In the last few months a number of reviews of my book Tolkien, Race and Cultural History: From Fairies to Hobbits have appeared in various journals and magazines. I was delighted to see the latest one: a review by Jon Barnes for the Times Literary Supplement. Here are some highlights of the latest reviews:
“Dimitra Fimi’s Tolkien, Race and Cultural History traces the evolution of the legendarium with admirable care… This scholarly yet approachable book is filled with…surprising fragments.”
Jon Barnes, Times Literary Supplement
“Fimi’s study is well worth reading for the specialist as well as (or even more so) for the general reader. The author brings together (often for the first time) relevant research from cultural history and lays out her arguments fair and square… Fimi’s approach…forces us to reconsider some well-beloved clichés. Thus, it will no longer be possible to talk naïvely about the linguistic inspiration of Tolkien’s fiction without adding at least some qualifying remarks… Fimi’s book has given us some answers but has also opened up some avenues for future research. What more can we ask for?”
Thomas Honegger, Tolkien Studies
“No one doubts Tolkien’s originality, but Fimi’s book allows us to glimpse a kind of creative logic through which his legendarium almost had to happen: a climate welcoming of fairies and folklore; romantic quests of national mythologies; a general interest in language and linguistic invention… Fimi’s book reads so well that it’s hard to believe that it’s an academic tome…”
Henry Gee, Mallorn
