Where was J.R.R. Tolkien’s short story Leaf by Niggle first published?

J.R.R. Tolkien’s short story Leaf by Niggle was first published in The Dublin Review.

The story appeared in the January 1945 issue of The Dublin Review. It follows Niggle, a painter who becomes absorbed in creating a single enormous tree, while practical duties and an approaching journey interrupt his work. The tale is widely read as a reflection on artistic creation, duty, mortality, and the relationship between small acts and larger purposes.

Leaf by Niggle is not part of the narrative of The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings. It is a standalone allegorical story, although Tolkien generally resisted reducing his fiction to one-to-one symbolic interpretations.

The story was later collected in Tree and Leaf, published in 1964. That collection also included Tolkien’s essay On Fairy-Stories, making the two works especially important for understanding his ideas about fantasy and creative work.