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Revisiting 'No Man's Land' With Author Simon Tolkien On Monday's Access Utah

Middle earth news

  No Man’s Land is dedicated to the author’s grandfather. Not unusual in itself, but Simon Tolkien has a somewhat unusual grandfather, JRR Tolkien, whose experiences in the Somme inspired his grandson’s fifth novel, published to mark Friday’s centenary of the battle.

JRR Tolkien fought in the Somme between July and October 1916, as a signaller in the Lancashire Fusiliers. Arriving at the front on 14 July, two weeks after the battle started, he lost two of his best friends during the battle, and was invalided out in mid-October, around a month before the battle ended.

“[His experiences] were very much in my mind,” said Simon Tolkien. “He died when I was 14 and … I don’t think he was someone who talked about it ... But if you read The Lord of the Rings, it’s a real war novel, and it’s clearly inspired by what happened in the Somme. His way was to mythologise.”

 

Tom Williams worked as a part-time UPR announcer for a few years and joined Utah Public Radio full-time in 1996. He is a proud graduate of Uintah High School in Vernal and Utah State University (B. A. in Liberal Arts and Master of Business Administration.) He grew up in a family that regularly discussed everything from opera to religion to politics. He is interested in just about everything and loves to engage people in conversation, so you could say he has found the perfect job as host “Access Utah.” He and his wife Becky, live in Logan.