My Private book 2013 - Uncollected Poems by J.R.R. Tolkien

That’s awesome: I want one lol!

Can you share any details about how it came to be? Even down to the copyright page??

At that time I sent a copy to the Tolkien Estate. I only made one copy. I can't sell or share it.
It is an amateur, fan-made book. It has sentimental value to me, but I don't consider it a collector's item.
I will "keep it secret" and "keep it safe".

I'm making my comparisons with the recent HarperCollins edition. It seems that the new box is still missing some Tolkien poems?

You can be a private as you wish with it, I was expressing interest in something that also appeals to me!

If you don’t mind sharing (and if you don’t think the post will be too long) could you share how the project came together? Like which poems did you select and why? And the order/placement of them?How about Alan Lee’s artwork that you chose to feature? Did they actually create the book themselves (HarperCollins and the Estate) or did you also create the copyright page?

Indeed: keep it secret and safe, as it’s a treasure. I’m just curious about the process, however much about it you wish to share 🙂 I’m interested, but I don’t wish to overstep or make you uncomfortable.

Eye_of_the_Black_Tower wrote:

You can be a private as you wish with it, I was expressing interest in something that also appeals to me!

If you don’t mind sharing (and if you don’t think the post will be too long) could you share how the project came together? Like which poems did you select and why? And the order/placement of them?How about Alan Lee’s artwork that you chose to feature? Did they actually create the book themselves (HarperCollins and the Estate) or did you also create the copyright page?

Indeed: keep it secret and safe, as it’s a treasure. I’m just curious about the process, however much about it you wish to share 🙂 I’m interested, but I don’t wish to overstep or make you uncomfortable.

Please do not badger members to do something they have already said that they are not comfortable doing.

This is really cool! Have you done or considered any other similar projects?

Concerning "It seems that [the recent Collected Poems release] is still missing some Tolkien poems?", I'm not sure what it's missing exactly, but it reportedly included ~70 poems that were not previously published. The three volumes combined are 1700+ pages, there's a lot in it.

Very cool project, thanks for sharing the photos!

rosshm16 wrote:

Concerning "It seems that [the recent Collected Poems release] is still missing some Tolkien poems?", I'm not sure what it's missing exactly, but it reportedly included ~70 poems that were not previously published. The three volumes combined are 1700+ pages, there's a lot in it.

Regarding what's "missing," I am still working my way through the 3 Collected Poems volumes, but I thought from a quick skim-through initially that all the known unpublished English poems were included except for the two bestiary poems that could not be found and for the full version of "The Song of Beewolf," significant excerpts of which were included and which the editors indicated would be worthy of its own volume.

Tuor son of Huor wrote:

Very cool project, thanks for sharing the photos!

rosshm16 wrote:

Concerning "It seems that [the recent Collected Poems release] is still missing some Tolkien poems?", I'm not sure what it's missing exactly, but it reportedly included ~70 poems that were not previously published. The three volumes combined are 1700+ pages, there's a lot in it.

Regarding what's "missing," I am still working my way through the 3 Collected Poems volumes, but I thought from a quick skim-through initially that all the known unpublished English poems were included except for the two bestiary poems that could not be found and for the full version of "The Song of Beewolf," significant excerpts of which were included and which the editors indicated would be worthy of its own volume.

Bummsdrapa also remains unpublished of the known poems. It is found at Leeds archive.

rosshm16 wrote:

I'm not sure what it's missing exactly

Most of the Hobbit and LotR poems are missing.

The very long poems are only represented by sample excerpts. Two of these poems remain unpublished elsewhere. (The Song of Beewolf Son of Echgethew & The Owl and the Nightingale)

There's some non-English poetry omitted.

And a few other things.

There's also a lot of alternate draft versions omitted, but I don't know if I'd count those.

Some of the omissions were due to not being able to access the relevant manuscripts. Most of the omissions were intentional.

Wayne and Christina stressed that it was "Collected Poems", not "Complete Poems". To have everything it would probably have needed to be double as long.

ibid wrote:

Two of these poems remain unpublished elsewhere. (The Song of Beewolf Son of Echgethew & The Owl and the Nightingale)

I hope these might be destined for separate publication, in that case.