Hobbits as Cultural Outsiders

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" rowspan="2" width=200 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="005dba33.gif"> <div> <A HREF="id88.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="A Few Thoughts on Escape"><U>A Few Thoughts on Escape</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id87.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Of Chapter Titles"><U>Of Chapter Titles</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id89.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Higher Gifts"><U>Higher Gifts</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id90.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Perilous Realm in Middleearth"><U>The Perilous Realm in Middle-earth</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id91.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="That what should be shall be"><U>'That what should be shall be'</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id75.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Congratulations! Its a Classic!"><U>Congratulations! It's a Classic!</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id44.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Dont the great tales never end?"><U>"Don't the great tales never end?"</U></A></div> <div> <B>Hobbits as Cultural Outsiders</B></div> <div> <A HREF="id46.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="What your folk would call magic"><U>What your folk would call magic</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id78.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Ring as Birthday Present"><U>The Ring as Birthday Present</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id48.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Deconstructing Middleearth"><U>Deconstructing Middle-earth</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id68.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Star Trek vs. LotR"><U>Star Trek vs. LotR</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id74.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="A Monster and a Critic"><U>A Monster and a Critic</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id93.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Wanderin Star"><U>Wanderin' Star</U></A></div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <IMG SRC="252a1f20.jpg" border=0 width="161" height="242" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> (Picture available copyright free from The Ultimate Image Archive)</div> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=90 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="005dba33.gif"> <div> <A HREF="http://www.frodolivesin.us" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://www.frodolivesin.us"><U><IMG SRC="006ef530.jpg" border=0 width="239" height="83" ALIGN="LEFT" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div>  |    <A HREF="http://www.frodolivesin.us/" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://www.frodolivesin.us/"><U> </U></A><A HREF="http://www.frodolivesin.us/" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://www.frodolivesin.us/"><U>home</U></A> |  back to  <A HREF="id12.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="For Tolkien Geeks"><U><B>For Tolkien Geeks</B></U></A></div> <div> </div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" height=390 colspan=2 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" background="2a0b5743.jpg"> <div>     </div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Hobbits as Cultural Outsiders</B></div> <bR> <div> One of the biggest challenges in writing fiction set in a secondary creation is explaining that world to the reader without the instruction being painfully obvious. Beginning writers often use "expositional lumps," which can lose the reader through either boredom or the confusion caused by so many facts being dumped into the memory at one time.</div> <bR> <div> Another less-than-ideal technique is having one character tell another <I>something they both know</I> simply as a way for the writer to get the information to the reader. It was somewhat tolerated in older science fiction, if used to explain technology, but even in that genre it's now avoided because of its devastating effect on suspension of disbelief.  </div> <bR> <div> A method that's often used to better effect is making an outsider, newcomer, or beginner a "stand-in" for the reader. If a character <I>doesn't</I> know something, it's perfectly natural for someone more knowledgeable to instruct him. By eavesdropping on the character's lessons (still not too lengthy, please), the reader picks up what he or she needs to know. As an added benefit, an outsider is more likely to notice aspects of everyday life that an entrenched member of that society would take for granted, and so learn many things without formal lessons.</div> <bR> <div> Experiencing life through an outsider's POV can be used to impart more than simple facts. The wonder and disorientation of coming to a new environment, the fear and excitement of facing the unknown, the pride of learning new things and developing new skills--as well as disappointment or anger after failing, are all emotions the reader can experience through the character. The one caveat for this technique is that the newcomer/outsider must have a believable, story-related reason for being in the new place (even if, at first, not even the character knows what that reason is).</div> <bR> <div> In many fantasies, the author uses true outsider(s) who have somehow stumbled into the secondary creation from our own. Examples are C.S. Lewis's <I>Chronicles of Narnia</I> and Stephen Donaldson's <I>Thomas Covenant</I> books. Since this type of character starts with no information about the secondary world--but does have basically the same knowledge of ours that the reader can be expected to have--he or she can be a good choice to serve as a guide.