J.R.R. Tolkien

British · b. 1892

J.R.R. Tolkien was an Oxford professor of Anglo-Saxon who survived the Somme, invented entire languages for pleasure, and scribbled 'In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit' on a blank exam page. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings built the foundations of modern fantasy — every quest story since walks roads he mapped.