Tolkien slept here

[wellinghall]

Head of Zeus has acquired a non-fiction title which explores the life of a 7th-century warrior, said to be the real-life inspiration for J R R Tolkien's character, Aragorn.

Publishing director for non-fiction Richard Milbank bought world rights in Max Adams' The King in the North: The Life and Times of Oswald of Northumbria from Ian Drury of Sheil Land. The publisher described it as a "thrilling and rigorously researched recreation of the life of the seventh-century Northumbrian warrior-king who was the real-life inspiration for J R R Tolkien's Aragorn".

Milbank said: "This is a stunning piece of research into our early history: Max Adams rescues Oswald of Northumbria from Dark Age obscurity to reveal an unjustly forgotten English hero."

http://www.thebookseller.com/news/hoz-acquires-life-aragorn.html

Comments

[bunn.livejournal.com]

I applaud the determination to find a market - somehow - for a book about seventh century Northumbria, even if there is a faint air of desperation about the approach...

Must confess I've always found poor Oswald a vaguely irritating king, although can't quite pin down why. Maybe being told a king is saintly is intrinsically irritating.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

I confess that I had barely heard of him.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Well he might be thought of as obscure 'down South' - but he was certainly not in obscurity when I lived in the North East!

Not sure about the Aragorn link though - I do remember he was hurried off to live with monks in Iona when his father was killed in battle... Iona/Imladris? But he died in battle and his hand was preserved at Bamburgh Church in the days of Bede.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

I confess that I had barely heard of him.