As well as recording the numerous changes made to the story both before and after publication, it examines – chapter-by-chapter – why those changes were made and how they reflect Tolkien's ever-growing concept of Middle-earth.The Hobbit was first published on 21 September 1937. Like its successor, The Lord of the Rings, it is a story that "grew in the telling", and many characters and story threads in the published text are completely different from what Tolkien first wrote to read aloud to his young sons as part of their "fireside reads".As well as reproducing the original version of one of literature's most famous stories, both on its own merits and as the foundation for The Lord of the Rings, this new book includes many little-known illustrations and previously unpublished maps for The Hobbit by Tolkien himself. Also featured are extensive annotations and commentaries on the date of composition, how Tolkien's professional and early mythological writings influenced the story, the imaginary geography he created, and how Tolkien came to revise the book years after publication to accommodate events in The Lord of the Rings.Like Christopher Tolkien’s The History of The Lord of the Rings before it, this is a thoughtful yet exhaustive examination of one of the most treasured stories in English literature. Long overdue for a classic book now celebrating 75 years in print, this companion edition offers fascinating new insights for those who have grown up with this enchanting tale, and will delight those who are about to enter Bilbo's round door for the first time.

    He saw the skin peel from the rocket beehive, men thus revealed running, running, mouths shrieking, soundless. Space was a black mossed well where life drowned its roars and terrors. Scream a big scream, but space snuffed it out before it was half up your throat. Men scurried, ants in a flaming matchbox; the ship was dripping lava, gushing steam, nothing!Journey with the century's most popular fantasy writer into a world of wonder and horror beyond your wildest dreams.Contents:- The Fog Horn (1951)- The Pedestrian (1951)- The April Witch (1952)- The Wilderness (1952)- The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl (1948)- Invisible Boy (1945)- The Flying Machine (1953)- The Murderer (1953)- The Golden Kite, the Silver Wind (1953)- I See You Never (1947)- Embroidery (1951)- The Big Black and White Game (1945)- A Sound of Thunder (1952)- The Great Wide World Over There (1952)- Powerhouse (1948)- En la Noche (1952)- Sun and Shadow (1953)- The Meadow (1953)- The Garbage Collector (1953)- The Great Fire (1949)- Hail and Farewell (1953)- The Golden Apples of the Sun (1953)

    R. R. Tolkien, author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, in four BBC Radio full-cast dramatizations available for the first time in the U.S. Tolkien's tales of myth, mystery, and rumbustious exploits have been specially adapted for radio by Brian Sibley, one of the dramatists of the highly acclaimed BBC radio production of The Lord of the Rings. In Farmer Giles of Ham, having accidentally shot a giant, Farmer Giles finds his brave reputation being tested by Chrysophylax the dragon. In Smith of Wootton Major, when young Smith eats a piece of cake containing a silver star, he is granted access to the magical land of Faerie. In Leaf by Niggle, a thought-provoking allegory on the theme of creativity, the painter Niggle embarks on a fateful search for perfection. In The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, join Tom and the Hobbits in scenes from The Lord of the Rings which were not included in the BBC Radio 4 dramatization.Dramatized by Brian SibleyMusic by Peter Howell of the BBC Radiophonic WorkshopProduced by John Taylor

    Told in the same fanciful, irreverent style as the Hitchhiker trilogy, with scraps of scripts, letters and comments from Adams, Don't Panic is the perfect companion to one of the most successful series in publishing history.

    The animals seem intelligent enough, and Red recruits Slim to help him train the odd creatures to do circus tricks. But the boys are about to discover their playthings aren’t exactly animals—and they’ve allowed themselves to be caught for a reason . . . Youth is a riveting tale from the author of countless classics, including I, Robot and the Foundation Trilogy, which won the Hugo Award for Best All-Time Series.

