The Hobbit or there
and back again
Written by: J.r.r Tolkien
Links to Related Book
Book Review
Book Related site
Description of the
Hobbit
The Hobbit, which was written by JRR Tolkien, tells the story of a peaceable creature named Bilbo Baggins. Bilbo,
like most hobbits, is similar to a human, but about half the size and not nearly as loud. Bilbo gets caught up in
affairs much greater than his own hobbit-life when, at the recommendation of a mysterious old wizard named
Gandalf, he is hired as a "burglar" by a group of dwarves. These dwarves are going to the Lonely Mountain in the
East to reclaim their family's treasure from the great dragon Smaug.
Along the way, the company gets into trouble with goblins, spiders, and other malevolent creatures, and
they often escape only because of the assistance of Gandalf and led the dwarves to the treasure with hardly any
help from Gandalf. He became strong and independent. He knew there had to be a leader of the group, so he took
the job. He was a silent leader, but a good one. He led the dwarves home safely from a very long weary quest. In
summation, Bilbo learned a lot while he was on his quest. In the Hobbit, which was written by JRR Tolkien, Bilbo
had magical help. He found a ring that turned him invisible. He was given an Elvish sword that glowed when it was
near evil and Bilbo had Gandalf to look up to. He helped Bilbo kill the great goblin. Once again the dwarves are
captured, this time by elves. Bilbo once again, using his magical ring frees the dwarves. They then journey
towards the dragon Smaug in order to smite him.
Amazingly, the dwarves and the hobbit didn't have to do a thing. While Smaug was out to look for
something to eat, someone from a nearby town shot him with an arrow. The treasure was now free! The only
discerning part was that the person that shot down Smaug now wanted a share of the treasure. Since the dwarves
though that the treasure was rightfully theirs they didn't want to give it up. At the end there is an epic battle called
the battle of the five armies. With elves, dwarves and eagles rushing to the small hobbits aid, they are able to win.
The treasure is then split, Bilbo refuses his share though. The Author of this book, JRR Tolkien was born on the 3 rd
of January in 1892. He is known most for his Lord of the Rings trilogy, the first book in this trilogy is the hobbit.
With these books he basically started the whole high fantasy works genre. One author, C.S. Lewis was heavily
influenced by JRR Tolkien, they were actually friends. Some literary elements used in The Hobbit are, theme,
setting and man vs. man. The Hobbit’s main theme is Bilbo’s development into a hero, in the beginning of the book
he Is looked upon as a lowly thief, but by the end he is the hero. The setting of this book is hobbiton, and various
places in middle earth, while the man vs. man conflict is shown by the numerous battles that take place within this
book.
Book/Movie comparison
The book The Hobbit written by JRR Tolkien is extremely similar to the 78 minute cartoon version of it.
Although it manages to tell a somewhat accurate version of the book, it is only given 78 minutes to depict the scenes
of a 300 page book. Given the short amount of time, the film is actually quite accurate, and in sync with the book in
many ways. But as good as the film is the book is much better, and people should definitely read the book before
watching the film, or else you will miss some interesting parts.
The first major difference is that the Dwarves show up with Gandalf all at once in the film, rather than arriving
in groups the day after Gandalf meets Bilbo and puts the mark on his door, also in the book Fili and Kili play crucial
roles and they have many lines, while in the film they all speak and sing in tandem. To go along with that small
difference the company leaves Bilbo's house on ponies, but after that the ponies are not seen until they are lost
crossing the Misty mountains. While in the book the group rode ponies from the shire all the way to Rivendell. In the
movie Gandalf has the power to make dawn come early and turn the trolls to stone, while in the book he throws his
voice in order to trick the trolls, the movie makes him seem a lot more powerful than he actually is, yes, he does have
powers, but he is not a white wizard yet.
Another difference within these two books is that Gandalf gives Thorin his fathers map and the key to smaugs
hideout in the troll cave, as opposed to the movie where he gives it to him before they leave bag end. Another
difference that was seen in the movie was that Bilbo’s sword sting always was glowing as opposed to in the book
where it only glows if goblins are near by. The whole incident at the enchanted river as well as Bombur’s magical
sleep is left out. It seems as if Gandalf is always missing in the movie, and then magically appears when they need
him most, this however is not the case, in the book he is there most often. For example when the dwarves are
captured by the goblins, it is because they wander in the cave while Gandalf is sleeping. In the movie it shows the
ponies being sucked into the tunnel, then they go after them.
One scene which I found very disappointing in the movie was the scene, were Bilbo and Gollum have a riddle
competition, in which Bilbo wins, but escapes by use of a magical ring. In this scene they only used four riddles, as
opposed to the ten riddles they used in the book. In the movie Gandalf acts like he knows exactly how Bilbo escaped
from Gollum, he hints at this by stating “has the ring of truth. Yes, it rings true. While in the book he has no idea how
Bilbo escapes and he never hints at anything having to do with rings. In the movie they meet wargs in the woods,
while in the book they meet trolls again, and never meet any wargs. Wargs are afraid of fire, and the company was
using torches so wargs would never think of attacking them. The trolls were riding large wolves not wargs.
Book/Movie comparison 2
JRR Tolkien depicts the wood elves as lovely creatures that are beautiful in every way, in the movie they're
depicted as blue skinned and quite ugly. Towards the end the movie shows Balin going to Smaugs secret hideout
with him, but in the book only Bilbo goes, Balin does not. Roac the raven is omitted. In the book, the ravens tell the
company that Smaug is slain and then is sent to Dain to ask for help. In the film, the Dwarves wait, lost inside the
Lonely Mountain for a week, and it is never explained why the ravens arrive at such a crucial moment. In the book
Thorin becomes angry with Bilbo because Bilbo is too cowardly to fight in the battle of 5 armies. In the movie
Thorin gets angry with Bilbo because he handed the Arkenstone to the elves. Basically the whole journey home is
omitted from the film, this includes: a winter at Beorn's home, a stop at Rivendell and digging up gold they buried
by the troll camp. If I were to change the film in any way I would have added in the scene with Tom Bombadill,
whish was very interesting, also they could’ve gone more in depth with the whole riddle scene. None of the scenes
from the book were really transformed in the film in my mind. Tolkien does a perfect job of describing what is going
on within the book, so much that a movie is almost unnecessary.
Although the movie leaves out a good amount of scenes from the book, it is still quite accurate when
attempting to depict sections of the book. Most of what was left out did not really effect, in my mind, how you view
both, Without reading the book and only watching the movie, my summary would have been almost identical. The
movie only leaves out unimportant parts, that don’t really contribute to the main story. In some cases, parts were
even changed for the better.
Film Related links
Link to new movie coming out in 2011
Link to old movie that came out in
1977
Work Cited
• http://tolkiengeek.blogspot.com/2005/07/h
obbit-cartoon-whats-wrong-with-it.html
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSHLG
nexe-w
• http://lotr.ugo.com/animation/hobbit/
• http://www.lordotrings.com/movies/hobbit.
asp