I've read most of the History of Middle Earth series that covers the writing of the Silmarillion material. This was my first History of Middle Earth book that covered only Lord of the Rings (I read Sauron Defeated which was limited to a couple chapters on the Lord of the Rings). I had thought that the Lord of the Rings history would actually be even more interesting than the Silmarillion but I actually found that not to be the case in this book.

The history of the writing of the Lord of the Rings is different than the history of the writing of the Silmarillion. This stems from the fact that both of these publications are very different types of stories and narrative style; The Silmarillion being practically a history book and the Lord of the Rings being a flowing, detailed, and character-driven story. The history of the writing of the Silmarillion often contained unfinished detailed stories that actually expanded on the published Silmarillion and provided additional material not published elsewhere. This was because Christopher could not include it all when creating the published version. Contrast that with the Lord of the Rings drafts which were often just early rejected versions of the same story and, most times, the finished product is much more entertaining to read. Some of the drafts were just a worse version of what was eventually published.

This was not always true however. I found that by following some of the changes that Tolkien decided to make, I actually became more aware of important small things that often deepened my understanding of his characters. To give an example: Tolkien made a conscious choice to change his initial draft of Gandalf passing the ring on from Bilbo to Frodo. Tolkien decided that Gandalf would have placed the ring on the mantle after Bilbo left since he would not have held it in his hand the whole time between when Bilbo leaves and Frodo arrives. Gandalf understood the temptation of the ring and Tolkien's initial version where Gandalf just casually held onto it for a while didn't fit in with this. It was small things like this that were most interesting to me.

Other than that, the biggest takeaway just how little of a plan Tolkien had when embarking on this "Hobbit sequel". It's amazing how the story just unraveled as he wrote without following much of a plan. This was definitely different than what I would have expected.

As with any book in the History of Middle Earth series, if you’re interested in reading early drafts of LotR to see how the story and characters changed from draft to draft, then this book is for you.

How many times did Tolkien break up the fellowship before deciding on how it happened? So many times!

I read this while following the Mythgard Academy seminar, which I highly recommend.

This is the seventh book in the History of Middle Earth (HoME) series, and the second in the History of the Lord of the Rings. It picks up where the last left off, in the mines of Moria. It covers the development of the story up through the beginnings of Rohan. I found the previous book, The Return of the Shadow, to be quite entertaining, watching the development of a story that actually led to publication. I thought this second book would continue to be as entertaining, but I found it much drier than I had expected.

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Goooood, more the Lord of the Rings history! That's what I signed up for! This reads a lot faster than the previous few.

"The Mighty One has great business afoot. All that has gone before is but a skirmish compared with the war that is about to be kindled. Fine days, fine days! Blood on blade and fire on hill, smoke in sky and tears on earth."

By late 1939, Professor Tolkien had developed the narrative of The Lord of the Rings to the point where the Fellowship arrives at the gates of Moria. He paused the work for nearly a year, then started over again in late summer 1940, his fourth complete rewrite.

The first 200 pages of The Treason of Isengard presents the changes introduced during this final revision. We follow in minute detail as the characters, scenes, and phrasing gradually come in line with known canon.

Things pick up when Tolkien begins to move the story forward again. The remaining bulk of Fellowship of the Ring is composed quickly after the hiatus with a minimal number of drafts. This newfound momentum carries straight into the first half of what would eventually become The Two Towers. (Tolkien, of course, conceived of the entire work as a single novel. It was not until years later the publisher insisted on splitting it into a trilogy.)

Chapters like "Urak-hai" and "Treebeard" spring forth nearly complete in a single draft with only light polishing needed to reach their final form.

Some of the issues Tolkien is working through at this junction are:

• What is the Relationship of the Three to the One Ring? Why weren't the Elves corrupted by their rings of power? Was there something fundamentally different about their rings from those of the Men and Dwarves?

• What is the timing, nature, and extent of Boromir's betrayal of Frodo?

