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The Fall of Gondolin
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The Fall of Gondolin
The Fall of Gondolin is a 2018 book of fantasy fiction by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by his son Christopher. The story is one of what Tolkien called the three "Great Tales" from the First Age of Middle-earth; the other two are Beren and Lúthien and The Children of Húrin. All three stories are briefly summarised in the 1977 book The Silmarillion, and all three have now been published as stand-alone books. A version of the story also appears in The Book of Lost Tales. In the narrative, Gondolin was founded by King Turgon in the First Age. The city was carefully hidden, enduring for centuries before being betrayed and destroyed. Written in 1917, it is one of the first stories of Tolkien's legendarium.
Tolkien began writing the story that would become The Fall of Gondolin in 1917 in an army barracks on the back of a sheet of military marching music. It is one of the first stories of his Middle-earth legendarium that he wrote down on paper, after his 1914 tale, inspired by the Old English manuscript Crist 1, "The Voyage of Earendel, the Evening Star". While the first half of the story "appears to echo Tolkien's creative development and slow acceptance of duty in the first year of the war," the second half echoes his personal experience of battle. The story was read aloud by Tolkien to the Exeter College Essay Club in the spring of 1920.
Tolkien was constantly revising his First Age stories; however, the narrative he wrote in 1917, published posthumously in The Book of Lost Tales, remains the only full account of the fall of the city.
The narrative "Of Tuor and the Fall of Gondolin" in the 1977 book The Silmarillion was the result of the editing by his son Christopher using the 1917 narrative (minus some elements all too obviously evocative of World War I warfare) and compressed versions from the different versions of the Annals and Quentas as additional sources. The later Quenta Silmarillion and the Grey Annals, the main sources for much of the published Silmarillion, both stop before the beginning of the Tuor story.
A partial later version of The Fall of Gondolin was published in the 1980 book Unfinished Tales under the title "Of Tuor and his Coming to Gondolin". Originally titled "Of Tuor and the Fall of Gondolin," this narrative shows a great expansion of the earlier tale. Christopher Tolkien retitled the story before including it in Unfinished Tales, because it ends at the point of Tuor's arrival in Gondolin, and does not depict the actual Fall.
There is also an unfinished poem, The Lay of the Fall of Gondolin, of which a few verses are quoted in the 1985 book The Lays of Beleriand. In 130 verses Tolkien reaches the point where dragons attack the city.
In 2018, the first stand-alone version of the story was published by HarperCollins in the UK and Houghton Mifflin in the US. This version, illustrated by Alan Lee, was curated and edited by Christopher Tolkien, J. R. R. Tolkien's son, who also edited The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, and the twelve-volume The History of Middle-earth.
The book ends with a list of names, additional notes, and a glossary.
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The Fall of Gondolin
The Fall of Gondolin is a 2018 book of fantasy fiction by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by his son Christopher. The story is one of what Tolkien called the three "Great Tales" from the First Age of Middle-earth; the other two are Beren and Lúthien and The Children of Húrin. All three stories are briefly summarised in the 1977 book The Silmarillion, and all three have now been published as stand-alone books. A version of the story also appears in The Book of Lost Tales. In the narrative, Gondolin was founded by King Turgon in the First Age. The city was carefully hidden, enduring for centuries before being betrayed and destroyed. Written in 1917, it is one of the first stories of Tolkien's legendarium.
Tolkien began writing the story that would become The Fall of Gondolin in 1917 in an army barracks on the back of a sheet of military marching music. It is one of the first stories of his Middle-earth legendarium that he wrote down on paper, after his 1914 tale, inspired by the Old English manuscript Crist 1, "The Voyage of Earendel, the Evening Star". While the first half of the story "appears to echo Tolkien's creative development and slow acceptance of duty in the first year of the war," the second half echoes his personal experience of battle. The story was read aloud by Tolkien to the Exeter College Essay Club in the spring of 1920.
Tolkien was constantly revising his First Age stories; however, the narrative he wrote in 1917, published posthumously in The Book of Lost Tales, remains the only full account of the fall of the city.
The narrative "Of Tuor and the Fall of Gondolin" in the 1977 book The Silmarillion was the result of the editing by his son Christopher using the 1917 narrative (minus some elements all too obviously evocative of World War I warfare) and compressed versions from the different versions of the Annals and Quentas as additional sources. The later Quenta Silmarillion and the Grey Annals, the main sources for much of the published Silmarillion, both stop before the beginning of the Tuor story.
A partial later version of The Fall of Gondolin was published in the 1980 book Unfinished Tales under the title "Of Tuor and his Coming to Gondolin". Originally titled "Of Tuor and the Fall of Gondolin," this narrative shows a great expansion of the earlier tale. Christopher Tolkien retitled the story before including it in Unfinished Tales, because it ends at the point of Tuor's arrival in Gondolin, and does not depict the actual Fall.
There is also an unfinished poem, The Lay of the Fall of Gondolin, of which a few verses are quoted in the 1985 book The Lays of Beleriand. In 130 verses Tolkien reaches the point where dragons attack the city.
In 2018, the first stand-alone version of the story was published by HarperCollins in the UK and Houghton Mifflin in the US. This version, illustrated by Alan Lee, was curated and edited by Christopher Tolkien, J. R. R. Tolkien's son, who also edited The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, and the twelve-volume The History of Middle-earth.
The book ends with a list of names, additional notes, and a glossary.