The National Archives<\/a> in Kew.<\/p>\nThe never-before-seen letters reveal a correspondence between the British Council and Tolkien from 1945.<\/p>\n
In addition to writing the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Tolkien was a professor of English Language and Literature at Oxford University. The letters are regarding funding for his early English languages research.<\/p>\n
Tolkien was hoping to gain funding for a collaborative research project with his former student, Simonne d\u2019Ardenne. When the letters were written in 1945, d\u2019Ardenne was Professor of Comparative Grammar, English Philology, Old Norse and Gothic at Liege University in Belgium. She was hoping to join Tolkien at her previous place of study and conduct research into historical languages.<\/p>\n
Tolkien sent two letters in support of d\u2019Ardenne\u2019s application for funding to the British Council. The first is dated 24 August 1945, when he wrote: \u201cMlle d\u2019Ardenne is a very considerable scholar, and in a field (early English) that is otherwise poorly represented in countries of \u2018Latin\u2019 language\u2026The war cut short our communications and left us with much unfinished work on hand.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said d\u2019Ardenne\u2019s return to Oxford would be \u201cof the greatest assistance\u201d, acknowledging: \u201cI find it very difficult to pick up the threads without her help.\u201d<\/p>\n
On 11 October 1945, Tolkien sent a follow up after not receiving a reply and hoped \u201csoon to have a favourable decision\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be of great satisfaction \u2013 and assistance to me. I am being pressed by the Early English Text Society\u2026 concerning the work of Professor d\u2019Ardenne and myself in our joint field\u2026 Assistance to this eminent scholar, one of the most distinguished in mediaeval English, is my chief object.\u201d<\/p>\n
The British Council granted the scholarship and Professor d\u2019Ardenne joined Tolkien at Oxford University in January 1946.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, Tolkien became unwell and the manuscripts which they were hoping to pick apart were unavailable due to bomb damage at the British museum. Professor d\u2019Ardenne consequently submitted a request to postpone the last three months of her scholarship until May 1974, a request which was granted.<\/p>\n
The documents are being held in the National Archives alongside previously catalogued correspondence from Tolkien.<\/p>\n
Sarah Castagnetti, Visual Collections Team Manager at The National Archives, said: \u201cThese letters provide an intriguing new glimpse into Tolkien\u2019s life and work, allowing us to hear from one of the world\u2019s best-loved authors in his own voice and through his own handwriting.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis discovery by one of our volunteers shows once again the enduring importance of archives and the windows they offer to the past.\u201d<\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n
","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Lord of the Rings author wrote the two letters to the British Council in 1945 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":23622,"template":"","categories":[1,16],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"3"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/03\/unseen-tolkien-letters-discovered-at-the-national-archives-scaled.jpg",2560,1687,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/03\/unseen-tolkien-letters-discovered-at-the-national-archives-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/03\/unseen-tolkien-letters-discovered-at-the-national-archives-300x198.jpg",300,198,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/03\/unseen-tolkien-letters-discovered-at-the-national-archives-768x506.jpg",768,506,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/03\/unseen-tolkien-letters-discovered-at-the-national-archives-1024x675.jpg",800,527,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/03\/unseen-tolkien-letters-discovered-at-the-national-archives-1536x1012.jpg",1536,1012,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/36\/2023\/03\/unseen-tolkien-letters-discovered-at-the-national-archives-2048x1350.jpg",2048,1350,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"The Lord of the Rings author wrote the two letters to the British Council in 1945","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/23621"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/wdytya\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}