Customer Reviews

Tolkien: A Biography

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

This biography is a highly commercialized ripoff. Avoid this. Humphrey Carpenter's definitive, authorized biography is vastly superior.

As far as I can tell, this book was written solely to capitalize on Tolkien's popularity. The introductory material makes clear that the author, White, wrote this with no independent knowledge of Tolkien's life. He admits that before starting this, he hadn't even read the Lord of the Rings since being a teenager. This book was written for one reason: to take your $$$$$.

If you're familiar with Carpenter's authorized biography, it quickly becomes apparent that this author has simply rearranged the material from Carpenter's book. The only information not lifted from Carptenter, from what I could discern, is a few bits lifted from another source: Tom Shippley's literary analysis of Tolkien. A wrinkle in the copyright laws (which gives less protection to biographies than to works of fiction) allows this sort of thing to happen. In schools everywhere, there's another name for it, which begins with a "p."

Moreover, Carpenter's biography is far stronger. Carpenter had access to Tolkien's papers, had met Tolkien, and studied at Oxford. He has also penned a biography on C.S. Lewis and the other Inklings. White, on the other hand, apparently had access only to Carpenter's biography; there is no evidence he did any independent research. Further still, Carpenter's authorized biography is charming and a pleasurable read, but this copycat version doesn't even offer that. And Carpenter's biography is only 250 pages, so this turkey isn't even more concise. Don't get suckered by this....

I wouldn't call this book biography. It's more a sort of "imaginative memoir"; where the author `recreates' his subject's life (including being privy to his thoughts and emotional states) as a way of padding out his meagre research. It's also marked by glib generalizations, facile writing, and persistent illiteracy. Save your money.

White frequently attempts to make vivid and interesting things he knows nothing about. Thus, he describes Tolkien's grueling introductory training in the British army and the intense preparatory training for trench warfare at Etaples as "idle time." He also writes that at Etaples, soldiers had little to worry about aside from mines and snipers. In fact, Etaples was so far from the front that neither of these endangered the troops there. White, moreover, describes soldiers greasing their bayonets as they moved in trains toward the fighting. In fact, the bayonets were oiled. Some reading of the standard British Great War memoirs by Sassoon and Graves, who served in the trenches, would have kept White from his egregious mistakes. A useful corrective to White is John Garth, Tolkien and the Great War.

See the amazon.canada reviews for further exposure of White's many errors.

As a number of the other reviewers have noted, this book was all-too-obviously written to cash in on the "Tolkien craze" attendant to the release of Peter Jackson's movies in 2001-2003. The other reviewers do a good job tabulating its inaccuracies and inventions, so I will restrict myself here to noting two things:

(1) This book is in every respect inferior to Humphrey Carpenter's "J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography" (1977) -- a much better place to spend your money. If you're looking for a shorter read which nonetheless covers the highlights accurately, then I would recommend Michael Coren's "J.R.R Tolkien: The Man Who Created The Lord of the Rings" much more readily than this book.

(2) While the other reviewers have quite properly judged the book for its contents rather than its cover, I think it's nonetheless useful to point out that White's laziness (he actually admits that most of his research came from 'googling' Tolkien websites) and his essential disinterest in (and consequent lack of respect for) Tolkien's work are all tellingly revealed in his treatment of Tolkien's invented writing systems in the cover art.

On the cover of this edition of the book (see picture above), the author and/or his publishers have added runes and script which are clearly meant to evoke the title pages of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, where such texts could be meaningfully deciphered (with the help of Tolkien's opening note on runes in The Hobbit, and of Appendix E to the Lord of the Rings) to disclose a longer title and additional details about the books. Here, though, Tolkien's angerthas runes appear in the background in random order, while a photograph of Tolkien is encircled by an equally meaningless inscription in Tolkien's tengwar script. Elsewhere, I've written a review of an earlier edition of this book, where the cover eschews Tolkien's scripts in favor of a repeating series of 24 characters from the "futhorc" (i.e., the Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet). Equally meaningless, but at least not quite as disrespectful to an author who lavished great time and attention on these invented scripts and the languages they recorded.

Just a short review of the book : while I did like the book and it was a fast read, I had trouble with some of the stuff being said. For one thing White comes across as not liking C.S. Lewis. I just couldn't understand where some of his facts were coming from. He makes crazy things up and I could tell that he has never researched the man and therefore should not be making comments on Lewis or his wife. I guess that was one of my biggest gripes. If you don't really know much about Tolkien or Lewis then go a head and read it. I'm now buying Carpenters book to get the real story. It's a shame that anyone can cash in on someone.

