The Unofficial Hobbit Handbook

by Peter Archer

  Even Gandalf and Galadriel, two of the most powerful beings in Middle-earth, would not be able to avoid the corrupting power of the Ring forever. If such paragons of character could not resist that downward slide, how could a typical person?

  In one major respect at least, wealth and power are unlike the power of the Ring: Wealth and power are neutral. They have no inherent moral bent toward good or evil. They are revealers, not destroyers, of character.

  In what areas are you inclined toward light or darkness? In what ways are you being tugged toward one or the other but feel you don’t have the ability to act now? This isn’t an encouragement to commit a crime or infidelity. This is simply an invitation to reflect on what is inside you at the moment. If you suddenly had unlimited wealth or power, would you do those things?

  Maybe you can’t bequeath millions to your favorite charity or to build a playground or to have the hospital add that special wing you’d like to see. But who says you can’t do something small right now? Maybe you could buy a commemorative brick in the hospital’s building campaign or even volunteer there on Saturdays. It has been suggested that what we do with little is representative of what we would do with much. So why not go ahead and pitch your “little” toward the good you wish you could do more for?

  Now about those rings that tend toward evil: Do you have anything in your life that is pulling you in the wrong direction? Anything—or anyone—bringing out the dark side in you?

  Consider the seven rings given to dwarves. They didn’t extend life or bestow invisibility. In fact, their only known power was to awaken avarice and anger.

  Can you imagine owning something that actually caused you to be angry? Or wearing something that automatically caused your greed to soar? It’s hard to imagine how this would be seen as a boon to anyone. But perhaps the dwarves used the power to amass wealth, thinking they could take the rings off whenever they chose.

  Many religious traditions teach that both good and evil want to have our allegiance, that both are at work inside us vying for control. In such a situation, if there were talismans that pulled us toward one or the other, it seems we would want them. We’d want the ring that pulled us toward good, if good was what we desired; and we’d want the ring that encouraged our negative attributes, if we wanted to give ourselves over to evil.

  But we’d certainly not want the object that pulled us in the direction we did not want to go.

  What (or who) do you have in your life that is causing you to move in the wrong direction?

  Letting Go of Rings

  The One Ring had a will of its own. It chose the bearer who could get it back to its evil master. If a bearer didn’t take it in the right direction, the Ring would abandon it in an attempt to “trade up,” to find a new bearer who would more perfectly obey its will.

  When the Ring was done with you, it would slip off and betray you. You’d be rid of it whether you wanted to be or not. And most likely you wouldn’t want to be rid of it.

  But if the Ring is not finished with you, you would certainly not want it to be parted from you.

  Some negative influences in our lives are just like that. We know we should distance ourselves from that place or person or activity or web page or group or realm of activity, and indeed we mean to. But somehow we find it in our pocketses.

  The Ring never had its wearer’s good at heart, unless its wearer was Sauron. Similarly, those negative influences just mentioned are not looking out for your best interests. Their end is destruction.

  So how do you let go of something that is hurting you or those around you, but that doesn’t want to let go of you?

  First, you should do all you can to remove yourself from the thing that is causing you to do (or to be tempted to do) evil. It is not unwise to simply stop watching that show or listening to that commentator or chatting with that friend if, afterward, you are left in a worse place than when you began.

  Sometimes we can’t just do that. Perhaps it’s a toxic relationship that requires a more careful treatment than simply walking away. Perhaps it’s part of our workplace or family. Or perhaps its claws are in us too deeply for us to step away using only our own power.

  In that case, we might need the help of someone else. As Frodo discovered at the Cracks of Doom, even an enemy can do the dearest work of friendship when you’re too far gone. Had Gollum not bitten the Ring off Frodo’s hand, what would have become of Middle-earth?

  Those around you can help you be rid of the “ring” that is drawing you toward destruction. Maybe it’s a friend or a spouse or a parent. Maybe it’s a co-worker or a counselor or a clergyman. And maybe it’s a group or organization or clinic.

  Fortunate is the one who has a friend to pick him up when he stumbles. Pity the man one who has no one to catch him when he falls.

  It’s possible, of course, to defy even the best intervention. Perhaps the wound is so deep or the addiction so strong that even professional help isn’t enough. Sometimes we have to be saved from ourselves.