</div> <bR> <div> Often, though, the author provides a guide who <I>does </I>belong to the secondary world, but is an outsider/newcomer to the culture dominant in the story: a peasant traveling to the city or to the king's court (or a young royal escaping into the countryside); an initiate in a religious group or council of wizards; someone taken prisoner or kidnapped by members of an "alien" culture; a trader, military person, or other traveler; or, in an urban fantasy, even the beginning employee or the new kid on the block. Even though the guide's original society might be somewhat different from the reader's, it's usually a life the reader can identify with more easily than he or she can with the "new" culture being discovered.</div> <bR> <div> Middle-earth was originally created to hold the languages and civilizations of <I>The Silmarillion</I>: Numenoreans, Elves, Dwarves, and the like, inhabiting places such as Gondolin and Arnor. It's meant to be our earth in an earlier age, thousands of years ago, and when we meet these original inhabitants and cultures we can imagine it to be just that. But these people can be a little too distant for many readers to identify with. </div> <bR> <div> Then, one day, Professor Tolkien, doodling on a student's paper, wrote, "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." He had no idea what it meant. But that sentence created a race that would become the guides to Middle-earth for countless readers. Even though we might think we <I>should </I>identify with the Men of Middle-earth, it's through the hobbits' eyes that most of us enter the world formed by <I>The Silmarillion</I>.</div> <bR> <div> It was no accident that, even though <I>The Silmarillion</I> existed (not in its final form, of course) before <I>The Hobbit </I>and <I>The Lord of the Rings</I>, it was published after them. When <I>The Hobbit</I>'s popularity led Tolkien's publisher to ask for a sequel, Tolkien's request to use <I>The Silmarillion</I> for that purpose was turned down on the grounds that people wouldn't be interested in it (at least, not interested enough to buy it in large numbers). Very possibly, the publisher was right at that time.  <I>The Hobbit</I> hinted at the broader world of <I>The Silmarillion</I>, but not enough to make most readers yearn to know more. </div> <bR> <div> But then <I>The Lord of the Rings</I> brought hobbits, and readers with them, into the midst of those Numenoreans, Elves, Dwarves, and the like. They encountered descendants of Middle-earth's earlier inhabitants (in some cases, such as Elrond and Galadriel, as well as the barrow wights and ringwraiths, those inhabitants themselves), heard--and became part of--old stories, and traveled across lands rich with history. Middle-earth had found its guides, and many readers who had followed them were eager to explore the world of <I>The Silmarillion</I> on their own. It was the interest of these readers that brought about an event Tolkien had been unable to accomplish during his lifetime--the publication of <I>The Silmarillion</I>.</div> <bR> <div> So, what is it about hobbits that makes them better guides than, say, the Dunadain? Are they more approachable because they're short and cute and have those hairy feet? If that's all it took, Bill the pony could have handled the job. </div> <bR> <div> Hobbits make good guides for the same reason any other characters do:  their culture is more like ours than is the culture to which they're introducing us. They may have some habits that seem odd to us, such as throwing themselves birthday parties, but basically they're pretty recognizable. We meet folks like them all the time. I've heard people described as being "hobbit-like," and have even used the term myself. Ever met anyone you consider "Numenorean-like"? We're comfortable with hobbits because they're so similar to us. They not only act like us, but tend to think like us as well. We understand them.</div> <bR> <div> Some specific characteristics of hobbits make them especially good "eyes and ears" for the reader. They don't generally have much interest in what goes on beyond the borders of the Shire, and even the few who are curious don't have information readily available. When Frodo grows restless as he approaches the significant age of 50, we read that, "He looked at maps, and wondered what lay beyond their edges: maps made in the Shire showed mostly white spaces beyond its borders." Therefore, when they become travelers they have to learn almost as much as the reader does about the rest of Middle-earth. </div> <bR> <div> They don't often believe in things they can't see with their own eyes, so when they encounter the magical for the first time, the reader does, too. Even Frodo, the hobbit who would be most likely to accept that kind of thing--who has heard all of Bilbo's stories and who talks with Elves himself--has to see the fiery writing on the Ring before he can begin to accept what Gandalf tells him about it. It's an unusual (and potentially dangerous) mentality for inhabitants of a world where magic exists, but magic is one of the things Shire folk have isolated themselves against. In fact, they've been protected against such influences by some of the very outsiders they distrust.