Middle-earth

Library

The History of Middle-earth

Christopher Tolkien’s twelve-volume scholarly record of how his father wrote, revised and reimagined the legendarium.

Supplementary writingsFrom posthumously published works, notes, drafts or appendices.
Author
J.R.R. Tolkien (edited by Christopher Tolkien)
Published
1983–1996
Format
Reference

Synopsis

This twelve-volume series is the most complete published window into Tolkien’s creative process. Christopher Tolkien traces the earliest “Book of Lost Tales” through the poetry and prose that became The Silmarillion, the drafting of The Lord of the Rings, the appendices, the Annals and the later “Myths Transformed”, constantly comparing versions and explaining his editorial choices. It is not a story to read straight through like a novel; it is a variorum, invaluable for anyone who wants to know where a given passage came from and how it changed. The final volumes, especially the largely philosophical “Morgoth’s Ring” and “The Peoples of Middle-earth”, extend the legendarium in ways the published Silmarillion does not.

Setting

A textual rather than geographic setting: the manuscripts, notebooks and typescripts of the legendarium from the 1910s to the 1970s.

Themes

  • the instability of texts
  • creation as revision
  • editorial responsibility
  • the unfinished nature of myth

Publication note

Publication note

Published between 1983 and 1996 in twelve volumes by Christopher Tolkien. It documents, and partially constitutes, the expanded legendarium; readers should treat it as scholarship and drafts rather than as a single narrative.

Sources

  • The History of Middle-earth · 1983–96

    Twelve volumes documenting the evolution of the legendarium.