Hobbits and wizards and Sauron--oh, my! Mild-mannered Oxford scholar John Ronald Reuel Tolkien had little inkling when he published The Hobbit; Or, There and Back Again in 1937 that, once hobbits were unleashed upon the world, there would be no turning back. Hobbits are, of course, small, furry creatures who love nothing better than a leisurely life quite free from adventure. But in that first novel and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the hobbits Bilbo and Frodo and their elfish friends get swept up into a mighty conflict with the dragon Smaug, the dark lord Sauron (who owes much to proud Satan in Paradise Lost), the monstrous Gollum, the Cracks of Doom, and the awful power of the magical Ring. The four books' characters--good and evil--are recognizably human, and the realism is deepened by the magnificent detail of the vast parallel world Tolkien devised, inspired partly by his influential Anglo-Saxon scholarship and his Christian beliefs. (He disapproved of the relative sparseness of detail in the comparable allegorical fantasy his friend C.S. Lewis dreamed up in The Chronicles of Narnia, though he knew Lewis had spun a page-turning yarn.) It has been estimated that one-tenth of all paperbacks sold can trace their ancestry to J.R.R. Tolkien. But even if we had never gotten Robert Jordan's The Path of Daggers and the whole fantasy genre Tolkien inadvertently created by bringing the hobbits so richly to life, Tolkien's epic about the Ring would have left our world enhanced by enchantment. --Tim Appelo
The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings Boxed Set (Mass Market Paperback Edition) FROM OUR EDITORS
J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings (The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King) -- plus the adventures of Bilbo Baggins, as told in the trilogy's classic prelude, The Hobbit -- is a genuine masterpiece. More than the most widely read and influential fantasy story of all time, it is arguably the most memorable and endearing tale ever written. Originally published in 1954, The Lord of the Rings set the framework from which all epic/quest fantasy since has built upon. Through the urgings of the enigmatic wizard Gandalf, young hobbit Frodo Baggins embarks on an urgent, incredibly treacherous journey to destroy the One Ring. This ring -- created, and then lost, by the Dark Lord, Sauron, centuries earlier -- is a weapon of evil, one that Sauron so desperately wants returned to him; with the power of the ring once again his own, the Dark Lord will unleash his wrath upon all of Middle-Earth. The only way to prevent this horrible fate from becoming reality is to return the Ring to Mordor, the only place it can be destroyed; unfortunately for our heroes, Mordor is also Sauron's lair. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy is essential reading not only for fans of fantasy but for lovers of classic literature as well.
--Andrew LeCount
FROM THE PUBLISHER
This four volume, deluxe paperback boxed set contains J.R.R. Tolkien's epic masterworks The Hobbit and the three volumes of The Lord Of The Rings (The Fellowship Of The Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return Of The King) in their definitive text settings complete with maps and cover illustrations from the motion pictures. In The Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins is whisked away from his comfortable, unambitious life in Hobbiton by the wizard Gandalf and a company of dwarves. He finds himself caught up in a plot to raid the treasure hoard of Smaug the Magnificent, The Lord Of The Rings tells of the great and dangerous quest undertaken by Frodo Baggins and the Fellowship of the Ring: Gandalf the wizard; the hobbits Merry, Pippin, and Sam; Gimli the dwarf; Legolas the elf; Boromir of Gondor; and a tall, mysterious stranger called Strider. J.R.R. Tolkien's three volume masterpiece is at once a classic myth and a modern fairy tale — a story of high and heroic adventure set in the unforgettable landscape of Middle-Earth.
Author Biography: J.R.R. Tolkien was born on January 3, 1892. After serving in the First World War, he embarked upon a distinguished career as a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University. He is the renowned creator of Middle-earth and author of the great modern classic, The Hobbit, the prelude to his epic masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings. Other works by J.R.R. Tolkien include The Silmarillion. J.R.R. Tolkien died in 1973 at the age of 81.
SYNOPSIS
A matched four-volume boxed set containing J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit and the three volumes of The Lord of the Rings, complete with maps and cover illustrations from the motion pictures
FROM THE CRITICS
Gale Research
J. R. R. Tolkien is best known to most readers as the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, regarded by Charles Moorman in Tolkien and the Critics as "unique in modern fiction," and by Augustus M. Kolich in the Dictionary of Literary Biography as "the most important fantasy stories of the modern period." From 1914 until his death in 1973, Tolkien drew on his familiarity with Northern and other ancient literatures and his own invented languages to create not just his own story, but his own world: Middle-earth, complete with its own history, myths, legends, epics and heroes.
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