Rater Reads The Hobbit

[Rater202]

So, I have never actually read The Hobbit, despite it being one of those books that everyone should read if given the chance, being that it and the rest of Tolkien's library are definitive influences on modern fantasy literature.

I have recently been gifted a new copy of the book, specifically a copy of the 75th Anniversary Pocket Edition, if that is at all relevant, and I thought it might be fun to, as someone with only an intellectual, pop-culture-influenced understanding of the book reading it otherwise blind, to share my thoughts don't he text.

I asked a bit ago, some people expressed interest, so I'm doing it.

A breakdown of how this is going to work: For each chapter, there will be two spoiler blocks.

The first will contain my thoughts on the chapter as I read it, which means they will probably be somewhat disjointed and stream of thought. the second will contain a more detailed set of thoughts after finishing the chapter.

sometimes, one will be longer than the other, and in both cases, the chapter will probably be summarized to some degree.

I do not have a set schedule for this. This will be updated as I read and I will read as I feel like it. There may come times where more than one chapter is read in a day—maybe even during the same post. I am a quick reader, I usually finish books pretty fast.

Discussion of the book is welcome, and anyone with a copy who wants to read along is welcome to, but please, anything that comes after the most recent chapter I have posted on should be in clearly marked spoiler tags, please and thank you.

I don't normally mind spoilers, but in this case, I want to respond to things after having read the chapter myself.

And here we go.

Before getting to the chapter proper, I feel I must note, as this edition preserves Tolkien's own illustrations, that Smaug is much more lanky and serpentine than more modern depictions.

Which honestly makes sense. "Smaug" means something along the lines of "to slither through" so he should look like something that slithers.

I like that the first chapter properly opens by saying the hobbit lives in a hole, then goes to length to explain that a 'hobbit-hole' isn't a literal hole in the ground but a cozy home built into a hill when it could have just said "the hobbit lived in a cozy house built into a hill" and gone on to describe it exactly the same. It feels like something someone might actually say, if they were trying to tell a story from memory.

We have our introduction to the wealthy, respected, and all together unadventurous Baggins family, and a description of what a hobbit actually is.: A good-natured, cheerful little fat person with hairy, leathery-soled feet. No mention of them having unusually large feet for their size, which you see in pretty much every adaption.

Another thing I find noteworthy is that the hobbits are described as having "long, brown fingers" which would indicate that... well, I man, pretty much every adaption of The Hobbit or The Lord of The Rings shows the Hobbit as fair-skinned, but to have brown fingers they would logically have brown skin. I'm not sure what exactly would constitute "Brown" to an Englishman in Tolkien's time but I'm imagining at the very least a moderate tan.

We are then given a description of Bilbo Baggins' parents, noting that his mother comes from a family rumored to have fairy blood because they tend to disappear on adventures, but that she never went on any adventures after becoming Mrs. Baggins.

In these kinds of stories, in my experience, it's always the father whom this kind of thing comes from. Inheritance from the father, maybe a gift from the mother. It's nice to see a case where when something is "in the blood" that it comes from the mother even almost 85 years back.

In comparison, all we're told about Bilbo's father is that he built a nice house that Bilbo eventually inherited. Almost a complete inversion of the trope from a book that, honestly, probably predates the trope.

"By some curious chance one morning long ago in the quiet of the world, when there was less noise and more green..." and I am immediately nostalgic for a time I've never known and probably never existed. That is some good descriptive prose right there.

Gandalf is introduced by more prose, presenting him as some sort of famed Myth-Hero capable of almost any miracle... Which considering that Tolkien's "wizards" are more akin to 'demigods' or 'questing angels' is more than appropriate... I wonder, did the idea of wizards as such beings come first, or did Tolkien write this description and then decide his wizards needed to live up to it?

And I immediately love the banter between Bilbo and Gandalf. "When you say good morning do you mean *number of options*"
"Yes."

I notice the descriptions of the dwarves describe quite colorful clothes and especially beards... I haven't seen the films, and only clips of the Rankin-Bass production. Am I right to assume that it is omitted in favor of more traditionally 'dwarvy' colors?

A dwarf taking wine? ye gods have things been simplified from the old days.

...I could hear the singing in my head. Thank you Peter Hollins drinking melody.

And, at least the Dwarves make for good guests. That's gotta be at least some consolation.

I already like these dwarves more than any other example of their kind in any other media. They already feel like a culture, a people who could exist, rather than a simple stereotype.

I literally shook with laughter at the description of Bullriarer inventing golf.

And Gandalf tempting Bilbo's latent adventurous side, hinted at his aborted comment about things being more exciting in the old days, was the entire point of this audacious stunt, was it not?

More heist movies should start like this. The team is already assembled, the plan is discussed and fine-tuned when the last guy is involved, and most of the story is just gettiing there.

And more beautifully descriptive prose, this time of the destruction wrought by Smaug.

...I don't like the Capital Letters on "The Necromancer."

And we end with everyone going to bed.

so, imagine if you will that you only know pizza from something.. Cheap. Like, say, bagel bites. Not bad, not by any means, but far from the best.

And then you taste a properly made pizza made fresh with top-shelf ingredients, fresh creamy mozzarella and sweet, spicy sauce seasoned just right on a crust that's just the right thickness and balance of crunchiness to tenderness.

that is how I feel going from my vague understanding of Tolkien via pop culture and derivative works to the original, real thing.

I'm repeating myself a bit, but... I love the prose. even bilbo's "not so prosy" prose does a good job of painting a picture in my mind's eyes.

Bilbo, Gandalf, and Thorin all have their own distinct voices from their first lines, and to repeat myself I love the initial conversation between Bilbo and Gandalf—it comes across very much like two very clever people who do not think the way normal people do and who don't quite understand each other trying to have a conversation when one clearly means something other than the other... Though Obviously, Gandalf understands more than he lets on, and is playing a con.

I can actually feel how increasingly flustered Bilbo becomes as the Dwarve begin to step in...

In general, I love literature. I love to read, I love to artistically critique what I've read, I love to examine it and reexamine it and learn about the context in which it was written, and this?

I have chills, they're multiplying, and I should stop here before I transition from my love of literature to my love of stage musicals.

And tha'ts chapter one done. I hope some people will design to join me in time for chapter two.

[Khedrac]

I'm glad to read that you are already loving the book, and I think you will be pleasantly surprised by many of the twists to come.

It is worth bearing in mind that The Hobbit is very different in style to the rest of the Middle Earth works - both those wirtten by Tolkein (or very nearly) and those assembled by his son atfer his death.

I, who have read The Hobbit many times before recently re-read it after a long break and I was very surprised by some of the things I had forgotten, bu all I woudl say at this point is that Peter Jackson ignored the book pretty much from the start (and I never watched the 2nd or 3rd Hobbit films).

Oh yes, do take time to look at the maps (online if those in the Pocket Edition are too small to read) - one of the nice touches is the way the Dwarf map of the lonely mountain isn't "North up".

[The Hellbug]

Ooh, this one could be fun to keep an eye on. The Hobbit was my favorite novel for probably a decade after I first read it (and it still obviously holds a place of honor in my heart). In fact, and this is personal taste, I vastly prefer it to Lord of the Rings; the fairy-tale-like tone of the narrative makes it so much more fun than the more epic and clinical style of Tolkien's related work. Bilbo is an extremely fun clever-but-out-of-his-depth character, and watching his relationship with the dwarves go from 'that guy the wizard told us we should bring' to a trusted ally that is relied on in the most perilous of circumstances is extremely engaging. Additionally, his sense of wonder at the wider world of Middle Earth is easy to latch on to as a reader, and he makes an excellent viewpoint character.

How much do you know of the recent films? I'm practically contractually obligated to dunk on them (they...very much miss the spirit of the original work in my opinion, among other problems), but I will say that their adaptation of the first chapter is actually pretty good if I remember correctly (it goes downhill rather quickly...and the first film is by far the best of them).

[Manga Shoggoth]

While I made myself watch all three LOTR films, I flat refused to watch The Hobbit trilogy because the book was good enough, and they tried to stretch it out into three films. (I was also dragooned into seeing a stage adaptation if The Hobbit, and that was pretty ropey, and runined by the number of times they tried to reference LOTR.)

I'm looking forward to this - it's a good book, and if you liked the first chapter you should enjoy the rest of it.

[Fyraltari]

Ooh, I cant tell this is going to be good.

We have our introduction to the wealthy, respected, and all together unadventurous Baggins family, and a description of what a hobbit actually is.: A good-natured, cheerful little fat person with hairy, leathery-soled feet. No mention of them having unusually large feet for their size, which you see in pretty much every adaption.

Another thing I find noteworthy is that the hobbits are described as having "long, brown fingers" which would indicate that... well, I man, pretty much every adaption of The Hobbit or The Lord of The Rings shows the Hobbit as fair-skinned, but to have brown fingers they would logically have brown skin. I'm not sure what exactly would constitute "Brown" to an Englishman in Tolkien's time but I'm imagining at the very least a moderate tan.
The question of skin color in Tolkien's Legendarium is a bit complicated as his descriptions are generally more evocative that descriptive. The hobbits being something of a stand-in for then-modern English people, it's likely the Professor didn't intend for them to have what we'd call dark skin today and was more referring to a worker's tan, but you never know. Also the people of Gondor and Nùmenor are also kind of whitewashed.


We are then given a description of Bilbo Baggins' parents, noting that his mother comes from a family rumored to have fairy blood because they tend to disappear on adventures, but that she never went on any adventures after becoming Mrs. Baggins.

In these kinds of stories, in my experience, it's always the father whom this kind of thing comes from. Inheritance from the father, maybe a gift from the mother. It's nice to see a case where when something is "in the blood" that it comes from the mother even almost 85 years back.

In comparison, all we're told about Bilbo's father is that he built a nice house that Bilbo eventually inherited. Almost a complete inversion of the trope from a book that, honestly, probably predates the trope.
In fact, whenever somebody is of mixed origin in the LEgendarium, the mother is always the most magical of the parents. Out of all the Men/elves coupling only one had a male elf and female human and they died without having children (it was war-time).



"By some curious chance one morning long ago in the quiet of the world, when there was less noise and more green..." and I am immediately nostalgic for a time I've never known and probably never existed.
Middle-Earth in a nutshell.

The world was young, the mountains green,
No stains yet on the Moon was seen,
No words were laid on stream or stone,
When Durin woke and walked alone...


Gandalf is introduced by more prose, presenting him as some sort of famed Myth-Hero capable of almost any miracle... Which considering that Tolkien's "wizards" are more akin to 'demigods' or 'questing angels' is more than appropriate... I wonder, did the idea of wizards as such beings come first, or did Tolkien write this description and then decide his wizards needed to live up to it?
Gandalf is already taking some pretty serious clues from Norse and Finnish mythology with a side helping of Arthurian mythos, so the former, I'd say.



I notice the descriptions of the dwarves describe quite colorful clothes and especially beards... I haven't seen the films, and only clips of the Rankin-Bass production. Am I right to assume that it is omitted in favor of more traditionally 'dwarvy' colors?
One thing I can say for the Jackson Hobbit movies, is that they gave each dwarf a distinctive visual identity.


A dwarf taking wine? ye gods have things been simplified from the old days.

...I could hear the singing in my head. Thank you Peter Hollins drinking melody.

And, at least the Dwarves make for good guests. That's gotta be at least some consolation.

I already like these dwarves more than any other example of their kind in any other media. They already feel like a culture, a people who could exist, rather than a simple stereotype.
...Unwearied then were Durin's folk,
Beneath the Mountains music woke,
The harpers harped, the minstrels sang
And at the gates the trumpets rang...

Okay, I should probably stop with the quotes, you might read The Lord of the Rings afterward.


I literally shook with laughter at the description of Bullriarer inventing golf.
You know, I keep forgetting that's a thing.


...I don't like the Capital Letters on "The Necromancer."
Fair enough.


so, imagine if you will that you only know pizza from something.. Cheap. Like, say, bagel bites. Not bad, not by any means, but far from the best.

And then you taste a properly made pizza made fresh with top-shelf ingredients, fresh creamy mozzarella and sweet, spicy sauce seasoned just right on a crust that's just the right thickness and balance of crunchiness to tenderness.

that is how I feel going from my vague understanding of Tolkien via pop culture and derivative works to the original, real thing.

I'm repeating myself a bit, but... I love the prose. even bilbo's "not so prosy" prose does a good job of painting a picture in my mind's eyes.

Bilbo, Gandalf, and Thorin all have their own distinct voices from their first lines, and to repeat myself I love the initial conversation between Bilbo and Gandalf—it comes across very much like two very clever people who do not think the way normal people do and who don't quite understand each other trying to have a conversation when one clearly means something other than the other... Though Obviously, Gandalf understands more than he lets on, and is playing a con.

I can actually feel how increasingly flustered Bilbo becomes as the Dwarve begin to step in...

In general, I love literature. I love to read, I love to artistically critique what I've read, I love to examine it and reexamine it and learn about the context in which it was written, and this?

I have chills, they're multiplying, and I should stop here before I transition from my love of literature to my love of stage musicals.

And tha'ts chapter one done. I hope some people will design to join me in time for chapter two.
Yup, This is going to be good. You've just embarked on a great journey, friend. And remember, The road goes ever on...

[Rater202]

Fair enough.

Now, when I say that, it's that "the Necromancer" says something all-together different than "a necromancer" does.

I'm vaguely familiar with the general outline of this story... But I don't quite recall anything about "the Necromancer."

[DavidSh]

"...love of stage musicals". Well, if memory serves, the first chapter already had a couple of songs, so you could imagine this as a musical. Let's see how that goes.

[Fyraltari]

Now, when I say that, it's that "the Necromancer" says something all-together different than "a necromancer" does.

I'm vaguely familiar with the general outline of this story... But I don't quite recall anything about "the Necromancer."

He's not actually in the story.

[Eldan]

You know what, this is a great opportunity to post some sung versions of those songs.

Now, the movie version of Far Over the Misty Mountains is excellent, but I'd like to instead plug a full version here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8ymgFyzbDo

(If you ever do the Lord of the Rings, I have so many more songs. And they are all great. I might be a minority, but I love Tolkien's super long songs.)

Edit: whoops, wrong version. That one also contains another song for some reason. THis is the right one.

[Dragonus45]

The thing I love most about the prose in the Hobbit is the way it almost compels me to read out loud whenever I'm reading it. It feels so much like a story you want to tell someone.

[Rater202]

The thing I love most about the prose in the Hobbit is the way it almost compels me to read out loud whenever I'm reading it. It feels so much like a story you want to tell someone.

Yes.

From what I've heard, The Hobbit was originally written as a bedtime story for Tolkien's own children.

Even if it wasn't, even one chapter in there's some obvious inspiration from ancient Norse literature, which consisted almost entirely of songs and poems which are, naturally, meant to be spoken or sung aloud.

[DavidSh]

Edit: whoops, wrong version. That one also contains another song for some reason. THis is the right one.

Yes, Durin's Song is all very well and atmospheric, but it's from The Lord of the Rings, not The Hobbit.

[Sapphire Guard]

The Clamavi de Profundis version of Durin's song is brilliant, though.

A few years back, I remember reading LOTR again, long years after the first time, and being startled at how genuinely well written it was, as a work in itself. Big difference, like when you read Dracula or Sherlock Holmes for the first time and find out they're not what pop culture made them.

[snowblizz]

I recently re-read the Hobbit and LotR, for the first time in over 2 decades probably, my last re-read was probably somewhere before the movies came out.

The thing I wanted to recapture not present in the movie was that special something the text had.

The really weird part however was a lot of things I thought I remembered from the books that were changed in the movies didn't actually occur in the books either. Very puzzling. It's like I remember something half-way between books and movies.

[DataNinja]

In fact, and this is personal taste, I vastly prefer it to Lord of the Rings; the fairy-tale-like tone of the narrative makes it so much more fun than the more epic and clinical style of Tolkien's related work.
I was pretty much going to say the same thing. The LotR have a place in my heart, but the Hobbit just has so much more fun and whimsey, it's such a joy.


How much do you know of the recent films? I'm practically contractually obligated to dunk on them (they...very much miss the spirit of the original work in my opinion, among other problems), but I will say that their adaptation of the first chapter is actually pretty good if I remember correctly
Agreed. The start of the film up until just about after Bilbo (spoilers) heads off on his adventure is definitely my favorite segment, and had given me lots of hope for the film.

[factotum]

From what I've heard, The Hobbit was originally written as a bedtime story for Tolkien's own children.


It definitely was--I think Christopher Tolkien wrote an introduction to one of the editions where he mentions his childhood self correcting his father on the colour of Thorin's hat because he'd made it different in one scene than in another! It's why it includes aspects of Tolkien's wider legendarium but really doesn't fit very well into it--you never see clocks anywhere outside the Shire in LOTR, as I recall, so apparently hobbits are the most technologically advanced race in Middle-earth.

[Trafalgar]

I was introduced to the Hobbit in, like 1980, by my parents who played the Mind's Eye Audio Production in the care on long road trips. I always think of the Dwarve's song the way they recorded it.


https://youtu.be/T3uYtK-06Lc

[PontificatusRex]

I've read the Hobbit a million times and read it to my son out loud twice. Judging by Rater's first post, I can tell it's going to be a lot of fun vicariously experiencing reading the book for the first time through them.

Regarding the descriptions of the Hobbits as "brown-skinned" and "long fingered", these seems to link them to lots of descriptions in Little Folk in Faerie lore - brownies, gnomes, etc. I think in Lord of the Rings the Hobbits morphed more into stand-ins for 19th century English country folk, just shorter.

Regarding the question of the Gandalf archetype - Tolkien based Gandalf on the stories of Odin wandering around in his big wide hat and cloak, pretending to be mortal and giving people advice, help, or maybe pointing them to their doom, as his mood warranted. These aren't in the Eddas much, but Odin appears in this fashion in lots of Scandanavian sagas (a number of which are wonderfully retold by fantasy author Poul Anderson, btw). Tolkien was definitely familiar with all of them.

[Rater202]

you never see clocks anywhere outside the Shire in LOTR, as I recall, so apparently hobbits are the most technologically advanced race in Middle-earth.

Gonna be honest, that actually makes sense.

You'd be surprised how many attempts at innovation were done because someone was just the right kind of lazy that they consider working hard now to be worth things being easier later, and Tolkien does describe the Hobbits in such a way that they are easy going and like their leisure time and their meals.

A device that lets them know that it's time for second dinner without having to go outside and check the position of the sun and moon is exactly the kind of thing they'd invent.

[PontificatusRex]

Tolkien does describe the Hobbits in such a way that they are easy going and like their leisure time and their meals.

A device that lets them know that it's time for second dinner without having to go outside and check the position of the sun and moon is exactly the kind of thing they'd invent.

Hmm, I see things a bit differently. While hobbits are easy going in lots of ways, I think they use clocks because they don't like surprises and unpredictability. If a guest is coming for tea, they want to know that guest is coming 3:30 sharp, not "some time in the afternoon".

As for meals, they don't need clocks to tell them when second breakfast, their stomachs do just fine.

[Fyraltari]

Oh yes, do take time to look at the maps (online if those in the Pocket Edition are too small to read) - one of the nice touches is the way the Dwarf map of the lonely mountain isn't "North up".
This is in imitation of medieval maps who had East up for religious reasons. This is why "orient" often comes up as a root in words about directions.

No mention of them having unusually large feet for their size, which you see in pretty much every adaption.

Thinking about this, part of the reason might be the need for actors to wear fake-feet over their real feet so they don't walk barefooted everywhere.

[Scarlet Knight]

The opening of the Hobbit:

“In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.”

may be amongst the greatest in all literature.

[GloatingSwine]

I was introduced to the Hobbit in, like 1980, by my parents who played the Mind's Eye Audio Production in the care on long road trips. I always think of the Dwarve's song the way they recorded it.

My version was always the BBC radio play version from 1968.

It's very worth checking out. Good performances, and faithful to the book.

[DavidSh]

Concerning the large feet on dramatized hobbits


Thinking about this, part of the reason might be the need for actors to wear fake-feet over their real feet so they don't walk barefooted everywhere.
That wouldn't explain the feet on the animated versions, however.

[Vahnavoi]

He's not actually in the story.

But he features more prominently in the sequel. :smallwink:

[Mith]

This reaction to Chapter 1 was delightful.

It makes me recall my reaction to any re read of Lord of the Rings when you start with 'Concerning Hobbits'. To me, that also has the 'settling in' quality to it that is uncommon in a lot of other literature I have read.

[Thomas Cardew]

Concerning the large feet on dramatized hobbits

That wouldn't explain the feet on the animated versions, however.

It's a meme spread from an artist's decision to emphasize them; the 1976 calendar by the Brother's Hildenbrandt. Tolkien never said they had them.

Tolkien's sketch (https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/sep/21/bilbo-baggins-75th-anniversary)of Biblo in his hole shows normally proportioned feet. He does refer to a specific character/family (the Proudfoots) in the Fellowship as having exceptionally large and hairy feet, that seems to have caught on in the general imagination as a key characteristic. More generally, he states that the most numerous breed of hobbits has 'nimble hands and feet' while the a smaller breed had large hands and feet.

[Fyraltari]

(the Proudfoots)

Proudfeet!

[Rater202]

And now we come to Chapter 2: Roast Mutton.

As an aside, the chapter title makes me hungry. Gonna have to eat something when I'm done here.

The dwarves are no-longer good guests, leaving a mess for Bilbo to clean.

Bilbo trying to talk himself out of being disappointed that the Dwarves left without him is somewhat indearing.

Also, Gandalf is more of a jerk than I've been lead to believe. For all that I find it amusing, I must note that in Bilbo's position I'd be mighty tempted to shove my non-existent boot up the wizard's ass.

I wouldn't go through within, but I'd be tempted.

Bilbo arrives just in time to get going, as I imagine may become a trend, but at least he is loaned a spare hood and Gandalf brought that which Bilbo was forced to leave behind in his haste.

As an aside, with how small hobbits are, and how sedentary, running over "a mile or more" in less than ten minutes is some damn good time. I imagine such swiftness may come in handy on a journey such as this.

The telling of stories and singing of songs in relating to the dwarves and their throng. It makes sense. Dwarves are originally from Norse mythology, and the Norsemen were big on stories and song, but I don't think such things are part of the common conception of "fantasy" dwarves.

Much, I fear, has been lost in imitation. If I ever actually play proper D&D again I'm making a colorfully dressed dwarven bard.

Either Middle Earth is very small, or the paragraph describing their travel through different lands is to emphasize that they've been on the road a long time. I feel tired and slightly anxious just reading it. A feeling that only get worse in the following paragraph.

As an introvert who loves routine and good food, it should come as no surprise that I strongly identify with Bilbo right now.

It is July. It is frickin' hot right now, but I can almost feel the chill of the long rainy day leading into a cold wet night.

And... Ooh, is this where the trolls come in? The light in the distance?

Yep, the trolls...

...Did "gravy" mean "grease" in 1930s England? Because I'm seeing it being hard to mix grease/broth with flour if you're cooking with sticks.

...A troll named William? My god. And they're clearly monsters, with their talk of eating man-flesh... But they're having an intelligent conversation in complete, if thickly accented, English. No "Me this" or "Bert that."

...I understand that, for reasons that we can't really discuss here, that Tolkien had issues with beings that were inherently "evil." Is this an example of this? The trolls are monsters, but they're also people. They could have chosen to be something other than monsters if given the chance?

Bilbo proceeds to attempt something quite brave and stupid and immediately gets caught...

He just barely managed to avoid trouble by accidentally starting a fight... Only for the dwarves to start wandering in and immediately be captured one by one. At least Torn was able to put up a fight.

And then Gandalf shows up after having vanished before and saves the day by starting another fight. And another. And another. Until daylight and then the light of the sun turns the trolls to stone. From stone, they are made, from stone they return forevermore...

Where do Ents come from? I know that a (proposed?) origin for Trolls is that they were a failed attempt to create a rival for the Ents, creatures of living wood. Living Stone to oppose Living wood would...

I'm getting ahead of myself.

Things wind down by searching for the cave in which the trolls must have had shelter, which they then loot, with attention drawn to some finely crafted swords and knives. They make camp, supplies restocked, and sleep till afternoon before discussing the road ahead. and where Gandalf vanished to.

First, I want to comment on the illustration.

The Trolls hiding in the shadows of the tree waiting for the dwarves to wander in. That's...

The trolls don't look like ugly lumpy pale humans. They look like...

Honestly, if I didn't know what I was looking at I imagine I was looking at devils hiding in the woods. They look quite sinister, in a way that you don't really see with trolls, giants, and ogres are commonly depicted.

Beyond that, I am starting to get the feeling that the story is somewhat... Episodic.

Which makes sense. Tolkien wrote this as a bedtime story for his children, so... so far each chapter feels like its own story. Like an episode of a serial...

...Probably would have adapted better as a mini-series than a movie?

I don't feel like I'm stopping in the middle of a story when I stop at the end of a chapter. That's nice.

[Fyraltari]

Also, Gandalf is more of a jerk than I've been lead to believe. For all that I find it amusing, I must note that in Bilbo's position I'd be mighty tempted to shove my non-existent boot up the wizard's ass.
Gandalf is a very old man with all the coolness and the crankiness that implies.


