I actually really enjoyed this book. Other books about Tolkien seem to skip over the time he spent in WWI. They talk briefly about it and then move on.
This book was based all around the time he spent in the army and it's effect on his writing. It seemed very logical for his war experiences to be portrayed in his writing some way, so I agree with the author. Also I was happy that they went not only into detail about Tolkien's war experience, but also Rob Gilson's, G.B. Smith's and Christopher Wiseman. They did talk about JRR grief at the death of Rob Gilson. But I was disappointed that they didn't go into his grief over G.B. Smith's death, since I know he had a closer relationship with GBS then he did RG.
It was really cool, to see the timeline of what he wrote, during what. And how he revised it.
It was an enjoyable read, I recommend it.

Tolkien and the Great War reads unevenly. Large sections are almost unbearably plodding, while others are vibrant, providing flashes of insight into the genesis of Tolkien's genius. In the balance, the insight gained is worth the plodding endured.

For me, the best of this book is saved for last. In the author's postscript he argues that, far from being mere escapism, Tolkien's writings were a valid counterpoint to the modernism that emerged from the Great War. Rather than discarding the romantic forms that Paul Fussell labelled as; "tutors in high diction to the war propagandists," Tolkien salvaged them and re-interpreted them through his own war-time experience. In doing so, he swam against the tide of academic chic, and rescued all of us from an unbearable future of endless and unabated T.S. Eliot and James Joyce.

When Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings came at the top of a string of "best/favourite books of the twentieth century" lists in the late 90s and early 2000s, there was predictable harrumphing from some guardians of literary taste. People like Germaine Greer sneered loudly that the hoi polloi simply couldn't be trusted with this sort of thing, though her comments made it clear she had only a vague idea why she was so certain Tolkien's stuff was "tosh". She seemed to think he was a Nazi sympathiser (he hated the Nazis), thought his fans carried around teddy bears (that would be Waugh fans, if any at all) and later admitted she hadn't actually read The Lord of the Rings anyway. When pressed, she and other critics were usually very light on specifics, but generally characterised Tolkien as a whimsical escapist whose wispy fantasies were the antithesis of "proper" literature, which was to be heavily character-driven, light on plot, modernist (or post-modernist), gritty, prosaic and tending toward cynicism or at least moral ambiguity.

Much of this conception of how modern literature "should" be was born in the the First World War, which was thought to have swept away the kind of romantic, if not openly imperialistic literature of the Victorian Era. The literature that came out of the Great War was primarily in the new mode of the new century, as seen in the writing of Wilfred Owen, Siegfried Sassoon, Robert Graves, Edward Thomas or David Jones. It tended to subert or invert romantic and patriotic tropes and rejected any form of idealism.

Most people would be unaware that Tolkien fought in the First World War, saw action in the Battle of the Somme and was later to observe that "by 1918, all but one of my close friends were dead." Garth's book traces the importance and fierce intensity of those close friendships Tolkien referred to - especially his idealistic schoolboy fraternity dubbed the "T.C.B.S." which he formed with several like-minded literary friends at the King Edward's School in Birmingham. The closest of these were Christopher Wiseman, who served in the Royal Navy and survived the War, Rob Gilson, killed on the first day of the Somme in July 1916 and G.B. Smith, who died of shrapnel wounds in December 1916. Tolkien himself was stricken with trench fever and eventually evacuated from the front lines to convalesce in England.

Garth details how the experience of these deaths and the horrors of the Western Front changed the course of Tolkien's writings, moving it from the truly whimsical (and pretty awful) fairy Victoriana of his first published poem "Goblin Feet" (1915) to the far darker stories he began to write for his invented languages while recovering in a field hospital. These were to become the tales of The Silmarillion, which in turn formed the back-mythology for The Lord of the Rings. And once their origins in the mud of the Somme is understood, the dismissal of his work as mere wispy escapism can be recognised as utterly facile.

As Garth notes, all of Tolkien's work is set in a war, against the backdrop of a war, in the shadow of impending war or in the bitter wake of a terrible conflict. Victories are often fleeting, always hard-won and never won without terrible tragedy and loss. Bravery is often futile. Sacrifice is regularly in vain. Odds are almost always overwhelming. The most admired virtues are bravery in the face of almost certain defeat, fortitude against all odds, loyalty based on friendship rather than obligation and hope in the face of cynicism and despair. These elements are derived from the experience of a veteran of the Great War, not some armchair romantic.

For all his works' many aristocratic lords and mighty warriors, there are two characters for whom Tolkien had special affection. One was The Lord of the Rings's Faramir: a captain who took on impossible missions given by a deluded and out-of-touch superior, who worried for his men while admiring their courage, all while doubting his own bravery and strength of character. Tolkien later wrote that of all his characters, Faramir was most like himself as a young man. The other was Samwise Gamgee, who was famously based on the batmen who attended British officers and who Tolkien admired for their loyalty, steadfastness and courage. Both characters clearly derive from Tolkien's own experience of war.

