LotR - Prologue

[Child of the 7th Age]

Fordim,

I agree with much of what you say. The point you raise about 'invisibility' is interesting. I can't help but wonder if that play on the word was "intentional" on the author's part. Moreover, as you state, Hobbits are not evil. But like other free peoples of LotR, they are "flawed", each race in different ways, and each share characteristics with Sauron.

However, at some point, I feel you may push the semblance too far:

....there are a number of intents that the Hobbits have in common with Sauron:

Order
Invisibility
'using' the land
Rules

Again, I would argue that the difference is one of degree not kind -- yes, the Hobbits intend to establish order for the sake of a well-regulated life, and intend to use the land for 'good'. So they are emphatically not the same as Sauron, but they do share his desire for the above things.

I see this as more than a simple difference of degree. For example, the desire to garden and to tend the land, to beautify it and bring forth productive fruit, stems from goodness. Such an impulse can certainly be abused, but at its best this is an example of subcreation in natural rather than artistic terms.

Sauron's path was different in its origin. His acts were the opposite of subcreation and involved setting his own will in opposition to what was natural or true.

You can apply the same words to describe what Sauron and the Hobbits were doing, as your list suggests. But these are mere labels--not the thing itself. The two lists share no real common ground. Their origins, their wellspring are different: one springs from goodness, and the other the perversion of goodness. Only in abuse by a Hobbit could you forge an actual tie. This is not to say that abuse did not occur. Most certainly, it did. But that is different than seeing an overall similarity of kind.

It is possible our differences may stem from the way we are using words... I am not sure.

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There is something no one else has mentioned on reading the prologue: how familiar and comfortable the Hobbits feel. I am certainly not the first reader to see this, but every time I read the prologue it strikes me. While the Hobbit perspective is not identical to my own, it's enough alike that I can identify with many of their desires and their shortcomings. There are hints of the goodness and failings in my own life, the small victories and numerous frustrations. Hobbits are not great "heroes" but folk whom I can understand, at least to some degree.

Today perhaps, we're more used to this device. Featuring the "small" character has become a stock usage in fantasy. But, way back then, it was not the norm. And I still feel Tolkien has done this as well as any other fantasy writer who has come since then.

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Thirdly, when I read the prologue this time, I was extremely curious when the author had written it. After all, we'd just finished discussing the foreward in terms of its dating. It also struck me as strange that it was written in numbered parts.

I scrounged around and did find a hint in HoMe for the part of the prologue labelled "i". CT says his father did this just around the time that the Hobbits had reached Bree. Some things about hobbit holes were actually dredged out of the general manuscript and put back in the prologue.

This implies that the latter parts were written later (as well as the lengthy note at the end). But I couldn't find any reference to their composition. Does anyone know? There are certainly references to people and events that had to come from later in the writing process.

To me, the prologue is like an old friend, full of names and hints of later developments. But I am wondering if maybe it's not so easy for the newbie, especially if they haven't read The Hobbit itself? Can anyone remember being confused by all these names and details on an early reading?

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Squatter,

We cross posted. How interesting that our responses should be so different!

Yes, I can see the "littleness" of the Shire in more ways than one. Yet it is a world that I can understand in a way that Lothlorien or even Rivendell elude me.

I think Tolkien would very much have identified with the non-conformists Frodo and Bilbo, living in a world where they were surrounded by "smallness" while yearning for something more. And perhaps it is that which sticks with me. I can sense how the Shire would be stiffling. But what I remember with a smile is Bilbo out walking the paths, searching for Elves, while his neighbors gossipped about his actions.

It is that yearning, that search for more, which makes the Hobbits and the Shire appealing to me: Sam's love of Elven tales, Frodo's halting attempts to speak Elvish, how Elanor and Fastred journied out to new territory to live in the shadow of the Elven towers. Despite all the monotony and the parochialism of the Shire, we still find extraordinary people like this.

Tolkien was very aware of the limitations of Hobbits. At one point, he has harsh words to say about his character Sam as embodying the parochialism and short sightedness of the "typical" Hobbit. Yet the appeal of family, the beauties of nature and growing things, and the simple pleasures of home life seem to have overridden the more negative characteristics for him.

[Kuruharan]

Again, I would argue that the difference is one of degree not kind -- yes, the Hobbits intend to establish order for the sake of a well-regulated life, and intend to use the land for 'good'. So they are emphatically not the same as Sauron, but they do share his desire for the above things.

I think that Sauron represents the desire for order carried to an extreme. Tolkien believed that evil does not create, but rather perverts. In this sense it is more a matter of Sauron reflecting traits of the hobbits rather than the other way around.

