[Estelyn Telcontar]

During my recent vacation, I read an old Tolkien biography that I found on my brother’s bookshelf and talked him into letting me keep. I suppose it could be called obsolete, since it dates back to 1976 and the author did not have access to information and documents because the family did not support nor cooperate with him. It was written before Humphrey’s official biography, which appeared one year later. Here’s a brief summary of the book.

• Title – J.R.R.Tolkien – Architect of Middle Earth
• Author – Daniel Grotta-Kurska
• Publisher – Warner Books
• Date of Copyright – 1976
• Edition – first (and presumably only)
  
• Summary description of the book's main themes – Each chapter of this biography deals with a period of JRRT’s life, from “The Young Lad” to “The Recluse”.
  
• Strengths and weaknesses of the book – Since the author had to rely on what research he was able to do, largely on his own, he presents a different view of Tolkien than the official biography. Writing as an American, primarily for Americans, he explains a lot of socio-cultural background which is often unfamiliar to those readers, for example the British school/university system. That is the book’s greatest strength, as I see it. He also draws his own conclusions and deductions from the information available to him, making plain by the way he states them that they are his own ideas. This is both strength and weakness, since some of his conclusions are later proved wrong from Tolkien’s documents/letters. The unofficial status of the book is a weakness as well; several passages of it had to be deleted for legal reasons. (Reading the notice of that fact made me all the more curious about what might have been there!)
  
• Whether you generally recommend this book and why – This is no substitute for Carpenter’s biography and is most likely no longer available, since I have not heard of it elsewhere. For completists who come across it and enjoy tidbits of additional information after reading Carpenter’s biography, it’s worth it.
  
• Whether you specifically recommend it for novices and why – Beginners who want a Tolkien biography should start with Carpenter’s official one, since he had access to the Tolkien family, papers, and letters.