Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth is a collection of stories and essays by J. R. R. Tolkien that were never completed during his lifetime, but were edited by his son Christopher Tolkien and published in 1980. Many of the tales within are retold in The Silmarillion, albeit in modified forms; the work also contains a summary of the events of The Lord of the Rings told from a less personal perspective.
The collection received a cautious welcome from scholars and critics. They noted Christopher Tolkien's warning that a good knowledge of the background was needed to gain much from the stories. Others noted that the stories were among the best of Tolkien's writing; Warren Dunn expressed a wish for the whole of the history in such a format. The book, with its commentary, was commercially successful, indicating a market for more of Tolkien's work and leading to the 12-volume The History of Middle-earth.
On "The Quest of Erebor" in Part Three, Christine Barkley comments that the perspective is the knowledgeable Gandalf's, contrasting sharply with the Hobbit Bilbo Baggins's narrower point of view in The Hobbit. Peter Jackson made use of the story to enrich the narrative for his 2013 film The Desolation of Smaug.
Overview
Unlike The Silmarillion, also published posthumously (in 1977), for which the narrative fragments were modified to connect them into a consistent and coherent work, the Unfinished Tales are presented as Tolkien left them, with little more than names changed (the author having had a confusing habit of trying out different names for a character while writing a draft). Thus some of these are incomplete stories, while others are collections of information about Middle-earth. Each tale is followed by a long series of notes explaining inconsistencies and obscure points.
As with The Silmarillion, Tolkien's son Christopher edited and published Unfinished Tales before he had finished his study of the materials in his father's archive. Unfinished Tales provides more detailed information about characters, events and places mentioned only briefly in The Lord of the Rings. Versions of such tales, including the origins of Gandalf and the other Istari (Wizards), the death of Isildur and the loss of the One Ring in the Gladden Fields, and the founding of the kingdom of Rohan, help expand knowledge about Middle-earth.
The commercial success of Unfinished Tales demonstrated that the demand for Tolkien's stories several years after his death was not only present but growing. Encouraged by the result, Christopher Tolkien embarked upon the more ambitious twelve-volume work entitled The History of Middle-earth, which encompasses nearly the entire corpus of his father's writings about Middle-earth.
Contents
Part One: The First Age
"Of Tuor and his Coming to Gondolin", an account of the central character of The Fall of Gondolin "Narn i Hîn Húrin (The Tale of the Children of Húrin)" is a long story of what happened to Húrin and his children Túrin Turambar and Nienor, after Húrin was cursed by the Dark Lord Morgoth. The story elaborates on what is told of these characters in the published Silmarillion, starting with the childhood of Túrin, continuing through the captivity of his father in the Nírnaeth Arnoediad, and Túrin's exile in Doriath, to Túrin's time in Nargothrond, his incestuous relationship with his sister Nienor, and ultimately ending with suicide by his sword after killing the dragon who caused much of his problems. A shorter version is given in The Silmarillion as the chapter "Of Túrin Turambar". A complete version is published in the 2007 The Children of Húrin.
Part Two: The Second Age
"A Description of the Island of Númenor", an account of the Atlantis-like island that supported a proud civilisation of Men "Aldarion and Erendis: The Mariner's Wife", a tale a King of Númenor who was more interested in the stars and voyaging than ruling a country, provoking a split with his father Tar-Meneldur. "The Line of Elros: Kings of Númenor", a chronicle listing all the Kings of Númenor from its foundation to its destruction "The History of Galadriel and Celeborn", a group of texts related to Galadriel's origins and exile