Hobbit notes (Patreon)

Did some sketching on The Hobbit which I might return to at some point. Tolkien’s relationship with regality and gold is worth discussing.

Many stylistic aspects of J. R. R. Tolkien’s writing in The Hobbit diverge from his later writing, the least of which is the way in which The Hobbit owns its identity as a children’s book. More remarkable is how The Hobbit is a children’s book which creates a world of largely self-serving and amoral players. Bilbo Baggins is quite a selfish character whose loyalties are to home and hearth — a classical hero hardly takes up an occupation like “burglar.” The dwarves’ quest for Erebor is almost myopically dedicated to accruing gold rather than desperately clutching for a sense of identity and home. Even Gandalf, the moral sage of The Lord of the Rings, is an ambivalent figure who frequently and abruptly exits the narrative. Even Bilbo’s lifesaving ring is acquired through mendacity — Bilbo cheats Gollum to keep it (granted it’s a ploy that saves his own life, but the moral lassitude of the book’s cast is a defining component of this classic scene). Tolkien views heroism with suspicion, casting it as an amoral enterprise from which the mendacious and avaricious profit. He much prefers nobility and grace, virtues of self-sacrifice and mercy relying not on ostensible strength but personal character.

Indeed, Tolkien’s relationship with regality is similarly ambivalent. Political power in Middle-earth is not an end in itself, as shown by the corruption of the Master of Lake Town and, to a lesser and more complex extent, Denethor, although this probably has much to do with Tolkien’s monarchist tendencies and his antipathy towards democracy (Michael Moorcock’s description of Tolkien as “crypto-fascist” is only slightly unfair). Nor does Tolkien inherently embrace the aesthetics of regality: gold is Thorin’s undoing. Tolkien is fiercely hostile to ecological destruction and ruthless greed, although his underlying belief in a stratified class system keep him firmly in the traditionalist camp and away from anti-capitalism. The ballad the dwarves sing at Bag End, though, speaks less of reckless greed and more a longing for home and legend, as well as mystifying the property of wealth:

“The dwarves of yore made mighty spells,

While hammers fell like ringing bells,

In places deep, where dark things sleep,

In hollow halls beneath the fells.

For ancient king and elvish lord

There many a gleaming golden hoard

They shaped and wrought, and light they caught

To hide in gems on hilt of sword.”

If anything, this makes the gold of Erebor sound haunted. It’s one of Tolkien’s classic passages, bearing all his most powerful moments of legend with a touch of the Gothic (a characteristic which The Desolation of Smaug begins to emulate in its better sequences).