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31%OFFJ. R. R. Tolkien - The Fall of Arthur - 9780007557301 - 9780007557301
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The Fall of Arthur

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Description for The Fall of Arthur Paperback. The world first publication of a previously unknown work by J.R.R. Tolkien, which tells the extraordinary story of the final days of England's legendary hero, King Arthur. Editor(s): Tolkien, Christopher. Num Pages: 240 pages. BIC Classification: DCF; FQ. Category: (G) General (US: Trade). Dimension: 130 x 198 x 22. Weight in Grams: 228.

The world first publication of a previously unknown work by J.R.R. Tolkien, which tells the extraordinary story of the final days of England’s legendary hero, King Arthur.

The Fall of Arthur, the only venture by J.R.R. Tolkien into the legends of Arthur King of Britain, may well be regarded as his finest and most skilful achievement in the use of the Old English alliterative metre, in which he brought to his transforming perceptions of the old narratives a pervasive sense of the grave and fateful nature of all that is ... Read more

Unhappily, The Fall of Arthur was one of several long narrative poems that he abandoned in that period. In this case he evidently began it in the earlier nineteen-thirties, and it was sufficiently advanced for him to send it to a very perceptive friend who read it with great enthusiasm at the end of 1934 and urgently pressed him ‘You simply must finish it!’ But in vain: he abandoned it, at some date unknown, though there is some evidence that it may have been in 1937, the year of the publication of The Hobbit and the first stirrings of The Lord of the Rings. Years later, in a letter of 1955, he said that ‘he hoped to finish a long poem on The Fall of Arthur’; but that day never came.

Associated with the text of the poem, however, are many manuscript pages: a great quantity of drafting and experimentation in verse, in which the strange evolution of the poem’s structure is revealed, together with narrative synopses and very significant if tantalising notes. In these latter can be discerned clear if mysterious associations of the Arthurian conclusion with The Silmarillion, and the bitter ending of the love of Lancelot and Guinevere, which was never written.

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Product Details

Format
Paperback
Publication date
2015
Publisher
HarperCollins Publishers
Condition
New
Number of Pages
240
Place of Publication
London, United Kingdom
ISBN
9780007557301
SKU
9780007557301
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 2 to 4 working days
Ref
99-2

About J. R. R. Tolkien
J.R.R. Tolkien is best known for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, selling 150 million copies in more than 60 languages worldwide. He died in 1973 at the age of 81. Christopher Tolkien, born on 21 November 1924, was the third son of J.R.R. Tolkien. During ... Read more

Reviews for The Fall of Arthur
Praise for The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún: “This is the most unexpected of Tolkien’s many posthumous publications; his son’s ‘Commentary’ is a model of informed accessibility; the poems stand comparison with their Eddic models, and there is little poetry in the world like those” Times Literary Supplement ... Read more

Goodreads reviews for The Fall of Arthur


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