• Who is Galadriel? (He keeps expanding her backstory until finally he is compelled to write her into the First and Second Ages)

• Timelines and geography: He revises his hand-drawn maps, changing the courses of rivers, renaming cities, and moving mountains, all of which require minor but pervasive changes to the story itself. He also plays around with the idea that time moves slower in Lothlorien, which alters previously established dates, seasons, moon phases, and holidays.

Tolkien's process was to stop every few chapters and outline the rest of the story. He keeps finding new elements of the larger legendarium to hang narrative bits on, and so the story grows in the telling.

While there are some passages of great interest, this is the driest and perhaps most technical volume so far of The History of Middle Earth. It has no compelling reason to exist. It does not showcase Tolkien's delicate, relentless world building as much as it just overloads readers with rough and intermediate drafts. Apart from the language exercise presented in "Appendix on Runes", Tolkien is just doing the normal work of any writer at this stage of composition unraveling knots of story and language.

2 stars.

The Treason Of Isengard (The History Of The Lord Of the Rings:  Part Two), by J.R.R. Tolkien

It is remarkable just how little of this book has to do with the Treason of Isengard.  Although I am very familiar with the writings of J.R.R. Tolkien, I have to say that I was unaware that there was so big an interest in the manuscript history of his Lord of the Rings to make it worth making a giant series that relies on the fact that readers are not only aware of the Lord of the Rings itself but are interested in seeing large amounts of variants that reveal the painstaking process by which that epic came into being.  And let it be understood that this book is by no means the only such book in the series--it is the second of three that I have read and it manages to cover some of the same ground that the first book had gone over showing the fourth and fifth (!) efforts that Tolkien made to get through some of the beginning chapters of the Fellowship of the Ring.  This sort of book is a clear example of a secondary work, one whose existence depends on the excellence and worth of a previous work, but such works are not bad ones.

This book consists of twenty-six chapters featuring manuscripts and various comments by the Tolkiens on material that ranges from the beginning of Fellowship of the Ring to the beginning of The Two Towers.  The material includes a discussion of Galdalf's delay (1), the fourth phase of the introduction to Fellowship (2,3), more discussion about Gandalf and Saruman (4), Bilbo's song at Rivendell (5), the council of Elrond (6,7), the movement of the ring to the south (8), the mines of Moria (9,10), the story as foreseen from that point (11), , Lothlorien (12), and Galadriel (13), and the farewell to Lorien (14).  There are chapters on the first map of the LotR (15), the story as foreseen from Lorien (16), the great river (17), the breaking of the fellowship (18), the departure of Boromir (19), the riders of Rohan (20), the Uruk-hai (21), Treeberad (22), some miscellaneous notes (23), the white rider (24), the story foreseen from Fangorn (25), and the king of the golden hall (26), a well as an appendix on runes and an index.  All told, this material takes up more than 400 pages, some of it turning in itself in the way that snakes are sometimes shown to have devoured their own tails, but not in a bad way.

It is hard to recommend this book to someone who is not a huge fan of Lord of the Rings.  While the original publishers of Tolkien's works wondered how big of an audience would be interested in the Hobbit and then Lord of the Rings and thought that they may lose money on it, the existence of this book not only proves that Lord of the Rings has a huge enough audience to support other books being written about it but that there is an audience that event wants to read the manuscripts that demonstrate the painfully slow process by which Tolkien's story that was originally going to be a simple and straightforward story of the destruction of the one ring as a sequel to the Hobbit became a sprawling epic that hinted at still more sprawling epic stories involved in his legendarium.  I found this book interesting, but at the same time I wonder if this sort of book is really a good one to enjoy very often, since like laws and sausages I would prefer not to know how my novels are made from endless and frustrating edits that add length and complexity to originally simple and straightforward plans, especially since Tolkien and I write in very different ways.

Bingo is dead! Long live Frodo!