...A troll named William? My god. And they're clearly monsters, with their talk of eating man-flesh... But they're having an intelligent conversation in complete, if thickly accented, English. No "Me this" or "Bert that."

...I understand that, for reasons that we can't really discuss here, that Tolkien had issues with beings that were inherently "evil." Is this an example of this? The trolls are monsters, but they're also people. They could have chosen to be something other than monsters if given the chance?
These three simply don't fit with how trolls behave in the other texts. They are very much more fairy-tale trolls than fantasy trolls, if you catch my meaning.




Where do Ents come from? I know that a (proposed?) origin for Trolls is that they were a failed attempt to create a rival for the Ents, creatures of living wood. Living Stone to oppose Living wood would...
Long story short, after her husband's pet project (the dwarves) got greenlit by the Big Guy Upstairs, Yavanna Kementari, Valië of Life (both vegetal and animal) complained that that made yet another race that would cut and burn trees and hunt animals and all that on top of the Dark Lord doing his thing, so she was granted the right to craft some protectors for her wards.



Beyond that, I am starting to get the feeling that the story is somewhat... Episodic.
Yes. In fairness, This tends to happen with stories focused on a trip to a certain place (Exhibit A: The Odyssey.)

[Peelee]

Gandalf is a very old man with all the coolness and the crankiness that implies.


These three simply don't fit with how trolls behave in the other texts. They are very much more fairy-tale trolls than fantasy trolls, if you catch my meaning.




Long story short, after her husband's pet project (the dwarves) got greenlit by the Big Guy Upstairs, Yavanna Kementari, Valië of Life (both vegetal and animal) complained that that made yet another race that would cut and burn trees and hunt animals and all that on top of the Dark Lord doing his thing, so she was granted the right to craft some protectors for her wards.



Yes. In fairness, This tends to happen with stories focused on a trip to a certain place (Exhibit A: The Odyssey.)

Exhibit B: Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle.

Truly it is a convention that spans the ages.

[DataNinja]

Which makes sense. Tolkien wrote this as a bedtime story for his children, so... so far each chapter feels like its own story. Like an episode of a serial...
I've heard it said that, while he did run the story by his children, he always had an intention of writing it as a novel. It's just something that he said given that... well, writing "fairy-tales" for anyone but children wasn't exactly seen as a spectacularly noble calling for a writer, especially one of his age. As far as I understand it, at least.

[PontificatusRex]

... Only for the dwarves to start wandering in and immediately be captured one by one. At least Torn was able to put up a fight.



I have to say, this is one of the only bits where I thought the Jackson movie was better than the book (in general, I liked the first half of the first movie very much, then it went downhill in a massive way super quickly). Even as a kid I was all "WHY are the dwarves doing this? 'Oh, that guy didn't come back, let's just send ANOTHER unarmed lone guy to see what's up!' "

As an adult I know it's kind of a humorous motif that Tolkien repeated - the dwarves showing up one by one with other folks being reacting all "What, ANOTHER one?" But it really just made no sense in this instance. I don't know if Rater has caught on to this yet, but:

The dwarves in the book start out on this quest completely unarmed. They're heading out across hundreds of miles of wild, dangerous territory with a dragon waiting at the end, and no one has anything more dangerous than a pocket knife on them.

I really appreciate that Jackson actually gave them enough sense to start out with weapons, and that they were all good warriors - the type you'd pick out to go on a dangerous quest with. Tolkien's depiction is more about using them for comic effect most of the time, except for Thorin. It's Gandalf's then Bilbo's job to get them out of trouble.

[Gnoman]

Also, Gandalf is more of a jerk than I've been lead to believe. For all that I find it amusing, I must note that in Bilbo's position I'd be mighty tempted to shove my non-existent boot up the wizard's ass.


Think the intention here is that Gandalf knows just how sedentary and settled Bilbo really is at heart. It is going to take a massive kick in the rear to get Bilbo moving, so Gandalf delivers it.




The dwarves in the book start out on this quest completely unarmed. They're heading out across hundreds of miles of wild, dangerous territory with a dragon waiting at the end, and no one has anything more dangerous than a pocket knife on them.

I really appreciate that Jackson actually gave them enough sense to start out with weapons, and that they were all good warriors - the type you'd pick out to go on a dangerous quest with. Tolkien's depiction is more about using them for comic effect most of the time, except for Thorin. It's Gandalf's then Bilbo's job to get them out of trouble.

It is pretty clear that the Dwarves had no real idea what they were doing. I think they say as much at the Party, but it is incredibly obvious once they find the door and Bilbo realizes how stupid the idea of burglarizing Smaug's hoard really is.

[Peelee]

It is pretty clear that the Dwarves had no real idea what they were doing. I think they say as much at the Party, but it is incredibly obvious once they find the door and Bilbo realizes how stupid the idea of burglarizing Smaug's hoard really is.

It's not even burglarizing the hoard. The Dwarves' entire point was that it's time for them to move back into Erebor. How is a burglar supposed to help with that?

[Keltest]

Its at least implied that the dwarves were hoping and wanting Gandalf to help them kill the dragon, even though he said he had other business to take care of.

[Corvus]

The creation of the Ents is covered in The Silmarillion. Aule (The Middle-Earth Hephasestus) was impatient to begin teaching others his skills, and so made the dwarves without his wife Yavanna's knowledge. When Eru (basically God) came to talk to him about it, Aule repented and offered to destroy the dwarves as they weren't alive, but Eru gave them life instead, on the understanding they would be sent to sleep until after the elves had been created, who were to be Eru's firstborn.

When Yavanna, whose spheres were animals and plants, heard this, she was disturbed, as she worried her children would be hunted or chopped down by the new races. The animals could at least flee, but the trees, who took long to grow and couldn't move, had no means of escape. And so Eru allowed her to make the Ents to shepherd the woods, but as Aule said the elves and dwarves and humans would still be needing wood.

[factotum]

It is actually kind of endearing just how generally useless the dwarves in The Hobbit are. They couldn't have been less prepared for this journey, and it really shows in what happens along the way.

The troll thing is one of the parts that fits least well into Tolkien's legendarium generally--they don't act or speak like trolls we see anywhere else. And where they came by the loot they had, well, who knows?

[Rater202]

It is actually kind of endearing just how generally useless the dwarves in The Hobbit are. They couldn't have been less prepared for this journey, and it really shows in what happens along the way.

The troll thing is one of the parts that fits least well into Tolkien's legendarium generally--they don't act or speak like trolls we see anywhere else. And where they came by the loot they had, well, who knows?

PResumably from the villagers and travelers who passed through before people started to wise up and avoid the area.

It is noted that the trolls have eaten several men and man-sized tools and clothes are strewed among the bones in the cave.

An, as an aside... No, I did not realize that the dwarves were all unarmed. The stereotype of dwarves carrying axes or hammers everywhere is so ingrained in my mind that I just assumed they all had a weapon on them.

[Peelee]

PResumably from the villagers and travelers who passed through before people started to wise up and avoid the area.

It is noted that the trolls have eaten several men and man-sized tools and clothes are strewed among the bones in the cave.

An, as an aside... No, I did not realize that the dwarves were all unarmed. The stereotype of dwarves carrying axes or hammers everywhere is so ingrained in my mind that I just assumed they all had a weapon on them.

They all do have instruments, if they were to choose to go the El Kabong route.

[Fyraltari]

It's not even burglarizing the hoard. The Dwarves' entire point was that it's time for them to move back into Erebor. How is a burglar supposed to help with that?

No, no, they did hire him to steal the treasure. They had absolutely no plan about how to deal with the dragon in any way.

Edit:
Are you sure they left unarmed? I remember thel losing their bagagges/ponies several times, didn't they lose their weapons too?

[Peelee]

No, no, they did hire him to steal the treasure. They had absolutely no plan about how to deal with the dragon in any way.

The didn't even think to hire him until they met Gandalf, though, and they were already set on their quest then. And even then, Thorin almost skipped Bilbo's house, IIRC.

[Khedrac]

Either Middle Earth is very small, or the paragraph describing their travel through different lands is to emphasize that they've been on the road a long time. I feel tired and slightly anxious just reading it. A feeling that only get worse in the following paragraph.

One of the things that every interpretation of Middle Earth I have ever seen gets wrong is how populated the lands are (well the lands west of the ford). Although nothing makes it on to the map (other than Bree in The Lord of the Rings) the text of The Hobbit is clear that the whole area is fairly well settled, just the quality of accomodations varies but it is not wilderness.
(Peter Jackson is probably the worst with the lovely aerial shots of them walking through pristine wilderness while they are supposed to following the main road.) I missed it until my last re-reading of The Hobbit earlier this year.

The Lord of the Rings has an excuse for missing all the settlements - Strider leads them on route specifically to avoid all of them, and Tolkein did not like crowding his maps with unimportant details - but anyone thinking about the implications of the text (in all the books) especially the fallen realm of Arnor should be able to see that the lands are populated.

This may also be a factor in the lack of weapons at this stage of the journey (something I had missed) - why bring weapons to a trip through civilized lands when one can acquire them later?

[Fyraltari]

The didn't even think to hire him until they met Gandalf, though, and they were already set on their quest then. And even then, Thorin almost skipped Bilbo's house, IIRC.
This does not contradict what I said in any way?

One of the things that every interpretation of Middle Earth I have ever seen gets wrong is how populated the lands are (well the lands west of the ford). Although nothing makes it on to the map (other than Bree in The Lord of the Rings) the text of The Hobbit is clear that the whole area is fairly well settled, just the quality of accomodations varies but it is not wilderness.
(Peter Jackson is probably the worst with the lovely aerial shots of them walking through pristine wilderness while they are supposed to following the main road.) I missed it until my last re-reading of The Hobbit earlier this year.

The Lord of the Rings has an excuse for missing all the settlements - Strider leads them on route specifically to avoid all of them, and Tolkein did not like crowding his maps with unimportant details - but anyone thinking about the implications of the text (in all the books) especially the fallen realm of Arnor should be able to see that the lands are populated.

This may also be a factor in the lack of weapons at this stage of the journey (something I had missed) - why bring weapons to a trip through civilized lands when one can acquire them later?

If memory serves, Weathertop is said to literally be the only named place between Bree and Rivendell.

Edit: Also Bree is very tiny and by all account always was, despite sitting at the crossing points of the two biggest roads of this part of the continent.

[Khedrac]

If memory serves, Weathertop is said to literally be the only named place between Bree and Rivendell.

Edit: Also Bree is very tiny and by all account always was, despite sitting at the crossing points of the two biggest roads of this part of the continent.

They may not be named, but:

Things went on like this for quite a long while. There was a good deal of wide respectable country to pass through, inhabited by decent respectable folk, men or hobbits or elves or what not, with good roads, an inn or two, and every now and then a dwarf, or a tinker, or a farmer ambling by on business. But after a time they came to places where people spoke strangely, and sang songs Bilbo had never heard before. Inns were rare and not good, the roads were worse, and there were hills in the distance rising higher and higher. There were castles on some of the hills, and many looked as if they had not been built for any good purpose. Also the weather which had often been as good as May can be, even in tales and legends, took a nasty turn.

So, how long was the journey covered in this paragraph?
Well the comment is made on May 31st (they day they later meet the trolls). so the question is when did they start out?
This is less clear, but during the party it is said that Thrain "went away on the twenty-first of April, a hundred years ago last Thursday" so the departure (the next day) is in the week ending 28th April.
The party is probably on a Wednesday since Bilbo "did not remember things very well, unless he put them down on his Engagement Tablet: like this: Gandalf Tea Wednesday"; hence the departure is probably on the 28th itself.

Thus the party spend 33 days travelling East from Hobbiton before they run out of civilized lands and meet the trolls. I agree that Weathertop is the only place named, and it is not a settlement, but the whole area is fairly well settled - it takes the skill of the Dunedain to travel through the lands without meeting people or being seen.

[Sapphire Guard]

Stealing treasure is still a better idea than trying to slay a dragon. They're not trying to fight.

There are more settlements in Middle Earth than are on the map, but there are a lot of wildernesses too. Arnor was destroyed by plague IIRC?

[factotum]

Thus the party spend 33 days travelling East from Hobbiton before they run out of civilized lands and meet the trolls. I agree that Weathertop is the only place named, and it is not a settlement, but the whole area is fairly well settled - it takes the skill of the Dunedain to travel through the lands without meeting people or being seen.

It's also worth noting that Elrond's house in Rivendell is called "The Last Homely House" in The Hobbit, but that would kind of be a weird name if there was nothing but unpopulated wasteland in every direction from it--there must be other homely houses somewhere around there, and they certainly aren't eastward of it because that's the goblin-infested Misty Mountains!

[Fyraltari]

They may not be named, but:


So, how long was the journey covered in this paragraph?
Well the comment is made on May 31st (they day they later meet the trolls). so the question is when did they start out?
This is less clear, but during the party it is said that Thrain "went away on the twenty-first of April, a hundred years ago last Thursday" so the departure (the next day) is in the week ending 28th April.
The party is probably on a Wednesday since Bilbo "did not remember things very well, unless he put them down on his Engagement Tablet: like this: Gandalf Tea Wednesday"; hence the departure is probably on the 28th itself.

Thus the party spend 33 days travelling East from Hobbiton before they run out of civilized lands and meet the trolls. I agree that Weathertop is the only place named, and it is not a settlement, but the whole area is fairly well settled - it takes the skill of the Dunedain to travel through the lands without meeting people or being seen.
I stand corrected.

Stealing treasure is still a better idea than trying to slay a dragon. They're not trying to fight.

There are more settlements in Middle Earth than are on the map, but there are a lot of wildernesses too. Arnor was destroyed by plague IIRC?
A combo of war, plague and the undead courtesy of the Witch-King of Angmar.

It's also worth noting that Elrond's house in Rivendell is called "The Last Homely House" in The Hobbit, but that would kind of be a weird name if there was nothing but unpopulated wasteland in every direction from it--there must be other homely houses somewhere around there, and they certainly aren't eastward of it because that's the goblin-infested Misty Mountains!

It's called "The Last Homely House West of the Wisty Mountains" so yes. South-East, actually, in Lothlorièn.

Edit: it's the last chronologically, not geographically, Sauron destroyed all the others.

[Sapphire Guard]

This... actually makes a surprising amount of sense. Arnor fell, but some people remain, some old fortresses are still inhabited, some old songs are remembered.

I didn't expect the worldbuilding to be so coherent.

The trolls are recent immigrants, 'Troll- country' is further north, but if they stumbled across some old treasure cache, it even makes sense to find the Gondolin relics.

[GloatingSwine]

I didn't expect the worldbuilding to be so coherent.

Especially since it wasn't supposed to be.

The Hobbit in its current form was actually retconned to being in Tolkien's created universe in order to better connect it to Lord of the Rings.

If one could find a copy from before 1951, the scenes with Gollum would be absent.

[warty goblin]

Especially since it wasn't supposed to be.

The Hobbit in its current form was actually retconned to being in Tolkien's created universe in order to better connect it to Lord of the Rings.

If one could find a copy from before 1951, the scenes with Gollum would be absent.

I believe it's actually a bit more complex than that


Gollum was in the Hobbit originally. However, in that version he simply gave Bilbo the Ring when he lost the riddle game. Lord of the Rings retcons this into Bilbo finding the Ring prior to the riddle game. The original version then becomes Bilbo's lie to justify his possession of the Ring. It's a very Tolkien way to do a retcon, and since everything is within a frame narrative in some ways counts less as a retcon and more as simply differing texts.

[Tarmor]

The absence of weapons completely surprised me. I'm so used to Dwarves having at least axes with them from so many stories and portrayals. Some quick reading of The Hobbit suggests that they certainly had a lot of equipment at some stages - tools and a spade are mentioned in chapter 1. It looks like the first weapons mentioned are those claimed from the trolls. A fight much later in the book mentions "some had knives, some had sticks". Nice pickup Rater, I'd never noticed even after multiple readings of the book.

[factotum]

Well, I guess there really isn't much point in taking axes and swords when you have such a small group and your target is a dragon! There was no way they were ever going to defeat Smaug, hence the idea of thievery instead. I suspect the road eastward was simply a lot more dangerous than the dwarves gave it credit for--they'd spent almost their entire lives in the western mountains near the Shire, after all, which is pretty obviously a super safe place to be. (According to LOTR appendices Thorin led his people westwards when he was a sprightly young dwarf of only 53 years of age, and he's nearly 200 at the time of The Hobbit--a lot can change in more than a century).

[Rater202]

And after a brief delay, chapter 3: A Short Rest
And now the danger of the adventure feels real, turning the adventure into a more somber affair as characterized by the lack of music.

I notice that Hobits tend to think of things a "The Thing." Bilbo does not live under a hill, he lives under The Hill. Here, he asks if the first of the Misty Mountains they encounter is The Mountain.

Admittedly, he'd never seen a mountain before judging from his comments about its size.

But no, this isn't even the right mountain rage, they have to cross it and go on for some time before they can even get to Lonely Mountain.

Gandalf spells out that trying to navigate the Misty Mountains by any means but a properly supplied trek across the specified at will lead to either having to return to the beginning or death. How kind of the mountains to let you start from scratch. Most just kill you.

Luckily, Gandalf has friends nearby. Not so luckily, nearby is relative and it takes most of a day of arduous journey just to get to the last homely house.

Again, I just love Tolkien's descriptive prose.

...I did not know that heather was a type of flower.

"Smells like elves" is a very odd descriptor. What are elves supposed to smell like?

More music. With lyrics. And a reminder that the same word in the same language can have radically different meanings in a different time or place.

I like Bilbo's description of the elves. They seem otherworldly rather than just "better than you."

...If fourteen days is a short rest then I don't want to know what a long one is.

"Where did trolls get elven-forged swords?"
"Hell if I know."

And I presume that is the last of that.

I am disappointed that it's moon-letter and not moon-rune. Come on, make it rhyme.

Is it funny or tragic that Thorin doesn't know how to tell the first day of the year on a dwarven calendar?
A shorter chapter than the first two... Not much happens really, Mostly just exposition and world-building.

It is quite literally a breather chapter.

[Fyraltari]

...If fourteen days is a short rest then I don't want to know what a long one is.
Honestly, Tolkien's heroes are about the chillest of all of fantasy.




Is it funny or tragic that Thorin doesn't know how to tell the first day of the year on a dwarven calendar?
Errr... I just checked my copy and it has Elrond not knowing and Thorin explaining.

A shorter chapter than the first two... Not much happens really, Mostly just exposition and world-building.

It is quite literally a breather chapter.

Rivendell just sounds like such a nice place to go on vacation to and just leave all your worries at the door.

[Rater202]

Errr... I just checked my copy and it has Elrond not knowing and Thorin explaining.

I may have misunderstood, but as I read it it seemed that Thorin was explaining what Durin's day was before finishing that the means did not exist to determine when exactly it would be.

[Fyraltari]

I may have misunderstood, but as I read it it seemed that Thorin was explaining what Durin's day was before finishing that the means did not exist to determine when exactly it would be.
Checking back for more details:

The first day of the dwarves' New Year, as everyone ought to know, said Thorin, is the first day of the last autumn moon at the threshold of winter. It is also called Durin's Day when the last moon of autumn and the sun are together in the sky. But that will not be much help, I fear, for who can foretell nowadays when such a thing will happen?

So dwarven New Year always happen the last day before winter begins, but it is only called Durin's Day when the moon is visible during the day. Thorin knows well when New Year is going to be, but he can't tell whether it is going to be regular New Year or Durin's Day.

*Translated back from my French copy.

[Aeson]

Is it funny or tragic that Thorin doesn't know how to tell the first day of the year on a dwarven calendar?
If I recall correctly, he knows how to tell the day but not how to calculate when it will occur. It's essentially the dwarf Easter - an important day of the year for those to whom it matters, but unless you know how the Moon's phases relate to the vernal equinox and when the vernal equinox will occur you aren't going to be able to tell me when Easter is without looking it up.

[GloatingSwine]

They know how to tell the first day of the year, it's the first day of the last moon of autumn.

They don't know how to calculate whether that will also be Durin's Day, when the last moon of autumn and the sun are visible in the sky together.

[factotum]

I wouldn't call heather a flower, per se, but it does have flowers on it at the right time of year--a heather moor in full bloom is actually a real sight to see, especially considering how muted they are for the rest of the year.

[Rodin]

I wouldn't call heather a flower, per se, but it does have flowers on it at the right time of year--a heather moor in full bloom is actually a real sight to see, especially considering how muted they are for the rest of the year.

I live right on the edge of the Yorkshire Moors and can attest. They're also a fairly common garden plant around here - you plant a bunch of them to make a low growing bush type effect, which then flowers all at the same time. Really pretty if you can pull it off.

Sadly, my attempts at growing heather have all ended in failure. They don't do well where I plant them, and the one set that was doing okay got turfed up by an overenthusiastic landscaper when I redecorated my back yard.

[PontificatusRex]

"Where did trolls get elven-forged swords?"
"Hell if I know."



Accurately predicting the experience of getting treasure off monsters for 95% of all RPG adventures.

Although now I'm imagining Elrond explaining "Trolls are Treasure Type G..."

[Rater202]

I'm going to repeat something I said early...

Tolkien's races legitimately feel like distinct peoples with cultures. At least with the very little of them we see in this book.

In derivative works based on or adapting Tolkien, you kind of get the feeling that...

Like, Elves derived from Tolkiens tend to feel like "humans, except longer lived, better than any human who lived, with a vague sense of moral superiority." But here when we meet them they seem... Like benevolent fae creatures. They are beautiful and otherworldly, but I don't get the sense that they think they're better than men, dwarves, or hobbits. Nor that we're supposed to think they are.

and like I said, our introduction to the Dwarves with the way they act and the songs they sing immediately paints a picture of what could have been a real people at some point in time. Not "Axbeard McStoneAx loves his God, his Ax, his mine, and his beer. Now let's multiply that a hundred thousand times and call it a race. Give some of them hammers instead of axes, that can be the variety."

In particular... When Bilbo listens to them singing of the mountain and the last treasure, he notes that he can feel a love for items that were crafted... For the joy of crafting, to paraphrase.

That's not really a thing we see much, I don't think. When you think of fantasy swarves, why do they mine precious jewels and metals and forge them into things? BEcuase they like money...

But here, they do it because they like crafting beautiful things...

Like, the closest comparison o that I can think of with any other dwarven race is the Disney animated Snow White, where the seven Dwarves work all day in a mine dragging up diamonds and other jewels... Becuase they like working in a mine.

[Qwertystop]

Pratchett did a decent job of it, I think, though deliberately starting from the thin stereotype version and filling it out. There's taboos and cultural/political subgroups and religious beliefs and things.

[Sapphire Guard]

I dunno, Pratchett's version eventually moves towards 'this culture is bad and needs to be stopped'

[Fyraltari]

I dunno, Pratchett's version eventually moves towards 'this culture is bad and needs to be stopped'

Rather "religious extremists are bad and need to be stopped."

[Rater202]

"a radical subfaction of this culture is holding onto traditions that are harmful in the modern-day and engaging homicide and terrorism because they're upset that the rest of their culture is changing with the times. They need to be stopped before they do irreparable harm to their own people and everyone else as well."

Also, I think that Thudd and Raising Steam between them do a good job of showing that the problem isn't Dwarven culture but rather these specific dwarves who were taking things a mite bit too far in the name of tradition... And also that they're complete hypocrites.

Though, admittedly, I omitted Pratchet's dwarves because, well... superficial differences aside they're actually not as similar to the traditional High Fantasy Dwarves derived from Tolkiens as you'd think.

[Fyraltari]

I'm going to repeat something I said early...

Tolkien's races legitimately feel like distinct peoples with cultures. At least with the very little of them we see in this book.

In derivative works based on or adapting Tolkien, you kind of get the feeling that...

Like, Elves derived from Tolkiens tend to feel like "humans, except longer lived, better than any human who lived, with a vague sense of moral superiority." But here when we meet them they seem... Like benevolent fae creatures. They are beautiful and otherworldly, but I don't get the sense that they think they're better than men, dwarves, or hobbits. Nor that we're supposed to think they are.
This is a complicated topic. While it's fair to say that The Silmarillion and The Lord of The Rings don't present the elves as being perfect (I mean Fëanor, I am right?), they do come off as better, and "elf-friend" is basically synonimous with "good". So it's not as bad as it would get with imitators, but it is present. Especially in TLotR, where all the bad elves were basically naturally selected out of existence by that point.


In particular... When Bilbo listens to them singing of the mountain and the last treasure, he notes that he can feel a love for items that were crafted... For the joy of crafting, to paraphrase.

That's not really a thing we see much, I don't think. When you think of fantasy swarves, why do they mine precious jewels and metals and forge them into things? BEcuase they like money...

But here, they do it because they like crafting beautiful things...

Like, the closest comparison o that I can think of with any other dwarven race is the Disney animated Snow White, where the seven Dwarves work all day in a mine dragging up diamonds and other jewels... Becuase they like working in a mine.
Maybe it's because I am a huge Tolkien afficionado, but my understanding of stereotypical dwarves always included "love crafting for crafting's sake".