  Happily, as Gandalf reminded another Ringbearer, we’re not in this alone: “There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil.”

  Frodo was carried along by more than the Fellowship and the goodwill of all the Free Peoples of Middle-earth.

  So are we all. Whether you cry out to the Universe, God, the Force, or a Higher Power, you probably do cry out to someone or something. It is the natural human condition to have faith in some being greater than man. Atheism must be learned.

  If you have a “ring” that you just can’t seem to let go of, admit it and call out for rescue.

  Sometimes help comes in the form of disappointment or failure. A certain man had gone to seminary and was hoping to become a hospital chaplain at a pediatric hospital. But try as he might, he couldn’t find a chaplaincy program that would accept him. It caused him deep despair, as he felt he could happily spend his entire career as a hospital chaplain, if only he could find a position.

  When his failures continued to mount, he finally took a job in an entirely different field—and he is immensely happy he did. He never would’ve been able to make it as a chaplain, he now realizes.

  Sometimes it is a blessing not to get what you want.

  If you have a ring that is pulling you toward evil but that you can’t get away from, no matter how hard you try, call out to those higher powers to bring the break. And if there is something you can’t achieve no matter how hard you try, perhaps that is your signal to try harder and without ceasing because it is the direction you should go. But there’s also the possibility that it is another force at work in your life blocking you from this, not to frustrate you but to bring about your better outcome.

  Some rings must be let go of or they could send you plunging into the Cracks of Doom.

  Conclusion

  Hobbits, or the males of the species, at any rate, are not by nature responsible creatures. If a magic ring came to them, it would most likely bend their wills to its own mind.

  For a while, having a magic ring would be good fun. It would allow the hobbit to blink out of view when unpleasant relatives were hanging on the bell, and it would no doubt result in many vegetarian delights to be lifted from right under Farmer Maggot’s nose.

  But eventually the ring would begin its downward pull. It is the rare hobbit—or man, for that matter—who would lift himself to the challenge of doing not what is fun to do but what must be done.

  Ordinary people, too, have responsibilities that must be tended to, though a party would be much more fun. Happily, we have more Frodo in us than we might realize. It is very good that this ring of responsibility has come to us, because we will bear it for as long as it is ours to carry.

  Solving Riddles

  Praps ye sits here and chats with it a bitsy, my preciousss. It likes riddles, praps it does, does it?”

  —Gollum, from JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit

  Hobbits are very skilled at riddles—much more so than, say, men
or dwarves (or even elves). Being close to the earth, they understand its humor, and riddles are born of the earth.

  Mr. Baggins, a pretty average hobbit (perhaps a little smarter and a little more courageous than most, though he doesn’t yet know it), is ready to take on the mysterious Gollum at riddling games. In fact, he even dares to think that he might beat the slimy creature. After all, hobbits spend a great deal of time sitting by the fire in the winter months making up and guessing at riddles. They’ve even come up with some questions that are remarkably difficult for other inhabitants of Middle-earth to guess.

  If you’re confronted by riddles, here are some hints about how to approach them.

  RIDDLES ARE ALL ABOUT MISDIRECTION. The solutions are always obvious and standing in plain sight.

  RIDDLES ARE ABOUT WORD PLAY. Hobbits are fascinated by words—this is a sign of their connection to elves. The more you enjoy riddles and word games, the more elvish you are.

  RIDDLES ARE ANCIENT. Bilbo himself knows that even a very old creature such as Gollum is going to know the basic rules of riddling.

  RIDDLES ARE A KEY TO GREATER TRUTH. In fact, the adventures of Bilbo, and later of Frodo, are a great riddle, and one to which the answer ultimately lies in the Undying West.

  Who Likes Riddles?

  It’s quite possible you may come into situations in which riddles are the most reasonable response to a given challenge. If so, you might ask what kind of people (or creatures) are riddling you. Their reaction to riddles will probably reveal something about their personalities, too.

  Elves and Riddles

  Elves, on the whole, like riddles. Which is to say, they like random, nonresponsive, confusing answers to questions. Frodo comments to Gildor, “It is said, Go not to the Elves for counsel, for they will say both no and yes.” The elf admits the justice of this remark. Elrond also has a habit of making cryptic comments that don’t make much sense—unless you’re a half-elf or a wizard. And Galadriel is positively Delphic in most of her utterances while the Fellowship is vacationing in Lothlórien. All in all, the elves like a style of communication that is confusing, cryptic, and only understandable by other elves. This makes them highly susceptible to riddles and other guessing games.

