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HANDOUT
Tolkiens Life Elias Knell Page 1
Years
Description
1892
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien is born on January 3rd in Bloemfontein.
1895
Mother, Mabel Tolkien, returns with the sons to England.
1896
Father, Arthur Tolkien, dies in South Africa. Mother with the sons moves to Birmingham suburb and begins to teach Ronald Latin, French and drawing.
1904
Mother, Mabel Tolkien, dies of diabetes. She was 34 years old. Ronald and his brother Hilary become wards of Father Morgan, a priest at the Birmingham Oratory.
1906 - 1911
Ronald studies Old English himself and begins to develop his own languages.
1908
Orphaned boys move to Aunt\'s, Mrs Faulkner, home in Birmingham.
1909
Ronald falls in love with Edith Bratt, his wife-to-be He fails the exams on obtaining Oxford grant.
1914
Ronald finds his sweetheart Edith Bratt. The War I is declared Tolkien returns to Oxford to finish his degree.
1915
Awarded First Class Honours degree in English language and Literature.
1916
Marries Edith Bratt in Warwick. Goes to war in France. Sees action on the Somme as second lieutenant. In November is returned to England with shell shock.
1917
While recovering begins to write \"The Simarillion\". Birth of the first son, John.
1920
Appointed Reader in English Language at Leeds University. Birth of the second son, Michael Begins to write Father Christmas Letters.
1924
Tolkien becomes a professor of English Language at Leeds. Birth of the third son, Christopher.
1926
Tolkien meets C.S. Lewis (the author of the famous "Chronicles of Narnia") and their friendship blossoms.
1929
Birth of the fourth child, Priscilla.
1930
Tolkien becomes one of the founder members of \"The Inklings\". Begins to write the first version of \"The Hobbit\".
1936
Tolkien completes \"The Hobbit\". Delivers his lecture \"Beowulf\": \"The Monsters and the Critics\".
1937
\"The Hobbit\" is published. Tolkien begins to write a sequel, which becomes \"The Lord of the Rings\" in future.
1939
Tolkien delivers his lecture "on Fairy stories\". 16 chapters of "the Lord of the Rings" are written.
1947
Draft of \"The Lord of the Rings\" is sent to publishers.
1948
\"The Lord of the Rings\" is completed.
1954
"The Fellowship of the Ring" and "The Two Towers" (part One and Two) are published .
1955
Publication of \"The Lord of the Rings\", part Three.
1959
Tolkien's retirement.
1965
American editions of \"The Lord of the Rings\" are published and campus cult of the novel begins.
1971
Edith Tolkien on November 29th dies, aged 82
1972
Receives CBE from the Queen
1973
J.R.R. Tolkien dies on September 2nd, aged 81
Elias Knell Page 2
Interesting Links
www.tolkienforum.de
www.elbenwald.de
www.tolkiengesellschaft.de
www.faszination-tolkien.de
www.tolkien-site.de
Primary and Secondary Literature
Primary Literature
Books about Middle Earth
The Hobbit/ There and Back again
The Lord of the Rings+Appendices
The Silmarillion
Lost Tales
News from Middle Earth
The Adventures of Tom Bombadil
Songs of the Hobbits
Other Books
Smith of Woottom Major
The Letters of Father Christmas
Farmer Giles of Ham
Tree and Leaf
Roverandom
Tolkiens Letters
Mister Luck
Different essays
Secondary Literature
Biography, Humphrey Carpenter
Elbisch, Helmut W. Pesch
Elbisches Wörterbuch, Wolfgang Krege
Biography, Michael Coren
Handbuch der Weisen von Mittelerde, Wolfgang Krege
Atlas von Mittelerde, Karen Wynn Fonstad
Paper about Tolkien
1 Introduction
1.1 Beginning sentences
This is my paper about Tolkien, I tried to make it about the author himself and not only about his books.
1.2 Structure
Here I present you the structure of my paper
(1) Introduction: Here you're informed about the next minutes.
(2) Biography: Here I tell you the basic things about his life.
(3) Works: I present here what he wrote.
(4) Material: Here I just show you some other things which you should know.
(5) Questions: This is some time for questions
2 His life
2.1 Beginning sentences
Here is his life structured in 4 parts.
2.2 Biography
2.2a Birth & Childhood
He was born in Bloemfontein / Southafrica, in 1892 and he was called John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. Short time after his birth he moved with his younger brother and his mum, Mabel Tolkien, back to England. His father stayed in Southafrica, because of his job, and he died when Tolkien was 4 years old. When he was 12 his mother died, because of diabetes. He became an orphan and went with his younger brother to an aunt. These happenings made him very mature and responsible, but all in all he had a lucky childhood.
