Quote:
In the next day or two Frodo went through his papers and his writings with Sam, and he hadned over his keys. THere was a big book with a plain red leather covers; its tall pages were now almost filled. At the beginning there were many leaves covered with Bilbo's thin wandering hand; but most of it was written in Frodo's firm flowing script. It was divided into chapters, but Chapter 80 was unfinished, and after that were some blank leaves. The title page had many titles on it, crossed out one after another, so:
My Diary. My Unexpected Journey. There and Back Again. And What Happened After.
Adventures of Finve Hobbits. The Tale of the Great Ring, compiled by Bilbo Baggins from his own obswervations and the accounts of his friends What we did in the War of the Ring.
Here Bilbo's hand ended and Frodo had wirtten:
THE DOWNFALL
OF THE
LORD OF THE RINGS
AND THE
RETURN OF THE KING
(as seen by the Little People; being the memoirs of Bilbo and Frodo of the Shire, suplemented by the accounts of their friends and the learning of the Wise.)
Together with extracts from Books of Lore translated by Bilbo in Rivendell.
"Why, you have nearly finished it, Mr. Frodo!" Sam exclaimed. "Well, you have kept at it, I must say."
"I am quite finished, Sam," said Frodo. "The last pages are for you."
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Phew! (From "The Grey Havens.")
The Red Book was Bilbo's diary, Frodo's writings on his journey, and Sam's addends. The three volumes Bilbo gave Frodo were supplementary to it, but separate. Frodo (and Sam) only added to the Red Book; the other writings he left alone. Interestingly enough, if you add the number of chapters in the Hobbit and LotR together, you get 80, which is the same number of chapters in the Red Book.
(I can certainly understand your confusion,
snowbird. I had the same problems shortly after reading LotR.)
Edit: The Diary is There and Back Again. That was what Bilbo wrote; Frodo added to it.