The J. R. R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Volume 1: Chronology. Christina Scull

1930 Kenneth Sisam writes to Tolkien, asking if he would be interested in cooperating in an edition of the Ancrene Riwle.

      23 September 1930 Tolkien completes a fair copy manuscript of his poem The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun, following a good but incomplete manuscript of some earlier date.

      29 September 1930 John Suffield, Tolkien’s maternal grandfather, dies.

      12 October 1930 Michaelmas Full Term begins. Tolkien’s scheduled lectures for this term are: Elene on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11.00 a.m. in the Examination Schools, beginning 14 October; and Old English Minor Poems (including The Wanderer, The Seafarer, The Dream of the Rood, and The Battle of Maldon) on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 12.00 noon in the Examination Schools, beginning 14 October.

      24 October 1930 Tolkien attends a General Board meeting. He is elected to the Standing Committee on Responsions, Holy Scripture, and Pass Moderations.

      25 October 1930 Tolkien and C.T. Onions examine L.E. Jones of Lady Margaret Hall viva voce on her B.Litt. thesis, An Edition of British Museum MS Harley 2372, at 11.00 a.m. in the Examination Schools.

      31 October 1930 Onions and Tolkien sign their report of the examination of L.E. Jones. They recommend that she resubmit her work after revision. – Tolkien attends an English Faculty Board meeting. He is elected to the Applications Committee with C.T. Onions. He is appointed to a committee ‘to consider the number and emoluments of the Readers’ (Oxford University Archives FA 4/5/1/1). Probably at this meeting the printed proposed revised regulations for the Final Honour School are presented; these include a note that they are to be circulated to the faculty, and that comments should be sent to Tolkien no later than 22 November 1930. The Applications Committee has appointed Tolkien the supervisor of E.V. Williams of Jesus College, a probationer B.Litt. student who wishes to work on a Middle English subject.

      5 November 1930 Tolkien attends a Pembroke College meeting.

      14 November 1930 Tolkien attends a General Board meeting.

      21 November 1930 Tolkien replies at last to Kenneth Sisam’s letter of September 1930. He would like to cooperate in an edition of the Ancrene Riwle, and already has rotographs of one of its most important manuscripts (Corpus Christi College, Cambridge MS 402). He believes that he could produce a plain text, with a limited glossary, in a short time, once he completed work on the Clarendon Chaucer; but a full text, with a complete glossary and grammar, would better serve the study of Middle English. He points out that the Oxford English syllabus is going to be altered to include a special study of the (West Midlands) language of that manuscript, and of a related manuscript in the Bodleian Library. He does not feel that he is solely responsible for the delay in completing the Clarendon Chaucer; he complains that all of the work done so far on the book has been done by him. George S. Gordon has not returned draft notes Tolkien sent him two years earlier, and Tolkien will do no more unless he is given some help in the difficult task of selecting notes and reducing them to the limits Sisam requires.

      25 November 1930 Kenneth Sisam replies to Tolkien, approving his decision to try to finish the Clarendon Chaucer.

      28 November 1930 Tolkien, as ‘Father Christmas’, writes to his children in reply to their letters. The North Polar Bear has had whooping cough.

      5 December 1930 Tolkien attends a General Board meeting. – He also attends an English Faculty Board meeting. The report (dated 28 November) of the committee (including Tolkien) appointed to consider the question of Readers’ and Lecturers’ emoluments is presented.

      6 December 1930 Michaelmas Full Term ends.

      Christmas 1930 Tolkien, as ‘Father Christmas’, writes to his children. His letter, dated 23–24 December, tells how the North Polar Bear came to have whooping cough after being lost in a snowstorm. An enclosed picture shows Father Christmas finding Polar Bear in the snow, and Polar Bear sitting with his feet in mustard and hot water; the party to celebrate Polar Bear’s recovery; and Snow Boys and Polar Cubs pulling a giant Christmas cracker. – If Tolkien conceived The Hobbit in summer 1930, he possibly now begins to tell the story to his children.

      28 December 1930 George S. Gordon writes to Tolkien, returning his notes for the Clarendon Chaucer, praising them and commenting on various points.

1931

      Early 1930s from ?1931 Tolkien writes various undated texts closely associated with but later than the Quenta Noldorinwa and the first version of the ‘earliest’ Annals of Beleriand. These are the ‘earliest’ Annals of Valinor, a chronological record of events during 3000 Valian Years (30,000 of our years) from the time the Valar entered the World until the return of the Elves to Middle-earth and the rising of the Sun and the Moon; two texts of the same work in Old English; and a second version of the ‘earliest’ Annals of Beleriand, virtually a new work but unfinished.

      ?1931–Trinity Term 1933 The members of Edward Tangye Lean’s ‘Inklings’ society, including Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, meet to read aloud unpublished compositions and receive criticism. Among those works is an early version of *Errantry. Tolkien will later write that the group ‘met in T.-L.’s rooms in University College…. If the club thought fit a [composition] might be voted to be worthy of entry in a Record Book. (I was the scribe and keeper of the book)’ (letter to William Luther White, 11 September 1967, Letters, pp. 387–8). See note. – Using the verso of an early manuscript of Errantry, Tolkien works on a version of his verse drama *The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm’s Son.

      ?1931 Tolkien writes several manuscripts in an invented Elvish script (*Writing systems). Among these are versions of his poems Errantry and *The Adventures of Tom Bombadil (Pictures no. 48), both apparently composed around this time.

      18 January 1931 Hilary Full Term begins. Tolkien’s scheduled lectures and classes for this term are: Old English Minor Poems (continued): Judith, Riddles, and The Battle of Brunanburh on Tuesdays at 11.00 a.m. in the Examination Schools, beginning 20 January; the Old English Exodus on Tuesdays at 12.00 noon in the Examination Schools, beginning 20 January; Gothic Traditions, Thursdays at 11.00 a.m. in the Examination Schools, beginning 22 January; Carmina Scaldica: Introduction to Reading of Scaldic Poetry, at an hour and place to be arranged; and Old English Textual Criticism, at an hour and place to be arranged.

      22 January 1931 Tolkien writes to Kenneth Sisam. He has done as much work as possible on the Clarendon Chaucer despite a ‘shattered vac[ation]’ (Oxford University Press archives), and Pass Moderations and external examining at four universities will now leave him no leisure before August. He asks for guidance on the permitted length of the book and the audience at which it is aimed, to avoid wasted labour. He has been unable to do any research, though ‘obscurities and unsatisfactory explanations’ remain. Further work on the Chaucer will have to be extracted from time normally given to sleep or study, but Tolkien vows to complete the book before the summer if physically possible. Then he will think about an edition of the Ancrene Riwle on the lines that Sisam has indicated.

      30 January 1931 Tolkien attends a General Board meeting.

      6 February 1931 Tolkien attends an English Faculty Board meeting. He is appointed to a committee on proposed new regulations for the Honour School. The Applications Committee has readmitted L.E. Jones of Lady Margaret Hall as a B.Litt. student, with Tolkien as her supervisor.

      12 February 1931 Tolkien attends an English Faculty Library Committee meeting at 2.15 p.m. in the Library. The Committee will now have two meetings per term, to be held on the second and seventh Thursdays.

      13 February 1931 Tolkien attends a General Board meeting.