[Sapphire Guard]

The surviving elves are like 5000 years old, they seem perfect because they've already learned from all the mistakes they've made.

[Keltest]

The surviving elves are like 5000 years old, they seem perfect because they've already learned from all the mistakes they've made.

Indeed. Elrond and Galadriel, two of the most important and powerful elves in the finished works, have a LOT of history and baggage behind them.

[factotum]

Maybe it's because I am a huge Tolkien afficionado, but my understanding of stereotypical dwarves always included "love crafting for crafting's sake".

That was the difference in Tolkien's dwarfs, though. A race wholly interested in crafting would have done what Legolas feared and just ripped all the precious stones out of the Glittering Caves of Aglarond to craft into other things, but Gimli said even a dwarf could not fail to be moved by how beautiful the caves were and want to preserve and even improve them.

[Fyraltari]

A race wholly interested in crafting

That's not what I said.

[Peelee]

Maybe it's because I am a huge Tolkien afficionado, but my understanding of stereotypical dwarves always included "love crafting for crafting's sake".

I got into D&D well before LOTR/The Hobbit, and that's been my takeaway as well.

[Rater202]

Chapter 4: Over Hill and Under Hill... Yeah, this is starting to sound familiar.

So the mountains are full of paths that go nowhere and passes full of monsters too dangerous for our party...

So, we know that Early D&D was inspired by Tolkien's work, to a greater or lesser degree. Now, I think that I know where he got his inspiration for adventure modules.

The first mountain takes days to climb... How big is it? Like, they say that it takes two months to climb Everest but from what I can tell that two months consist mostly of getting to base camp and preparing for the climb proper. The climb proper you can do in a day if you're adequately prepared and know what you're doing.

Bilbo can almost literally see his house from there.

I think it's notable that the Misty Mountains are described as a place where "No King Ruled."

Oh God, a terrible Thunderstorm when you're high in the mountains...That sounds terrifying. I think my heart rate spiked just reading it.

Illustration: I get the feeling that the mountains are big.

Huh. Stone giants living in the mountains and tossing things for sport... Honestly was not aware of giants as part of Tolkien's canon.

Yeah, definitely see Gygax's inspiration for adventure models, what with the thoroughly searched cave still turning out to be dangerous. Ambush by goblins when you thought you were safe, classic prank bro.

Huh. The Goblins are also musical.

This is a very musical book. Two songs in the first chapter and one each in three and four, that's four songs in the first four chapters, not counting allusions to singing without printed lyrics.

I know that there are places where horse meat is a delicacy, and it's apparently healthy and good tasting meat if the animal is healthy and slaughtered properly, but there's a part of me that is just... Filled with utter revulsion at the thought. From my perspective, hore meat is what you eat when you have a choice between eating the horse or committing cannibalism.

And I get the feeling that that's what Tolkien was getting at when he describes how the Goblins eat horses.

...Is Tolkien implying that modern mechanized war machines were secretly invented by goblins? And regardless, goblins being good weaponsmiths and masters of the Darkside of Tinkering... Started with Tolkien. And the beginning of the book before the story properly starts there's a note on the words used. It notes that in Middle Earth, 'Orc' and 'Goblin' are different names for the same race of people...

So, basically, in the original source material, Orcs were smart, if bent towards the creation of practical tools and weapons rather than more artistic merits.

I keep saying it, but... God Damn has much been lost in imitation. Imitations of Tolkien's dwarves make them cookie-cutter stereotypes. Imitations of his elves make them generically better than humans without any of the histories that make it true while also making them arrogant... And now his Orcs/Goblins are split into two races and usually made stupid and brutish, or at least less advanced than other races.

God Damn, compared to the source material the imitators come across like particularly ****ty fanfics.

And industrialization! They don't like working with their hand more than can be helped, so... Is he implying that Goblins/Orcs invented factories?

I am genuinely a little upset right now. I feel like I've been robbed because Tolkien's imitators chose to be superficial. I think.. I think that Warhammer 40,000 of all things is closest to what Tolkien describes here.

And yes, I saw the comments that the goblins hadn't yet advanced this far, but I think my point stands.

And the goblins literally call the cave our heroes were squatting in "Front Porch." That would be downright charming in any other context.

And looting the trolls comes back to bite them. I'd have to wonder why the goblins would lie about 'inviting' the dwarves and Bilbo but now I'm wondering... What if this is a genuine misunderstanding and this little meeting would have gone better if Gandalf hadn't fried those goblins?

Again, I love Tolkien's descriptive prose.

And Gandalf saves the day by committing regicide.

Chase sequence wherein our heroes are at disadvantage. Eventually, it turns into Gandalf and Thorin slaughtering their way through goblins, but uh oh, sneak attack and Bolbo is lost.

Another short chapter, not really much to discuss that I haven't covered already, but...

...Yeah, no. All I can think about is how much was lost in imitation regarding Tolkiens Orcs/Goblins. Like, is races in general, but his orcs/goblins especially.

And Next chapter, Riddles in the Dark... This is the big one. I'm tempted to make this a double, but I need to decompress a bit.

[Fyraltari]

Huh. Stone giants living in the mountains and tossing things for sport... Honestly was not aware of giants as part of Tolkien's canon.
This is literally the only time these giants are mentionned in any of his books. Though he would later give his own spin to the giant archetype. A more... vegetal spin if you catch my meaning.



Huh. The Goblins are also musical.
Seen in he comment section of a video of the Rankin adaptation of a later goblin song: "They are a spontaneously musical race. It is a remnant of their elven heritage."


This is a very musical book. Two songs in the first chapter and one each in three and four, that's four songs in the first four chapters, not counting allusions to singing without printed lyrics.
Did you know there's a Lord of the Rings musical (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjcXprEWy_c&list=PLfyxyVsrkMvzBDp9kvLPyfZfR6JaqTtyj)?


I know that there are places where horse meat is a delicacy, and it's apparently healthy and good tasting meat if the animal is healthy and slaughtered properly, but there's a part of me that is just... Filled with utter revulsion at the thought. From my perspective, hore meat is what you eat when you have a choice between eating the horse or committing cannibalism.
And now, I am craving a good old fashioned horse tartar. Thanks for nothing, Rater.

And I get the feeling that that's what Tolkien was getting at when he describes how the Goblins eat horses.


...Is Tolkien implying that modern mechanized war machines were secretly invented by goblins? And regardless, goblins being good weaponsmiths and masters of the Darkside of Tinkering... Started with Tolkien. And the beginning of the book before the story properly starts there's a note on the words used. It notes that in Middle Earth, 'Orc' and 'Goblin' are different names for the same race of people...

So, basically, in the original source material, Orcs were smart, if bent towards the creation of practical tools and weapons rather than more artistic merits.

I keep saying it, but... God Damn has much been lost in imitation. Imitations of Tolkien's dwarves make them cookie-cutter stereotypes. Imitations of his elves make them generically better than humans without any of the histories that make it true while also making them arrogant... And now his Orcs/Goblins are split into two races and usually made stupid and brutish, or at least less advanced than other races.

God Damn, compared to the source material the imitators come across like particularly ****ty fanfics.

And industrialization! They don't like working with their hand more than can be helped, so... Is he implying that Goblins/Orcs invented factories?

I am genuinely a little upset right now. I feel like I've been robbed because Tolkien's imitators chose to be superficial. I think.. I think that Warhammer 40,000 of all things is closest to what Tolkien describes here.

And yes, I saw the comments that the goblins hadn't yet advanced this far, but I think my point stands.
That's a recurring thing throughout all versions of the Legendarium, hell in the only detailed version of the Fall of Gondolin (that really doesn't mesh with the not-very-early continuity) the orcs had what sounds like tanks/armoured transports.


I'd have to wonder why the goblins would lie about 'inviting' the dwarves and Bilbo
Nothing (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NeverMyFault) unusual (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SelfServingMemory).

but now I'm wondering... What if this is a genuine misunderstanding and this little meeting would have gone better if Gandalf hadn't fried those goblins?
Doubt it. 'Specially with the swords. Also, the Great Goblin can indentify swords that have been unnacounted for for about six thousand years. Middle-Earth just lost one hell of an antique dealer.

[PontificatusRex]

And industrialization! They don't like working with their hand more than can be helped, so... Is he implying that Goblins/Orcs invented factories?



Tolkien HATED what industrialization did to the English landscape, and he was also a WW1 vet so he was part of that first generation to discover the horrors of mechanized warfare. So yeah, not surprising that he associated those things with the Goblins. And as Fyralti mentioned, early versions of 'The Fall of Gondolin' did include mechanized armor as part of the attack.

[PontificatusRex]

This is literally the only time these giants are mentioned in any of his books.

There's one other brief mention in the Hobbit, which Rater hasn't gotten to yet. Super quick and easy to miss, though.

[Thomas Cardew]

Doubt it. 'Specially with the swords. Also, the Great Goblin can indentify swords that have been unnacounted for for about six thousand years. Middle-Earth just lost one hell of an antique dealer.

I am now picturing the Pawnstars guy as the Great Goblin.

[Corvus]

Oh boy, do all those cheap imitators really miss the point with Tolkien's races. Its why I generally hate elves so much because they almost always are just all their good points and none of their flaws. There are some I do enjoy, and that is because they are their own thing - Pratchett's elves, the elves of Dark Sun and the Dark Elves (dunmer) of Morrowind.

The orcs/goblins suffer a lot of that as well except they get all the flaws and none of the good points. Again I like those settings where they subvert that - well, except for the 40k orks. They are just too fun not to like even if they are just dumb brutes - they just do it in style.

Tolkien's orcs/goblins were smart. They were creative. He also never quite finalised their origins - the only one in the setting who could create life was Eru. Morgoth couldn't, which meant he couldn't create the orcs and trolls. What he settled on was that the orcs were elves that had been captured and then twisted and corrupted into orcs, while trolls were meant to be from entish stock. The orcs were filled with self-loathing as a result and hated their own existence, which they took out on others. So they liked to break things and hated beauty because of their origins. Oh, and we never even hear mention of female orcs in any of the books, but they must exist and it talks about them breeding and there was also Bolg son of Azog.

And if I remember correctly in LotR there was also mention of some humans with orcish blood.

[Keltest]

Im a little surprised that nobody has mentioned this yet, but orcs and goblins are the same species. Orc is just the elvish word (or derived from it, rather), while goblin is the name given them by the dwarves and hobbits.

[factotum]

Oh boy, do all those cheap imitators really miss the point with Tolkien's races. Its why I generally hate elves so much because they almost always are just all their good points and none of their flaws. There are some I do enjoy, and that is because they are their own thing - Pratchett's elves, the elves of Dark Sun and the Dark Elves (dunmer) of Morrowind.


I think what they did with High Elves in Skyrim was quite interesting, too. Sure, they were still generally arrogant and holier than thou, but they took this to its logical conclusion by saying, "Well, if we're better than everyone else, we'd best go about ruling the world. Oh, and get rid of all these horrible ugly *men* that are cluttering up the place.".


Im a little surprised that nobody has mentioned this yet, but orcs and goblins are the same species. Orc is just the elvish word (or derived from it, rather), while goblin is the name given them by the dwarves and hobbits.

It's worth noting that Azog (who killed Thorin's grandfather in Moria) is described as "the goblin" in Chapter One of The Hobbit, but in references in other works and material he's always described as "a great Orc". Bit of an aside here: in later writings Tolkien took to spelling Orc with a k, because he was afraid that people would see the word Orcish and assume the "c" was pronounced as an "s".

[PontificatusRex]

So we're leaving The Hobbit here, but i have to say I love Tolkien's portrayal of the orcs in LOTR. Yes, they are bad, dangerous, and horrible and you'd better kill them first because they will gut you at the first opportunity, but they are also sassy, funny, and their dialogue is always compelling. The strong dominate the weaker and the weaker always hate it and will fight back if given any chance. Tolkien wrote in his letters that the orcs were basically based on the worst human behavior he saw in the war - I remember a quote that went along the lines of "We were all orcs in the trenches", and he gave his orcs a real "F**k this s**t" attitude that I love.

The goblins in The Hobbit have a similar kind of sass I appreciate - ambushing the dwarves and then saying it was the dwarves who started it. Kind of reminds me of some recent national events that I will not mention further. And yeah, they've got some good songs, Rankin and Bass did a pretty darn good job making those real.

[Gnoman]

It's worth noting that Azog (who killed Thorin's grandfather in Moria) is described as "the goblin" in Chapter One of The Hobbit, but in references in other works and material he's always described as "a great Orc". Bit of an aside here: in later writings Tolkien took to spelling Orc with a k, because he was afraid that people would see the word Orcish and assume the "c" was pronounced as an "s".

The distinction between Orc and Goblin is sort of present in The Hobbit. I think it is in the very next chapter, but Bilbo thinks of a passage as being "small for goblins, at least the big ones", to which the narrator comments something like "Bilbo was unaware that goblins, even the big ones - the Orcs of the mountains - went along well on all fours". It is the only time that the word "Orc" appears in The Hobbit proper. There's a note in the appendices that "Uruk" only really applies to Sauron's great soldier-orcs and not the lesser examples.

[hamishspence]

Tolkien wrote in his letters that the orcs were basically based on the worst human behavior he saw in the war - I remember a quote that went along the lines of "We were all orcs in the trenches"

I've read about that - this specific quote doesn't seem to have a source, and may be conflated from other quotes. Most of Tolkien's quotes about "orcishness in the real world" refer to the 2nd World War, not the 1st.


Letter #66 (dated 6 May 1944):

For we are attempting to conquer Sauron with the Ring. And we shall (it seems) succeed. But the penalty is, as you will know, to breed new Saurons, and slowly turn Men and Elves into Orcs. Not that in real life things are as clear cut as in a story, and we started out with a great many Orcs on our side .... Well, there you are, a hobbit amongst the Urukhai.


Letter #71 (dated 25 May 1944):

I hope that you will have some more leave in genuine Africa, ere too long. Away from the 'lesser servants of Mordor'. Yes, I think that the orcs are as real a creation as anything in 'realistic' fiction: your vigorous words well describe the tribe; only in real life they are on both sides, of course.


Letter #78 (dated 12 Augist 1944):

Urukhai is only a figure of speech. There are no genuine Uruks, that is folk made bad by the intention of their maker; and not many who are so corrupted as to be irredeemable (though I fear it must be admitted that there are human creatures that seem irredeemable short of a special miracle, and that there are probably abnormally many of such creatures in Deutschland and Nippon - but certainly those unhappy countries have no monopoly: I have met them, or thought so, in England's green and pleasant land.)


Letter #96 (dated 30 January 1945):

Yet people gloat to hear of the endless lines, 40 miles long, of miserable refugees, women and children, pouring West, dying on the way. There seem no bowels of mercy or compassion, no imagination, left in this dark diabolic hour. By which I do not mean that it may not all, in the present situation, mainly (not solely) created by Germany, be necessary and inevitable. But why gloat! We were supposed to have reached a stage of civilisation in which it might still be necessary to execute a criminal, but not to gloat, or hang his wife and child by him while the orc-crowd hooted.

[Fyraltari]

Fyralti
Fyraltari.

What he settled on
What Christopher Tolkien settled on. John kept changed his mind about this too, he last wanted orcs to be purely corrupted Men but died before he could rewrite the Silm in a way that would make this change fit. And let's be honest, had he lived longer he'd have changed his mind again.

Im a little surprised that nobody has mentioned this yet, but orcs and goblins are the same species. Orc is just the elvish word (or derived from it, rather), while goblin is the name given them by the dwarves and hobbits.
Rater did.


And the beginning of the book before the story properly starts there's a note on the words used. It notes that in Middle Earth, 'Orc' and 'Goblin' are different names for the same race of people...


I think what they did with High Elves in Skyrim was quite interesting, too. Sure, they were still generally arrogant and holier than thou, but they took this to its logical conclusion by saying, "Well, if we're better than everyone else, we'd best go about ruling the world. Oh, and get rid of all these horrible ugly *men* that are cluttering up the place.".
Thalmor =/= Altmer.



The distinction between Orc and Goblin is sort of present in The Hobbit. I think it is in the very next chapter, but Bilbo thinks of a passage as being "small for goblins, at least the big ones", to which the narrator comments something like "Bilbo was unaware that goblins, even the big ones - the Orcs of the mountains - went along well on all fours". It is the only time that the word "Orc" appears in The Hobbit proper.

People keep bringing that up, and to me it doesn't look as much like a distinction as the author not wanting to use the word "goblin" twice in one sentence.

[factotum]

Thalmor =/= Altmer.


There are non-Altmer Thalmor? Where? OK, Thalmor are not the entire High Elf species, just a subset, but given they canonically control Summerset Isle (among other places), they're pretty much the ruling class.

[Eldan]

[QUOTE=factotum;25143041]I think what they did with High Elves in Skyrim was quite interesting, too. Sure, they were still generally arrogant and holier than thou, but they took this to its logical conclusion by saying, "Well, if we're better than everyone else, we'd best go about ruling the world. Oh, and get rid of all these horrible ugly *men* that are cluttering up the place.".QUOTE]

Not too go on too much of a tangent here, but at least one faction of elves wants to go further than that in the Elder Scrolls and unmake the world, because the material world was the creation of the god of men, and the elves and their own gods were tricked into participating. The purely spiritual state before was better, or so they at least believe. It's why they are going around undoing the laws of the universe one by one.

[Eldan]

There are non-Altmer Thalmor? Where? OK, Thalmor are not the entire High Elf species, just a subset, but given they canonically control Summerset Isle (among other places), they're pretty much the ruling class.

The Thalmor are a political party, who have named themselves after an older political faction from the second era. They took over by pretty much deposing the existing nobility and turning them into puppets.

[Fyraltari]

There are non-Altmer Thalmor? Where?
Valenwood and Elseweyr, considering the Thalmor have Bosmer and Kahjiiti agents. In fact, if you manage to save the Wood Elf who lets you in the embassy, he'll be targeted by a Khajiit assassin on the Thalmor's payroll.

OK, Thalmor are not the entire High Elf species, just a subset, but given they canonically control Summerset Isle (among other places), they're pretty much the ruling class.

Government/ruling political party. The ruling class is still the nobility/mages.

[Rater202]

The... Interesting thing, about the Thalmor?

If you look at the game's code... They're right. Each race has hidden statistics that govern things like running speed and base melee damage and so on.

It's barely noticeable in actual gameplay, but looking at the numbers, the Altmer are objectively the "best" race in terms of physical ability.

So, basically, the Thalmor's political position is "The average altmer is more physically fit than an average member of any other race, therefore we should be ***** to everyone."

That's certainly an... Interesting choice on Bethesda's part.

[Eldan]

They also have good reasons to personally hate Talos. It's not impossible that at least some of their older mages were alive, or knew people who were alive, when the Numidium absolutely roflstomped their home in metaphysical ways.

Edit: the Khajiit too, though they are usually super chill about their religion. Riften is still a nuclear crater.

[Fyraltari]

The... Interesting thing, about the Thalmor?

If you look at the game's code... They're right. Each race has hidden statistics that govern things like running speed and base melee damage and so on.

It's barely noticeable in actual gameplay, but looking at the numbers, the Altmer are objectively the "best" race in terms of physical ability.

That's hardly the extant of their claim. In fact they don't even claim elves are physically superior.

[Tyndmyr]

The... Interesting thing, about the Thalmor?

If you look at the game's code... They're right. Each race has hidden statistics that govern things like running speed and base melee damage and so on.

It's barely noticeable in actual gameplay, but looking at the numbers, the Altmer are objectively the "best" race in terms of physical ability.

So, basically, the Thalmor's political position is "The average altmer is more physically fit than an average member of any other race, therefore we should be ***** to everyone."

That's certainly an... Interesting choice on Bethesda's part.

It's not implausible. If we had, say, superpowers or something in our earth, I would totally expect some people to get ridiculously arrogant and be kind of jerks as a result.

Hell, people are often jerks for no reason at all. Give them a bit of a reason, and oof.

[pendell]

I think it was Elrond who speculated that the trolls came by Glamdring and Orcrist because they "plundered other plunderers." I dunno about Orcrist, but if Glamdring was worn by the King of Gondolin, then the last time we would have seen it would have been at the Fall of Gondolin, in the Silmarillion and the First Age, when Gothmog and the elven king of the city slew each other by the fountain in the palace.

I don't think it's too much of a stretch that Angband soldiery scooped it up off the body of the Elven King while they fed the body to the crows, but it would have been bad luck to hold onto it... for orcs, those weapons are cursed and ill-fated. Remember that in LOTR Ugluk threw away Pippin's and Merry's Numenorean daggers "as if they burned him."

Who knows? Maybe they gambled them away in a mad night of lust and debauchery after the victory. Maybe they went to the Angband equivalent of a pawn shop to pay for a round of cheap drinks. Maybe they just threw them down on a deep hole. But trolls raid tombs and trolls ambush travellers. So what with one thing or another, they came into possession of rare and valuable elvish artifacts, including two swords and one enchanted knife. They had no better use for the weapons, so they just left the artifacts in their home along with everything else they came by that wasn't eatable. Trolls seem to be simple creatures of simple tastes. Just given them mutton, beer, they're happy.

Tolkien never wrote the story, and perhaps its best left to the imagination.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[factotum]

I dunno about Orcrist, but if Glamdring was worn by the King of Gondolin

Is there even a scrap of evidence for that, though? Both Orcrist and Glamdring are powerful weapons, so powerful that the orcs still remember them with fear thousands of years after they were forged. That suggests to me those weapons have to have been in regular use until relatively recently, so it's far more likely (IMHO, obviously) that they were carried out of the city by survivors of the Fall and used against orcs wherever they were found for years afterwards. It just doesn't make sense they would have the reputation they do if they were basically used *once* six thousand years ago and then never seen again.

[Fyraltari]

I think it was Elrond who speculated that the trolls came by Glamdring and Orcrist because they "plundered other plunderers." I dunno about Orcrist, but if Glamdring was worn by the King of Gondolin, then the last time we would have seen it would have been at the Fall of Gondolin, in the Silmarillion and the First Age, when Gothmog and the elven king of the city slew each other by the fountain in the palace.

King Turgon died when his tower collapsed, you are thinking of Captain Ecthelion. Not that it changes much.

[pendell]

King Turgon died when his tower collapsed, you are thinking of Captain Ecthelion. Not that it changes much.

Right, thank you. Correction noted.



Is there even a scrap of evidence for that, though? Both Orcrist and Glamdring are powerful weapons, so powerful that the orcs still remember them with fear thousands of years after they were forged. That suggests to me those weapons have to have been in regular use until relatively recently, so it's far more likely (IMHO, obviously) that they were carried out of the city by survivors of the Fall and used against orcs wherever they were found for years afterwards. It just doesn't make sense they would have the reputation they do if they were basically used *once* six thousand years ago and then never seen again.


There is no direct knowledge of Glamdring or Orcrist between the time Turgon carried the one, and the time Bilbo found them in a troll hole. Even so, I think the absence of evidence is itself telling. If either sword was in the hands of a capable warrior or king, why we'd be hearing about it. It would leave pages written in orcish blood in history, and not just the history of orcs. Remember the story of Turin in the first age; when the black sword Anglachel was at work, it wasn't just orcs who knew about it, the humans on whose behalf the sword was wielded knew of it too.

The most likely solution is that , like the ring, they have been lost, forgotten at the equivalent of a bottom of a river for a very long time. I'm not saying they were never wielded in battle at all between the first age and the troll hole, but if they were there is no record of it.

As to the goblins remembering 'Biter' and 'Beater', this is not a problem if we accept the Silmarrillion's origin story that they were created from Elves. If they were, that means they don't have a natural end to their life expectancy. And in any event, pretty much everyone in Middle Earth lives a long time. Dwarves live long lives, and Treebeard is old enough to remember the woods before the first age. Even hobbits age slowly -- their 33 is equivalent to our 21, and their 50 to our 33. It's only the humans who live such short lives and die like mayflies, which may in part explain the hunger of the Nazgul for eternal life through the rings, and the relative impatience, hot-temper, and hastiness of humans. But I digress.

At any rate, if orcs are immortal, most will still die young because they live lifestyles where brutal, violent death is common at a very young age. But those who live and survive could live a very, very long time indeed. Perhaps some very sharp and clever band of orcs were in the siege of gondolin and saw the Foe-Hammer wielded in person. Then the War of Wrath happened, and rather than die like all the rest of the hosts of Angband they very intelligently fled and hid themselves in the mountains. There they gathered followers and made a living, of sorts, robbing and enslaving random travelers. And as folk of evil heart would do, up in the mountains they have little to do save remember the time when they were lords, remember old grudges and feuds, growing ever more bitter and hateful as they meditate on it over and over again.

If that is what the goblin king and his chief soldiers were, it is not surprising both that they would recognize Beater and Biter at once and , furthermore, that they would hate those who possess them. It may have been five thousand years, but to a people for whom the years are as the blink of an eye, it does not signify, and the hateful memories have not become less hateful in the passage of time.

There is nothing in the textual evidence to contradict this theory, and quite a bit to support it, though of course I am in the market for a better one if someone can produce a better explanation.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Fyraltari]

Right, thank you. Correction noted.
You're welcome.




