It had been quipped on social media that my generation (Millennial) should really be called the Hobbit generation, in small part because a film adaptation of said book came out when we were still at theater-going age. Indeed, one of the few movies I saw in theaters before college was Two Towers. I re-read both Hobbit and Lord of the Rings last year, and wanted to reflect more on the former. As a reminder, here's the general outline of this post: I will . . .
- Contextualize the author's writings as a whole (bibliography)
- Bring the author's major ideas to the present day
- Comment on major sections of the book, or important chapters, depending on organization
**Pin 1: Literary Themes in The Hobbit
**Pin 2: The Hobbit Within Tolkien's Universe
Tolkien's Other Writings
The Tolkien Society has a complete list of his written and edited/contributor books. Since there are around 60 of them, I will list just a few here.
- Translations of Old English and Middle English texts, including Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl and Sir Orfreo, and 'Exodus'
- Assorted short stories for various audiences, including Smith of Wootton Major, Mr. Bliss, and Leaf by Niggle
- Middle Earth-related novels and created languages, particularly Elvish in several dialects.
- The Hobbit: or There and Back Again
- Lord of the Rings (trilogy)
- The Adventures of Tom Bombadil
- The Road Goes Ever On: a Song Cycle
- Bilbo's Last Song
- The Silmarillion
- Unfinished Tales of Numenor and Middle-Earth
- A 10-volume History of Middle Earth, starting with The Book of Lost Tales Part I and culminating in The Peoples of Middle-Earth
- The Children of Hurin
- Beren and Luthien
- The Fall of Gondolin
- The Nature of Middle-Earth
- The Fall of Numenor
I'm not sure how many total pages of text he wrote, but given the 500+ page length of my paperback editions of each volume of Lord of the Rings, but this prolific man spent every moment writing possible.
Tolkien's Major Ideas
Most information in this section is drawn from the Britannica biography of John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, linked in the previous section. Raised in Roman Catholicism after being orphaned, he studied English literature and language, creating and writing about his own fantasy world (Middle-Earth) in his spare time.
The Inklings
Tolkien was a member of a literary club called the Inklings. C. S. Lewis was another prominent member; the authors critiqued each other’s work at informal meetings. The honesty was impactful as noted by references in the acknowledgments of members’ books.
To bring this concept to the present out of the 1930s and 1940s, consider the types and effectiveness of feedback from others. Left to oneself, chances are your drafts of written work won’t turn out nearly as well as when they have had to be buttressed against the critiques of others. As I teach my students and apply in the classroom, there are a few types of feedback:
- Formative. This occurs along the way, before a work is finished, thus allowing for revision.
- Summative. This occurs at the end (like a course grade), not allowing for further changes.
- Positive. This states what the good or liked is about a work or work in progress. To (erroneously) equate “good” and “liked” reflects an emotivist philosophy.
- Constructive. This states what could be improved about a work. Ideally, the phrasing of constructive feedback will be actionable and not simply negative in tone.
For the purposes of improvement, you can see that formative is better than summative, and constructive generally better than positive.
Myths and Legends
Tolkien was also fascinated with Old and Middle English myths and legends, shown by his study of the languages and literature, translations of various works, and invention of place and people names for his own works based on particular older works.
What is generally meant by “myth”? The denotation is a bit different than the connotation, which makes academic-wise confusing to the member of the general public. In theology and history, “myth” denotes something based in history, at perhaps a variable distance from how people today would say that history “should” be written.
What about “legend”? This may be seen as one step farther from reality than “myth”, but is still believed to be based in history at some point. Both myth and legend fall under the art of historiography, that is, how people write about history and historical events.
Implicit Presentation
For background to this idea, please see this Rosebury chapter excerpt. Implicit statements imply ideas rather than saying them directly. Such is a modus operandi of Tolkien’s work as a whole. As Rosebury notes, he chose not to deal with a lot of issues-of-his-day. Rather, he chose timeless themes because good and evil don’t change in nature over time and place, but only in manifestation.
Good is manifested in right conduct. For Tolkien, this relates to right principles that also do not change over time, not to moral relativism. In how he presents storylines communicating these principles, he seems to have had the goal of acting as a poet rather than a news reporter or commentator.
Guided Tour
The Hobbit has 19 chapters and runs around 300 pages for a paperback. I'll break down the chapters into geographic locations. Inspirations for this book included boredom with grading papers, various folklore of Christian and pagan origins, Icelandic linguistics for place names, Victorian fiction, his own childhood neighborhood (i.e., pre-industrial England), other visited locations, and his WWI experience.
The most recent time I went through the book in its entirety, I used the audio recording of chapter 1 to help myself fall asleep more quickly. This I regretted when paging through my paperback copy in preparation for writing this post. There’s a large amount of humor (invention of golf?) that I missed in listening with sleepy ears.
Before Leaving the Shire
Bilbo, the central character in the eponymous Hobbit, is recruited by Gandalf in chapter 1 with the “encouragement” of the party of dwarves. By the first quarter of chapter 2 the first month of the journey toward the distant lands has brought the group just out of the safe, hobbit-filled Shire.
With Dwarves Before Getting Lost
Comprising chapters 2-4, this portion is comparatively short. First comes the tricky but ultimately successful encounter with trolls (Gandalf showing up at the end), visiting Rivendell and Elrond within it, then accidentally ending up among goblins within the Misty Mountains.
Adventures On His Own
In the caves of the goblins, Bilbo gets separated from the others, making his way down blindly to Gollum’s lair and being found by the One Ring. He doesn’t find out until after riddling the ancient hobbit that the Ring makes its wearer invisible. By the start of chapter 6, Bilbo has escaped the caves and accidentally been reunited with the dwarves and Gandalf.
Adventures With Dwarves
Comprising chapters 6-17, this forms the heart of the book. With Gandalf’s guiding presence until partway through Mirkwood, the entourage is tracked down by goblins and wolves, rescued by the Eagles, housed and supplied by the man-bear Beorn, caught by large spiders, then caught by wood-elves.
Only when Bilbo rescues the dwarves from the elves’ custody does he tell them about how the Ring has helped him. Their escape in barrels brings them accidentally quite close to their ultimate objective, a mountain treasure lair that the dragon Smaug has long taken over. Once a bowman from the lake kills Smaug, a larger group must defend the mountain from hostile forces. The family of the archer is of Aragorn’s line, which we learn in the later trilogy.
Return to the Shire
This return trip, in chapters 18-19, is much quicker and easier. To rectify the initial misunderstanding, Gandalf assists the group in making friends with the Wood Elves on the way, of whom Legolas will be shown to be a royal member.
Some of you may have watched the Hobbit movie trilogy, produced after Lord of the Rings. This is one case where I found the books more comprehensible after watching the movies for the bigger picture, but in general I would recommend the opposite order. So long as you see the big picture, you can start to tease out how and why the various characters manifest good and evil in the ways they do, thus understanding Tolkien’s intent beyond entertaining his audience.
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