Talkin’ About Tolkien [Bookshelf Tour 1/4]

Part 1 (Tolkien) | Part 2 (New bookcases) | Part 3 (Arctic exploration, Japanese religion, assorted adult fiction and non-fiction, and a few MG faves) | Part 4 (remaining adult fiction and non-fiction, fairy tales, favourite YA and adult authors) | Part 5 (middle grade and young adult fiction)

Preamble

I originally planned this series to start in January 2021, inspired by tours that Nicole @ Thoughts Stained with Ink and Mary @ Mary and the Words posted throughout 2020. It’s been over four years since I last posted a bookshelf tour. I did that tour right before I packed up and moved for grad school. While my main bookcase has stayed the same in terms of organizational structure, I’ve added plenty new titles and expanded outwards to a few other shelves

It seems to have worked out that I waited til this year to post this tour, because, as with the last tour, I have photographed my shelves right before a major move. The tour I’m about to give is of how I arranged my books while living in Vancouver. Right now, virtually all my books are in storage. It will be some time before I can display them again. So, let me index my collection and reflect on how it came to be, before it takes on a new form in a new home.

These posts will go more in depth than the tour I gave in 2017 – I’ll list each book that you can see in the photos. The series comes to you in four parts, as follows:

1. Tolkien (main bookcase)
2. Adult fiction and non-fiction (main bookcase)
3. Middle grade and young adult (main book case)
4. Jackson’s Middle-earth, Arctic, and fiction (desk hutch)

---

My Tolkien collection focuses on Middle-earth. I’ve purchased each book in this collection for the purpose of reading and reference. We need not get into which of these books I’ve actually read… (Almost all of the top shelf, roughly half of the bottom shelf.) Generally speaking, the top shelf features Middle-earth written or illustrated by J.R.R. Tolkien. I arranged this shelf sort of by in-universe chronological order. A notable except is that I put The Hobbit books on the end because they look better there.

Top Shelf

The History of Middle-earth edited by Christopher Tolkien

The first chunk of books are volumes from The History of Middle-earth (HOME). These paperbacks I carefully selected off eBay during middle school. I kind of regret going with the differentiated volumes for The History of Lord of the Rings (AKA the volumes of HOME that deal with The Lord of the Rings), but I do like that coppery shimmer on the spines.

• The Book of Lost Tales (Vol. 1)
• The Book of Lost Tales II (Vol. 2)
• The Return of the Shadow (HLOTR Vol. 1, HOME Vol. 6)
• The Treason of Isengard (HLOTR Vol. 2, HOME Vol. 7)
• The War of the Ring (HLOTR Vol. 3, HOME Vol. 8)
• Sauron Defeated (HOME Vol. 9)
  • I think this is the same as HLOTR Vol. 4 but I have the HOME edition
• The Peoples of Middle-earth (HOME Vol. 12)

Anything Middle-earth

All written by J.R.R. Tolkien with additional creators noted as applicable.

• Unfinished Tales
• The Children of Hurin
• Beren and Luthien
• The Fall of Gondolin
• The Silmarillion
• The Lord of the Rings
• The Lord of the Rings: A Reader’s Companion by Wayne C. Hammond and Christina Scull

The Hobbits + Artbooks

For more information about my various editions of The Hobbit, check out my post “A Collection of Hobbits“.

• The History of The Hobbit edited by John D. Rateliff
• The Annotated Hobbit annotated by Douglas A. Anderson
• The Hobbit illustrated by Jemima Catlin
• The Hobbit
• The Hobbit, first edition facsimile
• The Hobbit (this blue one is the first Tolkien book I ever purchased!)
• The Hobbit, 75th anniversary pocked edition
• The Art of The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien by Wayne C. Hammond and Christina Scull
• The Art of The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R Tolkien by Wayne C. Hammond and Christina Scull

Bottom Shelf

The bottom shelf features books other authors have written about Middle-earth, as well as writing by Tolkien on non-Middle-earth subjects. If pressed to described how this is organized… I would say first are books most concretely related to Tolkien’s Middle-earth writing, then other works by Tolkien, biographical titles and older books I’ve picked up in secondhand shops, literary critcism/academic works turned sideways to make more space, and oversized titles. There are a few other oddities tucked into each category. Can you spot them?

More Key Tolkien/Middle-earth Titles

• The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide by Wayne C. Hammond and Christina Scull
• The Story of Kullervo edited by Verlyn Flieger
• The Fall of Arthur edited by Christopher Tolkien
• A Secret Vice edited by Dimitra Fimi and Andrew Higgins
• Tolkien on Fairy Stories edited by Verlyn Flieger and Douglas A. Anderson
• The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien edited by Humphrey Carpenter
• J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography by Humphrey Carpenter
• Tolkien and the Great War by John Garth
• Tolkien at Exeter College by John Garth
• Tolkien’s Oxford by Robert Blackford
  • Not exactly a ‘key title’ but a great companion while visiting Oxford!

Older Titles

I like to pick these up every now and then because 1) they look cute on the shelf and 2) they give me an appreciation for how accesibility to Tolkien’s work has evolved over the decades.

• Tolkien and the Silmarillion by Clyde S. Kilby
• Tolkien’s World by Randel Helms
• Tolkien: A Look Behind The Lord of the Rings by Lin Carter
• A Tolkien Compass edited by Jared Lobdell
  • This one I picked up specifically for its inclusion of “Guide to the Names in The Lord of the Rings”
• Smith of Wooton Major & Farmer Giles of Ham by J.R.R Tolkien
• The Adventures of Tom Bombadil by J.R.R. Tolkien

Literary Criticism

• Understanding The Lord of the Rings edited by Rose A. Zimbardo and Neil D. Isaacs
• J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century by Thomas Shippey
• The Power of Tolkien’s Prose by Steve Walker
• Tolkien in Translation by Thomas Honegger
• Interrupted Music: The Making of J.R.R Tolkien’s Mythology by Verlyn Flieger
• Tolkien and Alterity edited by Christopher Vaccaro and Yvette Kisor
• J.R.R. Tolkien’s Sanctifying Myth by Bradley J. Birzer
• Tolkien, Race and Cultural History by Dimitra Fimi
• The Keys of Middle-earth edited by Stuart Lee and Elizabeth Solopova
• The Plants of Middle-earth by Dinah Hazell
• Flora of Middle-earth by Judd and Judd

The Rest

• Faerie, Fantasy and Pseudo-Mediaevalia edited by John Wurtley
  • A neat find in a local book shop – a volume of journal on twentieth century literature, published in the 1970s by a local university press. Includes a couple articles on Tolkien’s writing.
• Tolkien Treasures edited by Catherine McIllwaine
• Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth edited by Catherine McIlwaine
• The Atlas of Middle-earth by Karen Wynn Fonstad

---

Now that I’ve listed all these books, I wish I had some of these titles on hand so I could share some more close up photos! Ah well.

What books would you add to my Tolkien collection? Which topic do you own the most books on?