J.R.R. Tolkien was born on January 3, 1892, in Bloemfontein, South Africa.
Tolkien is best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion. He was also an academic who was a philologist – a person who studies texts – and a writer and a poet who sat as a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford, a fellow of Pembroke College, and a fellow of Merton College until his retirement in 1959.
His works were not accepted by the literati of his day, but they were loved by millions around the world, and became part of the counter culture of the 1960s and 70s. A master at world creation, one can see the influences of the landscapes that he grew up in, and traveled in as a young college student, in his work – the industrial countryside of England, near Wales, and the mountains of Switzerland, as just two examples. He also mastered multiple languages as a young student and had a strong pull towards Middle-English.
Within his world creation he built environments of extremes, great beauty and deep darkness. His environments were full of hobbits, orcs and elves. And The Ring.
Tolkien passed away on September 2, 1973, in Bournemouth, United Kingdom
The Tolkien Society is an educational charity and literary society devoted to the study and promotion of the life and works of the author and academic J.R.R. Tolkien. There is a lengthy and well written biography of the writer there.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.
Read and enjoy Tolkien’s books:
