His full name was John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, hence his pen name, ‘JRR Tolkien’. A common practice at the time that is still upheld by many authors today, for example J.K Rowling, was to abbreviate the first letters of your name on any published works and write only your last name in full. This was done for numerous reasons – some authors did it to attract an audience of both genders, others did it because they disliked their first names.
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