LAW FIRM ADVISES SCHOOL ON FORGOTTEN TOLKIEN POEMS

Swindon-based commercial law firm Thrings has given specialist copyright and intellectual property advice to the principal of a school where previously forgotten poems by author JRR Tolkien have been rediscovered.

The two poems – The Shadow Man and a Christmas poem called Noel – were found in the 1936 annual magazine of Our Lady’s School in Abingdon, Oxfordshire.

They are thought to have been written while Tolkien – best known for writing the Lord of the Rings fantasy trilogy – was a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University.

The poems were printed a year before Tolkien’s first literary classic The Hobbit was published.

The Shadow Man is an earlier version of a poem eventually published in 1962 in Tolkien’s Adventures of Tom Bombadil collection.

The discovery was made after American Tolkien expert Wayne G Hammond found a note from Tolkien in which the author referred to two poems he had submitted to the Abingdon Chronicle.

Tracking the reference to Our Lady’s School magazine, Hammond contacted Principal Stephen Oliver who passed the query on to archivists at the Bermondsey convent of the Sisters of Mercy, who founded the school in 1860.

But, while preparing for an event for school alumni, Mr Oliver came across an original copy of the magazine, complete with the two poems in question.

The poems have sparked a huge amount of interest among Tolkien enthusiasts and media around the world. Recognising their considerable literary significance, Mr Oliver took steps to establish the legal status of the poems, and to ensure there was no unauthorised publication or breach of copyright.

The school’s original copies of the newspaper will now be worth considerably more than they were before.

The value of the poems’ copyright, however, belongs to Tolkien’s estate. Only they can authorise any further publication.