The J. R. R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Volume 1: Chronology. Christina Scull
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Название: The J. R. R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Volume 1: Chronology
Автор: Christina Scull
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Критика
isbn: 9780008273477
isbn:
Too many of the kind readers, dear friends, and valued colleagues acknowledged here are no longer with us; to them we give special thoughts and thanks for their contributions. Most especially, we remain indebted to the dedicatee of this book, the late Rayner Unwin, for advice in the writing of the Companion and Guide and for many years of friendship and encouragement.
Christina Scull & Wayne G. Hammond
Williamstown, Massachusetts
April 2017
IN ADDITION to matters with which J.R.R. Tolkien was directly concerned, the Chronology includes selected events from the wider history of the world, as useful points of reference. Subjects marked with an asterisk (*), for the most part only at their first mention, are treated more fully in the Reader’s Guide volumes of the Companion and Guide. Dates are given as precisely as possible, qualified if approximate (c. = circa) or uncertain (?). Here it has seemed appropriate to refer to the young Tolkien as ‘Ronald’ before he went up to Oxford (October 1911), and thereafter usually as ‘Tolkien’. Unless otherwise noted, ‘Gilson’ refers to Robert Q. (Rob) Gilson, ‘Smith’ to Geoffrey Bache (G.B.) Smith, and ‘Wiseman’ to Christopher Wiseman, three of Tolkien’s closest friends during his schooldays and the First World War.
18 February 1857 *Arthur Reuel Tolkien, son of John Benjamin and Mary Jane Tolkien (see *Tolkien family), is born in Handsworth, then in Staffordshire, England, near *Birmingham.
January 1870 Mabel Suffield (*Mabel Tolkien) is born in Yardley, Warwickshire, to John and Emily Jane Suffield (see *Suffield family).
1888 Arthur Tolkien and Mabel Suffield become engaged, but because of her youth Mabel’s father forbids a formal betrothal for two years. Arthur and Mabel will see each other only at family parties and, with the help of Mabel’s younger sister Emily Jane (*Emily Jane Neave), exchange letters in secret.
1889 Arthur emigrates to *South Africa to work for the Bank of Africa in the Cape colony.
21 January 1889 Edith Mary Bratt (*Edith Tolkien) is born in Gloucester, England to Frances (‘Fannie’) Bratt of Wolverhampton and Alfred Frederick Warrillow of Handsworth. She will be brought up in that Birmingham suburb together with her cousin *Mary Jane (‘Jennie’) Grove.
13 February 1889 Edith Bratt is baptized in the Wesleyan Methodist chapel in Gloucester. The register records her surname as Bratt, her mother’s name as Fanny, and her father’s name as Frederick.
1890 Arthur is appointed manager of the Bloemfontein (Orange Free State) branch of the Bank of Africa.
March 1891 Only a few weeks after her twenty-first birthday, Mabel Suffield travels to South Africa on the ship Roslin Castle. See note.
12 March 1891 Alfred Frederick Warrilow dies. In his will he has named Frances Bratt, ‘Spinster’ and his ‘friend & Housekeeper’, sole executrix as well as his principal beneficiary, leaving her the bulk of his estate ‘including my trade or business of a Paper Dealer’, with a net value of £5,837 4s 8d.
16 April 1891 Arthur Tolkien and Mabel Suffield are married in Cape Town Cathedral.
3 January 1892 John Ronald Reuel Tolkien is born to Arthur and Mabel Tolkien at Bank House, Maitland Street, in Bloemfontein.
4 January 1892 Arthur Tolkien writes to his mother that ‘the baby is (of course) lovely. It has beautiful hands and ears (very long fingers) very light hair, “Tolkien” eyes and very distinctly a “Suffield” mouth…. The boy’s first name will be “John” after its grandfather [John Benjamin Tolkien], probably John Ronald Reuel altogether. Mab wants to call it Ronald and I want to keep up John and Reuel …’ (quoted in Biography, p. 12). It was the custom in the Tolkien family for the eldest son of the eldest son to be called ‘John’; ‘Reuel’ apparently was taken from the surname of a family friend (see Letters, pp. 397– 8, and *Names).
31 January 1892 John Ronald Reuel Tolkien is baptized in the Anglican Cathedral, Bloemfontein. See note. His godparents are Mabel’s elder sister, Edith Mary ‘May’ Incledon (see *Incledon family); George Edward Jelf, Assistant Master in St Andrew’s College (diocesan high school for boys), Bloemfontein; and Tom Hadley, the husband of Arthur’s sister Florence.
15 November 1892 Arthur, Mabel, baby Ronald in the arms of his nurse, and two native household servants pose in the garden of Bank House for a photograph, which the Tolkiens send with Christmas greetings to friends and relatives. At some time in 1892 or 1893 the houseboy Isaak, shown in the picture, steals baby Ronald for a time, to show off a white baby at his kraal. Despite the turmoil this causes, Isaak is not dismissed. See note.
Autumn (southern hemisphere) 1893 Mabel’s elder sister May and her husband, Walter Incledon, a Birmingham merchant, with their daughter Marjorie, come to Bloemfontein. May and Marjorie stay at Bank House through the southern winter while Walter travels on business.
Summer (southern hemisphere) 1893–1894 Ronald spends the cooler parts of the day in the garden and often watches his father planting vines or trees. One day Ronald is bitten by a tarantula and runs away in terror; his nurse snatches him up and sucks out the poison. In later life he will recall running through the grass, but not the spider itself. – Ronald now shows an interest in drawing, often scribbling with pencil and paper when he visits his father’s offices downstairs in Bank House. But his health СКАЧАТЬ