TheRed Book of Westmarch (sometimes theThain's Book^{[T 1]} after its principal version) is a fictional manuscript written byhobbits, related to the authorJ. R. R. Tolkien's frame stories. It is an instance of thefound manuscript literary device,^[1] to explain the source ofhis legendarium. In the fiction, it is a collection of writings in which the events ofThe Hobbit andThe Lord of the Rings were recounted by their characters, and from which Tolkien supposedly derived these and other works. The name of the book comes from its redleather binding and casing, and from its having been housed in theWestmarch, a region ofMiddle-earth next tothe Shire.

In reality, Tolkien modelled its name on theRed Book of Hergest, and followed a tradition in English literature established bySamuel Richardson in the 18th century. He was also attempting, according to the scholarGergely Nagy, to fitThe Lord of the Rings into his presentation of his legendarium as a genuine-seeming collection of tales and myths, by ascribing the documents to the hobbitBilbo Baggins.

TheRed Book of Westmarch is part ofTolkien's framing ofThe Hobbit as part of a long tradition of manuscripts, which hehappened to have found.^[1]

InThe Hobbit, Tolkien writes of the protagonist and title characterBilbo Baggins composing his memoirs. Bilbo thinks of calling his workThere and Back Again, A Hobbit's Holiday.^{[T 2]} Tolkien's full name for the novel is indeedThe Hobbit or There and Back Again.^{[T 3]}

InThe Lord of the Rings, this record is said to be written in his red leather-bounddiary. Bilbo says toGandalf that his intended ending would be him living "happily ever after to the end of his days".^{[T 4]} This is in fact a rephrased line from the final chapter ofThe Hobbit, originally conveyed through third-personnarrative voice.^{[T 2]}

Bilbo expands his memoirs into a record of the events ofThe Lord of the Rings, including the exploits of his kinsmanFrodo Baggins and others. He leaves the material for Frodo to complete and organize.^{[T 5]} Frodo writes down the bulk of the final work, using Bilbo's diary and "many pages of loose notes". At the close of Tolkien's main narrative, the work is almost complete, and Frodo leaves the task to his gardenerSamwise Gamgee.^{[T 6]}

In the last chapter ofThe Return of the King, Tolkien provides a "title page" for theRed Book of Westmarch inscribed with a succession of rejected titles. The final title is Frodo's:^{[T 6]}

Bilbo had translated material fromElvish lore from theElder Days. This work,Translations from the Elvish, by B.B., comprised three volumes, also bound in red leather. After the defeat ofSauron (the Lord of the Rings) Bilbo gives these volumes to Frodo. These four volumes were "probably" (according to Tolkien) kept in a single red case.^{[T 5][T 1]}

The volumes then pass into the keeping of Samwise Gamgee, Frodo's servant and later mayor of the Shire. In time, the volumes are left in the care of Sam's eldest daughter, Elanor Fairbairn, and her descendants (theFairbairns of the Towers orWardens of Westmarch). A fifth volume containingHobbit genealogical tables and commentaries is composed and added at unknown dates, presumably over a long period of time, by unknown hands in Westmarch. This collection of writings is collectively called theRed Book of Westmarch.^{[T 1]}

Tolkien states that the originalRed Book of Westmarch was not preserved, but that several copies, with various notes and later additions, were made. The first copy was made on the request ofKing Elessar of Arnor andGondor, and was brought to Gondor byThainPeregrin I, who had been one of Frodo's companions. This copy was known asThe Thain's Book and "contained much that was later omitted or lost". In Gondor it underwent much annotation and correction, particularly regarding Elvish languages. Also added was a short version ofThe Tale of Aragorn andArwen byFaramir's grandson Barahir.^{[T 1]}

The story then runs that a copy of a revised and expandedThain's Book was made probably by request of Peregrin's great-grandson and delivered to the Shire. It was written by the scribe Findegil and stored at the Took residence in Great Smials. Tolkien says this copy was important because it alone contained the whole of Bilbo'sTranslations from the Elvish.^{[T 1]}

This version somehow then survives until Tolkien's time, and he translates theRed Book from theoriginal languages into English and other representative languages orvarieties, such asOld English forRohirric.^{[T 7]}

A similar work in some respects was the fictionalYearbook of Tuckborough, the annals of the Took family of hobbits of Tuckborough. It was described as the oldest known book in the Shire, and was most likely kept at the Great Smials of Tuckborough. The story runs that it was begun around the yearT.A. 2000 and chronicled events dating from the foundation of the Shire in T.A. 1601 onwards. For comparison, the narrative inThe Lord of the Rings commences in the year T.A. 3001.

