Mr. Curtin contacted me last month about the copy of Tree and Leaf. I replied, in part, addressing several points made on the website: "All copies of Tree and Leaf in its first edition contain a printed facsimile Tolkien signature on the title-page, as shown in the video. My wife and I have in our Tolkien collection multiple copies of multiple printings of Tree and Leaf, and the facsimile signature is present from the first through at least the eighth impression of the hardback and the ninth of the paperback. Although both the hardback and paperback editions of Tree and Leaf were published simultaneously (from identical sheets), on 28 May 1964, the work was originally conceived by George Allen & Unwin for publication in its 'Unwin Books' (or 'U Books') paperback series, a feature of which was a facsimile signature of the author printed on the title-page. The same Tolkien signature appears as well in the Unwin Books edition of The Hobbit (1966)."

As for Tolkien returning to teach at Oxford, standing in for a colleague, Christina and I know of only one instance, during Michaelmas Term 1962 and Hilary Term 1963 (i.e. the end of 1962 and beginning of 1963), when C.L. Wrenn went on sabbatical. Of this Tolkien wrote to Rayner Unwin: "the return to lecturing . . . has proved a much greater burden than I expected. It has taken much more work than I guessed to shake the dust of seventeen years off matter which I once thought I knew". See Chronology, pp. 599 ff. At this time of course Tree and Leaf was not yet published; but one could still speculate about circumstances in which Mr. Prince could have received a copy from Tolkien.

Wayne

Our own problem has been with Amazon UK. Postal charges from the UK to the USA likewise have increased, along with which are Amazon's own fees, and although sometimes we can do better ordering from Book Depository (no fees, free overseas shipping), they don't always have what we want. Beyond this is the problem of Amazon UK typically shipping to the USA via Deutsche Post DHL, which amounts to slow surface mail, and more than once we've had to complain about parcels that disappeared. We can't rely on Amazon, then, for books when time is sensitive, as when we want a first printing (we have to think what we're doing about the trade and deluxe Fall of Arthur). And then there's the issue of increased risk of damage, when a parcel is knocking about for six weeks or more (on an estimated arrival of about four weeks). One could pay for expedited shipping, but the cost is an arm and a leg.

Wayne & Christina

We pointed out the omission to HarperCollins a few days ago. David Brawn replied that the deluxe edition should be on Amazon UK, and that they're looking into why it isn't.

Wayne & Christina

Book club editions sometimes lack bar codes or jacket prices because they're sold outside of the mainstream market. And yet, we have the first printing of the Guild Publishing edition (1987), and a bar code is present!

Wayne & Christina

It's the 1979 Unwin Paperbacks edition ('reset third paperback edition') but specially bound for Canadian sale, with a price of $2.75 on the upper cover. I made too brief a note about it under A3s in my bibliography (p. 57).

Wayne