</div> <bR> <div> The trait that's arguably most important in making hobbits good guides for the modern reader is that they and their society are anachronistic to the rest of Middle-earth. The Europe of thousands of years ago? Maybe in Minas Tirith and Rivendell, but not in Hobbiton and Bywater, where the locals drink beer at an inn, wear waistcoats instead of "ironmongery," dig potatoes and tend flower gardens, and have mantel clocks and pocket handkerchiefs. And, of course, they smoke pipes. Tolkien thoughtfully provides them with pipeweed, so they can indulge before the discovery of America and its tobacco--although he <I>doesn't </I>explain where the potatoes came from. (<I>Later edit:</I>  I mentioned this recently to a Tolkien scholar, who told me there's evidence JRRT was in the process of developing such an explanation when he died, so I guess we can't rule out the possible presence of potatoes in Middle-earth.)</div> <bR> <div> Ironically, although other inhabitants of Middle-earth consider the Shire to be backward (if they've heard of it at all), it's the most modern civilization in Middle-earth at the end of the Third Age. It might not be the "greatest," as it doesn't have cities or military capability, but that's because the residents aren't interested in such things. </div> <bR> <div> Part of the anachronism that makes hobbits such good guides for today's readers is that they're the most <I>psychologically </I>modern residents of Middle-earth. They're practical and unromantic (in the literary sense of the word) and, although they tacitly accept that there are "right" and "wrong" ways to behave as part of their society, they don't live their lives in reference to a religion or spirituality. They have senses of humor and like being comfortable, but difficulties can bring out the best in them.  They can fight when they need to, but theirs is no ancient "warrior culture."  They value emotionally close relationships rather than ones decreed by society (i.e., they choose their own loyalties).<FONT SIZE="4" COLOR="#FFFBF0" FACE="Trebuchet MS" ><A HREF="#cousins" TITLE="Hobbits as Cultural Outsiders"><U>*</U></A></FONT> They govern themselves without a system of royalty--even the Thain is more similar to a modern leader than to an ancient monarch<FONT SIZE="4" COLOR="#FFFBF0" FACE="Trebuchet MS" ><A HREF="#thain" TITLE="Hobbits as Cultural Outsiders"><U>**</U></A></FONT> - and aren't overawed by one when they encounter it, as we see when Pippin calls King Theoden, "A fine old fellow. Very polite." Even the travelers' respect for Aragorn is based more on personal friendship and admiration than on his claim to the kingship. And, as mentioned above, hobbits don't give much credence to what they consider magic; those who do are considered strange (even, in the case of Bilbo and Frodo, "cracked.")</div> <bR> <div> The only focus of magic in the Shire--the Ring--was brought back from a trip into the wider world, which is the equivalent of a trip back in time. It has been postulated that the Old Forest/Tom Bombadil/Barrow Downs part of <I>The Lord of the Rings</I>, which seems extrinsic to the rest of the story, is an opportunity provided by Tolkien for the hobbits and the reader to travel through the First Age (Old Forest and Tom Bombadil) and Second Age (Barrow Downs) of Middle-earth, since he (Tolkien) didn't know if <I>The Silmarillion </I>would ever be published. Bilbo and the hobbits of <I>The Fellowship</I> are, essentially, time travelers. They travel back in time to the world of <I>The Silmarillion</I> and take the reader along. </div> <bR> <div> This anachronism could be a serious threat to willing suspension of disbelief, if hobbits and the Shire weren't so consistent both internally and in their influence on the surrounding world. The only people who smoke are ones who've somehow had contact with hobbits, and after the travelers leave Bree and its outpost of hobbit civilization they don't see another inn. (Is their contact with hobbits the reason the Men of Bree seem more like "us" than the ones we meet in Rohan and Gondor?) The presence of pipeweed at Isengard is an immediately recognizable signal that Saruman has had some sort of dealings with the Shire; there was no place else to get it. </div> <bR> <div> Their isolation has kept hobbits virtually ignorant about the rest of Middle-earth and its history, and has preserved their anachronistic qualities--the two elements that make them most like the modern reader and, therefore, most able to serve as useful guides. </div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <A HREF="id45_m.htm" TITLE="Hobbits as Cultural Outsiders"><U><B><IMG SRC="16f7d3c0.jpg" border=0 width="125" height="60" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A></div> <bR> <div> ___________________________________</div> <div>  <A NAME="cousins"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></div> <div> *<FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FFFBF0" FACE="Trebuchet MS" >An example of this is two cousins serving in the armies of two different kingdoms: decisions they make independently from each other and for decidedly distinct reasons.</FONT></div> <div>  <A NAME="thain"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="4" COLOR="#FFFBF0" FACE="Trebuchet MS" >**</FONT>This is shown not only by the action taken by the Thain during the "occupation" of the Shire, but also by the lack of pomp and circumstance surrounding the office.  It's even more obvious in Pippin's attitude toward himself and in the way he's treated by the other hobbits.  He seems more like the heir to the family business than the "crown prince," even placing himself in fealty to a steward.  One of Tolkien's subtle ironies is having the people of Minas Tirith acclaim Pippin as the "prince of the halflings" when, in fact, he <I>is </I>(but not the kind of prince they're hoping for: one with an army behind him).   </div> <div> _________________________________________</div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div> Copyright 2001 by Trudy G. Shaw</div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>