There is no direct knowledge of Glamdring or Orcrist between the time Turgon carried the one, and the time Bilbo found them in a troll hole. Even so, I think the absence of evidence is itself telling. If either sword was in the hands of a capable warrior or king, why we'd be hearing about it. It would leave pages written in orcish blood in history, and not just the history of orcs. Remember the story of Turin in the first age; when the black sword Anglachel was at work, it wasn't just orcs who knew about it, the humans on whose behalf the sword was wielded knew of it too.

The most likely solution is that , like the ring, they have been lost, forgotten at the equivalent of a bottom of a river for a very long time. I'm not saying they were never wielded in battle at all between the first age and the troll hole, but if they were there is no record of it.
Disagree, there are huge parts of Arda's history we know nothing about. We don't know the name of even one king of either Cardolan or Rhudaur for example. There's plenty of room for the swords to have gained a bloody reputation among the orcs without Elrond knowing about it. Maybe they were looted by servants of Morgoth in Gondolin, taken South or East by Men of the Shadow after the War of Wrath and later claimed by opponents of the Dark Lord(s) there (maybe in relation with the Blue Wizards) and have only been taken back to the North-West of Middle-Earth as Sauron's influence grew more present. Possibly by people looking for allies in Lindon. If these elf-friends had a run-in with the Great Goblin before being eaten by the trolls a few decades before The Hobbit it'd even explain how the Great Goblin could recognize them by sight.


If that is what the goblin king and his chief soldiers were
Great Goblin.
As far as we know, Azog was the only goblin to style himself "king", though his son Bolg (our best evidence for "orcs don't age", by the way) probably did so as well.

[Keltest]

Eh, Elrond was a pretty learned and influential figure. I cant imagine that he would just not notice if a pair of elven blades hung out in a fairly major period of human history doing their thing out in the open. Thats the sort of thing that the elves would at least keep an eye on if they could help it.

[Fyraltari]

Eh, Elrond was a pretty learned and influential figure. I cant imagine that he would just not notice if a pair of elven blades hung out in a fairly major period of human history doing their thing out in the open. Thats the sort of thing that the elves would at least keep an eye on if they could help it.

Not that much communication happening between the North-East of Middle-Earth and the rest of it. And the Elves are explictly not interested in Men who aren't descended fromy the Three Tribes of the Edain, so...

[factotum]

Also, would Elrond be looking for references to "Biter" and "Beater"? It's unlikely the names Orcrist and Glamdring would still be naturally known to anyone around if the swords had been out of Elven hands for a while, Elrond himself only seemed to find out those names from reading the runes on the blades.

[PontificatusRex]

Alternate theory about Orcrist and Glamdring's history: They were loot kept by the goblins for a very long time, until the trolls got a hold of them. It's speculated the the trolls robbed other robbers. I can easily see those weapons being part of treasure looted from Gondolin and kept as trophies by the goblins and remembered - kind of like the Crown Jewels. Then at some point in the chaos of the Third Age the goblins lost their hoard - either robbed directly, or the goblins who were keeping the weapons were wiped out in one of the many wars and it was eventually found by the trolls. So the goblins would have far more recent memory of them while they were still lost to elves and men.

[Sapphire Guard]

I'm not sure that troll hole was originally a troll hole, it has a door well crafted enough that Gandalf and a company of dwarves can't get in without the key, even with magic. That's no ordinary door. Could be some kind of ancient vault.

Counterpoint: One of the trolls has a magic wallet. Perhaps they are mages.


The swords could be either loot or carried away by refugees from Gondolin. Either is plausible. Any history is likely to be long and complicated, changing hands many times.

Not even Gandalf recognises them as Gondolin swords, Elrond knows because he's Elrond, to anyone else (except maybe Glorfindel), they're just damned good swords. Some random villager could find it in a quarry and hang it over the fire for generations to fight off bandit and raiders and such.

The trolls are fairly recent immigrants, having come down from the mountains to look for people to eat. They've been around long enough that the locals leave, and Elrond's people knows there are trolls in the area, but either haven't found them or haven't looked yet.

[Keltest]

Also, would Elrond be looking for references to "Biter" and "Beater"? It's unlikely the names Orcrist and Glamdring would still be naturally known to anyone around if the swords had been out of Elven hands for a while, Elrond himself only seemed to find out those names from reading the runes on the blades.

Maybe, actually. "Beater" is the Foe-Hammer and "Biter" is the Goblin Cleaver. The names actually arent disconnected from their elvish names. Beyond that, i kind of assume that the elves would be at least passingly interested in anything that the orcs abjectly fear.

[hamishspence]

I'm not sure that troll hole was originally a troll hole, it has a door well crafted enough that Gandalf and a company of dwarves can't get in without the key, even with magic. That's no ordinary door. Could be some kind of ancient vault.

Counterpoint: One of the trolls has a magic wallet. Perhaps they are mages.

Or they took it from somebody else.


While the narrator says "Troll's purses are the mischief, and this was no exception", given that the events of The Hobbit were later recorded by Bilbo in-universe, there may be an element of "the narrator is Bilbo" - so he may not be 100% accurate about everything in-story, having his own perspective.

[Rater202]

Okay, let's knock this out.

Chapter Five: Riddles in the Dark.

This is the one that was most heavily altered between editions, with Tolkien adapting it to better tie to Lord of the Rings in the second edition.

Can't tell a difference between eyes open and eyes shut? That's a problem.

Oh, right away. A tiny ring of cold metal... This is it. This is the Ring, isn't it?

Yes, yes it is.

...I know that the Ring is meant to tempt you. I don't know which parts of the chapter were rewritten versus not, so I'm wondering if Bilbo imagining himself frying bacon and eggs in that exact moment is just the Hobbit missing his hole or something more sinister.

I know that the health risks of tobacco use were not well understood at this time but stopping for a smoke right now seems particularly unwise.

Though at least he realizes the problem.

Inside your pants is probably a bad place to keep a magic blade.

Luckily it's a goblin-killing elf knife, so it glows. He can see, at least a little.

Tolkien uses a lot of words to say "hobbits are smol, sneaky, and good at navigating tunnels." It's not bad, but I get the feeling I'd have been told off for such lengthy prose back in school.

After a short while, our poor hobbit treads into icy cold water...

And he can't swim. Not good.

Tolkien describes the process of evolution quite efficiently.

Older than the Goblins? You know, I can't help but note that Lovecraft died the year this came out. I seriously doubt that they would have gotten along, but this talk of strange, ancient slimy creatures in old caves brings his works to mind.

"Deep down here by the dark water lived old Gollum" Yeah, ain't no lead burying here.

In Lord of the Rings, unless I drastically misunderstand things, Gollum is a hobbit corrupted by The Ring, twisted in mind until all that remains is a wretch. Here he is described as some kind of... Abomination. Humanoid, tes, ut a monster of unknown origin, implicitly in these caves long before the goblins were.

And he occasionally eats goblins. You know, Orcs. What I've seen of The Lord of The Rings implied that he was a weak and pathetic creature, but here he's top if the food chain. Admittedly an ambush predator, but still.

I'll also note that the films make him pale, but the passage describes him as being as dark as darkness, except for his pale eyes.

Though his use of a boat makes him more of a fairytale monster, like the trolls. I don't know why exactly it's the boat that makes me think that, but...

Gollum calls himself precious? And he refers to Bilbo as the same, with intent to eat Bilbo I think? Yes, this is interesting.

Oh, hint at what Gollum was long before? Is that original to this, or an edit?

and here we go, a challenge of riddles.

I never would have guessed 'wind' for Gollum's second riddle. Bilbo is a clever boy.

Sun on the daisies... Yes, initially Gollum is described as an abomination, but during the challenge... It might be hindsight speaking, but it seems that anyone who has paid attention thus far might guess that he was once a hobbit.

And I don't even need to turn the page to know that "A box without hinges, key, or lid, Yet golden treasure inside is hidden" is 'an egg.'

"Alive without breath" was presented in the Dragon Compendium as an archetypical example of the kinds of riddles that are good for challenges in an adventure.

...And Bilbo literally only gets it by chance.

He gets Gollum with another simple Riddle, and then Gollum gets him with yet another riddle that he only gets by dumb luck.

"What have I got in my pocket" is another one of those archetypical questions, but... Here Bilbo uses it by accident. I legitimately don't know if this is a first use with the trope being simplified, or if Bilbo using it by accident is Tolkien playing with an established trope.

Only now do we find out that the Riddle Game is an old game covered by Ancient Laws... Honestly, it makes the whole setting feel as though it has a touch of the Fair Folk to it... and Bilbo does allegedly have fairy ancestry... Discussion for later.

Ohh, the Ring... Gollum has misplaced it.

An allusion to Sauron.

I'd almost feel bad for Gollum breaking down over losing "his precious" is the text describing how he'd come to acquire it didn't make it abundantly clear that it had destroyed him in mind and body, and if whatever that was good in him wasn't long gone by this point.

I assume that is an edit, however.

Gollum, not knowing that Bilbo is listening in his break down elaborates on what the Ring can do, panics about Bilbo escaping, runs off to the back door that Bilbo doesn't know about, and leads Bilbo right there.

Bilbo gets a sudden urge to kill Gollum, only to quash it as it would not be right or fair... The Ring at work?

Bilbo eventually passes Gollum with, what for a Hobbit, would be a mighty leap. I was under the impression that on a Hobbit's fingers the Ring only made you invisible, but understand that its true effect, in the hands of someone who is not strong enough to use its full power, is to amplify the ability you already have—tricksy hobbitses are naturally quiet and sneaky, yes they is, so the ring hides them from sight.

Is it perhaps possible that it has amplified the effects of the surge of adrenaline that at realizing that Gollum had detected his presence, just enough that he could escape? It is perhaps a stretch, but...

Other than a brief mishap of being spotted by goblins because the Ring was in his pocket, Bilbo is able to escape after that, and...Chapter end.

Not much happens in this chapter... But as I understand the story to come, and of course the sequel, this is the single most important chapter in all of Tolkien's canon.

that said, and I touched on this a bit earlier...

Bilbo, per the first chapter, allegedly has fairy ancestry through his mother's family.

In this chapter, the chllgne of riddles, the "game of riddles" is refered to as something honored and sacred, govenred by ancient laws.

And... And Gollum, after losing this challenge against a being of alledgly fae blood, tries to break his word and in doing so no only ends up holding up his end of a deal inspite of himself but losing his most prized posession in th eprocess.

This is, of course, all total concidence in-story, but I can't help but draw the parrleles to stories of people trying to get one over The Fair Folk here. Just something that occured to me as I read.

I have to wonder if that was deloberate. Tolkien playing with an old fairytale trope.

[factotum]

As I understand it, the main difference between the versions is:


In the original, Gollum actually *did* bet the Ring on the outcome of the riddle game, and was genuinely distraught when he couldn't find it and was thus unable to give Bilbo his "prize", so he showed him the way out in lieu and they parted courteously.


Obviously, this makes no sense whatsoever given what the Ring later turns out to be. Gollum's personality is all wrong and the idea that he'd actually give up the Ring willingly is nonsense. Hence the changes.

[Fyraltari]

Tolkien uses a lot of words to say "hobbits are smol, sneaky, and good at navigating tunnels." It's not bad, but I get the feeling I'd have been told off for such lengthy prose back in school.
Gotta know the rules before you can break them right.


Older than the Goblins? You know, I can't help but note that Lovecraft died the year this came out. I seriously doubt that they would have gotten along, but this talk of strange, ancient slimy creatures in old caves brings his works to mind.
The Nameless Things that are mentionned a couple of times in his work are often thought to be hommages or at least nods to Lovecraft, yes.


"Deep down here by the dark water lived old Gollum"
"Get off my lawn, filthy hobbitses!" yelled Old Man Gollum.


In Lord of the Rings, unless I drastically misunderstand things, Gollum is a hobbit corrupted by The Ring, twisted in mind until all that remains is a wretch. Here he is described as some kind of... Abomination. Humanoid, tes, ut a monster of unknown origin, implicitly in these caves long before the goblins were.
These aren't really contradictory. Also Bilbo is the in-universe author of The Hobbit and, he didn't know jack about Gollum's history.


And he occasionally eats goblins. You know, Orcs. What I've seen of The Lord of The Rings implied that he was a weak and pathetic creature, but here he's top if the food chain. Admittedly an ambush predator, but still.
Keep in mind that Tolkien's orcs are about the smallest of all of fantasy, and he's implied to prey on the weaker ones, but yes Gollum is tougher than he looks. And he never fights fair, either.


I'll also note that the films make him pale, but the passage describes him as being as dark as darkness, except for his pale eyes.
A good call on Jackson's part, if you ask me.


And I don't even need to turn the page to know that "A box without hinges, key, or lid, Yet golden treasure inside is hidden" is 'an egg.'

"Alive without breath" was presented in the Dragon Compendium as an archetypical example of the kinds of riddles that are good for challenges in an adventure.

...And Bilbo literally only gets it by chance.
Okay but what are the odds it was this book that made them famous?



"What have I got in my pocket" is another one of those archetypical questions, but... Here Bilbo uses it by accident. I legitimately don't know if this is a first use with the trope being simplified, or if Bilbo using it by accident is Tolkien playing with an established trope.
There's a mention in The Lord of the Rings of loremasters of later years having serious debates on whether that was a legal question. So, I'm guessing pretty new. Also I'm confident this question is "archetypical" because people love referencing Tolkien.
Although, knowing The Professor (which I don't), this question was probably inspired by the Vafþrúðnismál in which Odin wins a riddle contest by asking "What did Odin whisper at the ear of his son before laying him on the pyre?" Which is a blatantly unfair question.


I'd almost feel bad for Gollum breaking down over losing "his precious" is the text describing how he'd come to acquire it didn't make it abundantly clear that it had destroyed him in mind and body, and if whatever that was good in him wasn't long gone by this point.
*Sighs*




Bilbo eventually passes Gollum with, what for a Hobbit, would be a mighty leap. I was under the impression that on a Hobbit's fingers the Ring only made you invisible, but understand that its true effect, in the hands of someone who is not strong enough to use its full power, is to amplify the ability you already have—tricksy hobbitses are naturally quiet and sneaky, yes they is, so the ring hides them from sight.
It's a bit trickier than that. The Ring can amplify one's own strengths and talents but it can also move its wearer to the Unseen World where one can't be, well, seen by people in the" normal" world. This explains why Men can also become invisible by wearing the Ring. Ultimately, because no-one truly masters the Ring in the story, the extant of its power (and of its consciousness) stay very vague.


Is it perhaps possible that it has amplified the effects of the surge of adrenaline that at realizing that Gollum had detected his presence, just enough that he could escape? It is perhaps a stretch, but...
Yes it is possible. There are arguments to be made for and against it though.



Not much happens in this chapter... But as I understand the story to come, and of course the sequel, this is the single most important chapter in all of Tolkien's canon.
Eh. The Lord of the Rings is Tolkien's magnum opus but it is of surprisingly litlle relevance to the rest of the Legendarium all tucked at the end, like that. I'd say "The Darkening of Valinor" is the most important chapter of the "canon" (Ainulindalë doesn't count because creation myths are cheating.)


that said, and I touched on this a bit earlier...

Bilbo, per the first chapter, allegedly has fairy ancestry through his mother's family.

In this chapter, the chllgne of riddles, the "game of riddles" is refered to as something honored and sacred, govenred by ancient laws.

And... And Gollum, after losing this challenge against a being of alledgly fae blood, tries to break his word and in doing so no only ends up holding up his end of a deal inspite of himself but losing his most prized posession in th eprocess.

This is, of course, all total concidence in-story, but I can't help but draw the parrleles to stories of people trying to get one over The Fair Folk here. Just something that occured to me as I read.

I have to wonder if that was deloberate. Tolkien playing with an old fairytale trope.

Huh, I never thought of that. Neat.

[Eldan]

Fair folk is of course a good call, but it's also worth talking about Tolkien's background. As a linguist, he was an expert on old and Middle-english and Anglo-saxon poetry and history. Which also ties into Norse and Germanic mythology. And the Hobbit already takes tons from those myths. There's all the names: the twelve dwarves and Gandalf all come from a Norse list of Dwarf names. Magic rings are plentiful in those myths, too, and they grant all kinds of powers. Though I don't think there's one that makes you invisibile in Germanic myth, that's usually hats. There's the Ring of Gygas in Greek Philosophy, though.

Anyway, the Anglo-Saxons and Norse loved their riddles and riddle-contests. And we have dozens of riddles passed down in the sagas and otherwise written down. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the riddles, and the rules for riddle-contests that Tolkien mentions here, are directly from those stories.

Edit: for example, the Hervarar Saga (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hervarar_saga_ok_Hei%C3%B0reks) is explicitely called out as an inspiration, in which the king proclaims:


King Heithrek himself made a vow that however deeply a man should have wronged him, if he came into his power he should not be deprived of the chance of receiving a trial by the King's judges; but he should get off scot free if he could propound riddles which the King could not answer. But when people tried to ask the King riddles, not one was put to him which he could not solve.

The king, is of course, brought down by his own hubris, when he is visited by a man who calls himself Gestumblindi, the blind guest. Who is Odin.

By my count, Odin asks him 30 riddles, the King answers them all, until the last one:


Heithrek replied:
You are hard up when you have to turn back to things of long ago to bring forward against me. That is Othin riding his horse Sleipnir. It had eight feet and Othin two, and they had three eyes—Sleipnir two and Othin one.

Gestumblindi said:
Tell me lastly, Heithrek, if you are wiser than any other prince, what did Othin whisper in Balder's ear, before he was placed upon the pyre?

The King replied:
I am sure it was something scandalous and cowardly and thoroughly contemptible. You are the only person who knows the words which you spoke, you evil and wretched creature.

Then the King drew Tyrfing, and struck at Gestumblindi; but he changed himself into a falcon and flew out through the window of the hall. And the sword struck the tail of the falcon; and that is why it has had a short tail ever since, according to heathen superstition. But Othin had now become wroth with the King for striking at him; and that night he was slain.

[Scarlet Knight]

This is where Tolkien shines: creating a character like Gollum; and although he is planning to murder our hero, the reader's heart breaks for him. We feel all his sorrow and wretchedness.

[snowblizz]

that said, and I touched on this a bit earlier...

Bilbo, per the first chapter, allegedly has fairy ancestry through his mother's family.

In this chapter, the chllgne of riddles, the "game of riddles" is refered to as something honored and sacred, govenred by ancient laws.

And... And Gollum, after losing this challenge against a being of alledgly fae blood, tries to break his word and in doing so no only ends up holding up his end of a deal inspite of himself but losing his most prized posession in th eprocess.

This is, of course, all total concidence in-story, but I can't help but draw the parrleles to stories of people trying to get one over The Fair Folk here. Just something that occured to me as I read.

I have to wonder if that was deloberate. Tolkien playing with an old fairytale trope.
It is quite possible it is the Ring itself influencing events here. There is a similar thought, that the ring has influential powers posited by Frodo in LotR but I don't want to go into it more as that's kinda spoilers for LotR.

The world itself is somewhat magical, Words and Oaths have Power, as I said somewhere in such a context, quite fittingly for a Linguist like Tolkien really.

[pendell]

Okay, let's knock this out.

Chapter Five: Riddles in the Dark.

This is the one that was most heavily altered between editions, with Tolkien adapting it to better tie to Lord of the Rings in the second edition.


Here's a side by side comparison (https://www.ringgame.net/riddles.html) of the two versions, so you can see exactly what alterations happened. Scroll down and you can see the changes in blue.



Luckily it's a goblin-killing elf knife, so it glows. He can see, at least a little.


So a racist blade , you're saying :smallamused:. Yes, I said racist and not speciesist because Orcs and humans can breed true in the Tolkienverse, and so can elves and humans. They are all the same species.

I've gotta wonder at why the elves would make a knife that has the superpower of glowing bright blue in the presence of enemies. It may show Tolkien didn't do a lot of Trench-raiding. The last thing I would want , if I needed a knife in the middle of no-man's land at night, would be a knife that would light up the place brighter than a WP flare as soon as I pulled it out. Leave that sucker at home along with the chocolate hammer; it's no use for anything involving stealth.

... Which is a problem, because all hobbits do is stealth.



And he occasionally eats goblins. You know, Orcs. What I've seen of The Lord of The Rings implied that he was a weak and pathetic creature, but here he's top if the food chain. Admittedly an ambush predator, but still.


A very hungry one, also. Goblin is the sort of dish, I'm given to understand, that the modern Michelin guide would call an "acquired taste" or perhaps a "regional delicacy". In other words, most people vomit on the first bite. But Gollum can get it down and keep it down, which shows just how rare meat is down there.

On the plus side, I imagine an alternate history version of the Hobbit where Gollum opens a weight loss clinic advertising the wonders of a protein-rich carb-poor diet for getting it off and keeping it off. He'd probably have a lot of takers in the Shire. Those he didn't eat, of course.

Also, it may be hear your later but you'll notice he comments about twisting that 'nasty young squeaker'. He's talking about eating goblin children. Less tough and gamey than the big ones, don't you know.



Gollum calls himself precious? And he refers to Bilbo as the same, with intent to eat Bilbo I think? Yes, this is interesting.


Gollum has been living alone a very, very long time. Losing track of things like personal pronouns and so forth, which is something a linguist would spot.



and here we go, a challenge of riddles.


Wait, what? If you fail, you're just going to sit there and let him eat you Bilbo? Don't be ridiculous. Shouldn't bet what you aren't prepared to lose.



Only now do we find out that the Riddle Game is an old game covered by Ancient Laws... Honestly, it makes the whole setting feel as though it has a touch of the Fair Folk to it... and Bilbo does allegedly have fairy ancestry... Discussion for later.


Agreed. I think this was a basic fairy tale with fairy tale tropes before Tolkien decided to set it in the larger universe of the Silmarils and make it a grander thing than it was at first.



Bilbo gets a sudden urge to kill Gollum, only to quash it as it would not be right or fair... The Ring at work?


I don't think so. I think any reasonable creature would have felt that same urge. I know that if *I* were in his shoes I would most assuredly have gutted Gollum like a fish. It is wrong to judge by skin color and not by character, but we've had a really, really good luck at Gollum's character. At his treacherous, murderous character, and there's no way I'd leave an enemy like that behind me robbed but alive. For all I know I might get lost and turned around and I do NOT want to encounter this creature in the tunnels again.

Heh ... reading about Gandalf's pursuit of Gollum in Fellowship of the ring, he tells us of the rumor of him in Mirkwood, the "ghost which drank blood", which "slipped into nests to find the eggs, into windows to find cradles".

Because Bilbo didn't kill Gollum now, who knows how many human and goblin children he unwittingly condemned to death at Gollum's hands? Gollum has to eat, after all, and he is demonstrably not picky.




Other than a brief mishap of being spotted by goblins because the Ring was in his pocket, Bilbo is able to escape after that, and...Chapter end.


Actually... reading closely...

Here's the original paragraph. I'll bold the bits I think significant.



Bilbo blinked, and then he suddenly saw the goblins: goblins in full armour with drawn swords sitting just inside the door, and watching it with wide eyes, and the passage that led to it! They saw him sooner than he saw them, and with yells of delight they rushed upon him.

Whether it was accident or presence of mind, I don't know. Accident, I think, because the hobbit was not used yet to his new treasure. Anyway he slipped the ring on his left hand—and the goblins stopped short. They could not see a sign of him. Then they yelled twice as loud as before, but not so delightedly


Now compare with the revised paragraph



Bilbo blinked, and then suddenly he saw the goblins: goblins in full armour with drawn swords sitting just inside the door, and watching it with wide eyes, and watching the passage that led to it. They were aroused, alert, ready for anything.

They saw him sooner than he saw them. Yes, they saw him. Whether it was an accident, or a last trick of the ring before it took a new master, it was not on his finger. With yells of delight the goblins rushed upon him.
A pang of fear and loss, like an echo of Gollum's misery, smote Bilbo, and forgetting even to draw his sword he stuck his hands into his pockets. And there was the ring still, in his left pocket, and it slipped on his finger. The goblins stopped short. They could not see a sign of him. He had vanished. They yelled twice as loud as before, but not so delightedly.


This is the moment the ring betrayed him.

Or it tried to.

We can see that it was influencing the goblins to greater alertness and then treacherously slipped off Bilbo's finger in the hopes that Bilbo would be caught and the ring would be taken by a goblin, which could then be influenced to take it to Mordor.

But it failed. This time.



Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Rater202]

Huh... Bilbo's kind of a jerk in the original version.

"Uh, the creature must have lost it and I must have found it... Huh, I'll just leave the creature to stew and extort a second prize out of him. Finders keepers."

I mean, yeah, he needed to get out, but in the original version, Gollum was no longer a threat to him.

[hamishspence]

I've gotta wonder at why the elves would make a knife that has the superpower of glowing bright blue in the presence of enemies. It may show Tolkien didn't do a lot of Trench-raiding. The last thing I would want , if I needed a knife in the middle of no-man's land at night, would be a knife that would light up the place brighter than a WP flare as soon as I pulled it out. Leave that sucker at home along with the chocolate hammer; it's no use for anything involving stealth.

