What was the name of the publishing company that first released J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings?

George Allen & Unwin was the publishing company that first released J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings.

The British firm published the novel in three volumes between 1954 and 1955: The Fellowship of the Ring in 1954, followed by The Two Towers and The Return of the King in 1955. Tolkien had originally conceived the work as a sequel to The Hobbit, but it grew into a much larger mythology and narrative.

The firm’s chairman, Stanley Unwin, had previously published The Hobbit and supported Tolkien’s work despite the manuscript’s length and complexity. The American edition was later published by Houghton Mifflin, which is why some readers associate that company with the book’s first appearance.

The three-volume publication was a practical publishing arrangement rather than Tolkien’s preferred division into three separate novels. The work is one continuous story, with each volume containing two internal books and appendices in the complete edition.