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On the 21st of September 1937 the first copies of The Hobbit, or There and Back Again, appeared on the shelves of bookstores in England. The maps and illustrations were drawn by the author, one JRR Tolkien, and by Christmas 1937 the book had sold out of its first printing. Tolkien began writing The Hobbit in 1928 after writing down “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit” whilst grading exam papers. The rest is history. The success of The Hobbit led to fans demanding to ... read more

Unseen letters from famous authors such as JRR Tolkien are now on display in East Dunbartonshire. The event at Harper Collins office in Bishopbriggs is part of the Doors Open Days season, which is promoted by the Scottish Civic Trust. The open day includes maps showing the changing face of Glasgow through the decades.  There are explanations of how dictionaries are made.  The open day features original artwork by Alice B Woodward from the 1907 edition of Peter Pan. Felicity ... read more

Hollywood can be a fickle place, with many film-makers struggling to work out where their next gig is coming from. Jealous eyes, then, will be focusing firmly this morning on the hirsute visage of Guillermo del Toro, who, according to Variety, has just signed a deal to keep him in work until 2017. The Mexican director yesterday announced that he will work on four new films for Universal after he completes his current projects, which include the two planned prequels to The Lord of the Rings, ... read more

Enid Blyton has been named the United Kingdom’s best-loved writer, beating Harry Potter creator JK Rowling into third place and leaving literary giants such as Shakespeare, Jane Austen and Charles Dickens trailing. Blyton, creator of the Famous Five books as well as the Secret Seven, Malory Towers and Noddy, topped a poll of 2,000 adults for the 2008 Costa Book Awards. There was an extremely strong showing for fantasy authors, with Roald Dahl, JRR Tolkien and Stephen King all making the ... read more

There was a touching story in the Santa Barbara Independent today. Lyle Hillegas was the former Westmont College President and El Montecito Presbyterian Church Pastor who sadly passed away this week after a battle with cancer. Tom Schmidt, a fellow religious professional, carried him to his garden - a little corner of England nurtured by his own hand and read to him. Lyle’s choice for his last story was JRR Tolkien’s “Leaf by Niggle,” the tale of a modestly talented ... read more

Pauline Baynes, the artist and illustrator who died on August 1 aged 85, brought the worlds of CS Lewis’s Narnia and JRR Tolkien’s Middle Earth to life with her superb line drawings. In 1948 Tolkien was visiting his publishers, George Allen & Unwin, to talk about some disappointing artwork that they had commissioned for Farmer Giles of Ham, when he spotted some witty reinterpretations of medieval marginalia from the Luttrell Psalter that greatly appealed to him. These, it ... read more

Fantasy author Terry Pratchett has been named the ‘evergreen’ king in The Bookseller’s first-ever register of titles that have never fallen out of the top 5,000 chart. Only 12 books, out of the more than 1.8 million titles that Nielsen BookScan are on the ‘evergreen’ chart. Pratchett has three of his early Discworld novels in the selection: The Colour of Magic, Mort and The Light Fantastic. Sebastian Faulks’ Birdsong came out top. JRR Tolkien’s The ... read more

Terry Goodkind’s Wizard’s First Rule (unabridged) has stormed to the top of the fantasy charts at Audible.co.uk Wizard’s First Rule by Terry Goodkind Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman Northern Lights by Philip Pullman Outcast by Michelle Paver Prince Caspian by CS Lewis Stone of Tears by Terry Goodkind Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett All the top ten are ... read more

Oxford is set to honour CS Lewis with a blue plaque at his former Oxford home where he wrote his ever popular fantasy series, The Chronicles of Narnia. Lewis lived at The Kilns in Risinghurst, also known as ‘The Gateway to Narnia’, for 33 years and it was here that the fantasy author wrote his successful children’s stories. The Narnia books have sold more than 60 million copies worldwide. The commemorative plaque will be unveiled this Saturday (26th of July 2008) and will ... read more

Sir Ian McKellen, the actor who played Gandalf in Peter Jackson’s adaptations of The Lord of the Rings, said on Sunday he has received death threats due to his homosexuality and while these had fallen off in recent years, others were still being subjected to homophobia. “My own death threats have declined considerably. I think I’ve become rather boring now to the public at large on this particular issue so I’m thought to be unremarkable.” Sir Ian McKellen is a ... read more