The Lord of the Rings
... in intertwining the stories of all of the creatures to make the story, and Middle-earth, seem completely and undeniably real. Angela Arnold Marcia Kinter English 10002: Section 401 14 March 2005 Annotated Bibliography Brawn, David. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers Creatures. 2002. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2002. This is a behind-the scenes guide to The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers film. It highlights the main characters and creatures of this second part of the trilogy. It also gives some information on why creatures were chosen, why some weren’t, and how they created those creatures for the film. Full of color photographs from the movie, it’s just a short guide to some of the interesting things most people don’t know about. Chance, Jane. The Lord of the Rings: The Mythology of Power. 1992. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1992. Jane Chance critically explores the mythology of power – that is, how power, politics, and language interact. Chance analyzes the similarities of Tolkien’s masterpiece to the world of today, even though this story predates history. She claims that “The Lord of the Rings addresses the mid-twentieth century fear that the individual is powerless against political manifestations of evil.” Day, David. The World of Tolkien: Mythological Sources of The Lord of the Rings. 2003. New York: Gramercy Books, 2003. The World of Tolkien uncovers the “vast array of mythological, historical, literary, linguistic, and creative” sources that J.R.R. Tolkien used to create Middle-earth. Tolkien created a history for Middle-earth, but also an “imaginary history of our own world.” Many of his creatures and monsters were based on myths from around the world, and many of the places were inspired by real-life locations. This book is “the comprehensive guide to uncovering the ‘real-world’ inspiration behind the gods and demi-gods, races of men, elves and dwarves, wizards and hobbits, creatures and monsters, cities, geography, battles, and major events in the history of Middle-earth.” Garth, John. Tolkien and the Great War: The Threshold of Middle-earth. 2003. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2003. This biography details the life of J.R.R. Tolkien and how his horror and heroism helped shape Middle-earth. It describes the life he faced as a signals officer in the Battle of the Somme and introduces the reader to his close circle of three friends, and how the death of two of them spurred his story even further. This book claims to be “the first substantially new biography of Tolkien since 1977, meticulously researched and distilled from his personal wartime papers and a multitude of other sources.” John Garth embarks on a journey to argue that the foundation of Tolkien’s creation lies in the First World War, and how he kept “enchantment alive, reshaping an entire literary tradition into a form that resonates to this day.” Isaacs, Neil D. and Rose A. Zimbardo. Understanding the Lord of the Rings: The Best of Tolkien Criticism. 2004. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. This definitive collection of essays on The...