The History of Middle-earth (Boxed Set 1)

<strong>First in a series of hardback boxed sets celebrating the literary achievement of Christopher Tolkien, featuring double-sided dustjackets. Set 1 contains special editions of THE SILMARILLION and UNFINISHED TALES reproducing the first edition text, together with the two volumes of THE BOOK OF LOST TALES.</strong>

<strong><em>The Silmarillion</em></strong> is an account of the Elder Days, of the First Age of Tolkien's World. It is the ancient drama to which the characters in <em>The Lord of the Rings</em> look back, and in whose events some of them, such as Elrond and Galadriel, took part. The tales of <em>The Silmarillion</em> are set in an age when Morgoth, the first Dark Lord, dwelt in Middle-Earth, and the High Elves made war upon him for the recovery of the Silmarils, the jewels containing the pure light of Valinor.

<em><strong>Unfinished Tales</strong></em> is a collection of narratives ranging in time from the Elder Days of Middle-earth and the rise of Numenor in the Second Age to the end of the War of the Ring, and provides those who have read <em>The Hobbit</em> and <em>The Lord of the Rings</em> with a whole collection of background and new stories from the twentieth century's most acclaimed popular author.

<em><strong>The Book of Lost Tales</strong></em> stands at the beginning of the entire conception of Middle-earth and Valinor for the <em>Tales</em> were the first form of the myths and legends that came to be called <em>The Silmarillion</em>. Embedded in English legend and English association, they are set in the narrative frame of a great westward voyage over the Ocean by a mariner named Eriol to the lonely Isle where the Elves dwelt; from them he learned their true history, the Lost Tales of Elfinesse.

In the two volumes of the <em>Tales</em> are found the earliest accounts of Gods and Elves, Dwarves, Balrogs and Orcs; of the Silmarils and the Two Trees of Valinor; of the geography and cosmology of Tolkien's invented world.

Published together for the first time, these four books collect the beginning of Christopher Tolkien's forty-year career devoted to presenting his father J.R.R. Tolkien's writings on Middle-earth, a unique accomplishment that celebrates the greatest invented world in all of fantasy literature.