Almost everyone is familiar with the fantasy stories written by Professor Tolkien. Millions of people worldwide have enjoyed the books and movies about the adventures of the Hobbits.
After his father dies, toddler Ronald Tolkien lives in the picturesque English village of Sarehole Mill, together with his baby brother and mother Mabel. She reads him fairy tales, teaches him all about plants and discovers his talent for language. At the age of five, Tolkien reads and writes fluent Latin. Mabel is diagnosed with cancer and at the age of twelve Tolkien becomes an orphan. Priest Francis Morgan obtains custody of Tolkien and his little brother and the clergy man takes their education and upbringing very seriously. He will absolutely not have the boys distracted by women, so, when Tolkien starts a romance with Edith Bratt, the priest forbids any form of contact between the two of them.
Old love dies hard
Tolkien studies English Literature at the University of Oxford, but is also a frequent visitor of the pub and the rugby fields. He takes love a lot more seriously. On his twenty-first birthday, when he is finally an adult, Tolkien writes a passionate love letter to Edith, who got engaged to another man, but she breaks it off so she can be with her first love. The couple marries in March of the year 1916, during the First World War. A couple of months after the wedding, Tolkien is drafted for military duty and sent off to the Battle of Somme. This trench war is horrifying and only one of all of his old friends who fight alongside him survives. The writer himself falls ill and spends the rest of the war in England, first in hospitals and later on as a lieutenant. This is what saves him from a certain death.
Ronald Tolkien
After the war, Tolkien continues his career in literature. In 1925 he is named professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford. In his spare time he always occupies himself with language. He loves Old English legends and myths. He makes up fantasy languages, writes mythical stories and poems and founds societies for legend readings. He creates the stories about the Hobbits for his children. Years later, these tales are accidently discovered and consequently published in 1937. The Hobbit stories are immensely popular and both the readers and the publishing house want more. Tolkien commences the sequel to The Lord of the Rings, but suffers from writer’s block and stops writing more than once.
Kill your darlings
The story is finally finished after the Second World War but paper is scarce and the publishing house wants to publish the mammoth book in various tomes. This means polishing and re-writing until the book is printed in 1954. The readers love the new adventures as well, but the luxury bound edition is much too expensive for many people. In 1965, an American publisher releases a cheap pocket version of the book and opens the floodgates wide: a true Tolkien mania breaks loose in the US and also here in the Netherlands a craze is started. Tolkien sells the movie rights but does not agree with the design. He hates everything that faintly hints of Disney and is very hard to please. Only after his death in 1973, a number of animated movies are released.
It isn’t until 2001 that a new motion picture of The Lord of the Rings is produced. The trilogy is a massive success and Tolkien mania is back. Of course a chess set with the main characters had to be made, and we have one on display at the Chessmen Museum. A new trilogy about the Hobbits is currently being filmed for the Tolkien fans.
You must be logged in to post a comment.