The intensity of the glow determines how close the enemies are - once it starts glowing very faintly, you know the enemies are within a few hundred yards, then as it begins to brighten more, you know the enemies are guessing closer. You can also pull it out just a little way, if you suspect enemies might be getting near. It's more useful for defenders - guards who want a proximity alarm, than for night attackers.

Unlike in the movies, a point is in the book of how all the First Age elf-weapons glow like that, not just Sting.

[Fyraltari]

So a racist blade , you're saying :smallamused:. Yes, I said racist and not speciesist because Orcs and humans can breed true in the Tolkienverse, and so can elves and humans. They are all the same species.

I've gotta wonder at why the elves would make a knife that has the superpower of glowing bright blue in the presence of enemies. It may show Tolkien didn't do a lot of Trench-raiding. The last thing I would want , if I needed a knife in the middle of no-man's land at night, would be a knife that would light up the place brighter than a WP flare as soon as I pulled it out.
Because the orcs hate that light.



But Gollum can get it down and keep it down, which shows just how rare meat is down there.
Gollum's not one to overcook food.



I don't think so. I think any reasonable creature would have felt that same urge. I know that if *I* were in his shoes I would most assuredly have gutted Gollum like a fish. It is wrong to judge by skin color and not by character, but we've had a really, really good luck at Gollum's character. At his treacherous, murderous character, and there's no way I'd leave an enemy like that behind me robbed but alive. For all I know I might get lost and turned around and I do NOT want to encounter this creature in the tunnels again.

Heh ... reading about Gandalf's pursuit of Gollum in Fellowship of the ring, he tells us of the rumor of him in Mirkwood, the "ghost which drank blood", which "slipped into nests to find the eggs, into windows to find cradles".

Because Bilbo didn't kill Gollum now, who knows how many human and goblin children he unwittingly condemned to death at Gollum's hands? Gollum has to eat, after all, and he is demonstrably not picky.
Most people don't tend to resort to murder when they have other options you know. Also that last argument cuts both way: Had Gollum died there, Sauron would have won.


Huh... Bilbo's kind of a jerk in the original version.

"Uh, the creature must have lost it and I must have found it... Huh, I'll just leave the creature to stew and extort a second prize out of him. Finders keepers."

I mean, yeah, he needed to get out, but in the original version, Gollum was no longer a threat to him.

Gollum expressed the desire to eat him before. Bilbo's not the biggest jerk here. Plus, he really needs to get out of there.

[Rater202]

Gollum expressed the desire to eat him before. Bilbo's not the biggest jerk here. Plus, he really needs to get out of there.

Yeah, but still.

Regardless, I think the second version of the chapter makes for a better story.

[pendell]

Most people don't tend to resort to murder when they have other options you know.


Remember the context. Bilbo's standing right behind him and listened to his talk.



Curse it! curse it! curse it!" hissed Gollum. "Curse the Baggins! It's gone! What has it got in its pocketses? Oh we guess, we guess, my precious. He's found it, yes he must have. My birthday-present."

Bilbo pricked up his ears. He was at last beginning to guess himself. He hurried a little, getting as close as he dared behind Gollum, who was still going quickly, not looking back, but turning his head from side to side, as Bilbo could see from the faint glimmer on the walls.

"My birthday-present! Curse it! How did we lose it, my precious? Yes, that's it. When we came this way last, when we twisted that nassty young squeaker. That's it. Curse it! It slipped from us, after all these ages and ages! It's gone, gollum!"

Suddenly Gollum sat down and began to weep, a whistling and gurgling sound horrible to listen to. Bilbo halted and flattened himself against the tunnel-wall. After a while Gollum stopped weeping and began to talk. He seemed to be having an argument with himself.

"It's no good going back there to search, no. We doesn't remember all the places we've visited. and it's no use. The Baggins has got it in its pocketses; the nassty noser has found it, we ways.

"We guesses, precious, only guesses. We can't know till we find the nassty creature and squeezes it. But it doesn't know what the present can do, does it? It'll just keep it in its pocketses. It doesn't know, and it can't go far. It's lost itself, the nassty nosey thing. It doesn't know the way out. It said so.

"It said so, yes; but it's tricksy. It doesn't say what it means. It won't say what it's got in its pocketses. It knows. It knows a way in, it must know a way out, yes. It's off to the back-door. to the back-door, that's it.

"The goblins will catch it then. It can't get out that way, precious.

"Ssss, sss, gollum! Goblinses! Yes, but if it's got the present, our precious present, then goblinses will get it, gollum! They'll find it, they'll find out what it does. We shan't ever be safe again, never, gollum! One of the goblinses will put it on, and then no one will see him. He'll be there but not seen. Not even our clever eyeses will notice him; and he'll come creepsy and tricksy and catch us, gollum, gollum!"

"Then let's stop talking, precious, and make haste. If the Baggins has gone that way, we must go quick and see. Go! Not far now. Make haste!"


So, not only am I in the middle of a mountain surrounding in my enemies, not only did I just win a riddle game against a creature who was willing to eat me, but I'm now standing behind him listening to him plot my murder.

You think I'm going to leave this creature alive in the tunnels? Someone who knows the ins and outs of the place far better than I do, is a dab hand at killing and has just voiced the plan to kill me, specifically?

No. This is at least as justifiable as Haley whacking Crystal in the shower.

In the fifty years I have walked this earth in real life, I have had to kill zero human beings, justifiably or not. But then, the number of people who have made a realistic threat to eat me while I am in the wilderness far from civilization or law surrounded by enemies who would kill me without a second thought is also nil. Should either situation change, I may update those counts. Or not.

What people do on adventures is NOT how we live in ordinary civil society. That's why it's "civil".



Also that last argument cuts both way:

Had Gollum died there, Sauron would have won.



If Gollum had died the Powers -- or the author -- would have had to find another solution to the problem. Which is a different thing from it being the only possible outcome. Unless Eru Illuvator really wants to save or damn the entire world based on the actions of one hobbit decades before the protagonists of the adventure we're alluding to were even born.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[hamishspence]

I've seen suggestions in LOTR that the original version, with the "present" is what Bilbo told the dwarves, and Gandalf, at some point, before admitting the truth to Gandalf and later, the Council of Elrond - but, at least as written in the revised version of The Hobbit, Bilbo doesn't conceal much initially - just the existence of the Ring itself, and his account of Gollum's behaviour is much more accurate:


"And then I couldn't think of any other question with him sitting beside me," ended Bilbo; "so I said 'what's in my pocket?' And he couldn't guess in three goes. So I said: 'What about your promise? Show me the way out!' But he came at me to kill me, and I ran, and fell over, and he missed me in the dark. Then I followed him, because I heard him talking to himself. He thought I really knew the way out, and so he was making for it. And then he sat down in the entrance, and I could not get by. So I jumped over him and escaped, and ran down to the gate."
"What about guards?" they asked. "Weren't there any?"
"O yes! lots of them; but I dodged 'em. I got stuck in the door, which was only open a crack, and I lost lots of buttons," he said sadly, looking at his torn clothes. "But I squeezed through all right - and here I am."
The dwarves looked at him with quite a new respect, when he talked about dodging guards, jumping over Gollum, and squeezing through, as if it was not very difficult or very alarming.
"What did I tell you?" said Gandalf laughing. "Mr. Baggins has more about him than you guess."


"Let me see - it was in the year that the White Council drove the dark power from Mirkwood, just before the Battle of Five Armies, that Bilbo found his ring. A shadow fell on my heart then, though I did not know yet what I feared. I wondered often how Gollum came by a Great Ring, as plainly it was - that at least was clear from the first. Then I heard Bilbo's strange story of how he had "won" it, and I could not believe it. When I at last got the truth out of him, I saw at once that he had been trying to put his claim to the ring beyond doubt. Much like Gollum with his "birthday present". The lies were too much alike for my comfort. Clearly the ring had an unwholesome power that set to work on its keeper at once. That was the first real warning I had that all was not well. I told Bilbo often that such rings were better left unused; but he resented it, and soon got angry. There was little else that I could do. I could not take it from him without doing greater harm; and I had no right to do so anyway. I could only watch and wait. I might perhaps have consulted Saruman the White, but something always held me back."

"I will do as you bid. But I will now tell the true story, and if some here have heard me tell it otherwise" – he looked sidelong at Gloin – "I ask them to forget it and forgive me. I only wished to claim the treasure as my very own in those days, and to be rid of the name of thief that was put on me."

Prologue
...
Now it is a curious fact that this is not the story as Bilbo first told it to his companions. To them his account was that Gollum had promised to give him a present, if he won the game.


Presumably, after the existence of the Ring was revealed to the Dwarfs in Mirkwood, was when Bilbo changed the story he told of his encounter, from the much more accurate one, to the much less accurate one, with him telling the same story to Gandalf after the Battle of the Five Armies.




So, not only am I in the middle of a mountain surrounding in my enemies, not only did I just win a riddle game against a creature who was willing to eat me, but I'm now standing behind him listening to him plot my murder.

You think I'm going to leave this creature alive in the tunnels? Someone who knows the ins and outs of the place far better than I do, is a dab hand at killing and has just voiced the plan to kill me, specifically?

No. This is at least as justifiable as Haley whacking Crystal in the shower.

Bilbo actually does consider the "Gollum's planning to kill me" rationalisation - but rejects it:



Bilbo almost stopped breathing, and went stiff himself. He was desperate. He must get away, out of this horrible darkness, while he had any strength left. He must fight. He must stab the foul thing, put its eyes out, kill it. It meant to kill him. No, not a fair fight. He was invisible now. Gollum had no sword. Gollum had not actually threatened to kill him, or tried to yet. And he was miserable, alone, lost. A sudden understanding, a pity mixed with horror, welled up in Bilbo's heart: a glimpse of endless unmarked days without light or hope of betterment, hard stone, cold fish, sneaking and whispering. All these thoughts passed in a flash of a second. He trembled. And then quite suddenly in another flash, as if lifted by a new strength and resolve, he leaped.

No great leap for a man, but a leap in the dark. Straight over Gollum's head he jumped, seven feet forward and three in the air; indeed, had he known it, he only just missed cracking his skull on the low arch of the passage.

[Fyraltari]

Remember the context. Bilbo's standing right behind him and listened to his talk.



So, not only am I in the middle of a mountain surrounding in my enemies, not only did I just win a riddle game against a creature who was willing to eat me, but I'm now standing behind him listening to him plot my murder.

You think I'm going to leave this creature alive in the tunnels? Someone who knows the ins and outs of the place far better than I do, is a dab hand at killing and has just voiced the plan to kill me, specifically?

No. This is at least as justifiable as Haley whacking Crystal in the shower.

In the fifty years I have walked this earth in real life, I have had to kill zero human beings, justifiably or not. But then, the number of people who have made a realistic threat to eat me while I am in the wilderness far from civilization or law surrounded by enemies who would kill me without a second thought is also nil. Should either situation change, I may update those counts. Or not.

What people do on adventures is NOT how we live in ordinary civil society. That's why it's "civil".
You seem to be under the impression I was taking a moral stance. I was not. Most people don't decide whether to kill somebody by weighing the pros and cons of doing it. People do it or they don't and then they justify their choice. Bilbo is not use to violence, the act does not come naturally to him. Haley, to use your example, is a killer by trade, violence is an important part of her life. Murder as a solution comes more easily to her.

You can't actually know what you would do in Bilbo's situation until you find yourself in one similar. There is not, was never, will never be any point to go "if I had been there instead of person X, I would have done Y."




If Gollum had died the Powers -- or the author -- would have had to find another solution to the problem. Which is a different thing from it being the only possible outcome.
You can't fault Bilbo for the bad consequences of his choice without also praise him for the good ones.

[Vahnavoi]

This is a minor detail, but the reason why the blades glow is because in hands of elves they were shock and awe weapons, used in open field of combat, to strike terror into hearts of orcs, who hate light.

They weren't made for sneaking around, anymore than they were made to be used by hobbits. :smallamused:

[hamishspence]

You can't fault Bilbo for the bad consequences of his choice without also praise him for the good ones.

At least according to Gandalf, Bilbo's merciful moment here was a significant factor in how little the Ring managed to corrupt Bilbo over time:



"What a pity that Bilbo did not stab that vile creature, when he had a chance!"
"Pity? It was Pity that stayed his hand. Pity, and Mercy: not to strike without need. And he has been well rewarded, Frodo. Be sure that he took so little hurt from the evil, and escaped in the end, because he began his ownership of the Ring so. With Pity."

[Sapphire Guard]

You're thinking like adventurers. That blade is for Gondolin royalty, who are not going on dungeon crawls. 'Detect assassin' is much more or a priority than 'hide location', because if they are in battle, they will have an army with them.

'Go into the enemy stronghold with a small group of friends' is not actually something people do if they have better choices.

[warty goblin]

You're thinking like adventurers. That blade is for Gondolin royalty, who are not going on dungeon crawls. 'Detect assassin' is much more or a priority than 'hide location', because if they are in battle, they will have an army with them.

'Go into the enemy stronghold with a small group of friends' is not actually something people do if they have better choices.

Quite right. These were weapons of war, meant to be used in close combat. By the time the swords come out, the orcs already know you are there, and are probably trying to kill you. The advantage offered by a sword your enemy cannot look at without blinding themselves is, in a melee, quite substantial.

[Wintermoot]

You're thinking like adventurers. That blade is for Gondolin royalty, who are not going on dungeon crawls. 'Detect assassin' is much more or a priority than 'hide location', because if they are in battle, they will have an army with them.

'Go into the enemy stronghold with a small group of friends' is not actually something people do if they have better choices.

This is the best explanation i've ever heard for the glowing swords. Makes perfect sense. They date from a period before Elves were sneaking and skulking about, hunting orcs like dogs hunting foxes in the woods. They date from a period where having something to warn you about an ambush is better than somethign to help you perform an ambush.

[hamishspence]

These were weapons of war, meant to be used in close combat. By the time the swords come out, the orcs already know you are there, and are probably trying to kill you. The advantage offered by a sword your enemy cannot look at without blinding themselves is, in a melee, quite substantial.

Makes perfect sense. They date from a period before Elves were sneaking and skulking about, hunting orcs like dogs hunting foxes in the woods. They date from a period where having something to warn you about an ambush is better than somethign to help you perform an ambush.


Which raises the question - which of the two effects (early warning of proximity, and shock/disorientation to the enemy), is the primary benefit provided?

Did the elves create glowing swords for early warning of approaching orcs, and then find out just how painful the light was to extremely close orcs?

Or did the elves create glowing swords for maximum efficiency in orc fighting, with the light making orc fighting much easier, and then discover that, as a side effect, the swords could also give them early warning of orc approach?

Or were both uses planned for from the moment they started forging the first one?

[Keltest]

Which raises the question - which of the two effects (early warning of proximity, and shock/disorientation to the enemy), is the primary benefit provided?

Did the elves create glowing swords for early warning of approaching orcs, and then find out just how painful the light was to extremely close orcs?

Or did the elves create glowing swords for maximum efficiency in orc fighting, with the light making orc fighting much easier, and then discover that, as a side effect, the swords could also give them early warning of orc approach?

Or were both uses planned for from the moment they started forging the first one?

The blinding function may have been incidental, but given that it seems to be a special kind of magic elf light of some sort rather than just equivalent to torch light, it was probably intentional, or at least a known outcome.

[tyckspoon]

Which raises the question - which of the two effects (early warning of proximity, and shock/disorientation to the enemy), is the primary benefit provided?

Did the elves create glowing swords for early warning of approaching orcs, and then find out just how painful the light was to extremely close orcs?

Or did the elves create glowing swords for maximum efficiency in orc fighting, with the light making orc fighting much easier, and then discover that, as a side effect, the swords could also give them early warning of orc approach?

Or were both uses planned for from the moment they started forging the first one?

They may well have simply forged them with the intent to create 'a weapon to fight Orcs' and had the glow come out as the result without specifically trying to get that result or placing any specific magic on the sword. Consider things like the rope, traveling cloaks, and trail rations later on, which the elves do not consider magical or enchanted - they are simply very, very good at the purpose for which they are made.

[pendell]

This is the best explanation i've ever heard for the glowing swords. Makes perfect sense. They date from a period before Elves were sneaking and skulking about, hunting orcs like dogs hunting foxes in the woods. They date from a period where having something to warn you about an ambush is better than somethign to help you perform an ambush.

Gondolim WAS a hidden kingdom though. They didn't let anyone leave once they found their way in. I assume this meant that most of their guards were light infantry concealed. I dunno if they had the same policy, but the kingdom of Menegroth to the south, also a hidden kingdom, used concealed archers to kill anyone who entered their land without warning. Orcs, men, other elves. They took their concealment seriously.

The encounter the hobbits had in Lorien is probably emblematic of most human encounters with the elves. Stumble into their woods, if they like you, they laugh at you and tell you they could shoot you in the dark. If they don't like you, they DO shoot you in the dark and your bodies are never found. You just disappear into the woods. It's one way they keep out prying eyes and door-to-door salespeople.

Glowing blue knives and swords would not have been useful in the role of 'concealed archers in the woods'. Plain wooden bows and practical non-glowing knives, however, would.

All of which is to say that there has never been a time in any age when elves did not have a strong component of stealth and secrecy in their armed forces. They had heavy infantry as well, as seen in the Great Battles , and that's probably where the glowing blue swords and knives come in handy. But there's never been a time when elves were the hunters and not the hunted. Even in the time of their greatest strength, some chose to hide themselves away, preppers storing up food in their basement against the orc/balrog/dragon apocalypse. And Gondolin was specifically created as a kingdom for just that purpose.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Fyraltari]

Gondolim WAS a hidden kingdom though. They didn't let anyone leave once they found their way in. I assume this meant that most of their guards were light infantry concealed. I dunno if they had the same policy, but the kingdom of Menegroth to the south, also a hidden kingdom, used concealed archers to kill anyone who entered their land without warning. Orcs, men, other elves. They took their concealment seriously.


The Kingdom of Doriath (Menegroth is the name of the palace) was protected by the Ring of Melian, not hiding archers. Gondolin's best protection was that it was very high up in the mountains and out of the way not ligthtly armmoured patrols. Once Morgoth's forces knew the general location they managed to scout the area without the elves noticing anything amiss.

EDIT: The encounter in Lorien is typical of how the Elves act, in the Late Third Age, a time of suspicion and worry. When the elves thought they had Morgoth contained they were most likely much more relaxed.

[hamishspence]

Gondolim WAS a hidden kingdom though. They didn't let anyone leave once they found their way in. I assume this meant that most of their guards were light infantry concealed.

In Unfinished Tales's account of Tuor's coming to Gondolin, the passage to Gondolin itself has 7 gates, and each gate has its own guards, each armed and armed more ornately and impressively than the last, themed after the gate they guard.


The outermost tier of guards might be "light infantry concealed" (though, since they wear visible mail, I don't know how much concealment matters in this case), but not the innermost, not by a long shot.




One of the three weapons is the King's own personal sword. I can't see Turgon the King of Gondolin in the role of "light infantry concealed" and designing his sword accordingly, somehow.

The second, given its prominence (almost as famous as the King's sword) was probably owned by someone really prominent in the battles, and/or Gondolin's Fall - perhaps Ecthelion of the Foundation, head of all the gate guards.

The third might be closer to, as the movie The Unexpected Journey describes it, a letter-opener.

[Rater202]

I feel the need, in hindsight, to clarify something I said yesterday.
"Alive without breath" was presented in the Dragon Compendium as an archetypical example of the kinds of riddles that are good for challenges in an adventure.

...And Bilbo literally only gets it by chance.
These are two separate thoughts

The first is some trivia I felt like sharing: The Dragon Compendium has a chapter on using riddles in games, it gives "alive without breath" as an archetypical example—mentioning it and its answer come from The Hobbit by name.

The second is that I just find it amusing that Bilbo got it by accident.

I was thinking about the response that... I'm just gonna say Fyr because I'm never gonna be able to spell the full thing—regarding this book is what made it archetypical and realized there might have been some lack of clarity.

[InvisibleBison]

Which raises the question - which of the two effects (early warning of proximity, and shock/disorientation to the enemy), is the primary benefit provided

I suspect that the shock effect was the intended purpose. An early warning ability is most useful when you don't expect danger, and when you don't expect danger your sword is usually going to be sheathed.

[hamishspence]

In the movie, the glow is enough to be noticeable even when sheathed. Don't know if the books ever suggest that though.

[pendell]

The Kingdom of Doriath (Menegroth is the name of the palace) was protected by the Ring of Melian, not hiding archers. Gondolin's best protection was that it was very high up in the mountains and out of the way not ligthtly armmoured patrols. Once Morgoth's forces knew the general location they managed to scout the area without the elves noticing anything amiss.

EDIT: The encounter in Lorien is typical of how the Elves act, in the Late Third Age, a time of suspicion and worry. When the elves thought they had Morgoth contained they were most likely much more relaxed.

I was mis-remembering. I meant Nargothrond (https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Nargothrond). The Silmarillion recounts that after a great battle they took to the woods and slew all who attempted to enter them.

That is , until the valiant man Turin Turambar arrived and counseled the king to eschew secrecy and march forth to open battle against the hosts of Morgoth.


It doesn't go well


As towards the many gates of gondolin, they may have been impressive from the inside but they must have been well concealed from the outside. Bright walls that can be seen for miles away, and soldiers in gleaming mithril mail, would not have allowed the kingdom to remain hidden from scouts for very long. The first wave of defenses were probably the same kind of troops we met in Lorien, I deem. That's how I explain them being able to remain hidden for centuries, that plus Manwe's eagles to knock down aerial snoopers.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[factotum]

And why should what the Elves of Nargothrond did or didn't do have any relation to what the Elves of Gondolin did or didn't do? They're two entirely different circumstances and two entirely different groups of people!

[Mystic Muse]

Psssht, all elves are the same.

Except in the Elder Scrolls series, where the Orcs are elves, the dwarves are elves, and the cat-people are apparently also elves.

This does not reflect my actual opinion of elves. This does apparently reflect the fluff of Elder Scrolls. Also, enjoying this readthrough, Rater.

[Lord Raziere]

and the cat-people are apparently also elves.


Khajit say lore has not confirmed this. Khajit would like this to remain as ambiguous as possible. Khajit prefer high elves to not get ideas, they already have too many.

[Mystic Muse]

Khajit say lore has not confirmed this. Khajit would like this to remain as ambiguous as possible. Khajit prefer high elves to not get ideas, they already have too many.

I was mostly going off what my friend who is a huuuuuuge fan of the setting said, I had not looked into the Khajiit being elves thing.

Back to the actual thread topic, I am soooo sad that the movies weren't better than they were. Like, even ignoring the unnecessary deviations from the book, aspects of them just make them bad movies.

[Fyraltari]

I'm just gonna say Fyr because I'm never gonna be able to spell the full thing
Fair.

I feel the need, in hindsight, to clarify something I said yesterday.These are two separate thoughts

The first is some trivia I felt like sharing: The Dragon Compendium has a chapter on using riddles in games, it gives "alive without breath" as an archetypical example—mentioning it and its answer come from The Hobbit by name.

The second is that I just find it amusing that Bilbo got it by accident.

I was thinking about the response that... I'm just gonna say Fyr because I'm never gonna be able to spell the full thing—regarding this book is what made it archetypical and realized there might have been some lack of clarity.
Right, the ellipsis really made it look like the second one was a continuation of the first. Sorry about misreading you.

I was mis-remembering. I meant Nargothrond (https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Nargothrond). The Silmarillion recounts that after a great battle they took to the woods and slew all who attempted to enter them.

That is , until the valiant man Turin Turambar arrived and counseled the king to eschew secrecy and march forth to open battle against the hosts of Morgoth.


It doesn't go well

Yes that's after the breaking of the siege of Angband and the Dagor Bragollach, i.e. once the elves start losing a lot. Of course they'd be more cautious at that point, but that wasn't the policy when the kingdom was founded.


As towards the many gates of gondolin, they may have been impressive from the inside but they must have been well concealed from the outside.
City was built in a crater in the mountains. And Morgoth had reasons to assume Turgon was hiding far more to the South.




Back to the actual thread topic, I am soooo sad that the movies weren't better than they were. Like, even ignoring the unnecessary deviations from the book, aspects of them just make them bad movies.

The Jackson adaptation of The Lord of the Rings was a labour of love and it shows. The Jackson adaptation of The Hobbit wasn't and it shows.

[Eldan]

I was mostly going off what my friend who is a huuuuuuge fan of the setting said, I had not looked into the Khajiit being elves thing.

A Basic Point of the Elder Scrolls Setting is that almost everything in it goes back to the two forces of law and chaos, from gods to planes to mortals. Under that paradigm, the two basic kinds of life are lawful elves and chaotic men. The Khajiit and certainly the Argonians don't seem to fit that paradigm, though. On the other hand, the Khajiit have various forms, and some of them look similar enough to Wood elves to be confused for them.

[Divayth Fyr]

In the movie, the glow is enough to be noticeable even when sheathed. Don't know if the books ever suggest that though.
I don't believe so. A quick check doesn't show anything to suggest that, with bits supporting the opposite interpretation (ie. the blades glowing when drawn and Frodo specifically drawing the Sting to check if there are orcs nearby. Of course Glamdring should also glow, but if I remember the movies correctly, it doesn't...