Anyone who has read Tolkien's descriptions of the mounds of the slain heaping the field of the Nirnaeth Arnoediad - the "Battle of Unnumbered Tears" - or the rotting corpses in the pools of the Dead Marshes, or the Pelennor Fields where armoured behemoths lumber across the battlefield while winged terrors wheel and scream overhead knows that this is not escapist fantasy - it's modern war literature. Even his happiest endings have a heavy tinge of sadness and loss and the overwhelming feeling of his work is one of elegy, not whimsy. Garth shows that Tolkien was as much a war poet as any of the other writers who survived the Great War. And, as Tom Shippey argues in his J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (2000), the reason Tolkien has been embraced by millions in the century since the Great War is that he was very much a man of the world that war shaped, however much this confuses and annoys people like Germaine Greer.

This is an intensely poignant book of two genres: English fiction literature of the first half of the twentieth century (including J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Silmarillon”); and World War 1 non-fiction. On the back cover A.N. Wilson is quoted: “I have rarely read a book which so intelligently graphed the relation between a writer’s inner life and his outward circumstances”. That nails it; and a very unusual fascinating combination it makes, too.

We are often told that war makes men of boys; or that no good comes of fighting. How very, very different the world today might have been had circumstances of family, school and the development of such effective means of mechanical mass killing not unexpectedly proved quite so favourable for Tolkien’s etymological development of his creations of literary genius? From the Word came Myth. C.S. Lewis’ Christian allegories are not difficult to identify; whilst J.R.R. Tolkien’s instead embed the Christian faith in Middle Earth sufficiently deeply so as only to be discovered by those who read with eyes wide open, and an alert mind.

How many young children invent ‘secret’ imaginary words? Very many, I suspect, listening in to playtime at nursery school. But how many, like the young Tolkien go on further, to invent a new lexicon entirely of words that though new are not unrelated to known ancient or reconstructed words; before diligently inventing a new grammar, devising and enforcing formal rules of that invented grammar, and finally creating a new and unique fictional mythology? Vanishingly few, I expect.

So it was that I learned of the honour and close bond between four school friends growing up in Birmingham, members of the self-appointed Tea Club & Barrovian Society; and thence, as the pages turned, of the later utter, bleak despair in the horror of the taking of young lives by means of the rise of appallingly efficient new methods of killing by machine. Four lives in so very, very many, separated forever on this earth by (in one way or another) the Battle of the Somme, within a uniquely dreadful War.

Garth doesn’t dwell on or wallow in doom and gloom; he maintains a clear headed neutrality of fact and description; giving the mind of his reader the freedom to fully occupy the scene. Occasionally Garth makes welcome observations which distract from welling distress and the pooling of horrors. I learned of the Royal Defence Corps, founded in 1916 for the same reasons as would later be found needful in the Second World War (The Home Guard). I was surprised to also learn of a popular name for a cat, Tibert/Tybalt, derived from the tom cat in the medieval Reynard the Fox. ‘Tibbles’, or “ ‘Tibby’, … “SUPPER”; a wail I’ve often heard cried of a Summer’s evening; when I’ve wondered from whence such an odd name could have been derived!

Tolkien (a Roman Catholic) argued that “There is nonetheless a case for it: a form of language familiar in meaning and yet freed from trivial associations, and filled with the memory of good and evil, is an achievement, and it’s possessors are richer than those who have no such tradition.” (p.291). If only the Church of England would heed such words, look at the extraordinary and now long term popularity of Tolkien’s Middle Earth, and give up its utterly embarrassing attempts to modernise the language of Anglicanism!

Nothing is new under the sun. Garth in his postscript argues valuably and forcefully against the late 1920s revisionist approach of a mass waste of life. He illuminates Tolkien’s outlook in moving beyond the very disaster or discovery which should naturally be expected to light the fuse of extinguishing all hope; to an unexpected event, a change for the better which grows, widens, and leads to a confidence to dare for hope and redemption. For the last few years I have dreaded the thought that 2014 will turn into a 365 day long anniversary of the weeping and wailing of the ‘waste’ of it all. This book has reminded me of what is Good, and has girded me with Hope.


[P.S., see also Quote, “Literature shrivels in a universal language…” (J.R.R. Tolkein).]

As of this day of reviewing this book, I have only read The Lord of the Rings The Fellowship of the Ring. Some factors may have affected in the rating of this book.

This book is not what I really expected. I thought I was going to read War Stories of J.R.R. Tolkien and how that became a factor in shaping Middle-Earth. It was more of a combination of Literary History, Military History and Biography, focusing more on Literary.

n  Literary History:n
John Garth explains the pieces of literature that influenced Tolkien's Middle Earth. Tolkien was more inclined to Germanic, Norse and Celtic literature and he was inspired by it. In some perspectives, the Germans, the Norsemen and the Celts are deemed to be 'barbaric' but some would say they have a rich culture, notably literature.

n  Military History:n
Tolkien's Generation was called "The Lost Generation" because half of this generation lost their lives fighting World War One or in other names "The Great War" or "The War to End All Wars". Here, it tells the story of 2nd Lt. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien in this time of conflict. He was a signals man tasked with communications. There was little action told and not much of it. It was mostly how Tolkien did his duty when his country asked him to defend it.

n  Biography:n
Not much of a biography. It talked about Tolkien's Early Age, his educational background, his military service, and some parts of his latter life.It didn't speak of much specifics but it did detail some parts of his life.

