CHARACTER: appearance 13, 15–17, 167; manner of dress 167; manner of speaking 16, 62, 72, 171–3; self-declared resemblance to a hobbit 234–5; manner of lecturing and teaching 158–60, 178–82; skill as a philologist 55–6, 90–2, 177–8; interest in West Midland dialect 55, 92, 178, 181, 185, 188; concern for accuracy and perfection 182, 185–7, 259; love of revision 186, 194–5, 271; reaction to criticism 195; love for memory of his mother 50–1, 174–5, pessimism 50, 175–6; sense of humour 50, 172–6; a man of shifting moods 175–6; made friends easily 172; humility 176; attachment to countryside 35–7, 40, 52; sorrow at destruction of natural scenery 169–70; identification with West Midlands 35, 55, 95, 177–8, 181, 234; dislike of France, French language and cooking 38, 96, 163, 175; certainty of own station in life 173–4; political views 173; feelings towards Catholic church 50, 174; practice of his religion 52–3; 85, 95, 134, 174, 203; relation of Christianity to his writings 127–8; belief in the ‘truth’ of mythology 128–9, 197; views of allegory 128, 252–4, 270–1, 324; views on drama 212–13; lack of interest in travel 168; lack of interest in modern literature 99–100, 107, 220; interest in handwriting 38, 83; painting and drawing 38, 83, 217–19, 241–3; diaries kept by him 64–6, 139, 225, 296, 321–3
WRITINGS – PRINCIPAL BOOKS: The Silmarillion, origins of 101–2, 107–10, 125ff.; ‘a mythology for England’ 86, 125–7; begun 126; Tolkien’s working methods 127, 131–3; elves in 127–8; elvish languages in 131; invention of names for 129–32; Christianity related to 128; believed to be ‘true’ 128, 129; continuing work on 134–6, 147–8, 225; poems related to 148, 194–5; drawings related to
Tolkien, J. R. R. – cont. 217; read aloud to C. S. Lewis 199; shown to Allen & Unwin 244; reader’s report on 255; offered to Collins 277ff.; Tolkien’s work on in old age 315–16, 318–20, 333–5, 337–8; to be completed by Christopher Tolkien 338 and passim
The Hobbit: origins of story 233–5; story begun 230, 233–6; related to The Silmarillion 237; writing abandoned 239; read by C. S. Lewis 236; read aloud to the Inklings 201; comes to notice of publisher 239–40; Tolkien completes it 240; he prepares illustrations 241–3; production problems 241–2; publication 242; reviews 242; revision of ‘Riddles in the Dark’ 271 and passim
The Lord of the Rings : begun 247; written ‘out of the leaf-mould of the mind’ 171; title chosen 250–2; not an allegory 252–4, 270–2; not a trilogy 289; purpose declared 252–3; diction and style 254–5; topography and chronology in 259–61; names in 260; read aloud ot the Inklings 256, 262–7; writing of Book IV 262–7; discussed by C. S. Lewis 267–8; offered to Collins 277ff.; accepted by Allen & Unwin 287–8; appendices compiled 288, 295–6; volume titles chosen 289; spelling altered by printers 290; maps drawn 259, 290, 294; ‘The Book of Mazarbul’ 290; publication 292ff.; reviews 292–3, 244–7; sales 293ff.; readers’ response to 301–5; Tolkien’s views on this 307; sales of manuscripts 299; translations 14, 308, 299–300; film proposals 301; unauthorised American paperback 302–6; ‘campus cult’ 306–7; Tolkien’s reaction to success 313 nd passim
OTHER WRITINGS: The Adventures of Tom Bombadil 106, 216, 324; Ancrene Wisse (edited by Tolkien) 185, 319; (Tolkien’s article on language of Ancrene Wisse) 181, 185; ‘Beowulf: the Monsters and the Critics’ 186–8; Beowulf, Tolkien’s perface to revised edition of Clark Hall’s translation 256; ‘The Bloodhound, the Chef, and the Suffragette’ 86; ‘The Book of Lost Tales’ see The Silmarillion; ‘The Bovadium Fragments’ 218n., ‘The Children of Húrin’ 135; Earendel, early poem about 101, 103; ‘English and Welsh’ 298; ‘The Fall of Arthur’ 224; ‘The Fall of Gondolin’ 129–31, 133, 142, 228; Farmer Giles of Ham 220–1, 244, 269, 279, 299; proposed sequel to 221; the ‘Father Christmas Letters’ 219; The Fellowship of the Ring, see The Lord of the Rings; ‘The Gest of Beren and Lúthien’ 148, 194–5, 222–3, 245; ‘Goblin Feet’ 106–7, 111, 130; The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth 286; ‘Imram’ 229; ‘The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun’ 224; ‘The Lay of Earendel’ 108–9; ‘The Lay of Leithian’ see ‘The Gest of Beren and Lúthien’ Leaf by Niggle 128, 210, 261, 319, 322, 343; ‘The Lost Road’ 227–9, 244, 266; ‘The Man in the Moon came down too soon’ 106; ‘Mr Bliss’ 217–18, 299; ‘Mythopoeia’ 197n., 198, 253–4; ‘Namárië’ 302, 316; ‘The New Shadow’ 303; ‘The Notion Club Papers’ 229; On Fairy-Stories 128, 253, 324; poems, juvenile 71–2, 101–2, 105–7; poems written during 1920s and 1930s 222–6; The Return of the King, see The Lord of the Rings; The Road Goes Ever On 326; ‘The Shores of Faery’ 108–9; Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (edited by Tolkien and E. V. Gordon) 145, 185, 188; Sir Gawain, Pearl and Sir Orfeo (translation by Tolkien) 190–1, 319; Songs for the Philologists 146; Smith of Wootton Major 210, 221–2, 323–4; ‘The Story of Kullervo’ 104; ‘Tales and Songs of Bimble Bay’ 147; Tree and Leaf 324; The Two Towers, see The Lord of the Rings
