Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth exhibition, Weston Library Oxford

The Lord of the Rings enthusiasts will be excited to learn that this summer an extraordinary exhibition exploring JRR Tolkien’s life and work will be opening in Oxford. Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth will be well worth the short trip up to the city – a particular incentive is a 3D map of Middle-earth, commissioned specifically for this project.

The exhibition will bring together a vast assembly of artefacts from the UK and US, many of which have not been united since the 1950s. Visitors can expect to see maps of Middle-earth alongside original manuscripts of the stories set in this imagined world, as well as dust jacket designs and paintings. Letters written by his most notable admirers, ranging from Joni Mitchell to Iris Murdoch, will also be on display. Some of Tolkien's lesser known and posthumously published works will also feature in the collection.

The aim of the exhibition is to ‘take visitors beyond what they may already know about the work’ of Tolkien: essentially to reveal the man that has been somewhat dwarfed by the notoriety of his own work. Contextualising original manuscripts with personal letters, photographs, and even his art materials, this will offer incredible insight into the genius behind one of the most complex fictional worlds ever created.

This exhibition, and the accompanying book (set to be published in May), will celebrate Tolkien not only as a writer, but also as a linguist, an artist and, of course, a professor; it was, after all, as he sat down to mark undergraduate examination scripts that he spontaneously wrote the first words of the The Hobbit.