Bilbo's Last Song is a poem by J. R. R. Tolkien, written as a pendant to his fantasy The Lord of the Rings. It was first published in a Dutch translation in 1973, subsequently appearing in English on posters in 1974 and as a picture-book in 1990. It was illustrated by Pauline Baynes, and set to music by Donald Swann and Stephen Oliver. The poem's copyright was owned by Tolkien's secretary, to whom he gave it in gratitude for her work for him.
3rd edition; Red Fox, 2012
Donald Swann (right) in revue with Michael Flanders on Broadway in 1959
Image: Kilbennan St. Benin's Church Window St. Brendan Detail 2010 09 16
Pauline Diana Baynes was an English illustrator, author, and commercial artist. She contributed drawings and paintings to more than 200 books, mostly in the children's genre. She was the first illustrator of some of J. R. R. Tolkien's minor works, including Farmer Giles of Ham, Smith of Wootton Major, and The Adventures of Tom Bombadil. She became well-known for her cover illustrations for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and for her poster map with inset illustrations, A Map of Middle-earth. She illustrated all seven volumes of C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia, from the first book, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Gaining a reputation as the "Narnia artist", she illustratred spinoffs like Brian Sibley's The Land of Narnia. In addition to work for other authors, including illustrating Roger Lancelyn Green's The Tales of Troy and Iona and Peter Opie's books of nursery rhymes, Baynes created some 600 illustrations for Grant Uden's A Dictionary of Chivalry, for which she won the Kate Greenaway Medal. Late in her life she began to write and illustrate her own books, with animal or Biblical themes.
Even in her old age, Baynes never forgot the sights and sounds of Mussoorie.
An illustration by Edmund Dulac, one of Baynes's inspirations
An illustration by Arthur Rackham. In 1961, Tolkien urged Baynes to "avoid the Scylla of Blyton and the Charybdis of Rackham - though to go to wreck on the latter would be the less evil fate".
Baynes's illustration The Hoard for J. R. R. Tolkien's 1962 book The Adventures of Tom Bombadil. The image was Baynes's favourite among the book's illustrations, but it disappointed Tolkien as he felt both the figures were implausible: the knight should have had a shield and helmet, while the dragon should have been watching the cave's entrance.