The Hobbit

The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien, is a fantasy novel about the adventure of Biblo Baggins in Tolkien's Middle-Earth.



Author Biographical Information
J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973), or John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, was an English Language major scholar specializing in Old and Middle English. He wrote several Famous stories including The Hobbit (1937) and The Lord of the Rings (1954-1955).

Setting: Historical Information
Since The Hobbit is a fantasy, there isn’t really historical information about the setting since Tolkien’s Middle-Earth is imaginary. Although the story is set in the third age of Middle-Earth, 2941-2942, the story takes place in many different settings in the imaginary world of Middle-Earth. Middle-Earth is a prehistoric era invented by Tolkien.

Genre
Fantasy: is a genre often including fiction characteristics like magic, make believe animals and creatures, and supernatural phenomenons.

Plot Summary
The Hobbit is set in the period of ancient time between the age of Faerie and the domination of men. Bilbo Baggins, the hobbit that is the humble hero of this story, happens to have a lot of luck and courage to get home on and back home from an adventure. On the way he will make friends with some unlikely dwarves and a wizard; run into creatures like trolls, goblins (also known as Orcs), elves, and the dragon Smaug. Through this story, glimpses into the politics and history of a neglected but very important period in the history of the world.

Characters

 * Bilbo Baggins - Bilbo's role in the story is that he is the hero. Bilbo really makes the difference in the adventure with his inner strength helping him develope into the hero. Bilbo is described as: couragous, smart, little, strong, and hobbit.
 * Gandalf - Gandalf is the leader. He is a very wise wizard that is great at leading and always make a difference any time they get into trouble. He is decribed as: wise, wizard, old, strong, and tough nut to crack.
 * Thorin Oakenshield - Thorin Oakenshield's role in the story is that he is the leader of the dwarves. Thorin leads everyone on the adventure to reclaim his inheitance that the dragon Smaug stole years ago. He can be described as subborn, warrior, proud, greedy, and dwarve.
 * Gollum - Gollum was the previous holder of The Ring. Gollum has lived in The Mountain for years eating raw fish and surviving many livetimes because of The Ring's powers. Gollum refers to the ring as his precious, but goes crazy and will do anything to get it back after Bilbo finds it. Adjectives that describe Gollum are: queer(weird), slimy, small, and hobbit-like.
 * Smaug - Smaug is a dragon and the role Smaug plays is the antagonist. Smaug is the dragon that claimed Thorin's inheritance for himself. Adjectives include: almost invincible, greedy, has sense of humor, dragon, and extremely destructive.
 * Bard - His role is killing Smaug. Bard is a human that kills Smaug after learning his weakness. He is described as grim and human.
 * Beorn - Beorn is one of the creatures Bilbo, Gandalf, and the dwarves meet and he also aids them in their adventure. Signifigantly, Beorn helps Bilbo, Gandalf, and the dwarves with food and supplies on their journey and also helps them escape from the Goblins/Orcs and the Wargs(equivalent to a wolve). Beorn can be described as a human/bear, impatient, strong, and tall.
 * Elrond - Elrond is the leader of the Elves at Rivendell. He gives aid to Bilbo, Ganadalf, and the dwarves. Adjectives that describe him are: kind, warrior, wise, and immortal.

Author's Style
Tolkien writes in a style that is very light and fun. He also makes it to where his readers do not take everything that serious by making jokes at his characters expense. An example of Tolkien's style is as follows.

“Poor little Bilbo was very nearly left behind again! He just managed to catch hold of Dori’s legs, as Dori was borne off last of all; and up they went together above the tumult and burning, Bilbo swinging in the air with his arms nearly breaking.” (The Hobbit page 98)

Setting
The setting of The Hobbit is the third age of Middle-Earth from 2941-2942. During the adventure many locations will be visited including: Lonely Mountain, Long Lake,Forest River, Great River, Wilderland, Misty Mountains, Edge of the Wild, The Mountain, and the home of Bilbo Baggins. Also many creature will be introduced like: Humans just like us, Wizards like Gandalf, Goblins/Orcs are awful nasty monsters, Elves are immortal beings, Dwarves are greedy midgets, and Hobbits that are even smaller than Dwarves and very nice. Middle-Earth is the imaginary world that Tolkien created, including all of the creatures.

Themes

 * Humble Hero - Bilbo, being just an ordinary hobbit, transforms into a hero throughout the story. Bascially this represents someone common or someone ordinary turning into a hero or someone extraordinary.
 * Qualities - The different races of this novel all have different moral qualities in their nature. For example in The Hobbit all Goblins/Orcs are always evil and all Elves are always good. This symbolizes good races in harmony wit nature meaning they don't harm others and nature. Also those races that are evil at odds with nature because they are destructive and harmful to others.
 * Good vs. Evil - The struggle between good vs. evil is also a very powerful theme throughout The Hobbit and all of the Lord of the Rings books and movies. The Ring abstractly represents the root of all evil in Middle-Earth. Those against this represents the good. Examples are Hobbits and Elves are good and Orcs/Golbins, Wargs, and Gollum are all evil.

Motifs
Tolkien was a scholar of ancient languages at Oxford. A major source of inspiration for The Hobbit’s plot was the body of ancient epic literature that Tolkien studied, particularly Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon epics like Beowulf. Elements of the story originate from literature, including the form of the heroic quest, the dragon’s treasure hoard, the importance of named swords, the elves’ mysterious magic, and the grim focus on birthright and family lineage. The Hobbit revisits many of these ancient conventions with a playful, comic tone that is thoroughly modern. Bilbo himself, with his common sense, love of peace, and warmhearted self-doubt, is in many ways a rural Englishman of the 1930s transplanted into a medieval adventure. Tolkien’s exploration of this contrast between the world in which he lived and the worlds he studied is the source of a large part of the book’s comedy. This contrast also has some thematic importance—Thorin’s last words to Bilbo indicate that despite the grandeur of epic heroism, the simple modern values of the hobbits perhaps have a more important place in the world. Since The Hobbit takes place in a world of the author’s own creation—complete with its own history, language, geography, and mythology—much of the narrative is devoted to incidental descriptions of the places, people, and things that Bilbo encounters. As a result, Middle-Earth emerges as a finely detailed reality with a convincing visual presence and its own unique atmosphere. Taking the reader through this world is one of the primary considerations of the novel, and a great part of Tolkien’s literary ingenuity is devoted to making Middle-Earth seem as real as possible. For many readers, experiencing Middle-Earth as a self-contained whole is probably the most striking aspect of reading The Hobbit.
 * Contrasting Worldviews
 * The Nature and Geography of Middle-Earth

Symbols

 * Named Swords - Usually named sword with lineages are marks of great heros. When Bilbo names his sword it further shows his transformation into a hero.
 * Hobbits - Tolkien based his Hobbits off of the rural middle-class English people that which he lived and grew up with.
 * The Ring - The Ring that pocesses the dark pwers of an ancient lord symbolizes evil in Middle-Earth. It can be compared to the cause of sins of humans in the modern world.

Significance of the Opening/Closing Scenes
When Bilbo says he doesn't want any part of any shenanigans that happens to be ecatly what Gandalf wants him for. Although Bilbo seems weak when he faints at the idea of adventure, he becomes a strong great hero at the end of the story. After finally returning home from his adventure Bilbo has a greater appreciation for the comforts of his home. Bilbo, however, has changed views of society and his surroundings. He will never be the same.
 * Significan of the Opening Scene
 * Significance of the Ending/Closing Scence

Memorable Quotes
“Lets have no more argument. I have chosen Mr. Baggins and that ought to be enough for all of you. If I say he is a Burglar, A Burglar he is, or will be when the times comes. There is a lot more in him than you guess, and a deal more than he has any idea of himself. You may possibly all live to thank me yet.” (The Hobbit page 19) This speech that Gandalf gives eases the dwarves thoughts about Bilbo shortly after Bilbo faints from terror about the upcoming adventure that he did not volunteer for. Gandalf always backs up his authority, opinion, and leadership throughout the book. This is also foreshadowing of Bilbo’s transformation into the hero. “It’s got to ask uss a question, my preciouss, yes, yess, yess. Jusst one more question to guess, yes yess.” (The Hobbit page 73) This particular quote is the creature Gollum speaking to Bilbo while they are playing a riddle game. It perfectly captures Gollum’s hissing form of speech. The precious he is talking about turns out to be a magic ring which Bilbo in that moment had in his pocket. When Gollum speaks his infatuation with the ring reveals the ring has extreme power that is very seductive. “Somehow the killing of this giant spider, all alone by himself in the dark… made a great difference to Mr. Baggins. He felt a different person, and much fiercer and bolder in spite of an empty stomach, as he wiped his sword on the grass and put it back into its sheath. ‘I will give you a name,’ he said to it, ‘and I shall call you Sting.’” (The Hobbit page 142) Chapter 8 is where this quote is from and it is right after Bilbo kills a giant spider giving himself some confidence. From now on Bilbo shows that he is more capable in acting toward the greater good of the dwarves company then his own interests like a full stomach. Bilbo also names his sword which is symbolic to him further claiming himself a hero. “The most that can be said for the dwarves is this: they intended to pay Bilbo really handsomely for his services; they had brought him to do a nasty job for them, and they did not mind the poor little fellow doing it if he would; but they would all have done their best to get him out of trouble, if he got into it…. There it is: dwarves are not heroes, but calculating folk with a great idea of the value of money; some are tricky and treacherous and pretty bad lots; some are not, but are decent enough people like Thorin and Company, if you don’t expect too much.” (The Hobbit page 192) The dwarves true nature is really shown through in this quote because they are cowards for not helping Bilbo in the dragon’s lair. They send him alone being the cowards they are and it also shows that they are greedy and deceptive. “There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.” (The Hobbit page 258-259) Here in this particular piece of dialogue Thorin is speaking his last word to Bilbo telling him that Middle-Earth would be a better place with more people like Bilbo then people like Thorin. This means that Bilbo’s goodness and contempt are great qualities to have.
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 * Significance 1
 * Quote 2
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 * Quote 3
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 * Quote 4
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 * Quote 5
 * Significance 5

