Tolkien's
Letters paint an almost-comic picture of the life and death of the sequel to
Farmer Giles of Ham. It existed (in concept) for almost as long as its parent story, but never made it into print - as far as I can tell, because Tolkien never really wanted to write it unless someone had begged him to or had advanced him some money for it.
As Tolkien struggled to begin his "New Hobbit", or sequel to
The Hobbit, his publishers asked if he had anything else on hand to tide them over. He had previously submitted
Farmer Giles in its original form, as a comic narrative he had read out loud to a gathering, and it had not seemed to meet the need. Now, a year later in August 1938, he revised and enlarged it (and typed it) and re-submitted it:
I did not entirely forget 'Farmer Giles': I had it typed. I submit it now, for your consideration in its rather altered scope and tone...I see that it is not long enough to stand alone probably... It probably requires more of its kind. I have planned out a sequel (though it does not need one)...I might finish [it] off if Giles seems to you worthy of print and companionship. (Tolkien, Letters, No. 33 to C.A.Furth, Allen & Unwin, 31 August 1938)
By the following February, he was well into his discovery of the nature of
The Lord of the Rings. Its epic scope, tone, and length remaining to completion were both exciting and daunting, but in no way was it going to be ready for publication any time soon. To his publishers he wrote:
Perhaps you ought to be thinking about Mr Bliss. And what about Farmer Giles? You had the MSS of the enlarged form in September or October...The writing of The Lord of the Rings is laborious...In spare time it would be easier and quicker to write up the plots already composed of the more lighthearted stories of the Little Kingdom to go with Farmer Giles. (Ibid., No. 35, 2 February 1939)
The following week, Tolkien displays his usual coy curiosity about others' reactions to his private literary worlds:
Did Farmer Giles in the enlarged form meet with any sort of approval? Is it worth anything? Are two more stories, or any more stories of the Little Kingdom, worth contemplating? For instance the completion in the same form of the adventures of Prince George (the farmer's son) and the fat boy Suovetaurilius (vulgarly Suet), and the Battle of Otmoor. I just wonder whether this local family game played in the country just round us is more than silly. (Ibid., No. 36, 10 February 1939)
Six years later, as the war dragged to its end and
The Lord of the Rings had still made no appearance, publisher Stanley Unwin proposed that Tolkien put together some short stories to be published in a collection along with "Leaf by Niggle." Tolkien reviewed his portfolio in a rambling letter, which included his feelings that the war had sucked the wind out his enthusiasm for developing a series based on
Farmer Giles:
Were you considering 'Farmer Giles' as a possibility? It is rather a long short. The corrected and properly typed copy is 'out', on its usual travels, at the moment; but I've a tolerable home-made copy which I am sending for 'David Severn's' [The pen name of Stanley's son] perusal. (The sequel is plotted but unwritten, and likely to remain so. The heart has gone out of the Little Kingdom, and the woods and plains are aerodromes and bomb-practice targets). (Ibid., No. 98, c. 18 March 1945)
Unwin was interested in Farmer Giles, and said so. In 1946 he "asked if Tolkien could provide other stories to make up a sufficiently large volume". Tolkien dodged away:
I should, of course, be delighted if you see your way to publish 'Farmer Giles of Ham'...With leisure I could give him company, but I am in a tough spot academically...I could not promise to complete anything soon. (Ibid., No. 106, 30 September 1946)
Even with Farmer Giles going it alone, the publishers kept pushing for more of him, this time as a sequel. Good luck with that:
As for further 'legends of the Little Kingdom': I put a reference to one in the Foreword, in case they should ever come to anything, or a manuscript of the fragmentary legend should come to light. But Georgius and Suet remains only a sketch, and it is difficult now to recapture the spirit of the former days, when we used to beat the bounds of the L.K. in an ancient car. The 'children' now range from 20 to 32. But when I have at last got the 'Lord of the Rings' [completed]...the released spring may do something. (Ibid., No. 121, 13 July 1949)
When
Farmer Giles of Ham was finally published as a small book in 1949, it did not sell particularly well. Tolkien whined to his long-suffering publishers that he did not think it had been publicized very well, and that it would probably have done better if it had been one of a sequence of similar tales, as he had so often hinted to them before the War. The serial obstacles of aerodromes in Oxfordshire, too much academic work, and vanished childhoods, was replaced in this account by the obstacle of finishing
LotR and the
Silmarillion:
For me the chief thing [with LotR finally completed] is that I feel I can turn now to other things, such as perhaps the Little Kingdom of the Wormings, or to quite other matters and stories....P.S. How is little Farmer Giles doing, I wonder? (Ibid., No. 124, 24 February 1950)
All the same [the prospect of publishing The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion in full and together] would have been more encouraging if Farmer Giles could report better of his luck [i.e. was selling more copies]. Rather a donnish little squib after all? I cannot discover that he has been widely heard of. He does not seem to have been very forcibly brought to notice.
I always thought, that in so far as he has virtue, it would have been improved by other stories of the same kingdom and style; but the domination of the remoter world [Tolkien's preoccupation with Middle-earth] was so great that I could not make them. It may now prove different. (Ibid., No. 125, 10 March 1950)
"It may now prove different" - right. It never proved different. It was just another tease to steer Unwin to the idea of publishing
LotR. As I've said before, you gotta love Tolkien's passive aggressive tactics, but sometimes you just want to slap him.
]
] - but I have been collecting books by and about Tolkien for many years now, and the geordie library has amassed many copies (many, many copies) of most of Tolkien's works. I haven't had a count-up in a while, but I know there's several dozen copies of LotR and TH; and several copies of FGH; as stand-alone books as well as parts of anthologies.