Verlyn Flieger est une auteure, éditrice et professeure d'anglais à l'Université du Maryland à College Park. Elle enseigne la mythologie comparée, la littérature médiévale et les œuvres de J. R. R. Tolkien. Ses travaux explorent des archétypes profonds et des structures narratives qui résonnent à travers les cultures et les siècles. Par son expertise, elle offre aux lecteurs une exploration captivante des royaumes du mythe et de la légende.
A new expanded edition of Tolkien's most famous, and most important essay, which defined his conception of fantasy as a literary form, and which led to the writing of The Lord of the Rings. Accompanied by a critical study of the history and writing of the text.
Flieger attempts to illuminate the structure of The Silmarillion, allowing the reader to appreciate its broad, overarching design and its careful, painstaking construction.
Set in the expansive territories of Britain's colonies, the narrative explores the lives of characters navigating the complexities of colonialism and identity. It delves into themes of adventure, conflict, and the cultural exchanges that occur in this diverse landscape. The story highlights the struggles and triumphs of individuals as they confront the challenges of their environment and their relationships with one another, providing a rich tapestry of experiences that reflect the historical context of the time.
J. R. R. Tolkien is perhaps best known for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, but it is in The Silmarillion that the true depth of Tolkien's Middle-earth can be understood. The Silmarillion was written before, during, and after Tolkien wrote The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. A collection of stories, it provides information alluded to in Tolkien's better known works and, in doing so, turns The Lord of the Rings into much more than a sequel to The Hobbit, making it instead a continuation of the mythology of Middle-earth. Verlyn Flieger's expanded and updated edition of Splintered Light, a classic study of Tolkien's fiction first published in 1983, examines The Silmarillion and The Lord of the Rings in light of Owen Barfield's linguistic theory of the fragmentation of meaning. Flieger demonstrates Tolkien's use of Barfield's concept throughout the fiction, showing how his central image of primary light splintered and refracted acts as a metaphor for the languages, peoples, and history of Middle-earth.
The world first publication of a previously unknown work of fantasy by J.R.R. Tolkien, which tells the powerful story of a doomed young man who is sold into slavery and who swears revenge on the magician who killed his father. Kullervo son of Kalervo is perhaps the darkest and most tragic of all J.R.R. Tolkien s characters. Hapless Kullervo, as Tolkien called him, is a luckless orphan boy with supernatural powers and a tragic destiny. Brought up in the homestead of the dark magician Untamo, who killed his father, kidnapped his mother, and who tries three times to kill him when still a boy, Kullervo is alone save for the love of his twin sister, Wanona, and guarded by the magical powers of the black dog, Musti. When Kullervo is sold into slavery he swears revenge on the magician, but he will learn that even at the point of vengeance there is no escape from the cruellest of fates. Tolkien wrote that The Story of Kullervo was the germ of my attempt to write legends of my own, and was a major matter in the legends of the First Age; his Kullervo was the ancestor of Turin Turambar, tragic incestuous hero of The Silmarillion. In addition to being a powerful story in its own right, The Story of Kullervo published here for the first time with the author s drafts, notes and lecture-essays on its source-work, The Kalevala, is a foundation stone in the structure of Tolkien s invented world."