Tolkien, and the chronicles of modern despair

PETER JACKSON AND PHILIPPA BOYENS TELL US ABOUT THEIR EPIC QUEST TO FORGE A FAMILY – AND HOW THEY PUT TOGETHER A CREW THAT ENDURES TO THIS VERY DAY…

THE MAN BEHIND GOLLUM — AND SMÉAGOL — IS ABOUT TO SHEPHERD THE SAGA INTO A NEW ERA. ANDY SERKIS WRITES EXCLUSIVELY FOR EMPIRE ABOUT AN EPIC RESPONSIBILITY

Best books… Roy Foster The emeritus professor of ...

From Skins to Adolescence, Jack Thorne is a master of telling gritty teenage stories. Now he’s tackling the big one – Lord of the Flies

Once known for its lacemaking factories, Nottingham has reinvented itself as a centre of role-playing games. Games Workshop – maker of Warhammer 40,000 – is a multibillion-pound behemoth, and it sustains a whole ecosystem.

A round 3.30pm on 30 April 1945, Adolf Hitler shot himself in his Berlin bunker. Minutes later, his still warm body was carried outside by loyal staffers and burned in the Reich Chancellery gardens. H