Tolkien (J.R.R.) Farmer Giles of Ham, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author "with best wishes from J.R.R. Tolkien. Christmas, 1949" to front free endpaper with ink inscription below in another hand in Gaelic, illustrations by Pauline Diana Baynes, occasional marginal foxing, light browning to endpapers, original cloth, toning to head, dust-jacket, price-clipped, short nick to foot of lower panel, very light surface soiling but near-fine generally, [Hammond & Anderson A4a], 8vo, 1949.

⁂ Inscribed to Professor Diarmaid Murphy who has added his inscription in Gaelic to the endpaper. Tolkien served as an external examiner at the University of Galway for 1949, 1950, 1954 and 1959, where Murphy was lecturing in English and both men are listed as examiners on the examination papers for those years.

Tolkien (J.R.R.) The Lord of the Rings, 3 vol., comprising The Fellowship of the Ring, third impression, jacket with some spotting to panels, light toning to spine, small patch of red staining to head of rear panel, 1955; The Two Towers, second impression, jacket with light browning to spine tips, 1955; The Return of the King, first impression, jacket with light toning and creasing to spine tips, sliver of marking to margins of flaps, 1955, first editions, folding maps, some spotting or browning to endpapers along with some tape-marking, original cloth, dust-jackets, bright and excellent or near-fine overall, 8vo.

Tolkien (J.R.R.) The Hobbit, first edition, second impression, map endpapers, illustrations, frontispiece and 3 colour plates, light toning to endpapers and splitting from upper edge of flyleaf, upper hinge cracked at half-title, spotting throughout but very faint and occasional, pp.15/16 loose, original cloth, slight shelf-lean, light surface toning and discolouring, cloth splitting along upper joint and some edges, repairs to spine ends, preserved in facsimile jacket, [Hammond A3a], 8vo, 1937 [but 1938].

⁂ The second impression was the first version of the book to be illustrated in colour: the first impression had two plates only, both of which were uncoloured. A total of 2,300 copies were printed, and some 400 held at the binder's London warehouse were destroyed during the Blitz in November 1940.

Tolkien (J.R.R.) The Lord of the Rings, 3 vol., comprising The Fellowship of the Ring, second impression, half-title spotted, the odd faint spot, some light staining to inner margins, short tear to spine head, 1954; The Two Towers, first impression, occasional light spotting, 1954; The Return of the King, first impression, without signature mark "4" and text block straight on p.49, some light staining to inner margins, very faint spotting along board fore-edge, 1955, first editions, folding maps, last leaf or two foxed at margins, endpapers foxed, book-labels to front pastedowns, edges spotted, original cloth, spine ends lightly bumped, spines faded, a few small stains, board fore-edges nibbled with some loss, otherwise excellent, 8vo.

Tolkien (J.R.R.) The Lord of the Rings, single volume edition, reprint, signed by the author on front pastedown, original pictorial wrappers, spine ends bumped with head slightly frayed, otherwise clean and bright, 8vo, 1972.

⁂ In January 1972, while studying at Merton College, Oxford, the consignor's father was asked to give up his room for Professor Tolkien who had been offered a room after his wife's death and needed to be on the ground floor as the elderly author could no longer manage stairs. Tolkien was appreciative and the two often met at lunch throughout 1972. When this impression of Lord of the Rings was published in Spring of that year, he bought a copy from Blackwells. At lunch he asked Tolkien to sign it for his girlfriend and, though Tolkien was grumpy because the royalties on paperbacks were less than hardbacks, the author agreed to sign it - just for him. Tolkien passed away the following year.

WHO WAS ‘MR RANG’?

An enduring mystery for Tolkien scholars has been the identity of ‘Mr Rang’ who wrote to Tolkien in 1967 asking for enlightenment on various names and words, especially Rohan and Erech. Tolkien replied with some asperity at first, but then warmed to his theme and ended with a detailed explanation of Eärendil, He then decided not to send the draft, but wrote a note to say that he had sent a much shorter reply. The draft remained in his papers among his files of letters, and so appeared in the Letters as Carpenter #297: Letter from J.R.R. Tolkien to Mr Rang • August 1967 (#670), to our great enlightenment.

As ‘Mr Rang’ has not identified himself, even though he may well have bought the Letters and caught up with the answers late in the day, we have not bothered to try to unmask him. However, while reviewing my folders about William Morris from 2005 I came across a copy of the draft which I had filed because of its discussion of Eärendil, and suddenly it came to me that among my earlier books about Tolkien, which I had begun collecting from 1973, as soon as I got a full-time job, was Shadows of Heaven by Gunnar Urang, (SCM 1971). Urang was a Professor of English at Newark State College, New Jersey. The timing fits, if he was thinking about writing a book on Tolkien in 1967.

In the event the book covers Lewis, Williams and Tolkien, with a concluding chapter, and is written from a Christian perspective, He begins by asserting the literary merit of adult fantasy, and then the value of the works’ Christian teaching. Novels are discussed in detail, but The Chronicles of Narnia are completely omitted, presumably as they are not for adults. He has done a lot of research on his chosen authors, as is evidenced from the notes which give the source of his quotations. His claim for the novels’ literary merit is interesting, as he published ten years before Shippey! His book deserves to have been more cited than it has been. As he could not draw on Tolkien’s long letter to describe his sources, he cites Lin Carter’s Tolkien (1969) instead, a very underrated book in my opinion.

I don’t know why Tolkien referred to him as ‘Mr Rang’ unless he had typed his letter and then signed it by hand without typing his name as well. Oddly Tolkien should have recognized such a Germanic/Nordic name and surname, and may have wondered why they belonged to an American!

I have found out a little more about him:

About the author (2005) from Google:
Gunnar Urang held teaching and administrative posts in several colleges before being ordained an Episcopal priest in 1984. As a clergyperson he has continued his teaching ministry as well, both in local church contexts and in Vermont's Diocesan Study Program. Urang is the author of 'Shadows of Heaven', a study of religious themes and motifs in the fiction of C. S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and J. R. R. Tolkien.

Well, I hope you agree that this is the best guess, after all these years!

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The Hobbit, J. R. Tolkien, First Edition 1937, Second Impression, with dust cover

J. R. R. Tolkien - Farmer Giles of Ham, first edition, colour frontispiece and illustrations by Pauline Baynes, with dust jacket

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