The History of The Lord of the Rings

:"The War of the Ring redirects here. For the fictional military conflict, see War of the Ring."

"The History of The Lord of the Rings" is a 4-volume work by Christopher Tolkien that documents the process of J. R. R. Tolkien's writing of "The Lord of the Rings". The "History" is also numbered as volumes 6 to 9 of "The History of Middle-earth". Some information concerning the appendices and a soon-abandoned sequel to the novel can also be found in volume 12, "The Peoples of Middle-earth".

Contents

The volumes include:
# (HoME 6) "The Return of the Shadow" (1988)
# (HoME 7) "The Treason of Isengard" (1989)
# (HoME 8) "The War of the Ring" (1990)
# (HoME 9) "Sauron Defeated" (1992) (Also published as "The End of the Third Age", see below)

The titles of the volumes derive from the discarded names for the separate books of "The Lord of the Rings". J. R. R. Tolkien conceived the latter as a single volume comprising six "books" plus extensive appendices, but the original publisher split the work into three, publishing two books per volume with the appendices included into the third. The titles proposed by Tolkien for separate books were: "The Return of the Shadow" or "The Ring Sets Out"; "The Fellowship of the Ring" or "The Ring Goes South"; "The Treason of Isengard"; "The Journey of the Ringbearers" or "The Ring Goes East"; "The War of the Ring"; and "The End of the Third Age" or "The Return of the King".

Three of the titles of the volumes of "The History of The Lord of the Rings" were also used as book titles for the 7-volume edition of "The Lord of the Rings" - "The Return of the Shadow" for Book I, "The Treason of Isengard" for Book III and "The War of the Ring" for Book V.

The first volume encompasses three initial stages of composition, or as Christopher Tolkien entitled them, "phases", and finishes with the Fellowship of the Ring entering the Mines of Moria. The second continues to the meeting with Théoden king of Rohan, and includes the discussions of the original map of Middle-earth at the end of the Third Age and of the evolution of Cirth. "The War of the Ring" continues to the opening of the Black Gate. The last volume finishes the story, featuring also the rejected "Epilogue", in which Sam answers his children's questions.

"Sauron Defeated" also includes "The Notion Club Papers" (a time-travel story related to Númenor), a draft of the Drowning of Anadûnê and the only extant account of the Adûnaic language. However, some paperback editions, entitled in this case "The End of the Third Age", include only "The Lord of the Rings" material, being only a third of the original edition. [Amazon.co.uk: [http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0261103806 Edition by "Harper Collins"] ; [http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0261103806 Edition by "Houghton Mifflin"] ]

The original idea was to release "The History of The Lord of the Rings" in three volumes, not four. When "Treason of Isengard" first was published (in paperback) HoME 8 was named "Sauron Defeated" and was supposed to be the last part.

There is an inscription in the Fëanorian characters (Tengwar, an alphabet Tolkien has devised for High-Elves) in the first pages of every History of Middle-earth volume, written by Christopher Tolkien and describing the contents of the book. The inscription in Book VI reads: "In the Return of the Shadow are traced the first forms of the story of the Lord of the Rings, herein the journey of the hobbit who bore the Great Ring, at first named Bingo Baggins, afterwards Frodo, is followed from Hobbiton in the Shire through the Old Forest to Weathertop and Rivendell and ends in this volume before the tomb of Balin theDwarf, Lord of Moria.".

References

External links

* [http://www.tolkien-online.com/history-of-middle-earth.html More in-depth information on the individual books in The History of The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien]