‘Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth’ at the Morgan Library & Museum

The Morgan Library &Museum’s exhibition Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth feels like the missing piece of the Tolkien puzzle. Collecting a mass of his visual material together, the exhibition emphasizes that Tolkien’s holistic approach to his invented world went farther than map making. His illustrations draw from the same well as his writing and language creation, and complete the fantasy-fiction-as-historical-text that draws so many to Tolkien’s world.

Drink & Draw at The Living Gallery


Photo by Nyssa Frank

I’m sitting in a hot, crowded room, three rows deep with drinkers and drawers. We’re all breathing each other’s collective CO2 exhalations because there’s no ventilation—the front facing window and