Morinehtar wrote:

I guess I'm too late for a LEGO 1st print

Will have to look into buying it second-hand.

They are up to around 5,000 copies sold now, I believe, so the LEGO 1st was gone a long time back.

Well, after hacking away at this for a while, I've finally assembled a complete UK HoME set that I believe is as uniform as possible. At the very least, I wish the PoDs looked this way, instead of the hodgepodge currently on offer.

Conditions aren't perfect, but I can say that with the exception of PoME, I paid well under market prices–even taking condition into consideration. I consider these all reading copies with provenance, if that makes any sense.

It was probably a fool's errand, and a real collector would have gone for 1st/1sts all the way down. But, I like it; it tells a big part of the story of my journey into collecting Tolkien. I can look at almost every volume and think about something I learned along the way.

I will say this as a point of interest... based on prices and availability, I'm not the only one who desires HC prints for the early books. There's a market for them, even if it's not here on TCG.

Congrats, those look really good together! I would definitely call you a real collector - everyone has different goals for their collecting, there is definitely nothing wrong with what you have collected here.

Ah I guess the word "real" sounded more flippant than I intended. Didn't meant to make it sound like I was self-gatekeeping or anything.

But I hear you on everyone having their own goals. The fact that they can differ so much makes for a more interesting hobby/community!

I'm definitely happy with mine

Congrats Caudimordax !!!
This collection looks beautiful and your Purple UT shines like never before !!

Caudimordax wrote:

Ah I guess the word "real" sounded more flippant than I intended. Didn't meant to make it sound like I was self-gatekeeping or anything.

But I hear you on everyone having their own goals. The fact that they can differ so much makes for a more interesting hobby/community!

I'm definitely happy with mine

Nice shelf there, I like the way you have them arranged with Vinyar Tengwar included. The purple UT makes it all worth it to me.

I like them. The only reason I don't have the matching HC volumes on the shelf is lack of space, but they do look good together. Which print is your "Return of the Shadow"?

Emilien - Thanks man, you were there for the hunt! I call it "catharsis in book form". Definitely something I'd try to rescue were the house to catch fire!

Mr. Underhill - I was so happy they all fit together on this shelf! When the Index came in yesterday, I was genuinely worried the setup wouldn't work next to VT. I might, perhaps, reconsider when I get my hands on The Great Tales Never End, Tolkien's Legendarium, and Tolkien and His Literary Resonances. Or, I'll just build a bigger shelf!

Stu - First print, and it's funny you should ask. I suspect that some of the 2nd impressions have different spine designs, smaller HC logos, etc. But, doing conclusive research any way beyond just buying copies for comparison was more resource intensive than I cared for.

Question: Is there a Letters that would "work" better with my set? I did due diligence on tolkienbooks.net, and determined that this book was in a similar style analogous to the UK HoMEs. However, if there is a HC print I may have missed that also works, please let me know.

Otherwise, having the GA&U partnered with Remembrancer feels right enough!

Caudimordax wrote:

Question: Is there a Letters that would "work" better with my set? I did due diligence on tolkienbooks.net, and determined that this book was in a similar style analogous to the UK HoMEs. However, if there is a HC print that also works, please let me know.

There's only the PB from HC that is print now with the black spine and Tolkien's picture on the front. The other HB that was published around the same time was from HMH.

https://www.tolkienbooks.us/at/let/the ... ers-of-j-r-r-tolkien-1981