Tolkien, Mabel (mother of J. R. R. T.) 21–52 passim, 234
Tolkien, Michael (son of J.R.R. T.) 143, 156, 161, 162, 207, 211, 213, 215, 216, 236, 240, 257, 269, 317, 340
Tolkien, Priscilla (daughter of J. R. R. T.) 156, 161, 207, 257, 269, 282, 289, 296, 317–18, 321, 337, 340
Tolkien, Rachel (granddaughter of J. R. R. T.) 337
Tolkien, Simon (grandson) 337
Tolkien Society of America 305–8, 330
Treasure Island 39
Treebeard 258
‘Trotter’ (7‘Strider’) 250
Truth 296
‘Túrin’ 134, 148, 223
‘Two Trees, The’ 108
Unwin, Rayner 240–1, 248–9, 269–70, 280–309 passim, 324, 339
Unwin, Sir Stanley 240, 243, 244–8, 253, 259, 270–1, 273, 277, 279, 280–1, 283–4, 287
‘Valar, The’ 128 ‘Valinor’ 108–9, 127, 148
Venice 296
Völsungasaga 70, 99, 194
Völuspa 93
Wagner, Richard 70, 270
Waldman, Milton 278–80, 282–3, 288
Wanderer, The 188
Warwick 95–6, 97, 110, 113, 134, 307
Warwickshire 37, 43, 234
Water Eaton (Oxon.) 213
Wayland’s Smithy 214
Wells, Joseph 150
Welsh language 43–4, 57, 82–3, 96, 99, 298
Welsh Review 224
White Horse Hill 214
White Horse public house, Oxford 262
Williams, Charles 201–2, 227n., 262–4, 266, 306, 341
Williamson, Dick 339
Wilson, F. P. 267
Wiseman, Christopher 53, 58, 68–70, 84, 97, 104–5, 118, 120–1, 126, 149, 192, 337
Wood Eaton (Oxon.) 213
Worcester College Oxford, 221, 253
Worcestershire 35, 48, 147, 178, 234, 285
Worminghall (Bucks.) 214, 221
Wrenn, Agnes 208
Wrenn, Charles 183, 208, 213, 256, 317
Wright, E. M. (Lizzie), 205–6
Wright, Joseph 58, 80–3, 90, 91, 181, 206
Wyke-Smith, E. A. 220
Wyle, H. C. 162
Zimmerman, Morton Grady 301
J.R.R. TOLKIEN – A Biography
HUMPHREY CARPENTER was born in Oxford in 1946. After taking his degree at Keble College, Oxford, he worked for some years for the BBC, for whom he continued to broadcast after becoming a full-time writer in 1975. His other biographies include The Inklings (C.S. Lewis and his circle), which won a Somerset Maugham Award, W.H. Auden, runner-up for a Whitbread Award, and Jesus (Past Masters series). He also wrote several children’s books and a study of children’s literature, Secret Gardens, and compiled with his wife Mari Prichard The Oxford Companion to Children’s Literature. In 1984 he received an E.M. Forster Award from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. Humphrey Carpenter died in January 2005.
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AUTHOR’S NOTE
This book is based upon the letters, diaries, and other p
apers of the late Professor J. R. R. Tolkien, and upon the reminiscences of his family and friends.
Tolkien himself did not entirely approve of biography. Or rather, he disliked its use as a form of literary criticism. ‘One of my strongest opinions,’ he once wrote, ‘is that investigation of an author’s biography is an entirely vain and false approach to his works.’ Yet he was undoubtedly aware that the remarkable popularity of his fiction made it highly likely that a biography would be written after his death; and indeed he appears to have made some preparation for this himself, for in the last years of his life he annotated a number of old letters and papers with explanatory notes or other comments. He also wrote a few pages of recollections of his childhood. It may thus be hoped that this book would not be entirely foreign to his wishes.
In writing it I have tried to tell the story of Tolkien’s life without attempting any critical judgements of his works of fiction. This is partly in deference to his own views, but in any case it seems to me that the first published biography of a writer is not necessarily the best place to make literary judgements, which will after all reflect the character of the critic just as much as that of his subject. I have however tried to delineate some of the literary and other influences that came to bear on Tolkien’s imagination, in the hope that this may shed some light on his books.
H. C.
Oxford, 1976
ALSO BY HUMPHREY CARPENTER
The Inklings
The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien
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