Jesse Halverson
Mr. Bradford
Per. 7
12-01-10
Elements of an Epic hero in The Hobbit
The Hobbit, a story by J.R.R. Tolkien, has many elements of an epic poem. Both,
epic poems and The Hobbit, include parts of the story such as the call, the preparation, a
road of trials, allies, crossing a threshold, a low point, a resurrection, and a return of the
hero.
The call segment is near the beginning of the story when the hero is called to
begin his journey. In The Hobbit, a hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, the
main character, is greeted by the wizard, Gandalf, and asked
to go on an adventure. Bilbo declines and invites Gandalf to
tea the next day. The next day Gandalf arrives after thirteen
dwarves. Bilbo is informed that he has been volunteered by
Gandalf to be a burglar on the dwarves’ adventure. After
much persuasion by the dwarves and Gandalf, Bilbo agrees to
be the fourteenth member of their party.
The preparation comes very soon after the call. It is the section where the hero is
readied to begin his journey. This section in The Hobbit is very short and almost absent
from the story. In this section Bilbo wakes up the day after the tea with the dwarves and
is taken almost immediately without any supplies by Gandalf to the already departing
dwarves.
The road of trials portion is spread throughout the entire story. It includes any
enemies, difficulties, or problems the hero may face on his journey. Bilbo and the
dwarves constantly face difficulties on their journey such as goblins, wargs, giant spiders,
the forest Mirkwood, lack of materials, and extreme temperatures. One of the most
meaningful of Bilbo’s trials was his first burglary - an encounter with three trolls. The
group was walking in a forest when they saw light from a fire. They decided to send
Bilbo to investigate. When Bilbo found the fire he saw three large trolls sitting in a
clearing in the woods. Bilbo decided that because he is a burglar he needed to steel
something. He decided to take one of the trolls’ purses, but the
troll hears a noise and grabs Bilbo before he can run away.
While the three trolls are trying to decide how to cook Bilbo the
dwarves come into the clearing and are captured. Bilbo,
however, is forgotten. Then a voice that sounds like one of the
trolls, but is actually Gandalf who has just returned from a long
disappearance, starts off another argument. The trolls end up arguing until the sun comes
up and turns them into stone. Then Bilbo and Gandalf untie the dwarves and they
continue on there journey. Although Bilbo did fail this trial, it was the first in a long line
of spying, burglaries, and rescues Bilbo did for the dwarves.
Another more successful trial was when the party was traveling through the forest
of Mirkwood. They saw a group of lights in the distance and strayed off the path in
search for food. But as soon as they got close to the source of the light, an elf celebration,
the elves would vanish and the group would be left in the dark. This happened a couple of
times, and once there was so much commotion that Bilbo and the dwarves were separated
in the dark. After yelling and searching for the dwarves Bilbo decided to go to sleep.
When he wakes up he finds that his legs are bound with spider webbing and there is a
huge spider coming toward him. In the nick of time he whips out his sword, cuts his
binds, and kills the spider. Bilbo then finds the dwarves tied up and hanging from trees.
Bilbo slips on his magic ring which turns him invisible and leads the spiders away from
the dwarves. He then returns and frees the dwarves who help him attack the returning
spiders.
The allies are also very important parts of a story. Similar to the road of trials they
are found throughout the story. The allies are any of the characters in the story who assist
the hero on his journey. In The Hobbit some of the main allies to Bilbo are the dwarves,
the elves at Rivendell, the wizard Gandalf, the bear man Beorn, and the eagles. The most
helpful of all the allies is Gandalf. Gandalf comes and goes throughout the party’s
journey, seeming to always show up the moment when he is needed most. Gandalf is a
very powerful but mysterious wizard who, when available, can help Bilbo and the
dwarves out of many tough situations. The dwarves, however, are Bilbo’s most common
allies and are with him for almost the entire story. They are companions who help him
through the journey almost as much as he helps them, and they promise him his fair share
of the treasure they are going after.