This is a continuation of the notes and drafts from Tolkien that his son Christopher meticulously researched and presents to fans of Lord of the Rings. For non-fans this book would be extremely tedious and boring but for those of us curious enough to want to know more of the thoughts and insights from Professor Tolkien in formulating his great story it is a very interesting read. Although not a complete rewrite with huge plot changes or character revisions this volume does include some interesting notes and insights into the changes of how the story might have been crafted. Nothing monumental here but the fact that at some point Tolkien admits the story is 'writing itself' shows that he had a vision to his story and stuck with it; he would make basic notes, write, slightly edit or rewrite a passage and then work again (there are some large rewrites at times but the core of the story never really changed much). Enjoyable to see what directions the story 'might' have progressed toward and what eventually was retained in the completed version.

If the next book opens with yet another return to the Shire, then I will cackle for a full 23 minutes before lighting myself on fire.
Real talk: This was interesting and informative just like the last book, but the narrative is starting to resemble the published text more and more with each passing chapter which means it's not nearly as amusing and wild anymore lol. I'd much rather read the final published form.

Although not quite as exciting as the first part of Christopher Tolkien's account of the evolution of The Lord of the Rings, reviewed here, this is still a fascinating read for the Tolkien aficionado. The reason for the "not quite" can be found not in the quality or detail of its scholarship (which is as meticulous as ever), nor in any lack of substantial variation from the book as eventually published (there is plenty), but emerges as a direct consequence of J.R.R. Tolkien's writing process. The first 180+ pages of this volume are devoted to tracing, as Christopher makes clear, his father's attempts to resolve the "intractable problems" that had emerged during the drafts that make up The Return of the Shadow. This means that the beginning of this book has to go over a lot of the ground of its predecessor before it can move forward; and for the reader who is hoping to see the story move from 3, to 4, to 5 (numbers arbitrary), a return to 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3 can be a little frustrating.

Once this point is reached, though, with Tolkien senior eventually able to move on from Moria, to Lorien, to Rohan, there is plenty of fresh material to enjoy. This ranges from early plot lines (Boromir's projected return to Minas Tirith), to extended sequences of narrative that would end up changing quite radically (such as the early versions of Frodo and Sam's passage through Kirith Ungol and escape from Minas Morgul), and also includes glimpses of radical changes that Tolkien considered only momentarily (such as having Gandalf face Saruman, instead of a Balrog, in Moria), as well as absences (no Arwen or Faramir, as yet) and characters who lived for a few brief lines or pages, before vanishing (such as Idis, the daughter of Theoden, who appears beside Eowyn for a while, silent and overshadowed by her, until she is gone forever). Like the first volume, there is also plenty of detail on chronology and geography, and here for the first time an exhaustive examination of Tolkien's early maps, runes, and the evolution of some of the poems in the text. Much of this can be safely skipped or skimmed; and indeed doing so, according to the reader's interest, might be the best way to make the most of an enjoyable but sometimes formidable book.

This one didn't make as much progress through the text as the previous volume (Return of the Shadow). There is a whole chapter on the various permutations of Tolkien's maps of the LOTR world, and even an appendix on runic writing.

The most fascinating thing to me is the way Tolkien wrote. Sometimes he planned, sometimes he "pantsed." (If you participate in NaNoWriMo, you'll know what that means.) Some texts would be in nearly the final form the first time, others would be re-written numerous times. Often he would stop in the middle of a thought and start another one without stopping to cross out the previous bit.

As Tolkien was writing during WWII, and there was a paper shortage, Tolkien also was very thrifty and creative with his paper usage, often writing on the backs of meeting memos or calendar pages or student examination papers. There was even a reference to writing between the lines of these examination papers.

Much props to C. Tolkien for being able to sort it out!

Another collection of manuscripts showing the development of The Lord of the Rings, which proved just as helpful to me in understanding the mind of this highly influential author. Again, this is only for the die-hards but there's a lot of people who fit that category, and I predict soon that we'll get lots of interpretations of Tolkien that will be absolute bunk, so let's note some stuff.

