An early first edition of The Hobbit arrived at an Oxfam charity shop in Harborne, Birmingham, in a pile of otherwise ordinary donated books, and sold at auction for £38,400 (around $51,000), with all proceeds going to Oxfam’s charitable programs.
The copy is a 1938 second impression of the first edition, one of roughly 2,300 printed that year by George Allen & Unwin. Its particular value comes from timing: this was the first impression to include Tolkien’s own color illustrations. The original first impression, published September 21, 1937, went out without them. The 1938 printing added four plates drawn by Tolkien himself, “The Hill: Hobbiton-across-the-Water,” “The Trolls,” “Rivendell,” and “Bilbo Woke Up with the Early Sun in His Eyes.”
Title page of the first American edition of The Hobbit. Photographed by Daniel R. Strebe. Public domain.
Julian Grist, manager of Oxfam Harborne, told The Independent the book “arrived with a pile of fairly ordinary books,” and by the time he recognized what he had, the donor was already gone. “I would have loved the chance to tell them just how extraordinary their donation was,” he said. Grist added that Tolkien’s collectability means he never lets a copy pass without a second look. “Even something that looks quite ordinary can turn out to be incredibly valuable,” he said. “Sometimes an old dust jacket is all it takes.”
Oxfam’s books expert Ian Falkingham put the result plainly: “The £38,000 raised from this single donation will help fund Oxfam’s work with communities around the world.”
The Harborne shop sits in the city where Tolkien spent roughly 16 years, and his time in Birmingham, particularly around Sarehole, is widely believed to have shaped the Shire and its people. We know now what the anonymous donor gave away, even if they never will. The Birmingham Mail reports the donor left before staff had a chance to say a word, which is exactly the kind of story that keeps Grist scanning every spine that comes through the door.