[pendell]

You can't fault Bilbo for the bad consequences of his choice without also praise him for the good ones.


I forgot to mention this last night but this WAS a good point, thank you.

As to the reason the blades glow -- my understanding is that the reason is that the blades are "alive", in some sense, and they hate goblins. It's why the black sword of Turin went all waxy for a bit when it was used to slay Beleg, a truly decent being. Later, Turin asked it a question, and the sword answered him with a voice. None of the other weapons do that, but I think that in Tolkien's verse to be enchanted is to have something of the power and knowledge of the maker. The Ring is definitely an intelligent artifact. Perhaps other items are too?

At any rate, yes, the later book plays out differently if Bilbo killed Gollum, but I don't necessarily think it all plays out the same way and ends poorly if he does.



Admittedly, part of the reason Bilbo is so hard to corrupt is because he starts the ring off with pity and mercy. So ... what is the likely outcome if he's corrupted faster? Gandalf is a common visitor to Bag End during these times. Maybe he realizes something is wrong much, much earlier than the Birthday Party? So instead of "letting the matter be" and "trusting the words of Saruman", he does his research much earlier? So that Frodo or someone like him sets out for Rivendell years or a decade earlier, long before Gollum is captured by Sauron and forced to reveal the existence of the Ring? So that they aren't hunted by orcs across Rohan? So that the fellowship doesn't break? So that there are more people at the end of the road in Mount Doom besides Frodo and Sam? So that the ring still goes in the fire, just different from that as written in the books?

Of course, there's no guarantee of this outcome either. Another possible outcome is that the ring drives Bilbo mad, he bolts into the wild and there is waylaid or captured by orcs who take it to Sauron and the world ends.

There's a lot of different way this could go, but I suppose we'll never know since Tolkien didn't explore this.


Does anyone have a copy of Tolkien's letters handy? Did he speak more on this topic at any point , describing the different alternatives?

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Fyraltari]

I forgot to mention this last night but this WAS a good point, thank you.
You're welcome.


As to the reason the blades glow -- my understanding is that the reason is that the blades are "alive", in some sense, and they hate goblins. It's why the black sword of Turin went all waxy for a bit when it was used to slay Beleg, a truly decent being.
It doesn't. It laments having done it later. In every version of the Narn i chin Hùrin, the sword only speaks in the last moment of Tùrin's life when nobody is around to confirm it does so and it's not Tùrin having finally, finally, snapped and hallucinating it.

Later, Turin asked it a question, and the sword answered him with a voice. None of the other weapons do that, but I think that in Tolkien's verse to be enchanted is to have something of the power and knowledge of the maker. The Ring is definitely an intelligent artifact. Perhaps other items are too?
That's a neat idea.


At any rate, yes, the later book plays out differently if Bilbo killed Gollum, but I don't necessarily think it all plays out the same way and ends poorly if he does.



Admittedly, part of the reason Bilbo is so hard to corrupt is because he starts the ring off with pity and mercy. So ... what is the likely outcome if he's corrupted faster? Gandalf is a common visitor to Bag End during these times. Maybe he realizes something is wrong much, much earlier than the Birthday Party? So instead of "letting the matter be" and "trusting the words of Saruman", he does his research much earlier? So that Frodo or someone like him sets out for Rivendell years or a decade earlier, long before Gollum is captured by Sauron and forced to reveal the existence of the Ring? So that they aren't hunted by orcs across Rohan? So that the fellowship doesn't break? So that there are more people at the end of the road in Mount Doom besides Frodo and Sam? So that the ring still goes in the fire, just different from that as written in the books?

Of course, there's no guarantee of this outcome either. Another possible outcome is that the ring drives Bilbo mad, he bolts into the wild and there is waylaid or captured by orcs who take it to Sauron and the world ends.

There's a lot of different way this could go, but I suppose we'll never know since Tolkien didn't explore this.


Does anyone have a copy of Tolkien's letters handy? Did he speak more on this topic at any point , describing the different alternatives?

Respectfully,

Brian P.
Tolkien did write that no one would have had the will power to destroy the Ring. The Cracks of Doom is where its power is most potent, no mortal (and no elf, I'd wager) could resist it there. If Gollum doesn't show up to take it and dance near the edge it wasn't going to go into the fire.

Also a corrupted Bilbo wouldn't have given up the Ring willingly and may not have wanted to go to Rivendell in the first place (elf-things pain Gollum, remember), and I have a hard time picturing Gandalf forcefully taking the Ring from Bilbo. And if he did, I doubt Gandalf would have resisted its allure in turn.

[Eldan]

That and if Frodo hadn't used the power of the ring to order Gollum to kill himself by jumping into the volcano.

[hamishspence]

It doesn't. It laments having done it later. In every version of the Narn i chin Hùrin, the sword only speaks in the last moment of Tùrin's life when nobody is around to confirm it does so and it's not Tùrin having finally, finally, snapped and hallucinating it.


True, but, Melian the Maiar (prior to Beleg's death) suggests the sword is somewhat malevolent,


"There is malice in this sword. The dark heart of the smith still dwells in it. It will not love the hand it serves, neither will it abide with you long."


and shortly after Beleg's death, someone who isn't Turin - Gwindor - comments on how the sword mourns Beleg - so the idea that its malevolence takes the form of vengefulness, isn't all that unusual in the Tolkien setting.

[Rater202]

I'm gonna say that this is probably the best of all outcomes.

I mean, people ask why Gandalf didn't just have the giant eagles fly Frodo into Mordor and drop the ring into the volcano but do you want a giant eagle to have the Ring? I imagine that a massive sapient predatory bird is easier to tempt than some Hobbits who just want to get the job done so they can go home.

[Eldan]

That, and they actually discuss something similar in the book. Why not give the ring to the most powerful elven Princes around, who are thousands of years old and basically unstoppable warriors and mages and just have them walk into Mordor? Sauron would feel them coming. Same for semi-divine superbirds.

[Rater202]

That, and they actually discuss something similar in the book. Why not give the ring to the most powerful elven Princes around, who are thousands of years old and basically unstoppable warriors and mages and just have them walk into Mordor? Sauron would feel them coming. Same for semi-divine superbirds.

And the stronger you are, the more it can give you, the more it can tempt you.

Hobbits, in addition to being humble, are physically week and have little in the way of magic. There's really not much the ring can off them.

Having anyone but a hobbit carry it would have led to failure. nd even then I've been led to believe that Frodo taking the Ring to Mordor was a fool's errand—he's basically being set up to either die or be corrupted on the off chance that he actually makes it and resists the ring's power long enough to drop it in the lava becuase that off chance is basically their best, if not only, hope of victory.

[pendell]

So I propose the ideal ringbearer.

Bill , the Pony.

Hear me out! Who says the creature carrying the ring has to be sapient? Hang it on a chain round Bill's neck. Load him down with enough baggage that his "bolt for freedom" is more like a slow waddle. We also have Shadowfax with Gandalf, who should be more than able to catch a slow pony. Let the Ring tempt Bill all it likes with, I dunno, dreams of grass? Playing stallion to a herd which tramples the world under its hooves? The Stallion who mounts the world? Whatever. Get him to the Crack of Doom, give Bill something to make him sleepy, then use a stick or something to lift the the ring and its chain off Bill's neck , then fling it in.

The best part is that Bill won't be prone to looking down into valleys and muttering "Shall I ever look down into that valley again , I wonder", nor will he put on the ring at inconvenient moments because the ring won't fit around his hoof. Or his nose. Or anything else.

If a pony's too much, get a dog. Or a hamster. Just don't make it a cat, because that would waken a Dark Lord even Sauron would fear :smallamused:

Tongue-in-cheek ,

Brian P.

[Grim Portent]

Issue there would be that Bill would probably refuse to move while carrying it. I don't think non-bird animals in LotRs can be corrupted as such, at least not without torture, selective breeding and sorcery, but they can still sense the taint of Morgoth and Sauron.

Not to mention the ring would still just convince someone else to take it from Bill. Would probably be easier than taking it from Frodo because no one needs to get hurt in the process. Boromir could literally have just picked it up and walked off with it with far less internal conflict. Being faced with the prospect of having to hurt Frodo to get the ring was probably a large part of why it took him as long as it did to break,

[pendell]

Issue there would be that Bill would probably refuse to move while carrying it. I don't think non-bird animals in LotRs can be corrupted as such, at least not without torture, selective breeding and sorcery, but they can still sense the taint of Morgoth and Sauron.

Not to mention the ring would still just convince someone else to take it from Bill. Would probably be easier than taking it from Frodo because no one needs to get hurt in the process. Boromir could literally have just picked it up and walked off with it with far less internal conflict. Being faced with the prospect of having to hurt Frodo to get the ring was probably a large part of why it took him as long as it did to break,

I read Pratchett's Night Watch. Give the Fellowship some ginger, I'll wager they can find a way to move him. :smallamused:

Tongue-in-cheek,

Brian P.

[Grim Portent]

I think only Merry and Pippin would be up for giving Bill that kind of motivation.

[DavidSh]

I think only Merry and Pippin would be up for giving Bill that kind of motivation.
Sounds more like Moxie and Pepsi to me.

Besides all that, I wonder who carved the tunnels that Bilbo has been using. Goblins? Slaves of goblins? Dwarves? Nameless elder things? Natural caves are usually a lot more difficult to traverse.

[Scarlet Knight]

Besides all that, I wonder who carved the tunnels that Bilbo has been using. Goblins? Slaves of goblins? Dwarves? Nameless elder things? Natural caves are usually a lot more difficult to traverse.

Chapter 4 says about goblins: "They can tunnel and mine as well as any but the most skilled dwarves..."

[PontificatusRex]

You know, I can't help but note that Lovecraft died the year this came out. I seriously doubt that they would have gotten along, but this talk of strange, ancient slimy creatures in old caves brings his works to mind.

I doubt that Tolkien ever read Lovecraft, but there was a lot of "Slimy, ancient horrors deep underground" going on at the time. Clark Ashton Smith, Robert Howard, lots of lesser known folks. It's be interesting to examine what might have gotten that vibe going through so much early 20th century fantasy.



Though his use of a boat makes him more of a fairytale monster, like the trolls. I don't know why exactly it's the boat that makes me think that, but...

Only now do we find out that the Riddle Game is an old game covered by Ancient Laws... Honestly, it makes the whole setting feel as though it has a touch of the Fair Folk to it

And... And Gollum, after losing this challenge against a being of alledgly fae blood, tries to break his word and in doing so no only ends up holding up his end of a deal inspite of himself but losing his most prized posession in th eprocess.

This is, of course, all total concidence in-story, but I can't help but draw the parrleles to stories of people trying to get one over The Fair Folk here. Just something that occurred to me as I read.

I have to wonder if that was deliberate. Tolkien playing with an old fairytale trope.


The Hobbit is definitely more governed by fairy-tale rules than LOTR. Monsters talk with heroes, engage in contests, and generally act in ways that aren't "realistic behavior". I think that's one of book's great strengths - and LOTR explicitly plays against that with its more serious vibe.



Not much happens in this chapter... But as I understand the story to come, and of course the sequel, this is the single most important chapter in all of Tolkien's canon.


Not much happens? I'm kind of surprised you see it that way. Whether or not it's "the single most important chapter", a whole lot is happening, though it might be only apparent with hindsight. This is the chapter that transforms Bilbo from a liability to the Burglar he is supposed to be. I think it's safe to say without spoilers that having a ring that makes you invisible is going to have a gigantic impact on your career as a professional treasure hunter.

This chapter is a classic example of one of the key stages in the Hero's Journey as described by Joseph Campbell/Carl Jung. The hero descends into the darkest depths and confronts their opposite, and emerges transformed and empowered. For Bilbo, this means a small, sneaky hobbit like creature. For Gandalf in the depths of Moria, it's the Balrog. My favorite other example is from the science fiction masterpiece The Stars My Destination in which the protagonist is locked in an underground prison, but as he is an uneducated brutal thug his opposite is a very clever, highly educated woman who becomes his teacher. In that book the transformation is realistic and overt, whereas in the Hobbit it is symbolized by the Ring and the power it gives Bilbo.

[PontificatusRex]

Chapter 4 says about goblins: "They can tunnel and mine as well as any but the most skilled dwarves..."

Where there's a whip, there's a way.

[Peelee]

The Hobbit is definitely more governed by fairy-tale rules than LOTR. Monsters talk with heroes, engage in contests, and generally act in ways that aren't "realistic behavior". I think that's one of book's great strengths - and LOTR explicitly plays against that with its more serious vibe.

I never thought of it before, but that's kind of how Dragon Ball and DBZ worked too.

[Fyraltari]

Where there's a whip, there's a way.

We don't want to go to war today, but the Lord of the Lash says "Nay, nay, nay."

[pendell]

We don't want to go to war today, but the Lord of the Lash says "Nay, nay, nay."

We're gonna march all day, all day, all day!

CHORUS: For where there's a whip there's a way!

Tongue-in-cheek,

Brian P.

[Fyraltari]

We're gonna march all day, all day, all day!

CHORUS: For where there's a whip there's a way!

Tongue-in-cheek,

Brian P.

Left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right.

A crack on the back says: "we're gonna fight! We're gonna march! All day! And night! And moooooore!"
For we are the slaves of the Dark Lord's waaaaars.

Left, right, left, right, left, right.
Where there's a whip there's a wayyyyyy.




I have never watched that movie.

[Rater202]

When I say not much happened, I mean that literally

Bilbo woke up, found a ring, got into a contest with a monster, and escaped. It could probably have happened in half the word count but Tolkien has a lot of heavily descriptive prose.

Which is not a bad thing, mind you, but... This chapter maybe covers an hour out of a day.

Surprisingly little happened, but what did happen was majorly important.

[Peelee]

When I say not much happened, I mean that literally

Bilbo woke up, found a ring, got into a contest with a monster, and escaped. It could probably have happened in half the word count but Tolkien has a lot of heavily descriptive prose.

Which is not a bad thing, mind you, but... This chapter maybe covers an hour out of a day.

Surprisingly little happened, but what did happen was majorly important.

Oh just wait til you find out that they made an entire movie out of a part that the main character is unconscious for the entirety of.

[Scarlet Knight]

Yes, but oh the beauty of that prose! Fear, anger, despair, pity: and the reader feels them all.

It's like saying a rainbow is just some colors in the sky...

[Manga Shoggoth]

Older than the Goblins? You know, I can't help but note that Lovecraft died the year this came out. I seriously doubt that they would have gotten along, but this talk of strange, ancient slimy creatures in old caves brings his works to mind.

I doubt that Tolkien ever read Lovecraft, but there was a lot of "Slimy, ancient horrors deep underground" going on at the time. Clark Ashton Smith, Robert Howard, lots of lesser known folks. It's be interesting to examine what might have gotten that vibe going through so much early 20th century fantasy.



Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea

Tolkien would be more likely influenced by The Rime of the Ancient Mariner than Lovecraft, I imagine... I don't think Lovecraft was published in England until the 1950's.

[druid91]

So I dunno if anyone else did this yet, but...
I notice the descriptions of the dwarves describe quite colorful clothes and especially beards... I haven't seen the films, and only clips of the Rankin-Bass production. Am I right to assume that it is omitted in favor of more traditionally 'dwarvy' colors?


The full company in Rankin Bass,
https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-93ossmU4NLw/V8WlW3e5UiI/AAAAAAAAAzk/7PKlb57IqE0rvMDDX5UBdktVLFOLUnz7gCLcB/s1600/00316977.JPG

And the full Company in the peter jackson Hobbit.
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/lotr/images/2/21/Thorin_and_Company.png/revision/latest?cb=20110723162158

[Rater202]

Rankin-Bass did it better.

Peter Jackson's Dwarves sem... They're all visually distinct but the colors are all washed out.

...I'm not gonna rea Lord of The Rings and find out that Gimli was hot-pink, am I?

(I'm probably not gonna read Lord of the Rings. I don't have the energy for that anymore.)

[Fyraltari]

Rankin-Bass did it better.

Peter Jackson's Dwarves sem... They're all visually distinct but the colors are all washed out.

...I'm not gonna rea Lord of The Rings and find out that Gimli was hot-pink, am I?
No, but Legolas might have been a brunette.


(I'm probably not gonna read Lord of the Rings. I don't have the energy for that anymore.)
You can't see it, but I am making a sad face.

Edit: Also PJ's The Hobbit has a young Thorin which I don't like because it eliminates the element of "now or never" in Thorin's quest and because they show him looking the exact same when the Dragon takes the Mountain meaning that either that happened only a couple years before or dwarves don't age.

[Rater202]

No, but Legolas might have been a brunette.


You can't see it, but I am making a sad face.

It's 1178 pages.

I just can't. It'd take too long. I'd burn out before I finished.

And since it was written as one book, I can't imagine that I'd be able to take breaks between them. It'd feel incomplete.

I used to be able to read hundreds of pages in one go, reading entire novels in a single day—my record is reading Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, a book over 700 pages long, in less than 20 hours, no breaks—but I just can't do that anymore.

[Manga Shoggoth]

It's 1178 pages.

I just can't. It'd take too long. I'd burn out before I finished.

And since it was written as one book, I can't imagine that I'd be able to take breaks between them. It'd feel incomplete.

Actually, while it was written as one book it was originally published as three books (The films took the same titles), and you can still get the individual books. And even the doorstopper version was split into five or six parts.

Reading the whole thing is best left for long plane flights or train journies, but there are ways to split it up provided in the text.

[Fyraltari]

It's 1178 pages.

I just can't. It'd take too long. I'd burn out before I finished.

And since it was written as one book, I can't imagine that I'd be able to take breaks between them. It'd feel incomplete.

I used to be able to read hundreds of pages in one go, reading entire novels in a single day—my record is reading Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, a book over 700 pages long, in less than 20 hours, no breaks—but I just can't do that anymore.

Hey, you don't have to justify yourself, you do whatever you feel like.

Although The Lord of the Rings is convieniently split up in 6 different books.

[Keltest]

Rankin-Bass did it better.

Peter Jackson's Dwarves sem... They're all visually distinct but the colors are all washed out.

...I'm not gonna rea Lord of The Rings and find out that Gimli was hot-pink, am I?

(I'm probably not gonna read Lord of the Rings. I don't have the energy for that anymore.)

The picture just isnt good for showing the colors. In the actual movies there are shots that are much better lit that show them off better. Dori is in bright red, for example, but the picture just doesnt show it.

[factotum]

Edit: Also PJ's The Hobbit has a young Thorin which I don't like because it eliminates the element of "now or never" in Thorin's quest and because they show him looking the exact same when the Dragon takes the Mountain meaning that either that happened only a couple years before or dwarves don't age.

Yeah, that's not right--Thorin was only 24 when Smaug attacked the Mountain, pretty much still a child in dwarven terms. Alas, were that the only problem with the Hobbit movies...

[pendell]

Hey, you don't have to justify yourself, you do whatever you feel like.

Although The Lord of the Rings is convieniently split up in 6 different books.

If one is willing to fork over the money, and they aren't cheap, one can get audiobook versions of Lord of the Rings from Audible. I suppose if one has an audible membership , one can get the books for "free" but, of course, the subscription itself still costs. That's how I "read" a lot of fiction and nonfiction these days. Back before COVID, I had to spend hours a day commuting from home to office and back. This got boring. My radio choices were either music I didn't care or , or some old guy who sound like a crazy uncle ranting for hours on the evils of the day. This turned me to CD audiobooks at the time, and as technology advanced I turned to streaming instead. The professor and many others over the years since have been a companion on many a long, lonely drive.

In addition to Audible, there are other services such as scribd. Apropos of this, I cannot recommend highly enough Children of Hurin (https://www.scribd.com/audiobook/307267037/The-Children-of-Hurin?utm_medium=cpc&utm_source=google_search&utm_campaign=3Q_Google_DSA_NB_All&utm_device=c&gclid=CjwKCAjwgb6IBhAREiwAgMYKRlY8f8Jn_NR2kQU_il_A F74JO2sh3dlfeGnbtcVXPmeswqyAC5qC7hoCkpMQAvD_BwE) because it's narrated by Christopher Lee . The story is eh and has an unhappy ending, but it's all worth it to hear Christopher Lee read the story in his inimitable way.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[hamishspence]

Yeah, that's not right--Thorin was only 24 when Smaug attacked the Mountain, pretty much still a child in dwarven terms. Alas, were that the only problem with the Hobbit movies...

Yup - Dain Ironfoot, who fought Azog at Moria in the books, and killed him, was 32 at the time, and this was extremely exceptional for one so young.

[Trafalgar]

If one is willing to fork over the money, and they aren't cheap, one can get audiobook versions of Lord of the Rings from Audible. I suppose if one has an audible membership , one can get the books for "free" but, of course, the subscription itself still costs. That's how I "read" a lot of fiction and nonfiction these days. Back before COVID, I had to spend hours a day commuting from home to office and back. This got boring. My radio choices were either music I didn't care or , or some old guy who sound like a crazy uncle ranting for hours on the evils of the day. This turned me to CD audiobooks at the time, and as technology advanced I turned to streaming instead. The professor and many others over the years since have been a companion on many a long, lonely drive.

In addition to Audible, there are other services such as scribd. Apropos of this, I cannot recommend highly enough Children of Hurin (https://www.scribd.com/audiobook/307267037/The-Children-of-Hurin?utm_medium=cpc&utm_source=google_search&utm_campaign=3Q_Google_DSA_NB_All&utm_device=c&gclid=CjwKCAjwgb6IBhAREiwAgMYKRlY8f8Jn_NR2kQU_il_A F74JO2sh3dlfeGnbtcVXPmeswqyAC5qC7hoCkpMQAvD_BwE) because it's narrated by Christopher Lee . The story is eh and has an unhappy ending, but it's all worth it to hear Christopher Lee read the story in his inimitable way.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

You can get the excellent 1981 "Mind's Eye" version of the Hobbit for free on You Tube or on several other websites.

[An Enemy Spy]

I'm sure it's been mentioned somewhere before in this thread but it's important to remember that The Hobbit was not originally meant to be part of Tolkien's mythic history that would end up becoming The Silmarillion, and the very idea of The Lord of the Rings hadn't even entered Tolkien's mind at the time. I'm pretty sure what we think of as Middle Earth was invented for The Hobbit as a distinct world from Beleriand and then when Tolkien decided to roll the stories into the same continuity while working on Lord of the Rings he stuck the two realms together. That's why you get weird things like trolls named William and Bert, and Tom. And the idea of the Ring as an evil item didn't exist yet. It was simply an invisibility ring useful for getting out of tight jams.

[DavidSh]

On the other hand, Glamdring and Orcrist were made in Gondolin, according to The Hobbit.

[factotum]

Yeah, I don't think it was quite as separated as all that. It's true that the original conception of the Ring didn't have it as evil, we've already discussed how chapter 5 changed after the publication of LOTR to add that, but the Hobbit was definitely set in Middle-earth from the get-go. The whole thing with the rings was undoubtedly added to the legendarium later on, but things were changing in that throughout Tolkien's life anyway--the fact there's a sort of "canonical" version of it is largely down to the work of Christopher Tolkien after his father's passing.

[Gnoman]

The most plausible explanation is that Tolkien pulled elements from his other work for set dressings, but didn't really think hard about fitting The Hobbit in with it until writing LOTR.

[Rater202]

Next Chapter: Out of the Frying Pan Into The Fire.

Bilbo is safe from Goblins but also completely lost.

On the other hand, he is literally on the other side of the mountains now.

He quickly finds Gandalf and the dwarves, who are arguing about trying to find Bilbo.

Bilbo elects to use the ring to surprise them, and in doing so causes a commotion.

He elects not to tell them about the ring because their praise of his stealth pleases him... That's gonna bite him in the ass later.

After explaining the story, Bilbo asks Gandal how he showed up again and it's literally just "I snuck through the crack and was following you the entire time."

After a moment of rest, Gandalf informs them that they need to get the hell out of Dodge before night falls and keep getting because the Goblins will come after them come sundown.

They walk on, scavenging what food they can find but it's very little.

Rockslide. Luckily, there are trees.

Ad Gandalf suggests that the rockslide will buy them time when the Goblinscome after them, so silver lining.

Huh... Bilbo coined a proverb. "Escaping goblins to be caught by wolves," meaning the same thing as "out of the frying pan..."

That's... Good storytelling. Attention to detail, proverbs like that aren't nessesarily something you think about.

Climb trees to avoid wolves... Seem's legit.

Dori rescues Bilbo, who is much too small to climb a tree.

The wolves are confirmed to be the Wargs after they show up. Evil wolves.

And they talk. They are people and have their own language, which sounds awful. Gandalf understands it though.

The Goblins and Wargs were planning a raid, but the death of the Great Goblin through a wrench in that.

Gandalf, fearful of what the Wargs and Goblins were planning and the danger the party was in, transformed pinecones into incendiary bombs and sets the lot of them alight with magical fire.

Thus, we have the beginning of a tradition: When in doubt, kill it with fire!

And then the Lord of The Eagles shows up out o freaking nowhere.

