Designed to be the essential reference works for all readersand students, these volumes present the most thorough analysispossible of Tolkien's work within the important context of hislife. The Reader's Guide includes brief but comprehensivealphabetical entries on a wide range of topics, including a who'swho of important persons, a guide to places and institutions,details concerning Tolkien's source material, information about thepolitical and social upheavals through which the author lived, theimportance of his social circle, his service as an infantryman inWorld War I -- even information on the critical reaction to hiswork and the "Tolkien cult." The Chronology details the parallelevolutions of Tolkien's works and his academic and personal life inminute detail. Spanning the entirety of his long life includingnearly sixty years of active labor on his Middle-earth creations,and drawing on such contemporary sources as school records, warservice files, biographies, correspondence, the letters of hisclose frien