    Here is the definitive guide to the geography of Middle-earth, from its founding in the Elder Days through the Third Age, including the journeys of Bilbo, Frodo, and the Fellowship of the Ring. Authentic and updated -- nearly one third of the maps are new, and the text is fully revised -- the atlas illuminates the enchanted world created in THE SILMARILLION, THE HOBBIT, and THE LORD OF THE RINGS.Hundreds of two-color maps and diagrams survey the journeys of the principal characters day by day -- including all the battles and key locations of the First, Second, and Third Ages. Plans and descriptions of castles, buildings, and distinctive landforms are given, along with thematic maps describing the climate, vegetation, languages, and population distribution of Middle-earth throughout its history. An extensive appendix and an index help readers correlate the maps with Tolkien's novels.

    Clarke is the most celebrated science fiction author alive. He is—with H. G. Wells, Isaac Asimov, and Robert A. Heinlein—one of the writers who define science fiction in our time. Now Clarke has cooperated in the preparation of a massive, definitive edition of his collected shorter works. From early work like "Rescue Party" and "The Lion of Comarre," through classics like "The Star," "Earthlight," "The Nine Billion Names of God," and "The Sentinel" (kernel of the later novel, and movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey), all the way to later work like "A Meeting with Medusa" and "The Hammer of God," this immense volume encapsulates one of the great SF careers of all time.

    Finally resorting to medication, he instantly falls into a deep sleep that lasts two hundred years. Upon waking in the twenty-second century to a strange and nightmarish place, he slowly discovers he is master of the world, revered by an adoring populace who consider him their leader. Terrified, he escapes from his chamber seeking solace—only to realize that not everyone adores him, some even wish to harm him.

    P. Lovecraft. Despite this nearly unprecedented posthumous trajectory, at the time of his death at the age of forty-six, Lovecraft's work had appeared only in dime-store magazines, ignored by the public and maligned by critics. Now well over a century after his birth, Lovecraft is increasingly being recognized as the foundation for American horror and science fiction, the source of "incalculable influence on succeeding generations of writers of horror fiction" (Joyce Carol Oates).In this volume, Leslie S. Klinger reanimates Lovecraft with clarity and historical insight, charting the rise of the erstwhile pulp writer, whose rediscovery and reclamation into the literary canon can be compared only to that of Poe or Melville. Weaving together a broad base of existing scholarship with his own original insights, Klinger appends Lovecraft's uncanny oeuvre and Kafkaesque life story in a way that provides context and unlocks many of the secrets of his often cryptic body of work.Over the course of his career, Lovecraft―"the Copernicus of the horror story" (Fritz Leiber)―made a marked departure from the gothic style of his predecessors that focused mostly on ghosts, ghouls, and witches, instead crafting a vast mythos in which humanity is but a blissfully unaware speck in a cosmos shared by vast and ancient alien beings. One of the progenitors of "weird fiction," Lovecraft wrote stories suggesting that we share not just our reality but our planet, and even a common ancestry, with unspeakable, godlike creatures just one accidental revelation away from emerging from their epoch of hibernation and extinguishing both our individual sanity and entire civilization.Following his best-selling The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes, Leslie S. Klinger collects here twenty-two of Lovecraft's best, most chilling "Arkham" tales, including "The Call of Cthulhu," At the Mountains of Madness, "The Whisperer in Darkness," "The Shadow Over Innsmouth," "The Colour Out of Space," and others. With nearly 300 illustrations, including full-color reproductions of the original artwork and covers from Weird Tales and Astounding Stories, and more than 1,000 annotations, this volume illuminates every dimension of H. P. Lovecraft and stirs the Great Old Ones in their millennia of sleep.

    Tolkien, whose timeless fantasy classics have literally taken readers to another place.And what a place it is! The Middle-earth so graphically depicted in The Hobbit, The Rings Trilogy, and The Silmarillion is a breathtaking world of misty valleys and craggy tors, placid lakes and raging rivers, steamy bogs and glad green glades -- a magical kingdom inhabited by such unforgettable characters as the Great Goblin, Smaug the dragon, and the great wizard Gandolf. Small wonder this wonderland has provided such a rich source of inspiration for artists!In this book nine talented painters contribute powerful interpretations of Middle-earth, each one accompanied by the text that inspired it. Artists include Inger Edelfeldt, Tony Galuidi, Roger Garland, Robert Goldsmith, Michael Hague, John Howe, Alan Lee, Ted Nasmith, and Carol Emery Phenix.

