A professor sits in his study at Northmoor Road, grading exam papers. His name is John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. He fought in the First World War and he loves ancient myths.

As he grades the papers, he turns a page and sees that the student has left it blank. So he takes his pen and scribbles: “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.”

Tolkien doesn’t know what a hobbit is. But he is going to find out, and thus begins one of the greatest fantasy stories ever written.

J. R. R. Tolkien is the beloved author of “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings,” some of the most influential works of fantasy ever written. His stories about hobbits and Middle-earth manage to capture a sense of heroism in a tragic world, a sense of the Fall of Man and the unattainable desire to go back to Eden. 

Tolkien takes the ordinary miracles of courage, pity, and friendship — exemplified in the hobbits — and pits them against the full malice of the Dark Lord and his Ring of Power. All this in the most epic of adventures for the fate of Middle-earth. 

Of all writers, Tolkien is my favorite, and his works have significantly shaped my childhood imagination and, by extension, who I am today.

Some of my earliest memories are of listening to “The Hobbit” before bed and being enthralled by it. It seemed much more glamorous and exciting than my life.

It awoke a tremendous desire in me to run off with the dwarves and travel over mountains and look for lost treasure. When I first started writing my own stories (at the age of nine), I could not help but write my own version of “The Hobbit,” as there seemed nothing else worth writing about.

Today, many people are familiar with “The Lord of the Rings” through Peter Jackson’s adaptations. While Jackson’s films are indeed praiseworthy, they do not compare to the books.

I encourage all enthusiasts of fantasy and adventure to read Tolkien, to step into the beautiful and perilous world of Middle-earth.

Sources: J. R. R. Tolkien: A Biography by Humphrey Carpenter (Houghton Mifflin, 1977).