Nick Groom

Universitetskij uchenyj, izobretatel jazykov i mifologii, Tolkin povlijal na kulturnuju matritsu khippi i khristian, pankov i psikhologov, kinomanov i lingvistov. Segodnja Sredizeme sostoit ne tolko iz tolkinovskogo legendariuma, no i iz smesi literatury, izobrazitelnykh iskusstv, muzyki, kinematografa, gejminga, soobschestva poklonnikov i pop-kultury.Avtor etoj knigi - issledovatel, professor Nik Grum rasskazyvaet o rozhdenii Sredizemja, o tom, kak ono uskolznulo ot svoego avtora i stalo massovym dostojaniem, i o mire, kotoryj sozdal Tolkin.Kniga proilljustrirovana velikolepnymi gravjurami sovremennogo khudozhnika Grigorija Babicha.Perevodchik: Gorokhov V.Khudozhnik: Babich Grigorij

An original and thought-provoking journey into J. R. R. Tolkien's world, revealing how his visionary creation of Middle-Earth is more relevant now than ever before. *Shortlisted for the 2024 Mythopoeic Scholarship Award in Inklings Studies* *Finalist for the 2023 Tolkien Society Best Book Award* What is it about Middle-Earth and its inhabitants that has captured the imagination of millions of people around the world? And why does Tolkien's visionary creation continue to fascinate and inspire us eighty-five years after its first publication? Beginning with Tolkien's earliest influence--and drawing on key moments from his life, Tolkien in the Twenty-First Century is an engaging and vibrant reinterpretation of the beloved author's work. Not only does it trace the genesis and inspiration for the original books, but the narrative also explores the later film and literary adaptations that have cemented his reputation as a cultural phenomenon. Delving deep into topics such as friendship, failure, the environment, diversity, and Tolkien's place in a post-Covid age, Nick Groom takes us on an unexpected journey through Tolkien's world, revealing how it is more relevant now than perhaps Tolkien himself ever envisioned.

'Fascinating.... Wonderfully exhilarating.' Mail on SundayFinalist for The Tolkien Society Best Book AwardAn engaging, original and radical reassessment of J.R.R. Tolkien, revealing how his visionary creation of Middle-Earth is more relevant now than ever before.What is it about Middle-Earth and its inhabitants that has captured the imagination of millions of people around the world? And why does Tolkien's visionary creation continue to fascinate and inspire us eighty-five years on from its first appearance?Beginning with Tolkien's earliest influences and drawing on key moments from his life, Twenty-First-Century Tolkien is an engaging and radical reinterpretation of the beloved author's work. Not only does it trace the genesis of the original books, it also explores the later adaptations and reworkings that cemented his reputation as a cultural phenomenon, including Peter Jackson's blockbuster films of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit and the highly anticipated TV series The Rings of Power.Delving deep into topics such as friendship, failure, the environment, diversity, and Tolkien's place in a post-Covid age, Nick Groom takes us on an unexpected journey through Tolkien's world, revealing how it is more relevant now than ever before.

An authoritative new history of the vampire, two hundred years after it first appeared on the literary scene Published to mark the bicentenary of John Polidori’s publication of The Vampyre, Nick Groom’s detailed new account illuminates the complex history of the iconic creature. The vampire first came to public prominence in the early eighteenth century, when Enlightenment science collided with Eastern European folklore and apparently verified outbreaks of vampirism, capturing the attention of medical researchers, political commentators, social theorists, theologians, and philosophers. Groom accordingly traces the vampire from its role as a monster embodying humankind’s fears, to that of an unlikely hero for the marginalized and excluded in the twenty-first century. Drawing on literary and artistic representations, as well as medical, forensic, empirical, and sociopolitical perspectives, this rich and eerie history presents the vampire as a strikingly complex being that has been used to express the traumas and contradictions of the human condition.

Known the world over as a symbol of the United Kingdom, the Union Jack is an intricate construction based on the crosses of St George, St Andrew and St Patrick. Nick Groom traces its long and fascinating past, from the development of the Royal Standard and seventeenth-century clashes over the precise balance of the English and Scottish elements of the first Union Jack to the modern controversies over the flag as a symbol of empire and its exploitation by ultra-rightwing political groups. The Union Jack is the first history of the icon used by everyone from the royalty to the military, pop stars and celebrities.

Shortlisted for the Katharine Briggs Folklore Award and runner-up for Countryfile Book of the Year. For millennia, the passing seasons and their rhythms have marked our progress through the year. But what do they mean to us now that we lead increasingly atomised and urban lives and our weather becomes ever more unpredictable or extreme?In this splendidly rich and lyrical celebration of the English seasons, Nick Groom investigates the trove of strange folklore and often stranger fact they have accumulated over the centuries and shows how tradition and our links with nature still have a vital role to play in all our lives.

The Gothic is wildly diverse. It can refer to ecclesiastical architecture, supernatural fiction, cult horror films, and a distinctive style of rock music. It has influenced political theorists and social reformers, as well as Victorian home décor and contemporary fashion. Nick Groom shows how the Gothic has come to encompass so many meanings by telling the story of the Gothic from the ancient tribe who sacked Rome to the alternative subculture of the present day. This unique Very Short Introduction reveals that the Gothic has predominantly been a way of understanding and responding to the past. Time after time, the Gothic has been invoked in order to reveal what lies behind conventional history. It is a way of disclosing secrets, whether in the constitutional politics of seventeenth-century England or the racial politics of the United States. While contexts change, the Gothic perpetually regards the past with fascination, both yearning and horrified. It reminds us that neither societies nor individuals can escape the consequences of their actions. The anatomy of the Gothic is richly complex and perversely contradictory, and so the thirteen chapters here range deliberately widely. This is the first time that the entire story of the Gothic has been written as a continuous history: from the historians of late antiquity to the gardens of Georgian England, from the mediaeval cult of the macabre to German Expressionist cinema, from Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy to American consumer society, from folk ballads to vampires, from the past to the present. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

Shakespeare's absolute pre-eminence is simply unparalleled. His plays pack theatres and provide Hollywood with block-buster scripts; his works inspire mountains of scholarship and criticism every year. He has given us many of the very words we speak, and even some of the thoughts we think.Nick Groom and Piero explore how Shakespeare became so famous and influential, and why he is still widely considered the greatest writer ever. They investigate how the Bard has been worshiped at different times and in different places, used and abused to cultural and political ends, and the roots of intense controversies which have surrounded his work. Much more than a biography or a guide to his plays and sonnets, Introducing Shakespeare is a tour through the world of Will and concludes that even after centuries, Shakespeare remains the battlefield on which our very comprehension of humanity is being fought out.

Thomas Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) is one of the founding texts of English literature, and epoch-making collection of historical and lyrical ballads that defined the canon of popular poetry. It dramatically influenced Romanticism and the writing of Wordsworth and Coleridge, Walter Scott, and even Lewis Carroll. This is the first monograph devoted to Percy's seminal work. In The Making of Percys Reliques, Nick Groom vividly reconstructs pioneering antiquarianism and its processes of collecting, transcribing, and collating. With meticulous scholarship, he unravels Percy's working methods, examining his correspondence, library, and papers - as well as his friendships with scholars like Samuel Johnson. This microbibliographical analysis takes literary history and critical theory in significant new directions. As Groom shows, the creation about historical sources and the origins of Englishness, and the practices of eighteenth-century editing were intertwined with themes as diverse as gardening, nightingales, forgery, and cannibalism.