The eagles of these wood and mountains are a strong and noble race who make it a habit to drive the goblins into their caves, and they elect to interfere when they hear the commotion of the wargs and the marching of the goblins.

Cut back to the clearing, the goblins put out most of the fires... But not the fires near the trees that our heroes are hiding in. Instead, they build stacks of dead leaves and branches about them and then sing a song about burning the trees with our heroes still in them.

I think we're up to five songs?

And, as an aside, can I just say I love how even the "evil" races are spontaneously musical? I may have implied it before, but the presence of music, if only in lyrical form without notation, does a lot to make them feel like people and not just things that are there.

Gandalf chastising them and calling them little boys to make them angry just... It's just so petty. I can't help but laugh at the image.

And the Lord of the Eagles shows up just in time to save the day.

Illustration of the mountains... Looks completly different. How big is that range?

After a brief bit of confusion, the eagles feed our heroes and carry them down into plains and agree to carry them down into the plains. The chapter ends with Bilbo dreaming of home.

This feels like a transitional chapter.

Like, the entire conflict with the Wargs could have been skipped and you could just have our party on their merry way back to their original path, but...

Tolkien fits a great deal of worldbuilding into these 19 pages and I have to say I love every bit of it.

[DavidSh]

Regarding the songs, there was, if my memory serves:

The Dwarves washing-up song "That's what Bilbo Baggins hates"
Over the misty mountains old -- we must away by break of day
Whatever the Elves were singing in Rivendell
The song the Goblins were singing in the tunnels
Fifteen birds in five fir trees

[pendell]

Regarding the songs, there was, if my memory serves:

The Dwarves washing-up song "That's what Bilbo Baggins hates"
Over the misty mountains old -- we must away by break of day
Whatever the Elves were singing in Rivendell
The song the Goblins were singing in the tunnels
Fifteen birds in five fir trees


The Rankin Bass (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qgg9VywPKI&t=15s) version of the movie had renditions of all the songs which is why it is still my favorite film version of the book, even if it isn't a patch on the Jackson version as far as production values go.

So why don't they just ride the eagles to Erebor? I forget whether that's answered in this chapter or the next :smallamused: .

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Rater202]

The eagles don't want to go anywhere where humans might be—the eagles sometimes prey on domestic sheep, which means that the men tend to shoot at them with yew arrows.

The eagles, being good sports, admit that the men have a point... But the men also would not know that the eagles aren't there for that this time.

[factotum]

Regarding the Misty Mountains, it's supposed to be an absolutely enormous mountain range--this is more obvious in the map in LOTR. It pretty much splits most of the continent in half. I think it's basically the Middle-earth version of the Alps.

[Fyraltari]

Ah, my favourite scene in the book happens next chapter!

[Peelee]

Ah, my favourite scene in the book happens next chapter!

The lightsaber fight with Harry Potter?
Because I thought that was a little on the boring side.

[Lord Torath]

The lightsaber fight with Harry Potter?
Because I thought that was a little on the boring side.No, but if I remember correctly, we get another song.

[Scarlet Knight]

This chapter gives D&D players their biggest problem: how did Gandalf go from being ready to commit suicide because he had no spells to use to the guy who killed a Balrog in LOTR ( which is also why we should focus only on this book as the others & the movies often do not match up well). Perhaps Gandalf is only first level and already used his Burning Pinecone?

I believe it was said that Gandalf was not a power wizard in the Hobbit but the children's story version of a wise man who simply assisted others.



So why don't they just ride the eagles to Erebor? I forget whether that's answered in this chapter or the next :smallamused: .


To quote a wonderful NSFW comic: "You don't want to be riding one when it gets hungry."

[Fyraltari]

This chapter gives D&D players their biggest problem: how did Gandalf go from being ready to commit suicide because he had no spells to use to the guy who killed a Balrog in LOTR

What spell did he use against Durin's Bane that would have helped here?

[GloatingSwine]

This chapter gives D&D players their biggest problem: how did Gandalf go from being ready to commit suicide because he had no spells to use to the guy who killed a Balrog in LOTR ( which is also why we should focus only on this book as the others & the movies often do not match up well). Perhaps Gandalf is only first level and already used his Burning Pinecone?

I believe it was said that Gandalf was not a power wizard in the Hobbit but the children's story version of a wise man who simply assisted others.


Gandalf is not a wizard in the D&D sense.

He's an angel. In the absolute literal messenger of god sense. He is bound and forbidden from taking direct action in all but the most globally dire of circumstances, his divine task is to guide others to stand for themselves.

[pendell]

What spell did he use against Durin's Bane that would have helped here?

Now that you mention it , the only spell we see Gandalf use in that entire sequence is 'Hold Portal', which Vaarsuvius in-comic described as 'so useless I shudder to wonder what I was thinking when I wrote it in my spellbook' or words to that effect.

Middle Earth Magic is not Vancian magic; it is raw exercise of will, given form in voice. Often in song.
The battle of Finrod and Sauron (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eWZCYuYR6s), by Clamavi De Profundis, is the best example of a magical duel in Middle-Earth I can think of.

For context, Felagund and company are disguised as orcs to infiltrate the Enemy's land, but they've been brought before Sauron (who is not THE Dark Lord in this story, but only the Lieutenant of an outlying tower in the border defenses) who is suspicious of this 'orc-band'. For one thing, they didn't report in as expected and required.

-- Sauron sings a spell to penetrate the magical disguise Felagund has created. He visualizes and evokes in his spell symbols and images to reinforce the working; piercing, treachery.
-- Felagund responds with a counterspell. He also evokes images to counter Sauron's song; strength of tower, secrets kept, snapping chains. If successful, Sauron will be forced to let them go free.
-- They continue to throw more and more of their will into the contest, the volume of their singing growing as their wills grow stronger.
-- Felagund decides to up his game by calling on the Powers of Valinor far away, evoking them and bringing all the power of the west into his song.
-- But this proves a mistake. Sauron recognizes the ploy and instantly responds with images that turns Felagund's ploy against him: He evokes the Kinslaying, the dark deeds the elves committed when they left Valinor to return to Middle Earth. He sings of the murder of the sea-elves and the theft of their ships, the banishment of a large portion of those elves to walk across the Grinding Ice on foot. The treachery of the elves in the beginning cuts the link with Valinor and slams that door shut in Felagund's face, bereft and alone before the might of Sauron. The things he had put most trust in turn to his undoing.
-- Felagund is overcome by despair, his will broken, and collapses before the throne. He is stripped of his disguise and is laid bare, prostrate, before Sauron.

That isn't the end of the tale, but that is the end of this magical duel. Others of his party will escape the dreadful Tower but Finrod Felagund will die here, killing a werewolf with his bare hands and teeth so his companions can escape.

At any rate, that is magic in middle earth. It isn't throwing fireballs. It isn't modern artillery with a fantasy coloration. It is the imposition of will and desire on others and on nature, best done through song. Morgoth's strife with the music of Illuvatar in the beginning is of the same sort. Middle Earth magic is both far more powerful than vancian magic, as it is unbounded by any rules save one's own imagination and one's own spiritual power, mana, but it is also far more subtle and long-term. The work of Sauron to corrupt the nine men into wraiths, for an example, was an enchantment which took centuries to complete. It's also less tactically useful than Vancian magic; I assume that's why pretty much everyone in middle earth enchants their swords rather than using magic directly as a weapon; magic works better as a buff to amplify mundane action than it does as a substitute for same. In Middle-Earth, the most effective way to fight an enemy is still to stick them with the pointy end of a sword, not throw fiery pine cones at them.

ETA: This implies that PJ missed an opportunity by not portraying the battle at the door between the balrog and Gandalf as a rap battle! Yes. We can have the trolls beatboxing and playing the percussion while the Balrog throws out his (her?) rhymes.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Wintermoot]

Gandolf is a D&D wizard who is following an "optimization" guide he got off of the intarwebs, so he casts half his slots in the morning on extended long term buffs and memorized the rest on Divination spells so he "always knows what's going to happen" but then doesn't understand why he doesn't have anything to cast during combats.

[Manga Shoggoth]

The Wizards = fireballs does seem to be a more modern conceit. A friend of mine put it like this:



Magus, mage and wizard all come from root words meaning wise.

Wise men don't throw fireballs. At least, they don't throw fireballs to win fights. By the time the fight starts the wise man already knows how he's going to win. The fight is probably happening when and where it is because he's set it up like that. The whole conflict is serving a bigger purpose, taking forward much larger long term goals.

Wise men don't need fireballs. Wise men can arrange for their enemies to fireball themselves.

...

Readers discovering the works of J.R.R. Tolkein, written less than a century ago, are often surprised that Gandalf and his bretherin spend remarkably little time tossing around energy effects. The Grey (and later White) Wanderer doesn't need them. His magic is subtler and more devastating.

Go back to much older literary sources, to the archmage's archmage, Merlin, and there are even less lightning bolts. The archetypical wizard wanders the Arthurian world setting up Perilous Seiges and mysterious groaning gravestones ...

Even in The Hobbit, Gandalf does very little actual magic.

Both here, and with the Balrog, Gandalf is in a position he hadn't planned for, and has to resort to off-the-cuff tactics. With the Wargs it is an attempt at intimidation, with the balrog it is destroying the bridge to stop the Balrog from crossing (and getting pulled down with it for his pains). He had no intention of fighting the Balrog if he could avoid it, for all that he did a good number on it after the fall into the chasm.

It's not the case for all wizarding stories - I've read at least one (A Matter of Magic) where the flashy spells almost took second place to the more subtle pieces of magic.

[PontificatusRex]

Yeah, a whole lot of magic in Tolkien fits better within the framework of "psychic powers" - will versus will, picking up other people's thoughts, etc. Gandalf seems to specialize in pyrokinesis - psychic control of fire.

But there is another type of magic - there's lots of references to spells. Spells that open doors, spells that hold doors, spells woven in to swords that make them more effective against a particularly hated enemy. These seem to involve actual words that have to be said in a particular order and other traditional types of magic. None of it is the kind of thing you could deploy in combat like a Vancian spell.

I'm currently reading 'Beren and Luthien', one of the First Age stories separated out from the Silmarillion, and there's a great segment where Luthien, who has learned magic from her demi-goddess mother, fashions some powerful magical items in a very classically ritualistic way - she needs a goblet of water in a silver cup poured exactly at midnight, wine in a golden cup poured at noon, things like that. Obviously we never see anything like that in the Hobbit and LOTR, but it's still there as part of the general background.

Circling back to why Gandalf would be outmatched by a bunch of goblins and wargs but not a Balrog, I think D&D terminology sums it up pretty well: He has the wrong kind of build. He can take on a single very powerful foe that no one else could face, but if he's surrounded on all sides by a ton of mooks he's going to get overwhelmed before too long. The Balrog had Damage Resistance that he could overcome, but he doesn't have it himself.

[pendell]

Random facebook observation (https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=380351960126390&set=a.373824977445755) re-posted for funsies:

"Remember that time Gandalf convinced the rest of the party to flee so he could take out the balrog himself and not share any of the XP ? Shows up at the next session with new robes and everything. What a jerk."

Tongue-in-cheek,

Brian P.

[GloatingSwine]

Circling back to why Gandalf would be outmatched by a bunch of goblins and wargs but not a Balrog, I think D&D terminology sums it up pretty well: He has the wrong kind of build. He can take on a single very powerful foe that no one else could face, but if he's surrounded on all sides by a ton of mooks he's going to get overwhelmed before too long. The Balrog had Damage Resistance that he could overcome, but he doesn't have it himself.

On the other hand, the reason he couldn't do it here but could there is because the Balrog is a being like himself. A maiar, corrupted, but still a maiar.

He's not allowed to deploy his power against mortals, because his job is to guide and advise not solve their problems with divine intervention. He is allowed to remove those like himself from the board.

[Trafalgar]

Remember that the Hobbit takes place several decades before LOTR. So in the Hobbit, Gandalf is like level 3. By LOTR he is level 16. I read that in an interview Tolkien did with Dragon Magazine.

[hamishspence]

Tolkien died in 1973. TSR's first D&D magazine was The Strategic Review in 1975. Before that, the oldest iteration of D&D was in 1974. So I don't think the chronology works.

[Keltest]

On the other hand, the reason he couldn't do it here but could there is because the Balrog is a being like himself. A maiar, corrupted, but still a maiar.

He's not allowed to deploy his power against mortals, because his job is to guide and advise not solve their problems with divine intervention. He is allowed to remove those like himself from the board.

Excepting Sauron, who he was also not allowed to confront directly with his own power except in the most dire of circumstances (ie Sauron wins and Gandalf and the wizards are fleeing). I believe the idea was that a fight between the Wizards and Sauron would damage or destroy the world theyre trying to protect, and runs the risk of a wizard just setting themselves up to be the next super powered conqueror or the world.

[Wintermoot]

Tolkien died in 1973. TSR's first D&D magazine was The Strategic Review in 1975. Before that, the oldest iteration of D&D was in 1974. So I don't think the chronology works.

That's just what they want you to THINK man. Tolkein's head was frozen in the same vault as Walt Disney and electro-connected to a "it's a small world" marionette" so that they could use his genius to design the first D&D iteration.

Wake up Sheeple.

[PontificatusRex]

On the other hand, the reason he couldn't do it here but could there is because the Balrog is a being like himself. A maiar, corrupted, but still a maiar.

He's not allowed to deploy his power against mortals, because his job is to guide and advise not solve their problems with divine intervention. He is allowed to remove those like himself from the board.

I don't think it's that simple. We just saw him kill a bunch of goblins in Chapter 3, and I'm pretty sure setting the wargs on wire resulted in some of them dying.

[Fyraltari]

I just want to say that I find the need of D&D's fans to qualify everything from other fantasy work in that game's terms rather insufferable. Just like people saying that a dragon with only four limbs should be called a wyvern instead of a dragon.


On the other hand, the reason he couldn't do it here but could there is because the Balrog is a being like himself. A maiar, corrupted, but still a maiar.

He's not allowed to deploy his power against mortals, because his job is to guide and advise not solve their problems with divine intervention. He is allowed to remove those like himself from the board.
The singular of maiar is maia.

Excepting Sauron, who he was also not allowed to confront directly with his own power except in the most dire of circumstances (ie Sauron wins and Gandalf and the wizards are fleeing).

Except for the three times he directly confronted him in Dol Guldur?

[Kantaki]

I don't think it's that simple. We just saw him kill a bunch of goblins in Chapter 3, and I'm pretty sure setting the wargs on wire resulted in some of them dying.

I think most of Gandalf's pyrotechnics were him using one of the three rings of the elves.
He limited himself mostly to what mortals (including elves here) could theoretically accomplish unless up against something ina similar weight class.

[hamishspence]

I just want to say that I find the need of D&D's fans to qualify everything from other fantasy work in that game's terms rather insufferable. Just like people saying that a dragon with only four limbs should be called a wyvern instead of a dragon.


I thought that was more "heraldry fans" than "D&D fans"?



Except for the three times he directly confronted him in Dol Guldur?

Wasn't that movies-only - with novel Gandalf finding out that the Necromancer was Sauron, but never actually confronting him - sneaking in and sneaking out?

It's left unclear in the Hobbit and in the tie-in material, whether the White Council's attack on Dol Guldur (forcing Sauron to flee) involved any actual fighting on Sauron's part.

[Fyraltari]

I thought that was more "heraldry fans" than "D&D fans"?
Whoever they are, they are annoying.




Wasn't that movies-only - with novel Gandalf finding out that the Necromancer was Sauron, but never actually confronting him - sneaking in and sneaking out?

It's unclear. Gandalf went into Dol Guldur for the first time in 2063 T.A. and Sauron fled before him, setting off the Watchful Peace which lasted until the Necromancer came back to DG in 2460, leading to the creation of the White Council in 2463. In 2850 Gandalf comes back into Dol Guldur but is captured by Sauron (Gandalf formerly identify him at this point) and is imprisoned alongside Thrain, son of Thror. Then in 2941, this book happens and the White Council, Gandalf included march into Dol Guldur with Sauron fleeing once more. How much fighting happened each time is unclear, but come on.

[hamishspence]

In 2850 Gandalf comes back into Dol Guldur but is captured by Sauron (Gandalf formerly identify him at this point) and is imprisoned alongside Thrain, son of Thror.

I thought he snuck in.


"Your grandfather," said the wizard slowly and grimly, "gave the map to his son for safety before he went to the mines of Moria. Your father went away to try his luck with the map after your grandfather was killed; and lots of adventures of a most unpleasant sort he had, but he never got near the Mountain. How he got there I don't know, but I found him a prisoner in the dungeons of the Necromancer."

"Whatever were you doing there?" asked Thorin with a shudder, and all the dwarves shivered.

"Never you mind. I was finding things out, as usual; and a nasty dangerous business it was. Even I, Gandalf, only just escaped. I tried to save your father, but it was too late. He was witless and wandering, and had forgotten almost everything except the map and the key."


Now the Shadow grew ever greater, and the hearts of Elrond and Mithrandir darkened. Therefore on a time Mithrandir at great peril went again to Dol Guldur and the pits of the Sorcerer, and he discovered the truth of his fears, and escaped. And returning to Elrond he said:

‘True, alas, is our guess. This is not one of the Úlairi, as many have long supposed. It is Sauron himself who has taken shape again and now grows apace; and he is gathering again all the Rings to his hand; and he seeks ever for news of the One, and of the Heirs of Isildur, if they live still on earth.’
"Escaped" in this case, doesn't necessarily mean Sauron captured him and threw him in a cell - it can allow for the process of sneaking in and out.

A point is made of how Gandalf was sneaking around in disguise:




'I myself dared to pass the doors of the Necromancer in Dol Guldur, and secretly explored his ways, and found thus that our fears were true: he was none other than Sauron, our Enemy of old, at length taking shape and power again.'


'I remembered a dangerous journey of mine, ninety-one years before, when I had entered Dol Guldur in disguise, and had found there an unhappy Dwarf dying in the pits. I had no idea who he was. He had a map that had belonged to Durin's folk in Moria and a key that seemed to go with it, though he was too far gone to explain it. And he said that he had possessed a great Ring.'

[pendell]

I have a mental image of Gandalf sneaking around Dol Guldor in a cardboard box. I'm sure everyone here gets the reference :smallamused:

Tongue-in-cheek ,

Brian P.

[Sapphire Guard]

Gandalf explains the limitations of his fire abilites in Caradhras, he needs fuel to do it, he can't burn snow or air, he needs something to set alight.

...which, thinking about it, is a very logical and clever limitation which doesn't happen in most fireball spells.

[Manga Shoggoth]

Gandalf explains the limitations of his fire abilites in Caradhras, he needs fuel to do it, he can't burn snow or air, he needs something to set alight.

...which, thinking about it, is a very logical and clever limitation which doesn't happen in most fireball spells.



Ah yes, fireball. Material components: Piece of bat guano and sulphur - a rather explosive mix...

[pendell]

Ah yes, fireball. Material components: Piece of bat guano and sulphur - a rather explosive mix...

Given they just spent three days passing through the tunnels under the misty mountains they should have been able to pack off enough bat guano to open a business, were they so inclined. I was just listening to 'Riddles of the Dark' myself, and that was part of the flavor text -- bats flew by Bilbo's head all the time. At first it startled him, but eventually it happened so often he got used to it.

And, of course , where you find bats...

Tongue-in-cheek ,

Brian P.

[Fyraltari]

Gandalf explains the limitations of his fire abilites in Caradhras, he needs fuel to do it, he can't burn snow or air, he needs something to set alight.

...which, thinking about it, is a very logical and clever limitation which doesn't happen in most fireball spells.



That's because it isn't a fireball spell at all! He just sets fire to whatever he touches with his staff!

This is exactly the kind of things I was talking about.

[PontificatusRex]

That's because it isn't a fireball spell at all! He just sets fire to whatever he touches with his staff!


Though I think one could make a pretty good argument that Gandalf cast something like Lightning Bolt in Chapter 3 when the goblins first attack:





there was a terrific flash like lightning in the cave, a smell like gunpowder, and several of them fell dead

This actually contradicts my earlier point about spells not being something magical folks whip out in the middle of combat, though it only happens once in all the stories as far as I recall. When being chased by goblins later he doesn't use it again, it's just he and Thorin fighting off the goblins with the magic swords. If one wants to justify it, I can imagine it being thought of like a semi-magical trick in the same league as his fireworks, some literal gunpowder juiced up by his innate magic, and once it's gone, it's gone until he spends some time making more.

[Fyraltari]

Though I think one could make a pretty good argument that Gandalf cast something like Lightning Bolt in Chapter 3 when the goblins first attack:




This actually contradicts my earlier point about spells not being something magical folks whip out in the middle of combat, though it only happens once in all the stories as far as I recall. When being chased by goblins later he doesn't use it again, it's just he and Thorin fighting off the goblins with the magic swords. If one wants to justify it, I can imagine it being thought of like a semi-magical trick in the same league as his fireworks, some literal gunpowder juiced up by his innate magic, and once it's gone, it's gone until he spends some time making more.

Yeah it might have been a little bomb, like an artisanal grenade. Just like Saruman's own "wizardry" at Helm's Deep.

[Thrudd]

Yeah, probably Gandalf (or Narya) has the spell "Affect Normal Fires". He can make a fire brighter or bigger or keep it burning or shape it. He also seems to have the ability to create light..he can illuminate his staff, and shine a beam that drives away Nazgul (or their fell beasts?).

[Aeson]

There is also whatever Gandalf and the Nazgul he fought did on Weathertop that created flashes "like lightning that rises from the hilltops" which Strider and Frodo observed from afar.

Also, regarding the "magic is musical" theory: Sorry, but while some magic is portrayed musically, other magic is not. Gandalf tries opening the Doors of During by shouting imperatives at them ("Edro! Edro!" Open! Open!), for example, and neither "Naur an edraith ammen!" ("Fire for the saving of us!") nor "Naur dan i ngaurhoth!" ("Fire against the wolf-host!") strike me as particularly musical lines, though perhaps for others that is different.

[Keltest]

There is also whatever Gandalf and the Nazgul he fought did on Weathertop that created flashes "like lightning that rises from the hilltops" which Strider and Frodo observed from afar.

That may have been the Ring of Power he had. It was, IIRC, Narya the ring of fire.

[Aeson]

That may have been the Ring of Power he had. It was, IIRC, Narya the ring of fire.
We were also told that the Three were not created as weapons of war but rather to preserve and heal, which makes offensive magic having Narya as its source somewhat problematic. Also, if I recall correctly the only in-universe description we have of the powers of the Ring of Fire, at least that I can recall, suggest that the "fires" for which the ring is named are figurative, more a flame with which to inspire your allies than a torch with which to burn your enemies.

[Keltest]

We were also told that the Three were not created as weapons of war but rather to preserve and heal, which makes offensive magic having Narya as its source somewhat problematic. Also, if I recall correctly the only in-universe description we have of the powers of the Ring of Fire, at least that I can recall, suggest that the "fires" for which the ring is named are figurative, more a flame with which to inspire your allies than a torch with which to burn your enemies.

Eh. Elrond used his ring to crush the Nazgul beneath water at the ford of Bruinen. The difference between a sword wielded in self defense and a sword wielded to conquer is the wielder.

[Aeson]

Eh. Elrond used his ring to crush the Nazgul beneath water at the ford of Bruinen.
As far as I am aware, that is just speculation; there is no direct evidence one way or the other as to whether Elrond used the power of the ring to create the flood. Moreover, Elrond is an Elf-lord descended from some of the great figures of the First Age; it is far from implausible that he could have considerable magical abilities of his own even without his ring, and direct weaponization of his ring's power runs contrary to his later claim that the Three are not weapons of war but instead preserve and heal.

Furthermore, since you seem to wish to ascribe to the rings literal power over the elements for which they are named, might I point out that Elrond's ring is the Ring of Air, and that Galadriel, who holds the Ring of Water, does not drown the orcs who trespass on her realm when they cross a sacred stream, despite seemingly being fairly well aware of what occurred just within her realm's borders?

[Keltest]

As far as I am aware, that is just speculation; there is no direct evidence one way or the other as to whether Elrond used the power of the ring to create the flood. Moreover, Elrond is an Elf-lord descended from some of the great figures of the First Age; it is far from implausible that he could have considerable magical abilities of his own even without his ring, and direct weaponization of his ring's power runs contrary to his later claim that the Three are not weapons of war but instead preserve and heal.

Furthermore, since you seem to wish to ascribe to the rings literal power over the elements for which they are named, might I point out that Elrond's ring is the Ring of Air, and that Galadriel, who holds the Ring of Water, does not drown the orcs who trespass on her realm when they cross a sacred stream, despite seemingly being fairly well aware of what occurred just within her realm's borders?

Elrond's ring is a significant, if not the only, source of the magical protection that keeps Rivendell safe given the otherwise rather hostile country it is surrounded by. While he definitionally has his own powers as well, in order to be able to use a Ring of Power to any major effect at all, raising the torrential waters entirely on his own would be, by far, the mightiest act of overt... i guess spell casting that appear in any of the books. If the ring wasnt involved in that act, one wonders what, exactly, the point of it even is.

