The Man in the Moon Stayed Up Too Late

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa, on January 3, 1892. After his father died, his mother moved him and his brother to Sarehole, in Birmingham, England. He was a prolific writer and illustrator. Armed with degrees in Anglo-Saxon and Germanic languages and classic literature, he would go on to create hundreds of works in the form of novels, poems, scolarly works, drawings, paintings, and many construced languages. Some of his most notable works are The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. He died on September 2, 1873 in Bournemouth, Dorset, England.

The Hobbits, fantastical creatures that appear in Tolkein's universe, had their own lore. They knew the man in the moon as an old being who secretly hid on the island of "The Moon." The work that this website features was composed by Bilbo Baggins, famed Hobbit adventurer and the main protagonist of The Hobbit. This poem has appeared in Tolkiens collection of letters and illustrations titled Letters from Father Christmas, and his short children's story Roverandom. Without further ado, lets dive in!