"In the Tolkien Tradition" follow up

 So, thanks to Mykhalailo Nazarenko, Doug Anderson, and Dale Nelson for sharing the results of their researches into  when 'like Tolkien' blurbs first appeared on early post-Tolkien fantasy novels.

First, Mykhalailo pointed out that the copyright date given in the Ace actually applied not to the Ace paperback (1965) but the original hardcover (1960).

Given Ace's history of pirating books (cf. famously the Ace LotR, that same year of 1965) I shd have been more wary about taking their copyrights page at face volume. Here's what it looks like:

By contrast, the Ace FELLOWSHIP reads

THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RINGS

Complete & Unabridged

Cover and title page by Jack Gaughan.

Printed in U. S. A.

One interesting feature of the WEIRDSTONE book is that in addition to the "Tolkien tradition" blurb by Andre Norton* on the front cover, Norton also provided a brief (two-page) introduction which compares Garner to both Lewis and Tolkien as well as classifying fantasy works into two schools: the other worlds of Narnia and Middle Earth and the fantasy incursion into our world that Garner prefers. She is emphatic that WEIRDSTONE is "not a juvenile as this book was first judged".

Even though the mention of Narnia is in passing, this still marks an early linkage between CSL and JRRT as fantasy writers.

For much more information and interesting discussion thereof, cf. the link below to Doug's post: Doug has gone through and identified a list of books published no later than 1969 that fit the criteria of referencing Tolkien as a blurb somewhere on the cover (front or back). Interestingly enough, the earliest entry is still the Garner, even when shifted from 1960 to 1965. 

Here's Doug's post, incorporating some updates, particularly addenda from Dale Nelson 

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2011/07/pre-1970-paperbacks-with-comparisons-to.html

and here's Dale's summing up.

http://tolkienandfantasy.blogspot.com/2011/11/dale-nelsons-summation-on-tolkien-in.html

I have to say, there are far fewer such books that I expected. 

Thanks to Doug and Dale et a for sharing their work with us.

--John R.

*there wd be a research project for someone with a lot of time on his or her hands: compiling a list of all the blurbs Andre Norton wrote.