The Fireside

In a previous blog post, I mentioned how I associate fall reading with fantasy (especially with Tolkien and Harry Potter.). It was thanks to both Tolkien and Harper Collins (for putting various editions of his works) that got me into books. Not "reading" but "book buying" (different than 'collecting'...somewhat). So make sure you read up on some Tolkien now that school is back in session, and it is now the beginning of the ideal reading season.   This post is a brief run-down of Tolkien's works, as well as some quality cost-effective editions worth checking out.

Tolkien's version of Beowulf  will soon be released. There has been some scholary controversy over this release from those who study Anglo-Saxon literature, as well as Beowulf  scholars. The Tolkien scholars have been waiting awhile for this one for a while.  Tolkien's expertise on Beowulf and his own literary powers have made this translation a work every Tolkien fan will want to treasure. This edition includes the translation in prose and an illuminating commentary, based on a series of lectures given by J.R.R. Tolkien at Oxford in the 1930s. Through Tolkien’s clarity of vision, it is as if you entered into the imagined past: standing beside Beowulf and his men shaking out their mail-shirts as they beached their ship on the coast of Denmark, listening to the rising anger of Beowulf at the taunting of Unferth, or looking up in amazement at Grendel’s terrible hand set under the roof of Heorot. This edition also inclu...