight of fancy, The Lord of The Rings is, in fact, a product of his wartime experiences and stands as a great war novel.

About this title

Review:

John Garth's Tolkien and the Great War will certainly captivate the millions of new captives of the Lord of the Rings saga, who have been roped into JRR Tolkien's fantasy world as the result of Peter Jackson's three-part cinematic interpretation, but it's written more for those who've long been enthralled by Middle-earth and its fantastic denizens. While many early readers found parallels between World War II and the Lord of the Rings fairy tale, Garth reaches back to World War I to find the deep roots in Middle-earth. Prior to the Great War, Tolkien was a scholar with a deep passion for language and fables; with a few school pals he formed a literary circle dubbed the Tea Club and Barrovian Society. Its members had the misfortune of coming of age just as the war was reaching a fevered pitch; Tolkien, a second lieutenant in the British army, survived the bloody Battle of the Somme, which took the lives of two of his closest friends. Garth adeptly chronicles how the devastation Tolkien witnessed helped shape the mythic tale that was already brewing in his mind. Written with a seriousness one associates with the time it chronicles, Tolkien and the Great War is an erudite but eminently readable exploration of how the harsh reality of the early 20th century coloured one of the beloved fantasies of the modern era. --Steven Stolder, Amazon.com

Review:

"Very much the best book about JRR Tolkien that has yet been written. Even if you are not a Lord of the Rings fan, I commend this book to you. It is all so interesting in itself, and I have rarely read a book which so intelligently graphed the relation between a writer's inner life and his outward circumstances." A.N.Wilson, Evening Standard

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0007119526
• ISBN 13: 9780007119523
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 416