The Tolkien Society Awards, established in 2014, are presented annually by The Tolkien Society to "recognise excellence in the fields of Tolkien scholarship and fandom". The awards are announced at the Annual Dinner during the Society's AGM and Springmoot weekend. [2]
| Year | Artwork | Artist | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | "Eärendil the Mariner" [4] | Jenny Dolfen | [1] |
| 2015 | "Ulmo appears before Tuor" [5] | Fabio Leone | |
| 2016 | "The Prancing Pony" [6] | Tomás Hijo | |
| 2017 | "Maglor" [7] | Elena Kukanova | |
| 2018 | "The Hunt" [8] | Jenny Dolfen | |
| 2019 | "Durin's Crown and the Mirrormere" [9] | Ted Nasmith | [10] |
| 2020 | "The Professor" [11] | Jenny Dolfen | [12] |
| 2021 | "He Beheld a Vision of Gondolin Amid the Snow" [13] | Ted Nasmith | [14] |
| 2022 | "Minas Tirith built from 110000 LEGO Bricks" [15] | STEBRICK (model), Stefano Mapelli (design), and BrickCreation (assembly) | [16] |
| 2023 | "The Party Tree" [17] | Serena Malyon | [18] |
| 2024 | "Frodo's Inheritance" [19] | Donato Giancola | [20] |
| Year | Article | Author | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | "Tolkien and the boy who didn't believe in fairies" [21] | John Garth | [1] |
| 2015 | "A Hemlock by any other name…" [22] | Michael Flowers | |
| 2016 | "Tolkien's 'immortal four' meet for the last time" [23] | John Garth | |
| 2017 | "How J.R.R. Tolkien Found Mordor on the Western Front", [24] in The New York Times, 30 June 2016 | Joseph Loconte | |
| 2018 | "'Tears are the very wine of blessedness': joyful sorrow in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings", [25] in Death and Immortality in Middle-earth: Proceedings of The Tolkien Society Seminar 2016 | Dimitra Fimi | |
| 2019 | "Was Tolkien really racist?" [26] in The Conversation, 6 December 2018 | Dimitra Fimi | [10] |
| 2020 | "Deconstructing Durin's Day: Science, Scientific Fan Fiction, and the Fan-Scholar" [27] in Journal of Tolkien Research, vol. 8, no. 1 | Kristine Larsen | [12] |
| 2021 | "Defying and Defining Darkness” [28] in Mallorn 61 | Verlyn Flieger | [14] |
| 2022 | "A Song of Greater Power: Tolkien's Construction of Lúthien Tinúviel”, [29] in Mallorn 62 | Clare Moore | [16] |
| 2023 | "All that glisters is not gold” [30] in Mallorn 63 | Sara Brown | [18] |
| 2024 | "The Tale of 'Aldarion and Erendis': Not Just a Medieval Love Story” [31] in Journal of Tolkien Research, vol. 18, no. 1 | Sara Brown | [20] |
| Year | Book | Author(s) | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | Middle-Earth Envisioned ("Best Book") | Paul Simpson and Brian Robb | [1] |
| The Fall of Arthur ("Best Novel") | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien | ||
| 2015 | Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien | |
| 2016 | The Art of The Lord of the Rings | Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull | |
| 2017 | A Secret Vice | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Dimitra Fimi and Andy Higgins | |
| 2018 | Beren and Lúthien | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien | [10] |
| 2019 | Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth | Catherine McIlwaine | [12] |
| 2020 | Tolkien's Library | Oronzo Cilli | [14] |
| 2021 | Unfinished Tales (40th anniversary edition) | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien | [16] |
| 2022 | The Nature of Middle-earth | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Carl Hostetter | [18] |
| 2023 | The Fall of Númenor | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Brian Sibley | [20] |
| 2024 | The Letters of JRR Tolkien: Revised and Expanded edition | J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien | [20] |
| Year | Site | Ref. |
|---|---|---|
| 2014 | LOTR Project by Emil Johansson | [1] |
| 2015 | TolkienBooks.net by Neil Holford | |
| 2016 | The Journal of Tolkien Research by Bradford Lee Eden | |
| 2017 | — none — | |
| 2018 | Too Many Books and Never Enough by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull | |
| 2019 | TolkienGuide.com by Jeremy Edmonds | [10] |
| 2020 | The Prancing Pony Podcast | [12] |
| 2021 | Tolkien Experience Podcast | [14] |
| 2022 | The Prancing Pony Podcast | [16] |
| 2023 | Tolkien Gateway | [18] |
| 2024 | Nerd of the Rings | [20] |
| Year | Recipient | Ref. |
|---|---|---|
| 2014 | Christopher Tolkien | [1] |
| 2015 | Tom Shippey | |
| 2016 | Verlyn Flieger | |
| 2017 | John Garth | |
| 2018 | Priscilla Tolkien | |
| 2019 | Catherine McIlwaine | [10] |
| 2020 | Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull | [12] |
| 2021 | Dimitra Fimi | [14] |
| 2022 | Brian Sibley | [16] |
| 2023 | John D. Rateliff | [18] |
| 2024 | Charles E. Noad (posthumous) | [20] |
Treebeard, or Fangorn in Sindarin, is a tree-giant character in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. He is an Ent and is said by Gandalf to be "the oldest living thing that still walks beneath the Sun upon this Middle-earth." He lives in the ancient Forest of Fangorn, to which he has given his name. It lies at the southern end of the Misty Mountains. He is described as being about 14 feet in height, and in appearance similar to a beech or an oak.
