The Book of Lost Tales

"Yes. The Book of Lost Tales itself is a work that Tolkien began in 1916-17, aged twenty-five, and is the first narrative work on the history of Valinor and Middle-earth. However, the subtitle – “A History of Middle-earth” – applies to a larger book series that also reproduces other work from throughout his life. The Book of Lost Tales takes up the first two volumes, but there’s more beyond that to explore. The editor is his son Christopher Tolkien, and there couldn’t be a better guide to the texts. In his forward, he discusses the process behind The Silmarillion , where he needed to make choices between inconsistent and messy extant texts to bring everything into a single coherent narrative. In this series, he presents pieces as they were left, without making editorial choices. It’s one for real Tolkien fans who would like to get in the weeds of his lifetime’s creation themselves. No, there’s always a commentary essay, but it comes after the text. Linguistic comments and changes to names are dealt with in annexes. The idea is that you can get at the text itself without interruption if you want, and also follow Christopher Tolkien’s editorial insights. Another Inkling. Yes, sure. The Inklings were a group of writers in Oxford who met to read and critique each other’s work – the Eagle and Child pub claims them particularly. The most famous members were Tolkien and C. S. Lewis ."