Monday, September 14, 2020

The Covers of The Lord of the Rings

I don't think it's in the least bit controversial to acknowledge the pivotal historical role Ace Books played in releasing their unauthorized editions of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. Briefly, Donald A. Wollheim (who would later go one to found DAW) discovered a loophole in then-current copyright law which enabled Ace to publish a US edition of the three volumes without having to pay royalties to Tolkien. This unauthorized edition was only in print for about a year but it sold enough copies to raise the profile of both Tolkien and fantasy more generally in the United States.

The Ace books featured the artwork above by Jack Gaughan, who'd long done illustrations for Wollheim while he was at Ace. There's no denying that the covers are quite effective. The combination of primary colors plus very simple artwork is powerful, even if one is left wondering exactly what is being depicted. For example, it's clear that The Fellowship of the Ring shows Gandalf, though the identity of his companions is less certain (are they hobbits?). The cover of The Two Towers is much more obvious, portraying a Nazgûl upon the back of a fellbeast. Meanwhile, The Return of the King cover might be symbolic of the conflict between Middle-earth and Sauron, shown as a hooded figure standing over Barad-dûr.

The authorized US editions were published by Ballantine and featured these covers.
Truth be told, these are just as striking as the Ace covers – and just as confounding as to what they exactly depict. Barbara Remington, who died at the start of 2020, painted these covers. Interestingly, she also painted the cover of an edition of E.R. Eddison's The Worm Ouroboros, a novel Tolkien himself admired and from which he drew inspiration. 

The covers I first saw were those of the 1973 Ballantine edition. My school library had copies of these and I probably read them sometime in 1980. Consequently, these particular covers exercise a powerful hold over my imagination. Unfortunately, I cannot recall the name of the artist. (Update: it's J.R.R. Tolkien himself. I cannot believe I did not remember this. Thanks to everyone who pointed it out to me in the comments)
Another edition for which I have great fondness is the 1981 version featuring artwork by Darrell K. Sweet.
I received these three books, along with a yellow copy of The Hobbit (also with a Sweet illustration), in a boxed set as a Christmas gift from my parents in 1983 or '84. I kept them all on a bookshelf beside my bed and consulted them frequently, particularly Appendices E and F of Return of the King. I was (and am) deeply fascinated by constructed languages, so those sections were like catnip to me and had a powerful influence on my own efforts at creating imaginary languages for my D&D worlds.  

18 comments:

  1. Regarding those magnificent 1981 edition and the appendix in RotK. I used to think myself quite clever by mining that appendix for fantastic names for places and NPCs. I tried to pass them off as my own. However, other members of the Lincoln Middle School D&D Club also owned the same set of books. After a session they would scamper home, look up the name I had swiped from the index and call me on their rotary phones attached to the wall with the ugly truth. Thwarted!

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  2. I believe the 1973 covers were done by Tolkien himself as was the cover of "The Hobbit" released in the same style.

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    1. You're right. I can't believe I didn't remember this.

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    2. That's funny and ironic: I assumed your "cannot recall the name" was a dry joke.

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    3. Sadly, no. I am getting old, it seems.

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  3. Pretty sure the cover artist for the 1973 paperbacks was Tolkien himself.

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  4. As with you, James, the 1973 version was the first I laid eyes on, and continue to exercise a powerful hold on MY imagination. Found them in the closet of a friend’s home when I was a small child...so strange and beautiful, especially the latter two covers.

    I received the same 1981 box set around 1984-84 also, but as a birthday gift (my birthday is in November). Still have it to this day, and am currently rereading it...just started The Two Towers on Saturday. Man, they are coming apart (especially my copy of The Hobbit)...but I guess the ARE 35 years old, and have moved (with me) half a dozen times.

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  5. My first copies, I think by way of my Uncle, were the Remington covers. I still have them, though they are quite worn. At a school book fair in the early 80's, I bought a box set of the '73 Tolkien covers which included The Hobbit. The box was gold and had elvish House sigils on teh sides.

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  6. I just got rid of my dog eared copies of the 1973 edition; they were literally falling apart. They stood out because my Mother read them to us on trips.

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  7. I really loved Remmington's cover for Ouroboros. Pretty powerful art.
    The Ace covers make me wonder what a sword & sorcery LotR would have been like, maybe with a dash of the Weird found in either Vance's Dying Earth, or Moorcock

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  8. '73 covers were also my intro, though a few years earlier than you, James. I kept them for a long time, into my adulthood, but they eventually got lost or thrown out in a divorce. They have left a large impression on me for the "look" and "feel" of Middle Earth.

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  9. My first copies were the Tolkien Ballantines, and my favorites since then were the 1999 Mariner editions with the Alan Lee "places" covers.

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  10. I started with those '73 covers as well... but I'm wondering how my mental image of Middle Earth would have been altered by having first read under those earlier cover images instead. They're definitely more phantasmagorical and less quaint/pastoral.

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  11. The editions that I was first introduced to are the last ones by Darrell K. Sweet - I love the colors and the detailed paintings. The 1973 Ballentine editions also resonate strongly with me.

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  12. I'm envious of these covers. My introductions to the Lord of the Rings cover art were the 1988 covers (as listed here: https://www.adazing.com/lord-of-the-rings-book-cover-designs/), which I think don't hold up nearly as well as most of the other designs.

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  13. The '73 edition with Tolkien's artwork was the one I recall having the earliest memories of. They were at my grandparents' house. I think they were my aunt's. What I do remember was being captivated by those covers and wanting to read the books.Staying up late a night in the living room and just reading. Curling up with a blanket on the couch, having a drink and a snack. Simpler times....

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  14. My mother actually gave me the Ballantine set in the late 70's because some past boyfriend had given it to her. At age 8 I plowed the first book, but got lost in the endless names of the 2nd (trying to map the names and index them on graph paper didn't work) and never, ever returned to the collection. Return may have never had a page turned.

    I actually prefer the movies to the books simply because (even as an adult!) I can't sort-out all the effin' names.

    Gandalf takes Vadar, any day. Mister Rogers versus Bob Ross, tricky.

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