"This bone china mug features the watercolour design for The Hobbit dust jacket, by JRR Tolkien.

Tolkien’s publisher, George Allen & Unwin, so admired the black and white illustrations and maps that he had drawn for The Hobbit that they prevailed on him to design the dust jacket as well. He produced this striking design during the Easter vacation of 1937, when he was free of his teaching duties. His editor was delighted with the results, ‘we think your drawing is admirable. Nobody but the creator of the Hobbit could have produced something so suitable’. The jacket was designed to wrap around the book with the Lonely Mountain appearing on the spine, the dragon flying across the night sky on the back cover and the eagles soaring in daylight on the front cover. There is a strong symmetry in the layout of forest and mountains on the front and back."

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