Chris Tolkien

Chris Tolkien died. The world is better for him having been in it.

Chris put a great deal of work into preparing and publishing his father’s work for popular consumption, and Children of Hurin is and was one of the great Middle Earth works. But I’ve heard another story a few times.

The Hobbit started out as a bedtime story John (JRR) told his kids. As he told it, he would get details confused and mixed up. Thorin would have a blue hood one day and a purple the next. Chris bugged his father about this until in a fit of pique JRR wrote the whole thing down.

And thus we have the Hobbit and later the Lord of the Rings. More directly the Silmarillion, Histories, Unfinished Tales, and more.

The world is a better place for them having been in it.