J.R.R. Tolkien's Double Worlds and Creative Process Language and Life [Hardcover]

A close colleague of Tolkein for many years, Zettersten offers here a personally informed analysis of his fiction. In light of his unusual life experience and enthusiasm for the study of languages, Zettersten finds in Tolkein's fiction the same animating passions that drove that great author as a youth, a soldier, a linguist, and an Oxford Don.Foreword Our First Meeting Language Like Lightning from a Clear Sky Tolkien's Double Worlds Middle-earth From Bloemfontein to Birmingham From Sarehole to Shire An Orphan Drawn to Reading Student Life in Oxford Soldier at the Front Experience of War in Tolkien's Fiction Research as Motor Interlude at Leeds Interplay between Research and Fiction A Don on a Sidetrack The AB Language - A Unique Discovery Fantasy for Children and Adults The Final Years Facts and Fiction On the Truth of Myths The Reception of The Lord of the Rings in the World New Media Epilogue

This is a remarkable book - part memoir, part biography, part literary appreciation. It offers a fascinating perspective on Tolkien s life, scholarship, and fiction by someone uniquely placed to understand and connect them. As a philologist of international standing, Zettersten presents valuable insights into Tolkien s academic career; he reminds us of the immense contributions Tolkien made to the study of medieval language and literature, and how his scholarly life intertwined and interacted with his imaginative fiction. The whole exposition is grounded in Zettersten s vivid recollections of his friendship with the ageing Tolkien in Oxford, and what emerges is a deeply affectionate, personal portrait of a master storyteller and his work. - Richard Dance, Senior Lecturer in Old English, University of Cambridge

Zettersten's new biography of Tolkien is specially enlivened by the author's personal knowledge of him as a man and a scholar, through meetings in Oxford between 1959 and 1972;a common knowledge of the Scandinavian languages so important tol£–