Lord of the Rings, The, is a fantasy novel in three volumes. It was written by J. R. R. Tolkien, an English scholar and novelist. The three volumes are titled The Fellowship of the Ring (1954), The Two Towers (1954), and The Return of the King (1955). The Lord of the Rings became one of the biggest bestsellers in publishing history. It has had a major influence on fantasy literature of the later 1900’s and early 2000’s. Tolkien has been praised for his vivid portrayals of the novel’s many colorful characters and for his imaginative storytelling. 
Tolkien set The Lord of the Rings in a mythical world called Middle-earth in the distant past. The central characters are a race of gentle, small, humanlike creatures called hobbits. The hobbit Frodo Baggins receives a magic ring of invisibility from his uncle Bilbo. The ring has the power to control Middle-earth, but it also can corrupt its owner. After being told of the ring’s immense power, Frodo and a band of companions called “the Fellowship of the Ring” set out to destroy the ring by throwing it into Mount Doom, the volcano in which the ring was forged. The story’s major villain is the evil Lord Sauron, who wants to take back the ring and gain the powers it gives to its owner. The ring is eventually destroyed in the volcano, ending Sauron’s threat.
Tolkien was a professor at Oxford University in England. He based his hobbit stories on his knowledge of medieval folklore and philology (the study of languages). Tolkien introduced the hobbits in his novel The Hobbit (1937), which also serves as a prologue to The Lord of the Rings. The Silmarillion (published in 1977, after Tolkien’s death) contains earlier stories of Middle-earth.
The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit first became best sellers in the 1960’s. Motion-picture adaptations of the novels increased the books’ popularity in the early 2000’s. Three films based on The Lord of the Rings were released from 2001 to 2003, and three films based on The Hobbit were released from 2012 to 2014. The New Zealand filmmaker Peter Jackson directed all six films. A television series titled “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” premiered in 2022. The series is set thousands of years before The Lord of the Rings is set. It is based partly on background history that Tolkien included in the novel, particularly in the appendices (lengthy notes) at the end of The Return of the King.
