Middle-earth

Publication Order

The works of Middle-earth in the order they were published, from The Hobbit in 1937 to The Fall of Gondolin in 2018. Tolkien published The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings during his lifetime; The Silmarillion and all subsequent works were edited and published posthumously by his son Christopher Tolkien. This order tracks the evolution of Tolkien's legendarium as it became available to readers - starting with the accessible adventure of The Hobbit, building through the epic scope of The Lord of the Rings, and deepening into the mythological history of The Silmarillion. The posthumous works expand on specific stories from The Silmarillion, offering fuller versions of tales Tolkien worked on throughout his life but never completed in a single definitive form.