J.R.R. Tolkien was a British author best known for writing The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy. He was born in South Africa in 1892 and raised in England, becoming proficient in over 20 languages. During his life, Tolkien served in the British Army during WWI and worked on the Oxford English Dictionary. He is renowned for his high fantasy novels which include The Hobbit, published in 1937, and The Lord of the Rings trilogy, published between 1954-1955, both of which have sold over 100 million copies worldwide and been adapted into major motion pictures.