And I believe that Fordim makes a good point about chopping trees as it relates to reshaping the land.

[Durelin]

I only have the time and energy to reply to two general ideas from two posters, which is indeed a crime!

Fordim -

"Intent" is indeed the key -- but as we learn in the Prologue, there are a number of intents that the Hobbits have in common with Sauron:

Order
Invisibility
'using' the land
Rules

This is certainly a good observation, and I will agree that "intent is indeed the key", but I believe you go far to quickly to the extreme.

[sarcasm]This is why I love this world so much, we never can find a happy medium![/sarcasm] But with that said, let me explain, briefly, I hope, how this applies to intent. We humans like to judge, and how we relate with each other gives us the material to examine when we are the judge. But intent, in any human sense, is solely in the possession of the individual. When judging people's 'intent', we have only what we see to go on. First of all, what someone lets us see is almost entirely up to them. Secondly, what we see out of what they let us is entirely up to us. I think that, here, Fordim, you are judging the hobbits with very little evidence to back up your case. But, truly, I think your biggest problem with this is that your list of intents has intents behind each listed ‘intent’ as well.

You speak of the Ents, and what they would think of simply cutting down a tree to build a barn. Here, I think, is an example of how real Tolkien made his world. To keep on track with 'intent', it is full of different intents. Each person has their own agenda, and, many times, as a whole a community will have their own agenda. And behind that agenda will lay an intent. Also, each person and each community see what they wish to see, and let others see what they wish them to see. Their intents lie in their hearts or simply in their minds (this is the logical way...). It is this idea of intents, as a whole, that tear us apart, along with, I believe, are inability to find a happy medium. But it is only a problem because there is real evil in the world, and in Tolkien's world, as well.

Squatter -

Before their community is even off the ground, the Hobbits have begun to distance themselves from world events; but this also exhibits a huge self-confidence, which is exhibited throughout The Lord of the Rings by all but the most sensitive of Hobbits. They cut themselves off from the world as they have cut themselves off from their own history, as something that is inconvenient and unnecessary.

You say that the Hobbits formed Tolkien's 'ideal society', and yet you realize that there are some things that Tolkien finds un-ideal. It is interesting that, being so cut off from their own history and the outside world, that Tolkien would make them the center of his historical document, as well as the fictional authors. Could it be that bringing them so deeply into the goings on of the world, Tolkien was showing the Hobbits the light? Or was he trying to express that this was a great stain on the character and lives of the Hobbits?

[Elves] do not belong in the well-ordered, earthy, common-sense world of the Shire, which the Hobbits regard as the acme of achievement. Nor, for that matter, do wizards, heroes, myth and magic.

The Elves do not belong in their 'common-sense world', but where does their 'common-sense world' belong? Perhaps this is why Hobbits slowly began to disappear, once again, and, as it seems, for good. Tolkien's world was not made for hobbits, for his 'ideal society', as it was so real. Yes, real, though speaking not specifically of 'elves, wizards, heroes, myths, and magic'...well, perhaps magic.

-Durelin

[the phantom]

Does anyone here know of instance where it was specifically stated, whether in LotR, the Hobbit, Letters, etc., that Hobbits were particularly stout and stocky?

It's right there in the Prologue that we're discussing, silly.

and though they are inclined to be fat and do not hurry unnecessarily...

By the way, did anybody notice this-

Their height is variable, ranging between two and four feet of our measure.

Two feet tall? Are you kidding? Get out a ruler and see how short that is. That's tiny! I can't imagine a little two foot hobbit. Just think, Frodo and his buddies could be walking around town and saying hello to hobbits half their size. That's a very large range. For comparison, can you imagine if the typical human was anywhere from three to six feet? No way, that's too big of a difference.

I also thought this was funny-

To the last battle at Fornost with the Witch-lord of Angmar they sent some bowman to the aid of the king, or so they maintained, though no tales of Men record it.

Were the little guys lying?

"We sent some archers to help."
"Nobody saw them."
"But we did, I swear!" (they showed up a few days too late, but we don't tell that part)

So, I guess it's not a big deal that Bilbo lied about the ring. It's a typical hobbit practice.

he (Gandalf) also thought it important, and disturbing, to find that the good hobbit (Bilbo) had not told the truth from the first: quite contrary to his habit.

Notice, truth telling is his habit, not necessarily a hobbit habit.

hee hee... hobbit habit

[Son of Númenor]

the phantom

It's right there in the Prologue that we're discussing, silly.

Actually, for the sake of accuracy, it says that hobbits are not stout and stocky (when compared with Dwarves).

