"THE MOST INFLUENTIAL FANTASY NOVEL EVER WRITTEN," HANDSOMELY BOUND

TOLKIEN, J.R.R. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. The Two Towers. The Return of the King. London: George Allen & Unwin, (1966). Three volumes. Octavo, modern three-quarter red morocco gilt, raised bands, top edges gilt. $8000.

Second edition—with the author's new foreword and his revisions to the text throughout—of Tolkien's stirring tour de force, finely bound.

"The most influential fantasy novel ever written" (Clute & Grant, 951). Although immediately occasioned by his publisher's request for a sequel to The Hobbit (1937), Tolkien's incomparable epic draws on lore, legends and languages of Middle-Earth that he had been creating since the First World War. He wrote The Lord of the Rings during World War II in letters to his son, "and finally, having polished it to his own satisfaction, published it as a trilogy from 1954 to 1955, a volume at a time, impatiently awaited by a growing audience… [It is considered] one of this century's lasting contributions to that borderland of literature between youth and age… [It] seems destined to become this century's contribution to that select list of books which continue through the ages to be read by children and adults with almost equal pleasure" (Eyre, 134-35). "Many critics, including W.H. Auden, praised it as an extraordinary achievement" (DNB). "Of all popular bestsellers, The Lord of the Rings is the one most likely to be read over and over again" (Shippey, 306). Large folding maps, printed in black and red, at rear of each book. Hammond & Anderson A5e. See Fantasy and Horror 5-289. Pringle, Modern Fantasy, 60-61. Fantasy 100 Best, 161-62.

Fine condition.