Tolkien and the Silmarils

More about the book

The Silmarillion was J.R.R. Tolkien's most profound work, the book he wrote to please himself. The noted Tolkien scholar Randel Helms provides a lucid analysis of Tolkien's labour of love. He describes the sources of The Silmarillion, both classical and Biblical, its major themes and its separate parts. He explains its complex relationship with Tolkien's other major works, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and shows how it underlies them both. In a special afterword, he examines the question posed by the recent publication of Unfinished Tales, and discusses the possibility of further volumes of Tolkien's unpublished works. As an original and provocative guide to the mythical world of the Silmarils and to its creator, Randel Helms's study will prove invaluable to every Tolkien reader.