Minas Tirith is the capital of Gondor in J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novel The Lord of the Rings. It is a seven-walled fortress city built on the spur of a mountain, rising some 700 feet to a high terrace, housing the Citadel, at the seventh level. Atop this is the 300-foot high Tower of Ecthelion, which contains the throne room.
Fingolfin is a character in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, appearing in The Silmarillion. He was the son of Finwë, High King of the Noldor. He was threatened by his half-brother Fëanor, who held him in contempt for not being a pure-bred Noldor. Even so, when Fëanor stole ships and left Aman, Fingolfin chose to follow him back to Middle-earth, taking the dangerous route over the ice of the Helcaraxë. On arrival, he challenged the Dark Lord Morgoth at the gates of his fortress, Angband, but Morgoth stayed inside. When his son Fingon rescued Maedhros, son of Fëanor, Maedhros gratefully renounced his claim to kingship, and Fingolfin became High King of the Noldor. He was victorious at the battle of Dagor Aglareb, and there was peace for some 400 years until Morgoth broke out and destroyed Beleriand in the Dagor Bragollach. Fingolfin, receiving false news, rode alone to Angband and challenged Morgoth to single combat. He wounded Morgoth several times, but grew weary and was killed by the immortal Vala.
The Mythopoeic Awards for literature and literary studies are given annually for outstanding works in the fields of myth, fantasy, and the scholarly study of these areas. Established by the Mythopoeic Society in 1971, the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award is given for "fiction in the spirit of the Inklings", and the Scholarship Award for non-fiction work. The award is a statuette of a seated lion, with a plaque on the base. It has drawn resemblance to, and is often called, the "Aslan".
The works of J. R. R. Tolkien have generated a body of research covering many aspects of his fantasy writings. These encompass The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion, along with his legendarium that remained unpublished until after his death, and his constructed languages, especially the Elvish languages Quenya and Sindarin. Scholars from different disciplines have examined the linguistic and literary origins of Middle-earth, and have explored many aspects of his writings from Christianity to feminism and race.
Ted Nasmith is a Canadian artist, illustrator and architectural renderer. He is best known as an illustrator of J. R. R. Tolkien's works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion. Tolkien praised and commented on his early work, something that encouraged him in his career.
"A Secret Vice", also known as "A Hobby for The Home", is a lecture first presented by English philologist and author J. R. R. Tolkien in 1931. The lecture concerns Tolkien's relations with and view on constructed languages, in particular on artistic languages. In the talk, Tolkien discusses the human desire to make languages, and his criteria to create a good language – these include phonoaesthetics and the presence of a mythology to accompany the language. Tolkien's presentation was the first instance of him openly exhibiting his hobby of conlanging, and includes examples of several of his languages.
Jeffrey Patrick Murray was an American fantasy artist and author best known for his illustrations of works by J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. His paintings, illustrations, stories, poems, and essays appear regularly in Tolkien and Inklings-oriented publications and in Catholic publications worldwide. He was Artist-in-Residence for the St. Austin Review, and was artist guest of honor at the 2006 Gathering of the Fellowship in Toronto along with Ted Nasmith. He was nominated for an Imperishable Flame award in 2006, and his work has been exhibited in the USA, Canada, the UK, and the Netherlands.
Jenny Dolfen is a German illustrator and teacher.
