July Books 32) The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien

[nwhyte]

An old favourite, of course; but it must be a very long time since last I read it. I anticipated correctly that the lack of female characters would now seem an obvious gap; I had forgotten that there were so many sapient animals - the wolves, the birds, Beorn's friends. It is well-paced, and generally fair to the reader. I was surprised by how

Comments

[artw]

I suppose Gandalf is manipulative because he's a sort of archetypal parent.

[seawasp]

Gandalf seems manipulative only if I view the book in the context of the LotR (and if I do that, the contradictions between the books become more obvious). Outside of that, he strikes me more as someone who's trying to get three jobs done at once, and two of those jobs are None of the Dwarves' (and Hobbit's) Business, so sometimes Gandalf's there and sometimes he's not.

[blueboxfever]

I read "The Hobbit" before the LOTR trilogy, and I was pleasantly surprised at how much this book helps you get into the whole Middle Earth spirit before embarking on the far more epic adventure of the One Ring. Without knowledge of "The Hobbit", reading the LOTR trilogy becomes significantly more difficult. It's like you said: Gandalf's tendency to manipulate (but for a good cause, let's be honest) is already present here. Thus it makes more sense to see his involvement in the matter of Frodo and the Ring, and everything else that occurs.. he is such a pivotal character, but in his own way.

Well, if anything, that movie had better come soon, because it'd be a crying shame to have such an excellent LoTR trilogy on DVD without its predecessor to accompany it...