Tolkien 📔Book Covers

[Turgon]

I was leafing through my copy of 'The Book of Lost Tales II' earlier and was really struck by its cover - It's a picture by Roger Garland of the Fall of Gondolin and shows the Walls of Gondolin being attacked by Tolkien's earlier 'mechanical' dragons and a swarm of orcs coming out of the Dragons' bellies... it's really evocative... Just wondering what everybody else favourite book covers are... or even better, what your favourite Tolkien picture is... my Favourite book cover is the cover of my paperback Silmarillion, showing the Swan Ships of Alqualonde, also by Roger Garland, its beautiful...
As for Tolkien's art, well I'm a big fan of his pictures, there used to be a book in print in England called 'Pictures By JRRT' (think it was published by Unwin) I used to spend ages in the Bookshop looking at it... unfortunately I've not seen it for sale for about ten years now... and the picture books that have replaced it are just not of the same standard, which is sad...
But I love JRRT's picture of Smaug on his bed of gold ('cause he look so cute) and I loved the Heraldic designs he did for the different Houses in the Silmarillion...
Anyone else!?

 

[Talierin]

I love the heraldic emblems. They're on the box of my old lotr set. I've drawn some like them, though not as good. You can see them on my website.

Hmm, while we're at it, who's your favorite Tolkien artist besides the man himself? I really love Anke Eiszmann's art. It can be found here and here

 

[Turgon]

Big thanks for those links Talierin, fantastic... a real eye-opener... only spent about ten minutes or so looking at them, but I've book-marked them for a later viewing... I really loved the Luthien pictures (especially the ones with her face turned away) and the picture of Faramir... oh... and the 'Finrod reminded of his Oath'
I always feel that my favourite Tolkien pictures are the one that agree most with my own idea's of how things should look, so I'm more into individual pictures as opposed to specific artists... one of my favourite Tolkien pictures of all time is the 'City of Tirion' in 'A Tolkien Bestiary' by Linda Garland, I've got a copy of it on my wall... I did it in Oils myself and I'm really proud of it

 

[Talierin]

Yeah, same for me. I really don't like a lot of the big Tolkien artists like Howe, Nasmith, H. Brothers, Lee, etc, because most of the time their art doesn't fit what I imagined. That's why I really love Anke's work--even though it is a little strange--nearly all of it fits what I imagined, especially her latest pencil sketch of Faramir. Also, she does Sil art, which most artists don't do. That one pic of Luthien dancing always makes me get tears in my eyes cause it's so like what I imagined.

I'd love to see your painting! Can you get it scanned?

Heh, I once saw this really nasty pic of Luthien dancing, she was in a bright red bikini....

 

[Turgon]

Can't scan my Tirion painting, because it's too big... I tried scanning a few of my other paintings to put into the 'Guild of Artists' but nothing's come out well enough to do them justice. My friend's scanner is the only one I've got access to and it pretty poor...
Luthien in a bright red bikini? Nooooo!!! Surely she'd look better in a blue one...

 

[Hirila]

Try this link.

Wonderful pictures of many artists.

http://www.lycos.de/inc/link/treffer.html?URL=http://user.baden-online.de/~ckraemer/index2.htm

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Barbara Remington has died:

Redirect Notice

Those covers were on my first copies.

 

[CirdanLinweilin]

Has died:

Redirect Notice

Those covers were on my first copies.

Requiescat in Pace.




CL

 

[Elthir]

More sad news.

I know Tolkien fumed about parts of her illustration used for the covers, but The Lord of the Rings was eye catching I think, and I liked the idea of the three books under "one cover", so to speak. As my first edition as well, I feel a certain nostalgia for the illustration too.

Rest in peace.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

I used to have the mural, but foolishly gave it to a girlfriend long ago.

 

[Erestor Arcamen]

One thing I haven't seen discussed in a while are the various editions of Tolkien's books and their covers. I know there are countless versions out there but I'd love to see your favorites. I'm in the U.S. so I'm sure some of our international users have their own editions that they find special and that a lot of us may not have seen before. Some of the international versions I have seen are gorgeous! I'd love to see what you've got and I'm sure other members would too.

The first time I read Lord of the Rings, I borrowed the books from the library so these covers are definitely special to me. I love the simplicity of them.

This is the current hardback edition that I own but if I could find the older ones from above, I'd buy them for sure.

I'll dig up my copy of The Hobbit and share it too but I'd love to see covers from your country or that are special to you!

🥮

 

[Elthir]

I bought my first edition The Lord of the Rings in Winchester, years ago (okay, technically my wife bought it for me) -- with the Tolkien covers from EA's library (above). My favorite one volume edition (purchased last century by me) is this red gem!

 

[Rivendell_librarian]

This shows the Folio society standard editions:

 

[Elthir]

I like this Fellowship of The Ring cover (the other covers by this artist are nice as well, but this one is my favorite of the three).

 

[Elthir]

And these of course! More Tolkien!

 

[Erestor Arcamen]

I have Fellowship in that edition, though it's definitely seen better days. I really like their artwork too.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Who's the artist on your second one, Elthir? I haven't seen that one.

 

[Starbrow]

My first set OF LOTR was the same paperbacks as on Elthir's post. This is the hard cover version I got a couple of years later. The paper dust jackets disintegrated with frequent rereadings.

 

[TrackerOrc]

One thing I haven't seen discussed in a while are the various editions of Tolkien's books and their covers. I know there are countless versions out there but I'd love to see your favorites. I'm in the U.S. so I'm sure some of our international users have their own editions that they find special and that a lot of us may not have seen before. Some of the international versions I have seen are gorgeous! I'd love to see what you've got and I'm sure other members would too.

The first time I read Lord of the Rings, I borrowed the books from the library so these covers are definitely special to me. I love the simplicity of them.

This is the current hardback edition that I own but if I could find the older ones from above, I'd buy them for sure.

I'll dig up my copy of The Hobbit and share it too but I'd love to see covers from your country or that are special to you!

🥮

The three volumes were the first ones I owned many years ago, and coincidentally, I now have the 50th Anniversary edition too.

I also have a one-volume edition, with illustrations by Alan Lee, with (if I remember correctly) the front cover showing Gollum, Frodo and Sam at the Black Gate.

I don't know if it's just me, but I always throw away the slip-covers on any hardback books I own.

 

[Elthir]

Who's the artist on your second one, Elthir? I haven't seen that one.

The artist is Jian Guo S-eS . . . but now I'm not so sure these were published as book covers. I found this on the web, dated 2015:

One of the benefits of buying tangible books over the digital editions is some of the artistry that goes into designing the book covers. One fine example of this are the possible new Chinese variants of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. These amazing covers were designed by artist Jian Guo and are part of a competition held by the publisher WenJing Publishing. The company has been soliciting entries for the past year for the upcoming re-release of the Chinese version of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

I thought the illustrations had won the competition, but maybe not? And I'm posting this one below 'cause if this is "Khamûl"
(as some refer to one of the Ringwraiths) he looks lost.



Artist: John Jude Palencar