First off, I noticed that the way Tolkien writes, it is as though he thought of it as his duty not to invent the world of Middle Earth so much as to discover it. This is one of the reasons the book has such weight: it feels like Tolkien thought the world had to be a certain way, whether he wanted it to be that way or not, and that has a huge impact. It certainly makes things weird, but I think it explains the uncompromising nature of the project.

Second, the most fascinating thing about this book is the fact that Tolkien clearly didn't know where he was going. While many people highlight his perfectionism, pointing out that he wouldn't just copy and paste, and would always start over, this is only half the truth: Tolkien really did lean heavily on what he had already written and that's evident here. Some of the funnest portions are the bits where, after having decided that Boromir should try to take the ring from Frodo, he ponders (in the manuscripts) completely different outcomes. This shows that Tolkien was not at all sure where things would go, and thus any interpretation of the book that presupposes some grand platonic scheme in Tolkien's mind before he wrote the books must be discounted. It also shows, in my opinion, that Tolkien was more plot centered than character centered.

Here's some of the juiciest bits: before they got to Lothlorien, Tolkien intended for Sam to find Gollum and enlist his help in finding the fleeing Frodo. At that point Gollum leads them to Mordor where black riders arrive, turned into demonic eagles. Frodo and Sam reach the crack, Gollum takes the ring, but Sam grabs Gollum and dies with him in the gulf. The idea of multiple spiders is also thought of at this point, as is the idea of Sam temporarily bearing the ring. Also, when the ring is destroyed, wouldn't this have been cool: "Frodo standing on side of Fire Mountain holds up sword. He now commands Ringwraiths and bids them be gone. They fall to earth and vanish like wisps of smoke with a terrible wail." (210). At the same time, Merry and Pippin meet Fangorn (no orc attack), Legolas and Gimli get lost and are captured by Saruman, and Aragorn and Boromir go to Minas Tirith and when Denethor is killed, the men elect Aragorn, forcing Boromir to go to Saruman for help. In some versions of this, Legolas and Gimli lose heart and head north, only to meet Gandalf. Gandalf used mithril to escape Moria. Saruman AND Sauron attack Minas Tirith at the same time, and Treebeard breaks the siege of Minas Tirith. Tolkien even speculates on killing Boromir (through Aragorn) Pippin! Saruman is dressed in a mud-colored robe and told to beg for a day's digging.

At this point, Lothlorien is written, and at one point Galadriel and Celeborne have white hair. Frodo, I think, sees the vision at first alone, and then Sam is added. Gimli gets a green stone from Galadriel, rather than Aragorn! However, the story is otherwise the same as in the final version. After this, we get another outlining. As usual, Tolkien plans to have Aragorn and Boromir go to Minas Tirith together, where they come into conflict. More importantly, Tolkien starts writing the ending of Frodo and Sam's adventures. After some brief dialogue with Gollum's meeting with Sam and the two tracking down Frodo, he writes bits and pieces of Frodo's coma because of spider stings (there are still multiple spiders) and his capture after Sam takes the ring. Gollum leads the orcs to Frodo's body and is tasked with hunting down Sam. Sam's rescue of Frodo from Cirith Ungol is actually fairly close (though this time Frodo uses the ring to escape and they kill an orc to get his armor for the visible Sam). Frodo is separated from Sam in Mordor.

At this point however, Tolkien decides upon a less dramatic breaking of the fellowship in which Boromir is killed, Merry and Pippin captured by orcs, and the three hunters pursue them. Much stronger than Legolas and Gimli going across the plain. When Pippin and Merry meet Treebeard, he talks about Tom Bombadil. When Gandlaf returns, Tolkien ponders making Saruman the balrog.

The first draft of the arrival at Rohan has no Wormtongue, and Theoden is just grouchy and reluctant to help Gandalf, not under enchantment as in the final version. Eowyn, of course, is destined to marry Aragorn at this point.

So, again, a special thanks to Christopher Tolkien for being such a good scholar. I really do hope that these books are referenced as people write and interpret Tolkien.