Durelin

You say that the Hobbits formed Tolkien's 'ideal society', and yet you realize that there are some things that Tolkien finds un-ideal. It is interesting that, being so cut off from their own history and the outside world, that Tolkien would make them the center of his historical document, as well as the fictional authors. Could it be that bringing them so deeply into the goings on of the world, Tolkien was showing the Hobbits the light? Or was he trying to express that this was a great stain on the character and lives of the Hobbits? (italics mine)

You are implying, if I'm not mistaken, that the outside interaction of Frodo, Sam, Merry, Pippin and Bilbo could possibly have been viewed by Tolkien as a "great stain" upon the hobbits in question. I don't think that's a possibility. The hobbits in the Lord of the Rings who participated in some manner in the War of the Ring grew from their experience. They fought for their idyllic home and won. Sam, Merry and Pippin were able to return home wiser (and in the case of the latter two, merrier). Frodo and Bilbo outgrew the Shire, but this is not really a matter of staining so much as growth; in the course of Frodo's quest he reached a higher spiritual plane than could not be satisfied by a simple, agrarian place like the Shire. Bilbo, likewise, after all of his adventures and then the burden of having the Ring for all those years, outgrew his surroundings and 'retired' to live with the Elves. Both made the journey West (and ultimately Sam, too) not to be relieved of any 'stains', but to live out their lives in a place more suited to their spiritual needs.

The prologue, in my opinion, serves to highlight the idyllic, pastoral quality (and also the simpleness and 'smallness') of the Shire, perhaps even moreso than the actual book chapters that take place in the Shire. It lays the groundwork for why four hobbits are willing to fight to preserve their homeland, and ultimately serves as an illustration of why Frodo can never be at peace in the Shire after destroying the Ring.

[the phantom]

Actually, for the sake of accuracy, it says that hobbits are not stout and stocky (when compared with Dwarves).

Of course it does, which is why Nuru asked-

Does anyone here know of instance where it was specifically stated, whether in LotR, the Hobbit, Letters, etc., that Hobbits were particularly stout and stocky?

And in answer I gave her a quote directly from the Prologue-

and though they are inclined to be fat

Yes, my quote said "fat" instead of "stout" but according to my dictionary-
Synonyms: fat, obese, corpulent, fleshy, portly, stout

[Durelin]

Son of Númenor -

You are implying, if I'm not mistaken, that the outside interaction of Frodo, Sam, Merry, Pippin and Bilbo could possibly have been viewed by Tolkien as a "great stain" upon the hobbits in question. I don't think that's a possibility.

Remember that I asked two questions (please excuse the, perhaps, over-use of italics and bold...really don't mean to be rude), and answered neither. Ah, yes, but I did imply that this was a possibility. Still, I meant only to consider a different side, when the former of the two questions seemed more likely to be answerable with 'yes'. So, we are agreeing, though we might consider the other a possibility, as we can never really know for sure...

The prologue, in my opinion, serves to highlight the idyllic, pastoral quality (and also the simpleness and 'smallness') of the Shire, perhaps even moreso than the actual book chapters that take place in the Shire. It lays the groundwork for why four hobbits are willing to fight to preserve their homeland, and ultimately serves as an illustration of why Frodo can never be at peace in the Shire after destroying the Ring.

I agree with this, as well, and would just like to add a little bit. I see this laying of groundwork as imperative. Many times this is not needed in stories, though many times it is, and other times it is not and is there anyway... But, the point is, the prologue was needed to establish the 'setting', which includes not only the physical setting and the time, but the mental setting as well, of the 'fictional historical document'. This draws us away from drawing many conclusions from our own mindset without first looking into the mindset of the setting, and especially of its major characters - hobbits. But much of this brings me back to my first post on this discussion... And so I grow silent, for a bit.

-Durelin

[Nurumaiel]

It's right there in the Prologue that we're discussing, silly.

Ah, dear me, where have my eyes gone? I knew something like this would happen. I will offer no excuses and humbly bow and assume the title of 'silly.'

To the last battle at Fornost with the Witch-lord of Angmar they sent some bowman to the aid of the king, or so they maintained, though no tales of Men record it.

I also noticed this, though at a time after my first post... So either the Hobbits are lying, or the Men don't consider the important enough to record it. I can imagine both... the Hobbits thinking of this as a grand way to appear important and therefore lying about it, or the Men not considering it important enough. Dear me, I suppose it could be either way. It could also make an interesting fan fiction/RPG, concerning how they actually fought or concerning how they came up with the idea that they did. Goodness, I've had a most amusing image in my head of a group of Hobbits coming up with the idea after a late night at the bar!