I thought the book, being short, was well done. I'm not a tolkien, the man, fan, myself, I just like the books he wrote. It was short enough to keep me interested and didn't go into tolkien worship. He was a man just like any of us. White didn't go into intense depth like some of the other authors, who border on tolkien worship. This book is for those who want to skim his life, his associations, like C.S. Lewis, his wife, etc., to see who he really is really quickly and go on. The few supposed 'errors' as some other reviewers put it, are completely outweighed by the many facts put forth by the author that paint the picture as it is done in other works, but at 30,000 feet. Like I said before if you want more depth and concise tolkien history go to some other book.

Over 100 million copies of the Lord of the Rings and 60 million copies of the Hobbit have been sold around the world. Each of these books have been translated into 30 languages including Serbo-Croat, Icelandic, Hebrew and Russian.
Tolkien's works were a major component of 1960's hippie culture, and hundreds of Tolkien societies have flourished all over the world. With the release of the smash hit Lord of the Rings movie series, a new wave of Tolkienmania has swept the world, and a welcome development too. With the blurring of moral values we have seen in recent years, we need an influence that makes the distinction between good and evil, that shows that the forces of evil threatening the free world, do not have to win.

In this work, Michael White delves into hte life of the creator of Middle Earth, his birth in Bloemfontein, South Africa, the idyllic childhood in Sarehole, England ,and his mother's conversion to Catholic Church, and the tragic early death of his parents. Tolkien's Catholic faith would be a major part of his entire life.
The book covers the development of Tolkien's thought and literary tastes, his romance with Edith Bratt, who was to be his wife for over 50 years, his action in the British Army during the First World War, and his academic career, his long years as an Oxford Don and Professor of Anglo-Saxon.
It also covers the process behind the creation of Tolkien's most famous works, the Hobbit, the Lord of the Rings and the Silmarillion, and his lifelong creation, the world of Middle Earth and the Undying Lands.
It also tells of his membership of the club the Inklings, which met for many years, in the pub, the Eagle and Child.
The book tells much of Tolkien's character and of the acclaim and criticism of Tolkien's work, including the recent malicious libel against 'Tolkien the racist', 'Tolkien the sexist' and 'Tolkien the fascist' , by narrow minded politically correct bigots.
Ultimately the massive following of Tolkien's works and the spin-offs they have inspired, speak for themselves.
Long live the spirit of JRR Tolkien.

I read this book in just one day, wanting to know more about Tolkien. The chapters are all interestig. The author spent a great time going about his most famous book, The Lord Of The Rings. Altough White clearly loves Tolkien's writing, he does not worship him, and manages to produce well balanced commentaries.

Have you read and re-read LOTR over the years, purchased all of the movies but don't know much about JRR Tolkien's background and personal life? If so, then this book may be the ticket. It's not a big biography and can actually be read in a day or two.
But what a wealth of info and personal tidbits!
1) Tolkien was a devoted father of four. But he had some personal baggage. For example he had a somewhat rocky relationship with his wife. After teaching all day and grading papers, he hung out at the local pub with C.S. Lewis and crew to drink brewskis after work. Tolkien did however spend a lot of time with his kids and he was a doting father of four..one wonders where he found the time to write. Apparently, he would work after everyone was asleep (10 pm) and then delve into his writing until around 2 am! An increadible schedule which seems to be a typical success pattern for achievers. They always seem to find the time.
2) His relationship with C.S. Lewis was strained after 20 years which by then they scarcely aknowledged one another. Tolkien was both jealous and resentful of CS Lewis. For example, Tolkien hated "the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe". But the Inklings in the 50's was where he got his muse.
3) Tolkien was a strict Roman Catholic...he hated the Church of England and didn't exactly have a lot of tolerance for non-catholics. He was a man of his times..very conservative and opinionated.
4) The section on his war experience is pretty good too. Many people are not aware that Tolkien served in WWI trenches.
Overall, this biography is a wealth of info on J.R.R. Tolkien and a real eye-opener. I highly recommend it to Tolkien lovers.

I'm a major Tolkien fan, thanks to my dad, and I thought reading this book would be a great way to learn more about Tolkien's life and what influenced his writing and ideas. It started off as a great read, until I got to the end of page 86, where it suddenly skipped to page 119!!!!!!!!!!! The middle of chapter five turns into the middle of chapter 7. I bought the book at a Borders bookstore in Michigan and I have already gone back and placed an ordered for another copy, but I am hoping other copies are not missing pages. I did enjoy reading this book because the author delves deep into Tolkien's life to give the reader all aspects. I recommend this book to any Tolkien fan. Hopefully, I will get another copy soon!!