Royal Palace of Naples celebrates Tolkien, 70 years after the release of the first two volumes of The Lord of the Rings

Opened at the Royal Palace in Naples, Italy, the exhibition Tolkien. Man, Professor, Author, seventy years after the publication of the first two volumes of The Lord of the Rings: open to the public from March 16 to July 2, 2024, the exhibition is dedicated to John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, creator of the famous Middle-earth epic, with the intention of placing the writer at the center of everything and uncovering the various facets of his life: the man, father and friend, academic, author of essays and publications. An exhibition itinerary among autograph manuscripts, letters, memorabilia, photographs and works of art through which it is intended to tell the story of Tolkien’s human journey, academic work, narrative power and poetic force and the universe he created, as well as the relationship that bound him to Italy and the Italian publishing history of his works in addition to what he inspired in art, music and comics.

Strongly desired by Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano and promoted by the Ministry of Culture with the collaboration of the University of Oxford, the exhibition is organized by C.O.R. Creare Organizzare Realizzare with the Cultural Association Costruire Cultura, with curatorship by Oronzo Cilli and co-curatorship and organization by Alessandro Nicosia. Involved are several international institutions, such as the University of Reading, the Oratory of St. Philip Neri in Birmingham, the Venerable English College in Rome, the Tolkien Society, the Arnoldo and Alberto Mondadori Foundation, the Benedetto Croce Library Foundation, the Astrolabio-Ubaldini and Bompiani publishing houses, the Greisinger Museum in Jenins, and Warner Bros Discovery.

Particular attention will be given to Tolkien’s relationship with Italy: “I am in love with Italian, and I feel rather lost without the possibility of trying to speak it,” reads one of his letters, and the exhibition will not lack evidence of his trip to Venice and Assisi in 1955; as well as his many contacts, direct and indirect, with Italian scholars and intellectuals. Space is also given to film adaptations old and new, from Ralph Bakshi’s animated film to director Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, capable of portraying one of the most ambitious and popular sagas in world literature on the big screen, winning 17 Academy Awards.

“The exhibition on Tolkien at the Royal Palace in Naples, after the extraordinary success at the National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rome, offers the public a further opportunity to discover or rediscover the life and imagination of this extraordinary author, whose values have profoundly marked the literature of the 20th century: friendship, solidarity, fraternity, love of nature and, above all, the preservation of the human and its spiritual dimension are all central elements of his work, which are invisible to a certain nihilism to which we strongly oppose,” Minister Sangiuliano commented.

The catalog accompanying the exhibition, published by Skira, features contributions by Adriano Monti Buzzetti Colella, Giuseppe Pezzini, Emma Giammattei, Francesco Nepitello, Chiara Bertoglio, Gianluca Comastri, Father Guglielmo Spirito, Fabio Celoni, Davide Martini, Roberta Tosi, Salvatore Santangelo, Stefano Giuliano, Claudio Mattia Serafin, Gianfranco de Turris, Paolo Paron and Domenico Dimichino.

For all info visit: www.palazzorealedinapoli.org

Hours: Thursday through Tuesday from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Closed Wednesdays

Image: John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (Oxford, Museum Bodleian Library)

Royal Palace of Naples celebrates Tolkien, 70 years after the release of the first two volumes of The Lord of the Rings

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