John Steinbeck in 1939 Born

Final years

The grave of J. R. R. and Edith Tolkien, Wolvercote Cemetery, Oxford

Edith died on 29 November 1971, at the age of 82. Ronald returned to Oxford, where Merton College gave him convenient rooms near the High Street. He missed Edith, but enjoyed being back in the city.^[87]

Tolkien was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1972 New Year Honours^[88] and received the insignia of the Order at Buckingham Palace on 28 March 1972.^{[T 10]} In the same year Oxford University gave him an honorary Doctorate of Letters.^[37][89]

He had the name Luthien [sic] engraved on Edith's tombstone at Wolvercote Cemetery, Oxford. When Tolkien died 21 months later on 2 September 1973 from a bleeding ulcer and chest infection,^[90] at the age of 81,^[91] he was buried in the same grave, with "Beren" added to his name. Tolkien's will was proven on 20 December 1973, with his estate valued at £190,577 (equivalent to £2,322,000 in 2019).^[92][93]

Views

The Corner of the Eagle and Child Pub, Oxford, where the Inklings met (1930–1950)

Religion

"Tolkien's Christianity" redirects here. It is not to be confused with Christianity in Middle-earth.

Tolkien's Roman Catholicism was a significant factor in C. S. Lewis's conversion from atheism to Christianity, although Tolkien was dismayed that Lewis chose to join the Church of England.^[94] He once wrote to Rayner Unwin's daughter Camilla, who wished to know the purpose of life, that it was "to increase according to our capacity our knowledge of God by all the means we have, and to be moved by it to praise and thanks."^[95] He had a special devotion to the blessed sacrament, writing to his son Michael that in "the Blessed Sacrament ... you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves upon earth, and more than that".^{[T 4]} He accordingly encouraged frequent reception of Holy Communion, again writing to his son Michael that "the only cure for sagging of fainting faith is Communion." He believed the Catholic Church to be true most of all because of the pride of place and the honour in which it holds the Blessed Sacrament.^{[T 11]} In the last years of his life, Tolkien resisted some of the liturgical changes implemented after the Second Vatican Council, especially the use of English for the liturgy; he continued to make the responses in Latin, ignoring the rest of the congregation.^[87]