As for the specific elements, i make no such claim. We know Gandalf has the ring of fire because were told as much. The fact that the battle on Weathertop was visible as lightning-like bolts is almost certainly due to Gandalf's fighting style, not just a function of the ring.

[GeoffWatson]

That's because it isn't a fireball spell at all! He just sets fire to whatever he touches with his staff!

This is exactly the kind of things I was talking about.

It's the Druid spell fire seeds.

[factotum]

I thought he snuck in.


Yes, everything we're told in the text of the books suggests that Gandalf sneaked in and out of Dol Guldur. Spoilers for later in the book:


It took the entire White Council to drive Sauron out of Dol Guldur, and even then, I don't think they would have succeeded if he wasn't already ready to return to Mordor and take up his proper abode.

[pendell]

Elrond's ring is a significant, if not the only, source of the magical protection that keeps Rivendell safe given the otherwise rather hostile country it is surrounded by. While he definitionally has his own powers as well, in order to be able to use a Ring of Power to any major effect at all, raising the torrential waters entirely on his own would be, by far, the mightiest act of overt... i guess spell casting that appear in any of the books. If the ring wasnt involved in that act, one wonders what, exactly, the point of it even is.

As for the specific elements, i make no such claim. We know Gandalf has the ring of fire because were told as much. The fact that the battle on Weathertop was visible as lightning-like bolts is almost certainly due to Gandalf's fighting style, not just a function of the ring.

I'm trying to remember the exact quote, but the point of the elven rings is not in battle. In fact, each of the rings is unique to the people who made it, and appeal to their specific strengths.

-- The nine rings are for the gaining of power. Each of the men who took a ring was or became a great king and warlord, ruling great realms in the earth. The Witch-king himself held the realm of Angmar for a time. I suspect this is how Sauron managed to gain so many human subjects in the east and south -- they were under the rule of immortal god-kings, or so they would imagine the Nazgul.

-- The seven rings are for the acquisition of wealth. Each of the seven great dwarven hordes of old, it is suggested, had a golden ring as its foundation. These are what dwarves love and that is what they receive -- yet, perverted by Sauron, it turns to their undoing. For the rings awaken a great lust and greed in their hearts, which impels them to dig too deeply and in the wrong place, bringing ruin and destruction upon themselves, as at Khazad-Dum.

-- The power of the Elven rings is to preserve unchanged. And so they do. Rivendell and Lothlorien are places out of time, lands of a vanished age. Galadriel flat out tells us in the Fellowship of the Ring that if the One Ring is destroyed Lorien will disappear, implying that it is maintained with the power of the ring and, when the elvish ring stops working, time will catch up with the forest of the Dreamflower and it will become as everywhere else in Middle-earth. The Elves will have no special place there, and nothing will be left to them in Middle-Earth save to take ship to the west.

As Lorien is, so is Rivendell.

Gandalf's ring, which originally belonged to Cirdan , the shipwright, who gave it to Gandalf. As it has the power of fire, Gandalf uses it to kindle and inspire courage in the hearts of all the free people. I suspect he uses it when conversing with Theoden when freeing him from Wormtongue's grasp.

All of this is very useful, very powerful... but it's not battle-magic. That is because Tolkien's magic has its roots in myth, not in wargaming.

Elrond's calling forth of the flood is probably not with the aid of the Ring. It is because he is Master of that land, and not just of the people who live on it. When he commands, the land and the waters and the trees obey, just as the trees in the Old Forest obey the Old Willow Man.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Fyraltari]

I'm trying to remember the exact quote, but the point of the elven rings is not in battle. In fact, each of the rings is unique to the people who made it, and appeal to their specific strengths.

-- The nine rings are for the gaining of power.
[...]
-- The seven rings are for the acquisition of wealth.
[...]
-- The power of the Elven rings is to preserve unchanged.
This does not track. The Nine, the Seven and the Three were all made by and for elves.

[hamishspence]

This does not track. The Nine, the Seven and the Three were all made by and for elves.

Sauron helped the elves make the Nine and the Seven though - making them just a little different from the Three.

It's true though that that it is likely that the Nine and the Seven had identical "stats" (metaphorically speaking) - and that had Sauron given the Nine to Dwarves and the Seven to Men, exactly the same effects would be observed as were observed in the canon timeline.



-- The nine rings are for the gaining of power. Each of the men who took a ring was or became a great king and warlord, ruling great realms in the earth. The Witch-king himself held the realm of Angmar for a time.

The realm of Angmar did not arise, until long after the Nazgul became Nazgul - they all turned from Men to Wraiths mid-way through the Second Age, but Angmar was created in order to destroy the kingdom of Arnor which had been established by Isildur, and Angmar did not appear till mid-way through the Third Age.

[pendell]

The realm of Angmar did not arise, until long after the Nazgul became Nazgul - they all turned from Men to Wraiths mid-way through the Second Age, but Angmar was created in order to destroy the kingdom of Arnor which had been established by Isildur, and Angmar did not appear till mid-way through the Third Age.

True , but it's still written that the nine rings were given out to those who became 'great kings, sorcerers'. A 'sorcerer' in this is one who commands spirits, allowing them knowledge of things unseen. From this I infer that the kingdoms ruled by the ringwraiths becamse the kingdoms allied with Sauron in the Third Age, but that is not a great leap.

Found the quote :



Those who used the Nine Rings became mighty in their day, kings, sorcerers, and warriors of old. They obtained glory and great wealth, yet it turned to their undoing. They had, as it seemed, unending life, yet life became unendurable to them. They could walk, if they would, unseen by all eyes in this world beneath the sun, and they could see things in worlds invisible to mortal men; but too often they beheld only the phantoms and delusions of Sauron. And one by one, sooner or later, according to their native strength and to the good or evil of their wills in the beginning, they fell under the thraldom of the ring that they bore and of the domination of the One which was Sauron's. And they became forever invisible save to him that wore the Ruling Ring, and they entered into the realm of shadows. The Nazgûl were they, the Ringwraiths, the Úlairi, the Enemy's most terrible servants; darkness went with them, and they cried with the voices of death. — The Silmarillion, "Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age", 346


You may be right there may be no mechanical difference between the Nine and the Seven; It may be the distinction is that Sauron gave nine to humans, more than to anyone else, because they were most apt to his hand and easiest to sway.

UPDATE: The same essay, I keep quoting, again gives details.


But Sauron gathered into his hands all the remaining Rings of Power; and he dealt them out to the other peoples of Middle-earth, hoping thus to bring under his sway all those that desired secret power beyond the measure of their kind. Seven Rings he gave to the Dwarves; but to Men he gave nine, for Men proved in this matter as in others the readiest to his will. And all those rings that he governed he perverted, the more easily since he had a part in their making, and they were accursed, and they betrayed in the end all those that used them.



As towards the Three, I cannot find the book-quote, so I'll settle for this wiki quote (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Rings).



Tolkien noted in his letters that the primary power of the Three was to "the prevention and slowing of decay", which appealed to the Elves in their pursuit of preserving what they loved in Middle-earth.[6][T 4] As changeless beings in a changing world, the Elves who remained in Middle-earth relied on the Three to delay the inevitable rise of the Dominion of Men.[6][T 5][T 6] Tolkien explained that the Elves can only be immortal as long as the world endures, leading them to be concerned to burdens of deathlessness in time and change. Wanting the bliss and perfect memory of Valinor, and yet to remain in Middle-earth with their prestige as the fairest, as opposed to being at the bottom of the hierarchy in the Undying Lands, they became obsessed with "fading".[T 7]


EDIT: Found the quote, again in "The Rings of Power and the Third Age", again in the Silmarillion



The Dwarves indeed proved tough and hard to tame; they ill endure the domination of others, and the thoughts of their hearts are hard to fathom, nor can they be turned to shadows. They used their rings only for the getting of wealth; but wrath and an over-mastering greed of gold were kindled in their hearts, of which evil enough after came to the profit of Sauron. It is said that the foundation of each of the Seven Hoards of the Dwarf-kings of old was a golden ring; but all those hoards long ago were plundered and the Dragons devoured them, and of the Seven Rings some were consumed in fire and some Sauron recovered.


We also learn in Fellowship of the Ring that it was partly to find the dwarf-ring that the dwarves recolonized Moria. But they did not find it. Thror had not taken it into Moria with him when he perished there. He had instead given it to his son Thrain, and Thrain was captured by the Enemy, where the ring was taken from him with great torment.


Tolkien makes it plain both in his letters and his other works , again, that the Elvish rings are different in kind from the other rings and their powers are for the preservation of beauty unchanged, not for war-making. It may be that the effect of the rings of power given to dwarves and men is different because dwarves and humans are different, and not a difference in the rings themselves. But the difference is plain to see.


Thorin is a proto-fallen dwarf who would be slave to a ring, so consumed with greed that he is willing to make war on all the world and all his neighbors to keep hold of it.


Boromir would have made a fine nazgul -- caught up in visions of power and glory, leading armies to battle. Vulnerable to the temptation. If he had lived in the second age, I have no doubt he or someone like him would have been given a ring, used it to gain great power and glory, then eventually fade into the shadows as the one who would master all is himself mastered by the ring he trusts in; that which he trusts most turning to his undoing, as is the way of Sauron, the master of treachery.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[hamishspence]

I think it's safe to say that had Sauron disappeared after the 9 and 7 were created but before the 1 was, the elves would have used the 16 for preservation - that was their intended purpose too, before Sauron interfered.

Regarding the Nazgul - I don't know that they were all kings before receiving the rings - but certainly some were, and it's likely that they were all sorcerers between taking the rings (using them for sorcery) and succumbing to the effects of the rings.

Perhaps some were kings, and some were just "great warriors" before getting their rings.

[Fyraltari]

Thorin is a proto-fallen dwarf who would be slave to a ring, so consumed with greed that he is willing to make war on all the world and all his neighbors to keep hold of it.

Now that's rather unfair, he was plenty willing to give gold to Bard who had a legitimate claim to some of it both because he killed the dragon and because of the damage down to Lake-Town. What he didn't want to was to give gold to Thranduil who had thrown him into jail and who he owed nothing to. Can he really be blamed for that?

[pendell]

Now that's rather unfair, he was plenty willing to give gold to Bard who had a legitimate claim to some of it both because he killed the dragon and because of the damage down to Lake-Town. What he didn't want to was to give gold to Thranduil who had thrown him into jail and who he owed nothing to. Can he really be blamed for that?


You're right; I shouldn't have put that in open comments. I'll spoiler it in my post above.

Thorin is falling more and more under the spell of greed as he goes on. Towards the end he is preparing to renege on his agreement to relinquish the arkenstone in exchange for a share of the treasure, fight the nearby humans and elves in order to keep it all to himself. That is why he is repentent at the end , wishing he had 'valued food and cheer more than hoarded gold'. He recognizes that his greed has brought about pain and suffering. If he had continued on this course, it would have been to his undoing.

ETA: some quotes


"So much for joy, Thorin Oakenshield. You may go back to your halls in safety; all the treasure is yours -- for the moment. But many are gathering hither beside the birds. The news of the death of the guardian has already gone far and wide, and the legend of the wealth of Thror has not lost in the telling during many years; many are eager for a share of the spoil. Already a host of the elves is on the way, and carrion birds are with them hoping for battle and slaughter. By the lake, men murmur that their sorrows are due to the dwarves; for they are homeless and many have died, and Smaug has destroyed their town. They too think to find amends from your treasure, whether you are alive or dead.



"Your own wisdom must decide your course, but thirteen is small remnant of the great folk of Durin that once dwelt here, and now are scattered far. If you will listen to my counsel, you will not trust the Master of the Lake-men, but rather him that shot the dragon with his bow. Bard is he, of the race of Dale, of the line of Girion; he is a grim man but true. We would see peace once more among dwarves and men and elves after the long desolation; but it may cost you dear in gold. I have spoken."



Then Thorin burst forth in anger: "Our thanks, Roäc Carc's son. You and your people shall not be forgotten. But none of our gold shall thieves take or the violent carry off while we are alive. If you would earn our thanks still more, bring us news of any that draw near. Also I would beg of you, if any of you are still young and strong of wing, that you would send messengers to our kin in the mountains of the North, both west from here and east, and tell them of our plight. But go specially to my cousin Dain in the Iron Hills, for he has many people well-armed, and dwells nearest to this place. Bid him hasten!"



"I will not say if this counsel be good or bad," croaked Roäc; "but I will do what can be done." Then off he slowly flew.


As others have observed, when a 153 old raven says 'I will not say if this counsel be good or bad' that's a very passive-aggressive way of saying 'this is a really, really stupid idea'. Rather than dealing honorably with Bard for an honorable peace he is summoning an army for war. Which, even if won, would serve only to put the mountain permanently under siege if the humans who live at its feet won't trade with them.

And this also


Bilbo thought that Thorin would at once admit what justice was in them. He did not, of course, expect that anyone would remember that it was he who discovered all by himself the dragon's weak spot; and that was just as well, for no one ever did. But also he did not reckon with the power that gold has upon which a dragon has long brooded, nor with dwarvish hearts. Long hours in the past days Thorin had spent in the treasury, and the lust of it was heavy on him. Though he had hunted chiefly for the Arkenstone, yet he had an eye for many another wonderful thing that was lying there, about which were wound old memories of the labours and the sorrows of his race.


As the chapters go further and further on Thorin falls deeper under the influence of the dragon-sickness that lingers on the horde .. and I think this dragon-sickness is a pretty good parallel for the greed induced by the corrupt rings. He eventually escapes from it, but it is not hard to imagine the fate of those ring-bearing dwarves who were not so fortunate.

Though we can perhaps discuss this in more detail at its proper time.



Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Keltest]

You're right; I shouldn't have put that in open comments. I'll spoiler it in my post above.

Thorin is falling more and more under the spell of greed as he goes on. Towards the end he is preparing to renege on his agreement to relinquish the arkenstone in exchange for a share of the treasure, fight the nearby humans and elves in order to keep it all to himself. That is why he is repentent at the end , wishing he had 'valued food and cheer more than hoarded gold'. He recognizes that his greed has brought about pain and suffering. If he had continued on this course, it would have been to his undoing.

ETA: some quotes


As others have observed, when a 153 old raven says 'I will not say if this counsel be good or bad' that's a very passive-aggressive way of saying 'this is a really, really stupid idea'. Rather than dealing honorably with Bard for an honorable peace he is summoning an army for war. Which, even if won, would serve only to put the mountain permanently under siege if the humans who live at its feet won't trade with them.

And this also


As the chapters go further and further on Thorin falls deeper under the influence of the dragon-sickness that lingers on the horde .. and I think this dragon-sickness is a pretty good parallel for the greed induced by the corrupt rings. He eventually escapes from it, but it is not hard to imagine the fate of those ring-bearing dwarves who were not so fortunate.

Though we can perhaps discuss this in more detail at its proper time.



Respectfully,

Brian P.

I think youre overstating things in the books (compared to the movies). Thorin is deeply, personally offended that the elves, who imprisoned him and interrogated him, are now marching an army to claim the spoils of a quest that they did nothing to assist in and actively hampered in the resolution of. Thats it. He's also not a huge fan of Bard asking for treasure at the head of his own army, but explicitly says that if Bard backs off a little bit and gets rid of the elves he's willing to talk. There's certainly a degree of greed involved, but Thorin's position is entirely reasonable at the outset.

[factotum]

I always thought the idea was that the Rings, whichever one they are, gave power to the wielder according to their stature and desires. So the main effect of the One Ring on Bilbo, a hobbit who is naturally a bit timid and prone to wanting to hide, is to turn him invisible. I'm absolutely darned certain that it didn't do that for Sauron!

[Keltest]

I always thought the idea was that the Rings, whichever one they are, gave power to the wielder according to their stature and desires. So the main effect of the One Ring on Bilbo, a hobbit who is naturally a bit timid and prone to wanting to hide, is to turn him invisible. I'm absolutely darned certain that it didn't do that for Sauron!

The One Ring turned the hobbits invisible because it pushed them slightly into the realm of the spirits. The Ringwraiths, being wraiths, live there full time, but certain other beings, like (IIRC) Glorfindel the elf, and almost certainly the Maiar also have a presence there already. The Ringwraiths also were actually invisible under their cloaks as well, so even if youre invisible, that doesnt mean everything about you is invisible.

[pendell]

The One Ring turned the hobbits invisible because it pushed them slightly into the realm of the spirits. The Ringwraiths, being wraiths, live there full time, but certain other beings, like (IIRC) Glorfindel the elf, and almost certainly the Maiar also have a presence there already. The Ringwraiths also were actually invisible under their cloaks as well, so even if youre invisible, that doesnt mean everything about you is invisible.

Tom Bombadil is a bit of an odd one as well. He could see Frodo when Frodo was wearing the Ring, and when Tom put the Ring on he did not disappear. Which would imply that he has an existence in both worlds at once.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[hamishspence]

The One Ring turned the hobbits invisible because it pushed them slightly into the realm of the spirits. The Ringwraiths, being wraiths, live there full time, but certain other beings, like (IIRC) Glorfindel the elf, and almost certainly the Maiar also have a presence there already. The Ringwraiths also were actually invisible under their cloaks as well, so even if youre invisible, that doesnt mean everything about you is invisible.

Interestingly, in the Disaster of the Gladden Fields (Unfinished Tales) when Isildur puts on the Ring, the jewel he wears on a circlet round his head (the Elendilmir) remains visible until he puts his hood up.


I always thought the idea was that the Rings, whichever one they are, gave power to the wielder according to their stature and desires. So the main effect of the One Ring on Bilbo, a hobbit who is naturally a bit timid and prone to wanting to hide, is to turn him invisible. I'm absolutely darned certain that it didn't do that for Sauron!

There's a strong implication in LOTR that any mortal can use a Great Ring to turn invisible:


'A mortal, Frodo, who keeps one of the Great Rings, does not die, but he does not grow or obtain more life, he merely continues, until at last every minute is a weariness. And if he often uses the Ring to make himself invisible, he fades: he becomes in the end invisible permanently, and walks in the twilight under the eye of the dark power that rules the Rings. Yes, sooner or later — later, if he is strong or well-meaning to begin with, but neither strength nor good purpose will last — sooner or later the dark power will devour him.'

[PontificatusRex]

Interestingly, in the Disaster of the Gladden Fields (Unfinished Tales) when Isildur puts on the Ring, the jewel he wears on a circlet round his head (the Elendilmir) remains visible until he puts his hood up.



There's a strong implication in LOTR that any mortal can use a Great Ring to turn invisible



I remember wayyyy back when there was a question sent to Dragon Magazine's "Sage Advice" column, as to whether one would turn invisible permanently if they wore a ring of invisibility long enough, clearly inspired by Tolkien's description of the effects of using a Great Ring too much. The answer was "No, that would make a PC much too powerful", clearly ignoring the existential implications.

One little interesting implication about ring-lore in Tolkien's work that I've rarely seen discussed is the implication that a whole bunch of "lesser" rings were made. Before the Great Rings for each race were made, there were a bunch of lesser rings that were magical but really no big deal, and it's assumed at first that Bilbo found one of those. Sure you turn invisible, nifty, the elven-smiths made a bunch of those that got scattered around and were the basis of much future folklore, but the ONE RING is wayyyyy different.

[factotum]

Tom Bombadil is a bit of an odd one as well. He could see Frodo when Frodo was wearing the Ring, and when Tom put the Ring on he did not disappear. Which would imply that he has an existence in both worlds at once.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

He didn't disappear when wearing the Ring because, as stated at the Council of Elrond, it has no power over him. So he doesn't need to exist in both realms for that to happen.

[GloatingSwine]

I always thought the idea was that the Rings, whichever one they are, gave power to the wielder according to their stature and desires. So the main effect of the One Ring on Bilbo, a hobbit who is naturally a bit timid and prone to wanting to hide, is to turn him invisible. I'm absolutely darned certain that it didn't do that for Sauron!

No. Sauron is the master of the Ring, for absolutely anyone else it ends up the other way around. The Ring would make Sauron invisible if that's what he wanted, if he didn't it wouldn't.

But mostly what it does is enforce and make real the will of the user, allowing them to dominate others by the force of their will. Again, for everyone but Saruon that would eventually be twisted to produce tyranny (for Sauron, of course, no twisting would be required).

[Rater202]

it has no power over him.

Everyone asks why not take the Eagles, but "why not have Tom hold the Ring" seems like a more valid question.

...Unless there's a good reason for that. I know nothing about the character.

[Grim Portent]

Everyone asks why not take the Eagles, but "why not have Tom hold the Ring" seems like a more valid question.

...Unless there's a good reason for that. I know nothing about the character.

Essentially because Tom doesn't care about the ring enough to want to travel to Mordor and destroy it, nor to keep it hidden in his forest. He genuinely doesn't understand why anyone else cares about it, and Gandalf says he would probably lose it or throw it away. Sauron probably couldn't have taken the ring from him by force, but Tom wouldn't be much fussed if an orc came in and asked for it politely.

[GloatingSwine]

Everyone asks why not take the Eagles, but "why not have Tom hold the Ring" seems like a more valid question.

...Unless there's a good reason for that. I know nothing about the character.

Gandalf covers this in the council of Elrond. It's because it has no power over him. He wouldn't take it seriously. He'd forget it, or throw it away. And even if he didn't all that would mean is that Sauron would conquer everything else, and in the end even Tom Bombadil couldn't resist.

Bombadil is a nature spirit, basically. He is an embodiment of the natural world, and whilst that would resist Sauron as long as it could it would be dominated in the end.

[Fyraltari]

What old Tom is really isn't clear. Well what he is supposed to be in-universe actually. Out of universe he's a cameo of the protagonist of a bunch of poems Tolkien had composed even before he got to the Middle-Earth stuff (hence why he's Eldest) and/or a doll Tolkien's children had.

[pendell]

Everyone asks why not take the Eagles, but "why not have Tom hold the Ring" seems like a more valid question.

...Unless there's a good reason for that. I know nothing about the character.
As GloatingSwine says, the reason it's not a question asked often is because Tolkien both asked and answered in the books, directly. I forget which character suggested it but Gandalf shot that down in a hurry. Tom would lose the ring and it would find its way to something nasty.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Fyraltari]

Also they stress the need to destroy the Ring and not pass the bucket to the next generation.

[hamishspence]

As GloatingSwine says, the reason it's not a question asked often is because Tolkien both asked and answered in the books, directly. I forget which character suggested it but Gandalf shot that down in a hurry. Tom would lose the ring and it would find its way to something nasty.


Erestor, one of Elrond's councillors, suggested handing it over to Bombadil, Gandalf shoots it down on "unsafe guardian" grounds, Glorfindel brings up the "Sauron will conquer him too - just last" possibility.


Also they stress the need to destroy the Ring and not pass the bucket to the next generation.

Yup.

Glorfindel brings up two possibilities - send it across the sea, or destroy it - Elrond shoots down the "send it across the sea" possibility - the residents simply won't receive it - it's a Middle Earth problem.

Glorfindel suggests sinking the ring into the sea, to make it inaccessible - Gandalf shoots that down too - making it clear that they should be thinking of solving the problem permanently. And another of Elrond's councillors, Galdor, points out that Mordor's forces will probably be cutting them off from the sea anyway.

Finally Elrond proposes throwing it into Mount Doom.

[GloatingSwine]

Glorfindel brings up two possibilities - send it across the sea, or destroy it - Elrond shoots down the "send it across the sea" possibility - the residents simply won't receive it - it's a Middle Earth problem.


This is also the reason the Eagles aren't involved. They're not just smart birbs, they're messengers of the Valar who only intervene when they choose to.

[Fyraltari]

This is also the reason the Eagles aren't involved. They're not just smart birbs, they're messengers of the Valar who only intervene when they choose to.

Also, they don't have a phone.

[Manga Shoggoth]

This is also the reason the Eagles aren't involved. They're not just smart birbs, they're messengers of the Valar who only intervene when they choose to.

I decided to check up on the "Eagles are not a taxi service" answer (to see if Tolkein ever said it), and came across this little gem (https://www.tolkiensociety.org/blog/2015/01/i-received-this-hoary-query/).

Essentially, the article says:

That's not what the story is about - the story is heavily about the development of the Hobbits, with a generous side order of the rest of the companions.
As commonly noted, they 'ain't a taxi service. (When the eagles swoop in to rescue Sam and Frodo from Mt Doom it is heavily implied that Gandalf is calling in a favour).
The eagles are their own enitites, and perhaps trusting the ring to them would be a bad idea as they are very proud, and would be no more immune to the ring's influence than anyone else.
The whole point of the operation was stealth. A giant eagle making a bee-line to Mt Doom would be picked up by The Eye very easily.


Another post in the search noted that the eagles were also worried by farmers with bows, and also that the Nazgul could fly (or at least, had winged steeds available), so could easily deal with the eagles. Oh, and I had an interesting detour into MST3K...

[Peelee]

When do we discover the eagles aren't real?

[Manga Shoggoth]

But... but then ... who did Hotel California and Journey of the Sorcerer?

MY LIFE IS A LIE!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Fyraltari]

But... but then ... who did Hotel California and Journey of the Sorcerer?

The friends we made on the way to the Lonely Mountain, obviously.