TheYearbook recorded births, deaths, marriages, land-sales, and other events in Took history. Much of this information was later included in theRed Book of Westmarch. Tolkien wrote that it was also known as theGreat Writ of Tuckborough andthe Yellowskin, suggesting that it was bound in yellow leather or some other yellow material. Tolkien mentions several other supposedly historical documents related to theRed Book, but it is unclear whether these were integrated into editions. These works include theTale of Years (part of which was used as the timeline forThe Lord of the Rings) andHerblore of the Shire, supposedly written by Frodo's contemporaryMeriadoc Brandybuck, used for information aboutpipe-weed.^{[T 1]}

As a memoir and history, the contents of theRed Book correspond to Tolkien's work as follows:^[2]

However, according to the Tolkien scholar Vladimir Brljak, readers are probably not intended to imagine Tolkien's published works as direct translations from the fictitious Red Book, but rather as Tolkien's own scholarly and literary adaptations of this supposed source material.^[2]

Some events and details concerningGollum and themagic ring in the first edition ofThe Hobbit wererewritten forThe Lord of the Rings.The Hobbit was later revised for consistency. Tolkien explains the discrepancies as Bilbo's lies (influenced by the ring, now the sinister One Ring).^[3]

The Tolkien scholar Mark T. Hooker writes that the Red Book of Westmarch owes its name to a collection ofWelsh history andpoetry including theMabinogion, the 15th centuryRed Book of Hergest.^[4]

The titleThere and Back Again represents an archetypal Hobbit outlook on adventures. Frodo looks upon the going "there and back again" as an ideal throughoutThe Lord of the Rings similar to the Greek concept of νόστος (nostos, a heroic return).^[5] In the Tolkien scholarRichard C. West's view, Tolkien'sRed Book is a pastiche of scholarship. It functions, he writes, as what scholars would call a spurious source, but the authority it imparts is by an appeal not to the old and familiar, but to the modern mystique of scholarly research.^[6] The "found manuscript conceit",^[1] employed by Tolkien to situateThe Hobbit as a part ofThe Red Book of Westmarch, has been used in English literature sinceSamuel Richardson's novelsPamela; or, Virtue Rewarded (1740) andClarissa; or, The History of a Young Lady (1747–1748); Tolkien used it also inhis incomplete time travel novel,The Notion Club Papers.^[1][7]

Gergely Nagy notes that Tolkien wanted to present the complex set of writings ofhis legendarium as a seemingly-genuine collection of tales and myths within the frame of his fictional Middle-earth; he modifiedThe Lord of the Rings to ascribe the documents to Bilbo, supposedly written in the years he spent in Rivendell, and preserved in the fictitiousRed Book of Westmarch.^[8]

• 
  TheRed Book of Hergest inspired Tolkien to invent theRed Book of Westmarch.^[4]
• 
  Tolkien was following the tradition ofSamuel Richardson's 1740 novelPamela; or, Virtue Rewarded in the conceit of afound manuscript.^[1]

InPeter Jackson'sThe Fellowship of the Ring,There and Back Again provided the basis for the voiceover for the scene "Concerning Hobbits", greatly extended in theSpecial Extended Edition. Bilbo's writing of it provides his motive for wanting privacy in the film, substituting for a more complicated situation in the novel. Bilbo only says his line about his intended "happy ending" after he gives up the One Ring. The exchange is tweaked to symbolize Bilbo's unburdening from the great weight of the ring; this frees him to choose his own story's ending.^[9] In Jackson's film version, the book that Bilbo hands over to Frodo is subtitledA Hobbit's Tale rather thanA Hobbit's Holiday.^[10] TheRed Book in full (rather than just its title page) appears at the end ofThe Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.^[11] In 1974,Houghton Mifflin Harcourt published a one-volume edition ofThe Lord of the Rings, bound in red imitation leather.^[12]

• Frame story
• Story within a story
• Pseudotranslation inThe Lord of the Rings

• Tolkien, J. R. R. (1937).Douglas A. Anderson (ed.).The Annotated Hobbit. Boston:Houghton Mifflin (published 2002).ISBN 978-0-618-13470-0.{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
• Tolkien, J. R. R. (1954a).The Fellowship of the Ring.The Lord of the Rings. Boston:Houghton Mifflin.OCLC 9552942.
• Tolkien, J. R. R. (1955).The Return of the King.The Lord of the Rings. Boston:Houghton Mifflin.OCLC 519647821.

• Reproduction of theRed Book of Westmarch movie prop
• The Chroniclers of Middle-earth describing the fictional origins and history of theRed Book
• BBC Radio 4 dramatisation: Bilbo retrieves his Red Book
• Stages and Logic of the fictitious tradition of Tolkien’s Legendarium (Red Book of Westmarch)

• Middle-earth objects
• Fictional books
• The Lord of the Rings
• The Hobbit
• The Silmarillion

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