Reviews

Tolkien & the Silmarillion by Clyde S. Kilby

zajtrajsok's review

4.0

A glimpse into the past before the publication of The Silmarillion. 

An interesting and enjoyable read.

inhonoredglory's review

4.0

Yes, this book may be outdated, as it was written in anticipation of the posthumous publication of J.R.R. Tolkien's [b:The Silmarillion|7332|The Silmarillion (Middle-Earth Universe)|J.R.R. Tolkien|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1336502583s/7332.jpg|4733799], but it still has its biographical charms. Namely, the author's personal encounter with Tolkien, the vividness of his conversation and the life within his speech and expression; the importance of Tolkien's Christianity to his work with specific examples to demonstrate the Christian assumption inherent in Middle-earth; and a summary of the bond and shared interests of the three major Inklings Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, and Charles Williams. I loved the personal and humbled tone the author takes and the way he brings Tolkien to a simple and honorable life to his reader.

michaelromeo's review

4.0

Tolkien and The Silmarillion by Clyde S. Kilby. This is a brief book by a man who came to know Tolkien in the last phase of his life. Tolkien engaged Kilby to assist him in the sorting out and compiling of the many notes and manuscripts that would one day become The Silmarillion, a book that would not be published until after Tolkien’s death. Kilby takes us along as he meets Tolkien for the first time and over a period of several years comes to know him as a dear friend. The Tolkien we meet is still the scholar and mythologist the world knows him as, but we see him as well as an elderly man dealing with a life work that will never be finished. We see him as a husband dealing with his wife’s failing health. We meet him as a retiree struggling on an insufficient income. Kilby lets us in on Tolkien’s far ranging brain as he describes conversations in which Tolkien makes connections from one subject to another that many times only he could understand in the depths of his brilliant mind. Kilby’s book was very reminiscent of another favorite of mine, Churchill: The Struggle for Survival by Lord Moran, the man who was Churchill’s doctor for the last twenty-five years of his life.

https://secondpot.wordpress.com/2015/02/01/on-biographies-etc-frances-mayes-and-j-r-r-tolkein-become-companions-on-the-100-book-journey/