Almost every hero in a story goes somewhere special that the other characters
cannot or do not go. Crossing the threshold is a unique time in the story when the hero
goes somewhere that only he can go to assist or resolve his quest. In The Hobbit Bilbo
and the dwarves are attacked by goblins and taken to their cave system. They are brought
before the great goblin, and just before they are killed, Gandalf, who was not caught,
turns off all the lights. Gandalf, the dwarves, and Bilbo made a run for the exit, deciding
the route by Gandalf’s best guess. While riding on one of the dwarves back, Bilbo falls
and knocks his head. When Bilbo wakes up he is in a dark tunnel. He crawls around in
the dark and finds a ring lying on the floor and puts it in his pocket. Bilbo tries to find the
way out of the cave system but stumbles upon an underground lake. This lake is home to
a foul creature named Gollum. Gollum sees Bilbo on the edge of the lake and paddles his
boat over to get him, hoping to get a snack, but when Bilbo pulls out his sword Gollum
proposes a riddle game. Gollum tells Bilbo
that if he
could beat him at the game he would show
him the way
out of the caves, but if Gollum won then he
could eat
Bilbo. Bilbo, having no other choice,
agrees. After
many exchanged riddles Bilbo fiddles in his
pocket while
trying to think of another and feels the ring.
Forgetting
about finding it, he thinks aloud “What have
I got in my
pocket”. Gollum thinks this is a riddle so Bilbo plays along and eventually after three
tries Gollum gets it wrong. But before he shows Bilbo the exit he tells him he has to go
get something. Gollum disappears on his boat out into the lake, intending to fetch the ring
from his home which would turn him invisible so he could eat Bilbo anyway. While
Bilbo is waiting on the shore he slips on the ring, not noticing its powers. When Gollum
finds that his ring is missing he suspects Bilbo. When he goes back to the shore Gollum
doesn’t see the invisible Bilbo. Instead, he runs down the hallway thinking Bilbo went
toward the exit. Bilbo then follows him out of the caves.
The low point is another common section of a story. In this area the hero faces a
low point on his journey of near defeat and utter hopelessness. In this story Bilbo and the
dwarves are trapped in a secret tunnel of the Lonely Mountain. On one end of the long
tunnel is an avalanche blocked exit; on the other is the sleeping dragon, Smaug. The
group becomes trapped when Bilbo puts on his ring to turn invisible and tries to talk to
Smaug to learn about him. Smaug cannot see Bilbo but he can easily smell him. When
Bilbo leaves, Smaug is angered by Bilbo’s earlier theft and flies around the mountain,
devours the dwarves’ ponies, and blocks the one exit to the tunnel with an avalanche.
After the low point in the story there is usually a saving experience or
transformation. In this part the hero goes through an experience that saves him from the
low point. In The Hobbit the saving experience is when the
dwarves finally decide to exit the tunnel through Smaug’s
lair. Smaug assumes that Bilbo is somehow involved with
the nearby town, Laketown, and goes to attack it. Bilbo and
the dwarves finally find the courage to exit the tunnel
through Smaug’s lair. They send Bilbo ahead to make sure
Smaug is gone. Then they all go into the treasure filled lair
taking armor and weapons and searching through the piles of
gold and jewels. The adventurers leave the mountain through the main gate. Later Smaug
is killed by a townsman named Bard, and a five army war is launched over the treasure of
the lonely mountain. When Bilbo had talked to Smaug in the mountain he had discovered
a weak spot on the dragon’s belly. A message was later sent by with a bird to tell Bard of
the weak spot. Using his last arrow, Bard shoots Smaug in his weak spot and kills the
dragon. Because Smaug has destroyed their town the townspeople decide they want part
of the dwarves’ treasure and band together with the wood elves from Mirkwood to take
Lonely Mountain. An army of dwarves comes to assist Bilbo’s dwarves. Soon the party
receives news of a fourth and fifth army approaching - the goblins and wargs. The
humans, elves, and dwarves eventually, through much negotiation on Bilbo’s part, decide
to fight together against the goblins and wargs. The humans, elves, and dwarves win the
battle and split the treasure of Lonely Mountain.
The hero in the story almost always returns from his journey to his original home.
This segment is called the return. It is located toward the end of a story and is the hero’s
return home and his sharing of what he has learned. After the war Bilbo returns home
with a small but valuable portion of the dwarves’ treasure. When he returns, Bilbo finds
that his home and possessions are being sold, and he is presumed dead. He gets back as
many possessions as he can and settles down in his home.
The Hobbit, like many other stories, is very similar to an epic poem. Both the epic
poem and the story, The Hobbit, have very similar sections and parts, and both are set up
in a similar way and order and have many of the same qualities.