J. R. R. Tolkien

J. R. R. Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa in 1892 before leaving for England, the home country of his parents, at the age of three with his mother and brother. His father passed away in Bloemfontein before he could join them. Tolkien spent the rest of his childhood in Worcestershire, England and was brought up as a Catholic by his mother, who died when he was 12 years old. At the age of 16, Tolkien began a relationship with Edith Bratt, whom he married in 1916. During his engagement to Edith, Tolkien completed a degree in English language and literature at Exeter College, Oxford. He delayed enlistment in the British Army, which was at that time fighting in the First World War, but he was eventually commissioned and posted to France. After contracting trench fever in 1916, he was sent back to England and began to create the mythology of his fictional world that would eventually form the setting of The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings. He became a professor at Oxford in 1925 and completed The Lord of the Rings during his tenure before retiring in 1959, having found fame as an author. Tolkien died in 1973 at the age of 81.