Learn J. R. R. Tolkien’s «Letter From Father Christmas» To His Younger Youngsters (1925)

J.R.R. Tolkien is finest recognized for the sweep­ing fan­ta­sy land­scapes of Lord of The Rings and The Hob­bit. Other than being a cel­e­brat­ed creator, the Oxford Uni­ver­si­ty pro­fes­sor of Anglo-Sax­on was additionally a devot­ed father who dot­ed on his chil­dren.

In 1920, a number of brief years after Tolkien returned from World Warfare I, he started an endear­ing fam­i­ly Christ­mas tra­di­tion that may con­tin­ue for the following 23 years. After the delivery of his first­born son, John, Tolkien started to write down his 4 chil­dren let­ters from Father Christ­mas. These North Pole tales mainly con­cern Father Christ­mas’ strug­gles towards the north’s bat-rid­ing gob­lins, in addition to the mis­chie­vous hijinks of his helper, North Polar Bear. An adept illus­tra­tor whose orig­i­nal draw­ings accom­pa­nied lots of his writ­ings (see his book cov­er designs for Lord of the Rings), Tolkien includ­ed with lots of his Christ­mas let­ters a set of allure­ing pic­tures.

The numerous let­ters had been even­tu­al­ly col­lect­ed in a beau­ti­ful vol­ume referred to as Let­ters From Father Christ­mas. Because of the great work of Let­ters of Note, we deliver to you a sam­ple let­ter from 1925:

Cliff Home

High of the World

Close to the North Pole

Xmas 1925

My pricey boys,

I’m dread­ful­ly busy this 12 months — it makes my hand extra shaky than ever after I consider it — and never very wealthy. In truth, terrible issues have been hap­pen­ing, and a few of the presents have gotten spoilt and I haven’t obtained the North Polar Bear to assist me and I’ve needed to transfer home simply earlier than Christ­mas, so you may imag­ine what a state each­factor is in, and you will note why I’ve a brand new deal with, and why I can solely write one let­ter between you each. All of it hap­pened like this: one very windy day final Novem­ber my hood blew off and went and caught on the highest of the North Pole. I instructed him to not, however the N.P.Bear climbed as much as the skinny prime to get it down — and he did. The pole broke within the mid­dle and fell on the roof of my home, and the N.P.Bear fell by way of the outlet it made into the din­ing room with my hood over his nostril, and all of the snow fell off the roof into the home and soften­ed and put out all of the fires and ran down into the cel­lars the place I used to be col­lect­ing this 12 months’s presents, and the N.P.Bear’s leg obtained bro­ken. He’s effectively once more now, however I used to be so cross with him that he says he received’t attempt to assist me once more. I anticipate his tem­per is harm, and can be mend­ed by subsequent Christ­mas. I ship you a pic­ture of the acci­dent, and of my new home on the cliffs above the N.P. (with beau­ti­ful cel­lars within the cliffs). If John can’t learn my outdated shaky writ­ing (1925 years outdated) he should get his father to. When is Michael going to be taught to learn, and write his personal let­ters to me? A lot of like to you each and Christo­pher, whose title is slightly like mine.

That’s all. Good­bye.

Father Christ­mas

through The Paris Review

Relat­ed Con­tent:

110 Draw­ings and Paint­ings by J.R.R. Tolkien: Of Mid­dle-Earth and Beyond

Explore Rarely-Seen Art by J. R. R. Tolkien in a New Web Site Cre­at­ed by the Tolkien Estate

Dis­cov­er J.R.R. Tolkien’s Per­son­al Book Cov­er Designs for The Lord of the Rings Tril­o­gy

Sovi­et-Era Illus­tra­tions Of J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hob­bit (1976)

Map of Mid­dle-Earth Anno­tat­ed by Tolkien Found in a Copy of Lord of the Rings

Ilia Blin­d­er­man is a Mon­tre­al-based cul­ture and sci­ence author. Fol­low him at @iliablinderman.