The Tolkien Society is an educational charity and literary society devoted to the study and promotion of the life and works of the author and academic J. R. R. Tolkien.
The geography of Middle-earth encompasses the physical, political, and moral geography of J. R. R. Tolkien's fictional world of Middle-earth, strictly a continent on the planet of Arda but widely taken to mean the physical world, and Eä, all of creation, as well as all of his writings about it. Arda was created as a flat world, incorporating a Western continent, Aman, which became the home of the godlike Valar, as well as Middle-earth. At the end of the First Age, the Western part of Middle-earth, Beleriand, was drowned in the War of Wrath. In the Second Age, a large island, Númenor, was created in the Great Sea, Belegaer, between Aman and Middle-earth; it was destroyed in a cataclysm near the end of the Second Age, in which Arda was remade as a spherical world, and Aman was removed so that Men could not reach it.
Dimitra Fimi is a Greek academic and writer and since 2020 the Senior Lecturer in Fantasy and Children's Literature at the University of Glasgow. Her research includes that of the writings of J. R. R. Tolkien and children's fantasy literature.
A Companion to J. R. R. Tolkien is a 2014 book edited by Stuart D. Lee and published by Wiley-Blackwell. It is a part of the Blackwell Companions to Literature series, which have been described as prestigious reference works, and features authors well-known in the field of Tolkien studies.
Tolkien's artwork was a key element of his creativity from the time when he began to write fiction. The philologist and author J. R. R. Tolkien prepared a wide variety of materials to support his fiction, including illustrations for his Middle-earth fantasy books, facsimile artefacts, more or less "picturesque" maps, calligraphy, and sketches and paintings from life. Some of his artworks combined several of these elements.
John Garth is a British journalist and author, known especially for writings about J. R. R. Tolkien including his biography Tolkien and the Great War and a book on the places that inspired Middle-earth, The Worlds of J. R. R. Tolkien. He won a 2004 Mythopoeic Award for Scholarship for his work on Tolkien. The biography influenced much Tolkien scholarship in the subsequent decades.
Tolkien and the Great War: The Threshold of Middle-earth is a 2003 biography by John Garth of the philologist and fantasy author J. R. R. Tolkien's early life, focusing on his formative military experiences during the First World War.
The Worlds of J. R. R. Tolkien: The Places that Inspired Middle-earth is a 2020 non-fiction book by the journalist and Tolkien scholar John Garth. It describes the places that most likely inspired J. R. R. Tolkien to invent Middle-earth, as portrayed in his fantasy books The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Those places include many that Tolkien lived in or visited in his early life, as well as sites from history and literature. Most are real, for instance with England as the counterpart of the Shire, though some, like Atlantis, are mythical, and others, like Mirkwood, probably have roots in real places. He notes the ambiguities in some of the connections, and that others have made superficial comparisons, such as of Tolkien's towers with various modern towers in Birmingham, where Tolkien lived as a child. Garth presents his theories of the likely origins of some of these places, supporting these with maps and photographs.
The economy of Middle-earth is J. R. R. Tolkien's treatment of economics in his fantasy world of Middle-earth. Scholars such as Steven Kelly have commented on the clash of economic patterns embodied in Tolkien's writings, giving as instances the broadly 19th century agrarian but capitalistic economy of the Shire, set against the older world of feudal Gondor. Others have remarked on the culture of gifting and exchange, which reflects that of early Germanic cultures as described in works like Beowulf. A different clash of cultures is addressed by Patrick Curry, who contrasts the pre-modern world of the free peoples of Middle-earth with the industrialising and in his view "soulless" economies of the wizard Saruman and the dark lord Sauron, based on machinery, fire, and labour.
Tolkien Calendars, displaying artworks interpreting J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, have appeared annually since 1976. Some of the early calendars were illustrated with Tolkien's own artwork. Artists including the Brothers Hildebrandt and Ted Nasmith produced popular work on themes from The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit; later calendars also illustrated scenes from The Silmarillion. Some calendars have been named "Hobbit Calendar" or "Lord of the Rings Calendar", but "Tolkien Calendar" has remained the most popular choice of name.
Tolkien, Race, and Cultural History: From Fairies to Hobbits is a 2008 book by Dimitra Fimi about J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth writings. Scholars largely welcomed the book, praising its accessibility and its skilful application of a biographical-historical method which sets the development of Tolkien's legendarium in the context of Tolkien's life and times. Major themes of the book include Tolkien's constructed languages, and the issues of race and racism surrounding his work.
