There are over 20 books belonging to Tolkien's Legendarium and dozens more bearing Tolkien's name, so it comes as no surprise that many people - especially those who are new to the Legendarium - find it all rather confusing. The purpose of this post is to introduce these books and explain what they are and how they all relate to each other. This is not intended to be a comprehensive or exhaustive bibliography, but rather an in-depth introduction to aspiring readers.
Recommended Reading Order:
What are all these books about?
In his lifetime, J.R.R. Tolkien only published two major works set within his fantasy world of Middle-earth: The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings; these are the cornerstones of the entire Legendarium, and the two books that any aspiring Tolkien reader must read.
However, in his lifetime Tolkien produced thousands of pages of essays, narratives (mostly unfinished), revisions, notes etc., and much of this material has been published posthumously by his son, Christopher Tolkien (and much still remains unpublished). The first major posthumous publication is The Silmarillion, which presents the tales of the Elder Days, the early history and the mythology of Middle-earth. It was compiled by Christopher from many half-finished and often contradictory texts, and so, in his attempt to create a cohesive text, he had to make some editorial decisions which in later years he came to regret. For this reason Christopher then went on to publish even more of his father's works, going more in-depth, publishing unfinished texts with fewer editorial intrusions and discussing the evolution of his father's stories.
The first of these is Unfinished Tales, a collection of unfinished but quite well developed tales and essays, covering some of the stories already told in the Silmarillion (in much more detail) and more. Afterwards Christopher went on to publish the 12-volume The History of Middle-earth, which covers the development of the entire Legendarium and as much detail as anyone could hope for. More recently he also published the three Great Tales: The Children of Húrin, Beren and Lúthien and The Fall of Gondolin; the first of these compiles all the different versions of the story of Túrin Turambar into one cohesive narrative, whereas the latter two focus more on the conceptual evolution of the stories.
Also of note, as far as Middle-earth lore is concerned, are The History of The Hobbit (edited by John D. Rateliff), which is a counterpart to The History of Middle-earth; and the recently published The Nature of Middle-earth (edited by Carl F. Hostetter), which presents various late notes written by Tolkien regarding the nature (i.e. the basic or inherent features) of Middle-earth and its inhabitants. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien is also quite interesting and useful for better understanding some of Tolkien's ideas, and The Atlas of Middle-earth (by Karen W. Fonstad, a professional geographer) is highly recommended.
There are also plenty of other books concerning Middle-earth written by other authors (and please, for the love of Eru, avoid David Day like the plague), as well as a number of Tolkien's own works that do not concern Middle-earth - see the list below for some of them.
List of Books
This is not an exhaustive list of all the books relating to Tolkien and his Legendarium; however, it contains all of the most important books. Many of the books here are commonly referred to by abbreviations - in such cases the abbreviation(s) precede the name of the book and are given in bold.
For The History of Middle-earth books, it is also common to refer to them by number (e.g. HoMe III = The Lays of Beleriand); I do not give these abbreviations individually for each book so as to not overburden the list.
Main Legendarium
Recommended Reading Order:
- The Hobbit
- The Lord of the Rings
- The Silmarillion
- Unfinished Tales
- Everything else (the order no longer matters at this point)...
What are all these books about?
In his lifetime, J.R.R. Tolkien only published two major works set within his fantasy world of Middle-earth: The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings; these are the cornerstones of the entire Legendarium, and the two books that any aspiring Tolkien reader must read.
However, in his lifetime Tolkien produced thousands of pages of essays, narratives (mostly unfinished), revisions, notes etc., and much of this material has been published posthumously by his son, Christopher Tolkien (and much still remains unpublished). The first major posthumous publication is The Silmarillion, which presents the tales of the Elder Days, the early history and the mythology of Middle-earth. It was compiled by Christopher from many half-finished and often contradictory texts, and so, in his attempt to create a cohesive text, he had to make some editorial decisions which in later years he came to regret. For this reason Christopher then went on to publish even more of his father's works, going more in-depth, publishing unfinished texts with fewer editorial intrusions and discussing the evolution of his father's stories.
