While Tolkien never decided on an official origin for the Orcs, the one I’ve seen cited the most often is that they were descended from corrupt elves. Tolkien’s goblins are heavily based on those in George MacDonald’s The Princess and the Goblin, albeit without the soft feet. While I can’t say I thought about it as a kid, comments I’ve read as an adult make me feel this isn’t entirely fair. They’re just thoroughly bad creatures, described as clever workers but only making weapons and other unpleasant items. In Lord of the Rings, it became the name of another dwarf, the son of Bilbo’s companion Gloin.Īlso worth mentioning are the goblins, who kind of get the short shrift in Tolkien’s work, because it appears that it’s impossible to be a goblin (or Orc, as they’re called in Lord of the Rings) and NOT be evil. Speaking of Norse names in Tolkien’s work, the name Gimli was originally given to the future home of the survivors of Ragnarok. He appears to be a human magic-worker, but is later identified as essentially an angel in human form. In the finished manuscript, however, Gandalf was neither elf nor dwarf. Gandalf was originally Tolkien’s name for the dwarf who would become Thorin Oakenshield, with the wizard having the name Bladorthin. The name essentially means “wizard-elf,” and I’m pretty sure elves and dwarves were hardly as distinct in Norse mythology as they would later become in popular culture (largely through Tolkien’s own influence). Actually, Gandalf is also a dwarf name in the Norse work. Well, all except for Balin, but that would still fit in quite well with the names in the poem. In The Hobbit, all of the dwarves’ names are taken from the Norse poem of creation known as Voluspa. They’re both small peoples, but the hobbits are smaller, and generally don’t have beards. Of course, in Middle-Earth, dwarves are quite different from hobbits. I know the NES translation has a character called Norud the Dwarf, but I think he might have originally been Norud the Hobbit. I also recall the term “hobbit” being used in some versions of Dragon Quest III. There’s some discussion of this on Wikipedia, including a mention of Ultima’s Bobbits, which would become an unfortunate word choice with a certain incident in 1993. It’s interesting that hobbits have become part of popular culture, but usually as “halflings,” due to “hobbit” itself being trademarked. His hobbits are really not fairy creatures except in the sense of existing in fairy tales they don’t possess any magical powers. The word “hobbit” itself appears to have been an old English word for a sort of fairy creature, but Tolkien doesn’t seem to have been aware of this. Bilbo Baggins starts out quite respectable and becomes much less so in the Shire after his epic adventure. They also have a clear notion of respectability that involves staying where you belong. The hobbits have their own society in the Shire, and tend to be fond of food, drink, and gossip. Looking largely like miniature humans with furry feet, they’re often more human than the actual humans in the books, who are often too busy being epic archetypes to take too much part in the simpler aspects of human life. I have to say that hobbits themselves are one of J.R.R. While I can’t understand why they’re making multiple movies based on one not-very-long book, I am looking forward to seeing them. I took up Lord of the Rings not long after that, but it was a few years before I read all three volumes. I do know I was eleven when I finished it, though. It took me a while to finish The Hobbit the first time, even though it’s pretty short I think I kept forgetting where I left off. Honestly, I think the annotations are a bit sparse. For anyone curious, it was the annotated edition with notes by Douglas Anderson. I just finished re-reading The Hobbit in preparation for the upcoming movie.
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