The Book of Lost Tales Part One

“The Book of Lost Tales” is an assemblage of stories by JRR Tolkien which was published and distributed in two volumes, this one being the first. Written by Christopher Tolkien, it is a series of 12 volumes known as the “History of Middle-earth.” The oldest form of complex fictional myths, the manuscripts of these stories have been analyzed and presented in this book. Later on, was integrated into the book of The Silmarillion. The original tales were written by his father. Christopher Tolkien took to explain in detail about the myths and objects mentioned in the story, by putting down notes in his version. The second part of “The Book of Lost Tales,” followed a year after the publication of the first one.

The tales of The Silmarillion by JRR Tolkien, are quite different from those written by Christopher Tolkien although the history is quite similar. This might be the case because initially when Christopher had started writing tales & detailed explanations, he was still exploring part of the World created by his father. During the process of writing and discovering, a lot of words would be interchanged or used for different objects in the first and the second book. Although it might seem a little bit confusing, the days are written in a more complex and detailed manner in the Book of Lost Tales, if you compare them with The Silmarillion. The writing style is not very formal and is a little archaic & they use a lot of obsolete words, which were not continued by JRR Tolkein. The Noldoli suffered defeat much earlier and they became the subjects of Thingol even though they were determined to punish him. Thingol did not want Beren to marry his Daughter because he was a gnome & was blessed with immortality therefore was an enemy to the kingdom. The conversations between the different elf races are also quite different.

Christopher Tolkien changed the names of the characters quite frequently in his adaptations of the Book of Lost Tales because he was in the process of deciphering the world that was created by his father as part of Middle-Earth. Sometimes the obsolete names are repeated throughout his version and sometimes new names are introduced by him that was not part of JRR Tolkien’s version. In his version of the book, when a mere mortal man visited the Isle of Tol Eressëa they learned the history of its dwellers. In the previous editions, Eriol, as he was referred to, and in the later editions, he is used in the name of a European origin, Ælfwine. For ease of distribution, the book of lost Tales was divided into two parts consisting of different Tales from different times and different translations and descriptions.

In the table below, we made a comparative analysis of the Book of Lost Tales vis-a-vis the Silmarillion. Although more than the comparisons are the same, there are quite a few changes made by Christopher especially in terms of names of characters that were picked up from the original versions and not retained in the new versions of the book. In fact, even the new versions created by him change from time to time as he describes and translates the different tales. In the 6th part, the tale was broken down into two different parts for the convenience of storytelling.


The History of Middle-earth Series (1983 - 2002)

1. The History of Middle-earth: Index
2. The Peoples of Middle-earth
3. The Shaping of Middle-earth
4. Morgoth's Ring
5. The War of the Jewels
6. The War of the Ring
7. The Treason of Isengard
8. The Lost Road and Other Writings
9. The Return of the Shadow
10. The Lays of Beleriand
11. Sauron Defeated
12. The Book of Lost Tales Part One and Part Two