http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/J-R-R-Tolkien-s ... 972_W0QQitemZ170463423740

Not sure about this one...

This one was recently sold and brought (assumingly by ebay seller) at an auction. Regretably i couldnt attend myself and missed seeing it. I am awaiting a reply from seller but it certainly looks interesting?

The latest (which went unsold, with no bids) is a standard Allen & Unwin internal memo of the period. We've seen many examples. Nor do we have any problem with the signature and date on the verso being in Tolkien's hand. The event to which Tolkien was driven on 14 July 1972, at the Allen & Unwin offices and warehouses at Hemel Hempstead, is mentioned in our Chronology, p. 765, and in Letters, p. 421.

Wayne & Christina

Thanks Wayne & Chistina
I took a punt and brought it. I knew it had come from the son of the driver and with a few enquiries as well I was fairly confident (although I did miss the letters entry) it was genuine.
Awaiting its arrival. I always said I wouldnt bow to buying signature as overpriced but there you go.

CANT WAIT!

Not seen these bookplates before, but it looks okay to me, even though the seller recently tried to pass off a "Higgins" letter.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Christopher-Tol ... tible?hash=item5886d03025

Looks good to me as well.
In fairness this seller did remove the Higgins when he learnt errors of his way.

Is it correct that 200 plates were signed by Christopher as claimed in advert. I too havent ever seen one before and you would have thought that if 200 were done one would have hit the market before now?
Also why wouldnt he have signed the books themselves or have i missed something.


Any thoughts?

The bookplate is very nice - I have one myself, pasted inside a copy of the Methuen edition, bound in blue leather. (Mine has the inscription, in Christopher's hand, 'With gratitude, Christopher Tolkien').

But ths seller's write-up is nonsense. Stating that Christopher and JRR had a bad relationship, and suggesting that CT went ahead and published TS after JRR's death anyway.

It's nothing short of scandalous.

Laurel writes:

"Also why wouldnt he have signed the books themselves or have i missed something."

I think it would have been unusual for CT to sign the actual books - much easier all round for the publisher to send him a packet of bookplates. Allen and Unwin did the same thing in 1987, when CT signed the first 100 bookplates for the full-leather 'super de luxe' Hobbit. And of course, more recently, CT signed a number of bookplates for the publication of CoH.

Mind you, the super deluxe copies (and those of Sigurd and Gudrun) are signed to the page... I guess CT and Alan Lee may have been sent the sheets to sign?

This whole auction listing really annoys me.

If the seller would spend more time talking about the book in question (this information is buried away at the bottom of the listing), and less time waffling a whole load of garbage about how, apparently, J. R. R. and Christopher never got on; along with much other peripheral rubbish about the books genesis --then the auction would have more success & would be viewed with less suspicion by this collector.

There are a number of oddities, biographical detail aside --none of them raising any particular doubts as to authenticity.

Firstly garm --nice story. You have one. Neil Holford (I'm sure he won't mind me saying) has a copy with similar pasted in bookplate. So these aren't unheard of. But the '1 of 200' limitation: I have asked the seller to confirm where this piece of information has come from. I doubt, like laurel, that 200 of these were ever signed, as they simply do not come up enough to suggest there are that many copies kicking around. I think this is a number plucked from the known facts regarding the CoH and Metheun Silmarillion releases. The seller would have been better not stating this.

The other statements suggesting Christopher attended the launch, but didn't flat sign --has anyone here ever heard any of this before? I have asked around a few times about when & where any launch was, and whether anyone can confirm if Christopher did, or did not, attend.

Nigel Sustins, of Church House Books, had some sort of Silmarillion launch back at publication time: Priscilla, Carpenter, and Rayner Unwin all attended --they signed his copy. I'm pretty sure this was right at publication time, or thereabouts --but Christopher did not attend. Not that this means much, but I always guessed he never attended any (public) launch.

Either way, if he was there (as this seller claims) why on earth would he not flat sign books, and only sign these bookplates? Also, Christopher did flat sign some copies for GA&U staff --someone else, besides me, has a copy (as it has been discussed on this forum); the providence was good --it was accompanied by an original typed note to the ex-GA&U employee stating that she would have to pay £2.48 for her signed copy. (Bargain!)

And, to one last point, why does the book (like some other items we've seen lately) only have a copy of the letter? Why on earth would someone sell this book and keep the old letter. I struggle to see why/how these became separated. (Understandable if the original letter was from Christopher or something; and was an item of worth in its own right.)

BH