I have been a Tolkien fan since I first read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings in 1976 just before heading to college. I reread them every break for the next few years and bought every book by or about Tolkien I could find, including The Silmarillion when it first came out in America. As a linguistics major, I admired his languages and writing systems (which are very sophisticated), and the historical and cultural depth of the world really grabbed me.

But there were some things that confused me. The Adventures of Tom Bombadil didn’t seem to have much to do with Middle Earth, and Farmer Giles of Ham didn’t do much for me at all. (A blunderbuss? Really?) I was new to fantasy, and it didn’t grab my imagination the way the other fantasy literature I was discovering did—Narnia, the Ransom Trilogy, Earthsea, Amber, and others.

But then, as C.S. Lewis said in his dedication to The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, “some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again.” That day has come (and I think probably came a while ago, but I didn’t notice).

While I was in Oxford with the Pugcast last May, I picked up a number of books that included works by Tolkien that I didn’t own. Over Christmas, I began reading Tales from the Perilous Realm, a collection of Tolkien’s shorter and less well-known works, including Roverandom, Farmer Giles of Ham, The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, Smith of Wootton Major, Leaf by Niggle, and “On Faerie Stories.”

In short order, my respect for Tolkien’s imagination and storytelling ability jumped to a new level. These stories can’t match Middle Earth for depth, but now that my expectations are different than they were when I was 18 (and now that I’m old enough to read fairy tales again), I found them thoroughly delightful—even Farmer Giles of Ham.

Let’s start with Roverandom. Tolkien’s son lost a favorite toy dog on a beach, so Tolkien wrote a story to console him. There was a young dog who annoyed a wizard, who turned him into a toy dog. The toy dog wriggled loose on a beach, and another wizard turned him back into a dog, but he was only the size of the toy. To be restored, the dog is sent to the moon, where he has a series of adventures (including encountering a dragon). He then returns to earth and is sent to the bottom of the sea, where more adventures ensue, before he finally returns to land and is fully restored and returned to his owner.

It’s a fun, silly story, but I was astonished at the range of Tolkien’s imagination, especially because this long, elaborate story was inspired simply by wanting to console his son on the loss of a toy. I had read The Father Christmas Letters to my children when they were young, but this was on a whole different level.

Farmer Giles of Ham is a story about a reluctant and unlikely hero who subdues a dragon and the events that follow. Farmer Giles is a distant cousin of hobbits. They both represent English peasants with all their character flaws but also their unexpected strengths. While recognizing the worth of the good Farmer Giles despite his foibles, Tolkien ruthlessly mocks elites and court life, making the knights and the king buffoons rather than heroes. This perhaps reflects Tolkien’s admitted preference for “anarchy” properly understood. Despite these themes, it’s again a fun story that adults can appreciate for the satire and sly humor.

The Adventures of Tom Bombadil is a collection of poems, some silly, some not. The introduction by Tolkien connects them to the Shire and some to Bilbo and Sam. Tolkien suggests that some of the poems may have a darker subtext, but I haven’t spent enough time with them to pick up on that.

Smith of Wootton Major is my favorite story in the book and the one that most directly involves the Perilous Realm of Faerie. Much of the story revolves around a boy who is blessed with a fairy star that gives him great skill in song and in his craft of smithing, and also the ability to travel into the realm of faery [sic]. But it also involves a cook who does not believe in faery. Even when he encounters the King of Faery who grants him a wish, he still finds ways out of believing in fairies. I’ll leave you to draw your conclusions about Tolkien’s message there.

I was already familiar with Leaf by Niggle. This is an allegorized picture of Tolkien’s creative work and his rather pessimistic picture of what he thought would be left of his legendarium. But it ends with a picture of hope through Tolkien’s Catholic faith. Most intriguing is the idea that his creative vision will be fulfilled in the afterlife and that he will be able to complete there what he left incomplete here for the benefit of others.

And lastly, we have “On Faerie Stories,” Tolkien’s apologia for his love of faerie and his own faerie stories. For anyone interested in fantasy literature, this is a must-read essay that explains what he’s doing in these stories.

As a lover of Tolkien, I’m embarrassed to admit how long it’s been since I’ve read any of these stories, and some were completely new to me. I was thoroughly delighted by them, and I’m looking forward to revisiting them. I knew Tolkien the worldbuilder, mythmaker, poet, philosopher, and scholar; I am delighted to become reacquainted with Tolkien the teller of fairy tales. I couldn’t ask for a better guide into the Perilous Realm.