2.2b Youth, Edith & First World War
When he was 16 he got to know Edith Bratt, the woman who would get his wife some years later. But a priest, who was a kind of dad for him and the one who brought the brothers up, forbid him to meet her. When John was 21 he started to study english language and literature and married Edith Bratt. After this he made an military training and went to war. While he fighted in France he got ill and went back home. The brutal things he saw in war are reflected in the LotR. with the Orks and the many wars, says his biograph Humphrey Carpenter.
2.2c Children & Career
When Tolkien was 25 his first son, John, was born and with 28, in year 1919, his second son, Michael, was born. Tolkien got professor with 32 years and his third son, Christopher, who is responsible for everything around the LotR today, was born. A short time after that his daughter, Priscilla, was born. He started writing "The Hobbit" just for his children, but some relatives persuaded him to publish it. He published "The Hobbit" by Allen and Unwin and it got very famous.
2.2d The Lord of the Rings, Retirement & his end
Just for Fun and because it was his hobby, but also because many people asked for something like "The Hobbit", he started writing "The Lord of the Rings" (LotR), from which he had parts in his head since the first WorldWar. The process to write this book was very long, because Tolkien was a perfectionist and wrote some parts new. Also he had problems with Allen&Unwin,the publishing company. Tolkien was retired and some years later, a worldwide LotR-Hype starts.
When Tolkien was 80 years old his wife, Edith Tolkien, was 82 and died. Two years later John Ronald Reuel Tolkien dies ans is burried in Oxford.
The time since his first son was born was very busy for Tolkien because he had to move houses caused by a growing family and another job. Despite he was a good father and had still time for his hobbies. For example: He founded a group of men called "The Inklings", including C.S. Lewis, the auther of Narnia, and Humphrey Carpenter. Both of them were good friends of Tolkien. In this group they showed their selfwrote books and talked about literature.
2.3 Anecdotes
Tolkien was Catholic and very religious, this is very rare in Great Britian. But nevertheless, he was a typical british man full of national proud. He smoked pipe and loved to go´in Pubs. He stayed nearly his whole life in Britian and everything from the Continet was very suspect to him, what does not means that he was a rassist!
3 His Works
3.1 Beginning sentences
This is the third part of my paper, wich deals with Tolkiens work. I present two examples, a world famous book and a nearly unknown book. These books should make clear how Tolkien let flew his interests, in new and other languages, his knowlegde and his privat affairs in his books.
3.2 The Lord of the Rings
Now I speak about the most famous book of Tolkien "The Lord of the Rings", which was published in 1954 and 1955 and wich is more popular than the bible. LotR is based on "The Hobbit" and a fantasy novel. It is the fight between good and bad.
First I will resume the story:
It exists a ring which had to be destroyed to save the good. This task should be managed by a group of people, wich splits up in different groups, while the story goes on. Every single group is described and they're able to destroy the ring in the end of the story. For a short time Tolkien tried to write a continue of LotR named "The new shadow" but he didn't finish it.
After publishing, the book got good reviews but the big hype began later, when an unautherised version entered the american market.
With LotR Tolkien created a very complex world with an own history, new languages, new numbers and new alphabets.
Tolkien used his whole knowledge for this book and his experiences are in the book, too.
For example: The shire(Auenland) stands reprasentative for the place of his childhood and the detailed fights are based in Tolkiens memory from the first worldwar.
3.3 The Father Christmas Letters
Secondary I present "The Father Christmas Letters". These stories are written in letters and were published in 1976. In this letters Tolkien wrote the part of Father Christmas and they're adresssed to his children. He began when his first son was three years old and stopped twenty years later. The letters are about the life of Father Christmas and started very simple and got more complex over the years. They were for private use and are very nice illustrated by Tolkien himself. A new language and a new alphabet is in them, too.
4 Material
4.1 Other Books from Tolkien
Here are more books from Tolkien! Evt. Noch nen paar Worte wenn die Zeit reicht.
4.2 Handout
This is my Handout with a booklist, a linklist and a lifeline!
4.3 Secundary Literature
These are other books about and around Tolkien.
Humphrey Carpenter: This is the elemantary biography wich should be read by everyone who is interested in Tolkien, but I don't have it till now.
Micheal Coren: This is a new biography with very good reviews.
Helmut W. Pesch:He analysed and explained the elemantary languages in LotR very good, but it is vey hard to read!
5 Questions
Here is some time for questions!
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