Tom Shippey facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Tom Shippey
In 2015
Born	Thomas Alan Shippey (1943-09-09) 9 September 1943 (age 81) Calcutta, British India
Nationality	British
Education	King Edward's School, Birmingham
Alma mater	Queens' College, Cambridge (B.A., M.A., Ph.D.)
Occupation	Academic and writer
Known for	Tolkien scholarship
Scientific career
Institutions	University of Birmingham St John's College, Oxford University of Leeds Saint Louis University

Thomas Alan Shippey (born September 9, 1943) is a British expert on the Middle Ages. He is a retired professor who studied old English languages and literature. He also knows a lot about modern fantasy and science fiction stories.

Many people think he is one of the best experts in the world on the books by J. R. R. Tolkien. He has written several books and many papers about Tolkien's works. His book The Road to Middle-Earth is often called "the single best thing written on Tolkien."

Tom Shippey's life and career are quite similar to Tolkien's in some ways. He went to King Edward's School, Birmingham, just like Tolkien. He also became a expert in languages, a field called philology. Shippey even held the same teaching job as Tolkien at the University of Leeds. He also taught Old English at the University of Oxford, using the same study plan Tolkien created.

He has won three Mythopoeic Awards and a World Fantasy Award. He also helped with Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings movies. He helped the actors learn different accents. You can see him as an expert on the Middle Ages in the special documentary DVDs for The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit movies.

About Tom Shippey

Early Life and Education

Thomas Alan Shippey was born in 1943 in Calcutta, which was then part of British India. He spent his first few years there. From 1954 to 1960, he went to King Edward's School in Birmingham.

Like J. R. R. Tolkien, Shippey grew to love Old English, Old Norse, German, and Latin languages. He also enjoyed playing rugby. He earned his first degree from Queens' College, Cambridge in 1964. He then got his master's degree in 1968 and his PhD in 1970.

Teaching Career

Shippey started his teaching career at the University of Birmingham. Later, he became a Fellow at St John's College, Oxford. There, he taught Old and Middle English literature.

In 1979, he became a professor at Leeds University. This was the same job that Tolkien once held. After 14 years at Leeds, Shippey moved to Saint Louis University in 1996. He taught, researched, and wrote books there. He has also been a visiting professor at other famous universities, like Harvard University and the University of Texas.

He has written over 160 books and articles. He also helped edit important collections of writings. After he retired in 2008, he moved back to England and kept doing his research.

Writing About Fantasy and Science Fiction

Tom Shippey has been a fan of science fiction since he was a teenager. In the early 1980s, he worked with author Brian Aldiss. They discussed how to create detailed worlds for stories, which is called "world-building."

Using the pen name "John Holm," he wrote a series of three alternate history novels with Harry Harrison. These books imagine what might have happened if history had been different. He also helped Harry Harrison create a constructed language for his 1984 book West of Eden.

Shippey has edited two well-known collections of stories: The Oxford Book of Science Fiction Stories and The Oxford Book of Fantasy Stories. For ten years, he reviewed science fiction books for The Wall Street Journal. He still writes book reviews for the London Review of Books.

Expert on Tolkien

Shippey's interest in Tolkien began when he was 14 years old. Someone lent him a copy of The Hobbit. He says that he accidentally followed in Tolkien's footsteps in many ways:

• They both went to King Edward's School in Birmingham.
• They both played rugby for the Old Edwardians team.
• Shippey taught Old English at St. John's College, Oxford, just as Tolkien was retiring.
• He became a professor at Leeds, taking over Tolkien's old job and teaching plan.

Both Shippey and J. R. R. Tolkien were professors at Leeds University. Their offices were near Woodhouse Lane (pictured). Shippey thought Tolkien would have seen this name as a sign of the woodwoses, who were wild men of the woods.

In 1969, Shippey gave a talk about "Tolkien as a language expert." Tolkien's secretary was there and asked for a copy for Tolkien to read. In 1970, Shippey received a letter from Tolkien himself. Shippey said it took him 30 years to fully understand Tolkien's polite way of writing. Tolkien hinted that Shippey was nearly always right about his ideas.

Shippey and Tolkien met in 1972. Later that year, Shippey became a Fellow at St. John's College. He then taught Old and Middle English using Tolkien's own study plan.

His first book about Tolkien, The Road to Middle-earth, came out in 1982. In this book, he showed how Tolkien's work was connected to the study of languages. In 2000, he published Tolkien: Author of the Century. This book looked at how Tolkien's fantasy stories reflected important issues of the 20th century. These issues included war, the origin of evil, and what it means to be human.

An updated version of The Road to Middle-earth was published in 2005. In it, Shippey explained that The Lord of the Rings is a book about war and what happens after war. He compared Tolkien's writing to other authors who wrote about war. The Road to Middle-earth also helped explain why so many people love The Lord of the Rings. It has been called "the single best thing written on Tolkien."

As a well-known expert, Shippey was part of the team that edited Tolkien Studies: An Annual Scholarly Review. Many other Tolkien scholars see him as a very important figure in the field.

Family Life

Tom Shippey married Susan Veale in 1966. After that marriage ended, he married Catherine Elizabeth Barton in 1993. He has three children. He retired in 2008 and now lives in Dorset, England.

Film and Television Appearances

Tom Shippey has appeared in several TV shows. In these shows, he talked about Tolkien and his Middle-earth books:

• 1984: Tolkien Remembered
• 1996: J.R.R.T.: A Film Portrait of J.R.R. Tolkien
• 1998: An Awfully Big Adventure: J.R.R. Tolkien
• 2002: Page to Screen: The Lord of the Rings
• 2003: J.R.R. Tolkien: Origins of Middle-Earth

He helped with Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings movies. He worked with the people who taught the actors how to speak with different accents. He was also featured on the documentary DVDs that came with the special extended versions of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit movies. He said that being interviewed for the films was "good fun."

Awards and Honors

Tom Shippey has received several awards and honors for his work:

• 1984 – Mythopoeic Award for The Road to Middle-earth
• 2001 – Mythopoeic Award for J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century
• 2001 – World Fantasy Award for J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century
• 2008 – Mythopoeic Award for The Shadow-Walkers: Jacob Grimm's Mythology of the Monstrous
• 2008 – A special book of essays, called a festschrift, was made in his honor.
• 2014 – Another festschrift was published for his 70th birthday, called Tolkien in the New Century.
• 2020 – A third festschrift was published, titled Literary Speech Acts of the Medieval North.