This year marks the 75th anniversary of the publication of The Hobbit, and as a result, we’ve been blessed with all manner of new Hobbit-related media coming to fruition. Inspired by the recently published compendium of Tolkien’s artwork, The Art of The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien, we decided to track down a few other literary authors who created illustrations for their works, whether published or unpublished. Though The Hobbit is arguably a book for children (and The Lord of the Rings trilogy even more arguably so), it gets a pass as a classic, and for the rest of this list we’ve been committed to leaving out children’s literature, picture books, and graphic novels — because that’s just too easy. Click through to see our list of ten literary authors who illustrated their own works — and since a list like this can never be complete, let us know who we missed in the comments!
J.R.R. Tolkien
Tolkien was not only a prodigious storyteller, but a fine illustrator as well — he drew maps and illustrations for both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, though (aside from the maps) they only appeared in some editions of the books. For a veritable treasure trove of Tolkien’s illustrations, head here.
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