Douglas A. Anderson

Douglas Anderson was born in Valparaiso, Indiana, United States.{{Citation needed|date=January 2025}} After becoming friends with him in Oxford in 1978, he assisted Humphrey Carpenter with work on the latter's biography of Auden, and with The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien.{{Cite journal |last=Anderson |first=Douglas A. |date=2005 |title=Humphrey Carpenter 1946-2005 |url=https://www.academia.edu/5350364/Humphrey_Carpenter_1946_2005 |journal=Tolkien Studies |pages=223}}

His first published book was The Annotated Hobbit (1988), which grew out of a study of J. R. R. Tolkien's revisions to the various editions of The Hobbit following the publication of The Lord of the Rings. The book consisted of Anderson's detailed explanations alongside Tolkien's text. A revised and illustrated edition was published in 2002.{{cite web |title=Douglas A. Anderson |url=https://www.hmhbooks.com/author/Douglas-Anderson/2230341 |publisher=Houghton Mifflin |access-date=July 3, 2021 |archive-date=July 9, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210709190718/https://www.hmhbooks.com/author/Douglas-Anderson/2230341 |url-status=dead }}

Anderson's textual studies of The Lord of the Rings are the core of the Houghton Mifflin revised American edition of 1987, incorporating various changes made to British editions at Tolkien's direction. He contributed a "Note on the Text" discussing the history of these changes, which was subsequently incorporated into later editions with various minor revisions.

With Verlyn Flieger and Michael D. C. Drout, he is a founding editor of Tolkien Studies: An Annual Scholarly Review; the first volume appeared in 2004.{{cite web |title=Volume 1, 2004 |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/9448 |publisher=Tolkien Studies |access-date=July 3, 2021 |quote=The founding editors are Douglas A. Anderson (The Annotated Hobbit), Michael D. C. Drout (Beowulf and the Critics), and Verlyn Flieger (Splintered Light: Logos and Language in Tolkien's World).}}

Anderson has edited modern editions of works by fantasy authors including Leonard Cline, Kenneth Morris, Evangeline Walton and William Hope Hodgson.

He is a visiting lecturer at Signum University.{{cite web |title=Douglas A. Anderson Visiting Lecturer |url=https://signumuniversity.org/directory/douglas-anderson/ |publisher=Signum University |access-date=July 3, 2021}}

Aside from his editing and Tolkien studies, he is a bookseller, having worked first in Ithaca, New York, and then in Indiana. He runs the publishing business Nodens Books, which seeks to revive the work of forgotten authors.

The Annotated Hobbit won the 1990 Mythopoeic Award for scholarship.{{cite web |title=Mythopoeic Scholarship Award: Inklings Studies |url=http://www.mythsoc.org/awards/awards-winners.htm |publisher=Mythopoeic Society |access-date=July 3, 2021}}

; Written

• J.R.R. Tolkien: A Descriptive Bibliography (Winchester Bibliographies of 20th Century Writers) (with Wayne G. Hammond), St. Paul's Bibliographies, 1993
• Tales Before Tolkien: The Roots of Modern Fantasy, Ballantine Books, 2003
• J.R.R. Tolkien: Interviews, Reminiscences, and Other Essays, Houghton Mifflin, 2007 {{ISBN|978-0-618-44516-5}}
• Tales Before Narnia: The Roots of Modern Fantasy and Science Fiction, Del Ray, 2008, {{ISBN|978-0-345-49890-8}}

; Edited

• The Annotated Hobbit, Houghton Mifflin, 1988, revised 2002
• The Chalchiuhite Dragon by Kenneth Morris, Tom Doherty Associates, 1992
• The Lady of Frozen Death and Other Weird Tales by Leonard Cline, Necronomicon Press, 1992
• The Dragon Path: Collected Tales of Kenneth Morris, TOR, 1995
• The Marvellous Land of Snergs by E. A. Wyke-Smith, HarperCollins, 1995
• The Life of Sir Aglovale de Galis, Theclassics Us, 2000
• Eyes of the God: The Weird Fiction and Poetry of R. H. Barlow, Hippocampus Press, 2002
• Book of The Three Dragons by Kenneth Morris, Cold Spring Press, 2004
• Tolkien Studies: An Annual Scholarly Review, Volume 1, 2004 (co-editor), West Virginia University Press, {{ISBN|0-937058-87-4}}
• H.P. Lovecraft's Favorite Weird Tales: The Roots of Modern Horror, Cold Spring Press, 2005
• Adrift on The Haunted Seas: The Best Short Stories of William Hope Hodgson, 2005
• Tolkien Studies: An Annual Scholarly Review, Volume 2, 2005 (co-editor), West Virginia University Press, {{ISBN|1-933202-03-3}}
• The Dark Chamber by Leonard Cline, Cold Spring Press, 2005
• Seekers of Dreams: Masterpieces of Fantasy, Simon & Schuster, 2005
• Tolkien Studies: An Annual Scholarly Review, Volume 3, 2006 (co-editor), West Virginia University Press, {{ISBN|1-933202-10-6}}
• Tolkien Studies: An Annual Scholarly Review, Volume 4, 2007 (co-editor), West Virginia University Press, {{ISBN|1-933202-26-2}}

{{reflist}}

• Anderson, Douglas A (editor): The Annotated Hobbit (revised edition), 2002, {{ISBN|0-618-13470-0}}
• Mythprint, June 1999

• {{isfdb name|11127}}
• {{LCAuth|n92105291|Douglas A. Anderson|5|}}

{{J. R. R. Tolkien}}

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Category:Living people

Category:1959 births

Category:People from Valparaiso, Indiana

Category:American male non-fiction writers

Category:The Tolkien Society members

Category:Tolkien scholars

Category:American academics of English literature

Category:American literary historians