The first of these is Unfinished Tales, a collection of unfinished but quite well developed tales and essays, covering some of the stories already told in the Silmarillion (in much more detail) and more. Afterwards Christopher went on to publish the 12-volume The History of Middle-earth, which covers the development of the entire Legendarium and as much detail as anyone could hope for. More recently he also published the three Great Tales: The Children of Húrin, Beren and Lúthien and The Fall of Gondolin; the first of these compiles all the different versions of the story of Túrin Turambar into one cohesive narrative, whereas the latter two focus more on the conceptual evolution of the stories.
Also of note, as far as Middle-earth lore is concerned, are The History of The Hobbit (edited by John D. Rateliff), which is a counterpart to The History of Middle-earth; and the recently published The Nature of Middle-earth (edited by Carl F. Hostetter), which presents various late notes written by Tolkien regarding the nature (i.e. the basic or inherent features) of Middle-earth and its inhabitants. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien is also quite interesting and useful for better understanding some of Tolkien's ideas, and The Atlas of Middle-earth (by Karen W. Fonstad, a professional geographer) is highly recommended.
There are also plenty of other books concerning Middle-earth written by other authors (and please, for the love of Eru, avoid David Day like the plague), as well as a number of Tolkien's own works that do not concern Middle-earth - see the list below for some of them.
List of Books
This is not an exhaustive list of all the books relating to Tolkien and his Legendarium; however, it contains all of the most important books. Many of the books here are commonly referred to by abbreviations - in such cases the abbreviation(s) precede the name of the book and are given in bold.
For The History of Middle-earth books, it is also common to refer to them by number (e.g. HoMe III = The Lays of Beleriand); I do not give these abbreviations individually for each book so as to not overburden the list.
Main Legendarium
- H, TH The Hobbit
- LotR The Lord of the Rings (LR5050th Anniversary Edition with continuous pagination)
- I, FR The Fellowship of the Ring
- II, TT The Two Towers
- III, RK The Return of the King
- Silm, S The Silmarillion
- UT Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth
- The Great Tales of Middle-earth:
- CoH The Children of Húrin
- BaL, B&L Beren and Lúthien
- FoG The Fall of Gondolin
- HoMeThe History of Middle-earth
- LT1 The Book of Lost Tales, Part I
- LT2 The Book of Lost Tales, Part II
- LB The Lays of Beleriand
- SM The Shaping of Middle-earth
- LR The Lost Road and Other Writings
- RS The Return of the Shadow
- TI The Treason of Isengard
- WR The War of the Ring
- SD Sauron Defeated
- MR Morgoth's Ring
- WJ The War of the Jewels
- PM The Peoples of Middle-earth
- HHThe History of The Hobbit (edited by John D. Rateliff)
- Part One: Mr. Baggins
- Part Two: Return to Bag-End
- NoMe, NM The Nature of Middle-earth (edited by Carl F. Hostetter)
- Tales from the Perilous Realm
- Roverandom
- Farmer Giles of Ham
- The Adventures of Tom Bombadil
- Smith of Wootton Major
- Leaf by Niggle
- The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún
- The Fall of Arthur
- Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary
- The Story of Kullervo
- The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun
- Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, with Pearl and Sir Orfeo
- Let, Letters The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien
- RGEO The Road Goes Ever On
- MC The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays
- LFC Letters from Father Christmas (edited by Baillie Tolkien)
- Bilbo's Last Song
- A Secret Vice
- J.R.R. Tolkien: Artist and Illustrator
- The Art of The Hobbit
- The Art of The Lord of the Rings
- RC The Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion (Wayne G. Hammond & Christina Scull)
- The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide (Christina Scull & Wayne G. Hammond)
- Fonstad The Atlas of Middle-earth (Karen W. Fonstad)
- The Annotated Hobbit (annotated by Douglas A. Anderson)
- The Road to Middle-Earth: How J. R. R. Tolkien Created a New Mythology (Tom Shippey)
- J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (Tom Shippey)
- J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography (Humphrey Carpenter)
- Flora of Middle-earth: Plants of J.R.R. Tolkien's Legendarium (Walter S. Judd & Graham A. Judd)
- Exploring J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit (Corey Olsen)
- PE Parma Eldalamberon; 22 issues, e.g. PE17 = Parma Eldalamberon #17
- VT Vinyar Tengwar; 50 issues, e.g. VT49 = Vinyar Tengwar #49
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