What do you think?
Rate this book
Poems from The Lord of the Rings
Hardback volume containing the well-loved poems from Tolkien's literary masterpiece The Lord of The Rings, featuring a cover illustrated by celebrated Tolkien artist Alan Lee. Featuring poems written in Tolkien's inimitable style -- each of which add to the magic, mystery and lyricism of the epic saga The Lord of The Rings. These poems can also be enjoyed as a separate entity, apart from the main body of the text , with each stanza giving an insight into the mythology and sagas of Tolkien's parallel universe of Middle-earth. Trying to furnish England with a mythology he felt it hitherto lacked, and drawing on his own studies of epic poems of the past, including classics such as Beowulf, it could be argued that Tolkien's poetry is at the heart of the saga that was to become the Book of the Century.
96 pages, Hardcover
First published October 20, 1994
2 people are currently reading
549 people want to read
About the author
J.R.R. Tolkien
799 books78.1k followersJohn Ronald Reuel Tolkien: writer, artist, scholar, linguist. Known to millions around the world as the author of The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien spent most of his life teaching at the University of Oxford where he was a distinguished academic in the fields of Old and Middle English and Old Norse. His creativity, confined to his spare time, found its outlet in fantasy works, stories for children, poetry, illustration and invented languages and alphabets.
Tolkien’s most popular works, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are set in Middle-earth, an imagined world with strangely familiar settings inhabited by ancient and extraordinary peoples. Through this secondary world Tolkien writes perceptively of universal human concerns – love and loss, courage and betrayal, humility and pride – giving his books a wide and enduring appeal.
Tolkien was an accomplished amateur artist who painted for pleasure and relaxation. He excelled at landscapes and often drew inspiration from his own stories. He illustrated many scenes from The Silmarillion, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, sometimes drawing or painting as he was writing in order to visualize the imagined scene more clearly.
Tolkien was a professor at the Universities of Leeds and Oxford for almost forty years, teaching Old and Middle English, as well as Old Norse and Gothic. His illuminating lectures on works such as the Old English epic poem, Beowulf, illustrate his deep knowledge of ancient languages and at the same time provide new insights into peoples and legends from a remote past.
Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa, in 1892 to English parents. He came to England aged three and was brought up in and around Birmingham. He graduated from the University of Oxford in 1915 and saw active service in France during the First World War before being invalided home. After the war he pursued an academic career teaching Old and Middle English. Alongside his professional work, he invented his own languages and began to create what he called a mythology for England; it was this ‘legendarium’ that he would work on throughout his life. But his literary work did not start and end with Middle-earth, he also wrote poetry, children’s stories and fairy tales for adults. He died in 1973 and is buried in Oxford where he spent most of his adult life.
Tolkien’s most popular works, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are set in Middle-earth, an imagined world with strangely familiar settings inhabited by ancient and extraordinary peoples. Through this secondary world Tolkien writes perceptively of universal human concerns – love and loss, courage and betrayal, humility and pride – giving his books a wide and enduring appeal.
Tolkien was an accomplished amateur artist who painted for pleasure and relaxation. He excelled at landscapes and often drew inspiration from his own stories. He illustrated many scenes from The Silmarillion, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, sometimes drawing or painting as he was writing in order to visualize the imagined scene more clearly.
Tolkien was a professor at the Universities of Leeds and Oxford for almost forty years, teaching Old and Middle English, as well as Old Norse and Gothic. His illuminating lectures on works such as the Old English epic poem, Beowulf, illustrate his deep knowledge of ancient languages and at the same time provide new insights into peoples and legends from a remote past.
Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa, in 1892 to English parents. He came to England aged three and was brought up in and around Birmingham. He graduated from the University of Oxford in 1915 and saw active service in France during the First World War before being invalided home. After the war he pursued an academic career teaching Old and Middle English. Alongside his professional work, he invented his own languages and began to create what he called a mythology for England; it was this ‘legendarium’ that he would work on throughout his life. But his literary work did not start and end with Middle-earth, he also wrote poetry, children’s stories and fairy tales for adults. He died in 1973 and is buried in Oxford where he spent most of his adult life.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
June 8, 2021
Rating: 5 stars
The poems in The Lord of the Rings are often overlooked, but I think they are wonderful. The way Tolkien inserts the verses throughout his epic story is so clever, and it is even more clear in this small bind up. The the poems slowly decrease in frequency as The Lord of the Rings goes on, as it gets more and more darker in tone, as the elves and other races more likely to sing leave and men remain. Automatically the story seems less light. Tolkien spent a very long time on his tome, and it's no surprise that I am still discovering things about it.
The poems in The Lord of the Rings are often overlooked, but I think they are wonderful. The way Tolkien inserts the verses throughout his epic story is so clever, and it is even more clear in this small bind up. The the poems slowly decrease in frequency as The Lord of the Rings goes on, as it gets more and more darker in tone, as the elves and other races more likely to sing leave and men remain. Automatically the story seems less light. Tolkien spent a very long time on his tome, and it's no surprise that I am still discovering things about it.
March 21, 2024
This book is just Awesome! Like all The Lord of the Rings books series. If You like Lord of The Rings, You have to read this book. Its nice choice to Your library collection :)
December 27, 2024
A nice reminder of the Trilogy, perhaps time for a second reading.
November 16, 2025
It seems I will always go back to LOTR.
Read
January 23, 2026Alan Lee’s art is so beautiful.
June 7, 2024
I had such a great time with this little book. It presents nothing new, but I listened to performances of the songs/poems while reading, especially by Clamavi De Profundis and the Tolkien Ensemble. Anyway, I wish we had a similar book for all the poems found in the rest of Tolkien's works (specifically all the poems that were published in the HoME).
August 10, 2021
Nice way to bring all the poems together from LOTR
December 5, 2021
A quick read, of course, but beautifully illustrated and with all of Tolkien‘s LotR poems in one place, who could resist!
March 22, 2015
A lovely, short and beautifully illustrated journey through Middle Earth. Must re-read some Tolkien soon.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews