The events described in The Silmarillion, as in Tolkien's other Middle-earth writings, were meant to have taken place at some time in Earth's past. In keeping with this idea, The Silmarillion was supposedly translated

The first edition was brought out in hardback by Allen & Unwin in 1977. HarperCollins published a paperback edition in 1999, and an illustrated edition with colour plates by Ted Nasmith in 2008. The book has been translated into at least 28 languages. It has sold

A challenge to complete
Academic criticism of Christopher Tolkien's 1977 text concentrated on his father's intention to complete the work: Since he did not do so, his plans for the overall narrative, out of the large collection of draft texts, were not

• Carpenter, Humphrey, ed. (1981), The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, ISBN 978-0-395-31555-2
• Chance, Jane (2001). Tolkien's Art: A 'Mythology for England'

Development
J.R.R. Tolkien began working on the stories that would become The Silmarillion in 1914, intending them to

At the time of release, reviews of The Silmarillion were generally negative. The Tolkien scholar Wayne G. Hammond records that the book's publisher, Rayner Unwin,

In 1998, the German power metal band Blind Guardian released a concept album about the events in the book titled Nightfall in Middle-Earth.