J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings was published in three volumes during 1954–1955.
The first volume, The Fellowship of the Ring, appeared on 29 July 1954. The Two Towers followed on 11 November 1954, and The Return of the King was published on 20 October 1955. George Allen & Unwin issued the British editions.
The three-volume format was a publishing arrangement, not evidence that Tolkien originally conceived three unrelated novels. The work is one continuous story, and Tolkien generally called the volumes “books” within a larger work. Printing costs and paper shortages influenced the decision to publish it in separate volumes.
The dates are sometimes simplified to 1954 because two volumes appeared that year. The complete first publication, however, continued into 1955. Tolkien’s long writing and revision process had begun during the Second World War, and the finished work followed The Hobbit by roughly 17 years.