How big an error can be created by a small typo. When George Beahm submitted his volume The Inessential J. R. R. Tolkien Sourcebook, someone left out the "in," and look what resulted.

I am, of course, being exceptionally caustic, because I bought this book without seeing its contents, and it turns out to be completely useless to me. This is not a book about J. R. R. Tolkien's sources; this is a book about the J. R. R. Tolkien industry.

If I were making a list of Tolkien's sources, it would include such things as the Dvergatal, the "Tally of the Dwarfs" in the Vôluspá, where Tolkien found the names of the dwarves in The Hobbit. It would include Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, which deeply influences the morality of the Mount Doom scenes in The Lord of the Rings. I would include Sir Orfeo, which gave him much of the image of Mirkwood. The Sigurd legend gave him his dragons. The Kalevala gave him Túrin Turambar. A grove in Holderness where his wife danced (a place deeply associated with Robin Hood, incidentally) gave him Lúthien. The influence of Beowulf is everywhere in his writings. Those are Tolkien's sources.

What this offers instead are Tolkien-related produced, from stationary to board games to the movies that took out so much of the mythological depth that made Tolkien Tolkien. These seem to be good as far as they go, although now massively out of date. If this had been entitled "The Essential J. R. R. Tolkien Fan Activity Guide," I'd have no problem with it, although I wouldn't be likely to buy it. But that's not what it calls itself. To me -- and, I'm quite sure, to J. R. R. Tolkien, the great scholar of language and folklore -- a "source" is an inspiration or a thing that supplies ideas and themes. Tolkien had plenty of those -- my list above hardly scratches the surface. But you can't learn about them here. For my (mis-spent) money, that's false advertising.

Your dictionary's definition may vary.

[Correction February 25: corrected "produced" to "products."] ( )