Allusions
Gollum is an interesting piece of the puzzle. Sitting on a rock within a subterranean lake, besieged by memories of life with his grandmother above ground, Gollum is an allusion to Caliban, a pitiable, doomed-to-be-evil malcontent who appears in Shakespeare's The Tempest and reappears in "Caliban upon Setebos," a famous Victorian poem. Like Caliban, Gollum has a history that includes a brief education, a maternal unit, life above ground and more happiness than the present. Caliban is named for cannibalism and marked by his inability to speak properly; Gollum is named for the talking sound he makes while eating and as far as eating goes, Gollum is more than willing to voice his grammatically improper desire to eat Bilbo or anything else. Gollum's dismal state stimulates a brief flash of sympathy, for his loss of his magical ring (another parallel to the alluded Caliban) is a well-timed juxtaposition to Bilbo's growing nostalgia and magical power (much like Caliban's victorious adversary). In the first few chapters, we find that sleep is one of the few cherished joys of the hobbits. Things change as the quest requires Bilbo's maturation into a full hero. Chapter 8 offers an interesting fusion of sleep, lethargy and unconsciousness. We find Bilbo's victory is achieved because he is a light sleeper, while Bombur's dip into the water has made him blissfully forgetful. This is an allusion to the dark waters of the underworld (Greek mythology). The river Lethe, from which we get the word lethargy, inspired an erasure of memory. The opiate and narcotic effects of the underworld are repeated in this same chapter as the "dinner dreams" (fires set by numerous elves) seem to be forged in some hellish furnace, a deliberate effort to lure the travelers off of their path. Continuing with the idea of sleep, we can also see the archetypal forest and residential elves paving a way to Shakespeare's hilarious "A Midsummer Night's Dream." This is not an allusion; rather, both works take the old images and ideas surrounding sleep, forests and elves and employ them in new efforts that encourage us to reconsider who we think our noble hero is, where we think our homes are, and what we think is happening while we sleep. Tolkien retains Protestantism's intense suspicion of sleep and only when we are deep within the elven lands can we glimpse the beauty and revelry of unsuspecting, bewitched sleepa pagan vestige that Shakespeare secured by placing his story within an explicitly pre-Christian setting (Athens of ancient Greece). This is of primary importance when we remember that Bilbo has stolen a ring that makes him invisible. Throughout the novel, the need ot hide oneself is present and one thing that certainly distinguishes this group of travelers from an ordinary set of heroes, is the fact that they are always hiding in fear of a lurking monster. Creatures like Gollum thrive on the advantage they haveto see others while remaining invisible. We also see this power used for good in the examples of Bilbo and Gandalf. The issue of surveillance is very connected to the theme of captivity as the group is captured in every other chapter. Bilbo is able to play a hero's role by using his invisibility to avoid initial captivity. Then, he can invisibly rescue his friends. He can help his friends to share his freedom, but in the end, he cannot share his magic with them. This story is full of maps, keys and clever games of riddles. All of this helps to balance the magic of the story. Besides fate and magic, there is a good deal of wisdom that is necessary in order for Bilbo to become a successful hero. We find characters like Elrond, who is able to decipher the moon-runes, and Bard, who is able to understand the language of the bird, Roac. At the end of the novel, Bilbo's own foray into political intrigue demonstrates that he has gained a certain sensibility. And this is no small feat, as the Ring tends to make its bearer foolhardy and unwise, rather than cautious, generous and patient.
 * Solitude and Nostalgia
 * Sleep and Unconsciousness
 * Captivity, Surveillance and Invisibility
 * Wisdom and Knowledge

Adaptations
There are many adaptations of The Hobbit but the most recent one follows up on the Lord of the Rings movies that were made most recently.
 * The Hobbit - The Hobbit is an upcoming two-part film based on J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novel of the same name. The films will star Martin Freeman as Bilbo Baggins, Richard Armitage as Thorin Oakenshield and Benedict Cumberbatch as Smaug. Several actors from The Lord of the Rings will reprise their roles, including Ian McKellen, Andy Serkis, Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Lee, Ian Holm, Elijah Wood and Orlando Bloom. Also returning for the production are a big part of the production crew; among others, illustrators John Howe and Alan Lee, art director Dan Hennah and cinematographer Andrew Lesnie. As with the trilogy, props will generally be crafted by Weta Workshop and visual effects managed by Weta Digital. Additionally, composer Howard Shore, who wrote the score for The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, has confirmed his role in both parts of the film project. The two parts, titled The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Hobbit: There and Back Again, are being filmed back to back and are in production in New Zealand; principal photography began on 21 March 2011. They are scheduled to be released on 14 December 2012 and 13 December 2013, respectively.