This has been a whimsical tangent of mine for a long time. Barrow meisters please relocate my thread as you see fit.
Quote:
|
Letters #131: Tolkien specifically says that "The Hobbits are, of course, really meant to be a branch of the specifically human race (not Elves or Dwarves)–hence the two kinds can dwell together (as at Bree), and are called just the Big Folk and Little Folk."
|
The narrative and point of view of both The Hobbit and LOTR are hobbitish, being transcribed by hobbits in the Red book. I know this was never the authors intention but... it's fun for me to consider a "what if" as i read LOTR:
The Big Folk in the tales were human, but of a strain (or tribe) that bestrode ME along side the other fantastic creatures that eventually faded away as the others did, and the true inheritors of Arda were... hobbits.
The hobbits are Us. What the hobbit eye saw the world and the events in it is what a real "average" homo sapien would view ME. We are merely a descendant of the hole dwelling meek who have inhereted the earth. Our bigger and sometimes nobler cousins were the stuff of myths. The hobbits didnt fade away, ME did.