This book is a bit boring if you don't understand some references. But for me, this was academical and analytical. I learned about Tolkien's state of mind (sort of) and how the world's beloved Middle Earth writer came to be. It wasn't entirely focused on Tolkien. It talked about his companions and how he developed languages (for his legendarium) and analyzed stories(later inspired by it) and later the creator of Middle-Earth

Why it took me so long to read this I cannot say. It had been on the back burner for me, and only really pushed to the forefront as I am seeing the author at a conference in a few weeks. To say that this book spoke to me in a way that only a small handful of books have done would be an understatement. I have long been fascinated both by Tolkien and military history, so it was a natural pairing. But beyond that, you cannot read this book without feeling a sense of the utter tragedy of youth and promise swallowed up in the trenches, and how no one from that generation, least of all the veterans who survived, escaped unscathed.
Tolkien himself disliked literary criticism based on biographical exploration of the author, but we are all products of our environment and experiences. WWI changed Tolkien, and as Garth speculates, likely changed the trajectory of his writing. Consider this book part biography, part literary analysis. I think it is worth a read alone for the postscript: an examination of the prevailing narrative of Great War writers (disenchantment and disillusionment), and where Tolkien fits in that narrative. It also presents a strong argument against fantasy as "escapism", of which Tolkien has long been accused. I promise you will see Tolkien's work, especially what he produced in these war years, in a totally new light.

Hard to imagine how an account of formative trauma on an author's life and work could be better.

I really enjoyed this! A lot on Tolkien's mythologies and liguistics went over my head a bit because I'm not as familiar with his work as I should be, but it was still fascinating and I learned a lot. Garth writes skillfully, as comfortable covering parts of Tolkien's life in broad strokes as he is focusing on minute details of World War One. He ties together his work and his experiences in astute ways throughout.

This was not my first biography of Tolkien and so I was armed with some knowledge before I delved into it. I was more than pleasantly surprised because even though it has quite a narrow focus (the years of WW1 almost exclusively) it reveals a lot about Tolkien the author and Tolkien the human being. At times it felt like reading a novel and many of the sentiments and events included left me touched and moved. My only small complaint is that the epilogue and postscript, though very interesting, felt a little too long, since by then I felt the point had already been made.

It's quite different from what I expected. However, it is extremely well written and researched with in-depth insights into Tolkien's life and relationships during WW1. The author flawlessly ties together the different phases of Tolkien's mythology and its origins during the Great War and how it could have influenced his work while also going into detail about the different stories themselves that Tolkien developed in his early years.
If you are a sucker for biographies, then this is highly recommended for you.
I have trouble getting along with reading (auto)biographies. Therefore, "only" 4 stars, but all in all, a great addition if you want to expand your knowledge about the origins of Middle Earth.

I'd like all war books to come with a side of lit. crit, please!

I can't speak highly enough of this book. The amount of detailed biographical research alone would make it invaluable to anyone interested in Tolkien (or, for that matter, in the experience of the generation of university students who fought in World War I). I only wish we had two or three more volumes coming from him, to cover the rest of Tolkien's life, a deep-dive utilizing the research tools and resources of the twenty-first-century, ala what Mark Lewisohn is doing for the Beatles (ETA: YE GODS, HE *HAS* WRITTEN ANOTHER ONE! I'll get on that forthwith!). But I'm incredibly grateful that we have this work, which I feel has enriched my understanding of Tolkien far beyond even what I hoped to learn from it.

But beyond biographical detail, Garth also engages in extremely compelling analysis of the impact of the war on not only Tolkien's writing, but his worldview, his academic interests, and so forth (all of which are, of course, intertwined). Even more valuably, he does so while acknowledging Tolkien's own reluctance to admit much inspiration (though of course, an author is singularly unsuited to make those kinds of assessments!) as well as engaging with the many other excellent (and less excellent!) critical pieces to have tackled these questions over the years. There is a real sense of expertise throughout the work, which manifests not as a tone of "know-it-all-ism," but rather in his willingness to acknowledge what we can't know or understand about Tolkien and the people around him, or can only guess at. The mark of a real expert, in my opinion!

Stylistically, I was delighted by the tone: readable without being pandering or cheap, academic and knowledgable without being dense, full of love for Tolkien's work but never devolving into fannishness.

My only complaint is that I occasionally had difficulty reading scenes because I was tearing up. (Actually, my first emotional meltdown occurred on the dedication page, and my final one on the last page of the main text, when Tolkien signs his last letter to Wiseman "TCBS." So, it was a systemic problem, I guess! Hazards of dealing with stuff that touches on questions so deeply rooted in what it means to be a human, a writer, a person in the modern age, a lover of fantasy, and so forth.)