    An emergency skeleton crew sees only one chance for survival: to create an artificial consciousness in the Earthling's primary computer, which could guide them to their destination . . . or could destroy the human race. Frank Herbert's classic novel that begins the epic Pandora Sequence (written with Bill Ransom), which also includes The Jesus Incident, The Lazarus Effect, and The Ascension Factor.

    and expert at seeing the cosmos on 30 Altairian dollars a day. Ford lives by the Guide's seminal bit of advice: Don't Panic. Which comes in handy when their first ride--on the very same vessel that demolished Earth to make way for a hyperspacial freeway--ends disastrously (they are booted out of an airlock). with 30 seconds of air in their lungs and the odd of being picked up by another ship 2^276,709 to 1 against, the pair are scooped up by the only ship in the universe powered by the Infinite Improbability Drive.But this (and the idea that Bogart movies and McDonald's hamburgers now exist only in his mind) is just the beginning of the weird things Arthur will have to get used to. For, on his travels, he'll encounter Zaphod Beeblebrox, the two-headed, three-armed ex-President of the Galaxy; Trillian, a sexy spacecadet he once tried to pick up at a cocktail party, now Zaphod's girlfriend; Marvin, a chronically depressed robot; and Slartibartfast, the award-winning engineer who built the Earth and travels in a spaceship disguised as a bistro.Arthur's crazed wanderings will take him from the restaurant at the end of the Universe (where the main dish of the day introduces itself and the floor show is doomsday), to the planet Krikkit (locked in Slo-Time to punish its inhabitants for trying to end the Universe), to Earth (huh? wait! wasn't it destroyed?!) to the very offices of The Hitchhiker's Guide itself as he and his friends quest for the answer to the Question of Life, the Universe and Everything ... and search for a really good cup of tea.Ready or not, Arthur Dent is in for one hell of a ride!

    This official publication contains 500 exclusive images, from the earliest pencil sketches and conceptual drawings to magnificent full-color paintings that shaped the look of the film. All the principal locations, costumes, armor and creatures are covered in stunning detail, including concepts, storyboards and images that did not make it into the final film.As well as a wealth of sketches, paintings and digital images, The Art of The Fellowship of the Ring contains photographs showing how the creative process was realized and a number of stills from the film. Contributors include Alan Lee and John Howe, the two artists who inspired Peter Jackson's vision of Middle-earth and who worked with him to bring his trilogy to the big screen. They and a dozen other designers who created all of these diverse elements explain how they contributed to the development of the film, giving a fascinating insight into how Middle-earth was brought to life.With text compiled from exclusive interviews with director Peter Jackson, special effects supervisor Richard Taylor, designers Grant Major, Ngila Dickson, Paul Lasaine and others, this unique book celebrates the pivotal contribution made by a handful of people which help turn the first Lord of the Rings movie into an award-winning global success.

    In this visionary tale, human society slips into violent reverse as once-peaceful residents, driven by primal urges, re-create a world ruled by the laws of the jungle.

    Morgon, prince of the simple farmers of Hed, proved himself a master of such riddles when he staked his life to win a crown from the dead Lord of Aum. But now ancient, evil forces were threatening him. Shape changers began replacing friends until no man could be trusted. So Morgon was forced to flee to hostile kingdoms, seeking the High One who ruled from mysterious Erlenstar Mountain. Beside him went Deth, the High One's Harper. Ahead lay strange encounters and terrifying adventures. And with him always was the greatest of unsolved riddles; the nature of the three stars on his forehead that seemed to drive him toward his ultimate destiny.