Thanks for adding some clarification. Sounds like rather an odd foreward.

Look at this!!

Nice find! I assume you bought it...

You betcha. At that price ($29.00), I even ran it past the wife first!

Enjoying the read, too.

I once had a conversation with a Scandinavian fellow (I can’t remember any more details about him), and when it turned to The Hobbit and Beorn, he nodded happily and told me he had grown up on tales of Beorn. That always stuck with me. I knew Beorn had literary antecedents, but the way he put it, the concept that there were more tales of Beorn out there somewhere, really ultimately got me very excited about this book.

I wonder what the story is behind the copyright dispute. It doesn't seem likely it would be something Doug would have overlooked before publishing. My guess would be that he got permission but upon publication, the estate (who acquired/given a copy), read the foreward, and "withdrew" their support (for its existence generally).

A nice find, indeed! I am still searching for a copy (original or the reissue)...

Does "33/3072" mean there were 3072 copies made?

Ulmo wrote:
Does "33/3072" mean there were 3072 copies made?

I am pretty sure that is a bookseller inventory code, not a publisher's notation. Meaningless except to the person who wrote it.

Thanks. That makes sense. So 33 is probably 1933.

Ulmo wrote:
Thanks. That makes sense. So 33 is probably 1933.

No, I don't think it refers to the year, but to a numbering system that meant something to the bookseller who wrote it and as Urulöké pointed out is now meaningless except for the person who wrote it.