  The only problem with starting a riddling contest with an elf is that it’s likely to go on for days, as the riddles get more and more obscure, bound up in lore that’s thousands of years old and remembered only by the elves, and even then not many of them. So don’t start riddling with elves unless you have plenty of time on your hands and nothing urgent in the offing (such as saving Middle-earth from the Dark Lord by dropping his ring in a volcano).

  Dwarves and Riddles

  Dwarves are plain, down-to-Middle-earth folk with no time for nonsense—riddling or anything else. Dwarf lore is largely a matter of transmitting plain, ordinary fact, although every now and then there’s a bit of mysticism wrapped up in it, such as the Mirrormere and the myths surrounding Khazad-dûm. But who wants to spend his time speculating on the answers to obscure questions when there’s ale to be drunk, beards to be grown, and orcs to be slain?

  If you want to start a riddling contest with a dwarf, be sure to make the stakes worth his while: a pile of gold coins, perhaps, or a trinket or two made of mithril; possibly a couple of barrels of well-brewed ale to go along with a nice stash of Longbottom Leaf (since dwarves are notorious connoisseurs of pipeweed).

  Men and Riddles

  Let’s face it: Compared to most other races of Middle-earth, men are a bit simpleminded. (The exception is Númenóreans, but there aren’t many of them around. We’re talking about normal, average, everyday men.) They aren’t nearly as mystic and complex as the elves, and they don’t have strong connections to the earth like dwarves do. However, they generally like riddling speech, as witness the strange dream that Faramir and then, once, Boromir have:

  Seek for the Sword That Was Broken

  In Imladris It Dwells

  There shall be counsels taken

  Stronger than Morgul Spells

  And so on.

  In point of fact, men rather like riddles, since riddles are mysterious and allow for days—months, sometimes—of endless debate, thus shutting off any need to take action.

  From this point of view, the best time to start a riddling contest with a man is when he’s contemplating some disastrous course of action and you want to delay him as long as possible from making an ass of himself and possibly bringing ruin on everyone else. Gods sometimes come down from the heavens to challenge mortal men to riddling contests as a way of testing man’s wisdom and deciding if they’re truly worthy of ruling.

  Orcs and Riddles

  Orcs don’t like riddles. They don’t like anything confusing. All they want is to get a plain answer to plain questions, preferably with a little torture to go with it, and then get on with slaughtering and rampaging. If you’re stuck in a dungeon with a couple of grumpy orcs, don’t try to riddle them. Spend your mental energy thinking of a way to escape with most of your skin intact.

  Dragons and Riddles

  Dragons like riddles. They’re fascinated by riddling speech, as witness Smaug’s reaction when Bilbo tells riddles during their conversation. There’s a lot of riddling talk, and Smaug loves it—which is why he doesn’t end the conversation right then and there by blowing Bilbo to ashes with his fiery breath. The rules here, if you’re talking to dragons, are:

  KEEP THE TOPICS LIGHT. Don’t spend any time on famous elvish warriors who’ve slain dragons or notable dwarves who’ve been able to defeat the great Wyrms of the North. Instead, stay on topics such as the weather, food, and what the well-dressed dragon is wearing this season.

  REMEMBER THAT DRAGONS ARE SENSITIVE TO THE SUBJECT OF WEALTH (ESPECIALLY THEIR OWN). Dragons have spent a good deal of time accumulating their hoards, so it’s very rude to suggest that anyone else might have a claim to them.

  GIVE THE DRAGON AN OPPORTUNITY TO SHOW OFF ITS JEWEL-ENCRUSTED UNDERBELLY BY TELLING IT HOW MAGNIFICENT IT IS. Dragons like to boast as much as the next magical beast. They also appreciate fulsome praise. Who knows? You may discover something useful.

  TRY NOT TO BRING UP PAST HEROES WHO MAY HAVE CHALLENGED THEM AND WHOSE DESCENDANTS ARE STILL AROUND, POSING A DISTANT, BUT NONETHELESS DISTINCT THREAT. Dragons, like other magical beasts, have extremely long memories.

  DON’T SHOPLIFT HIS TREASURE. For goodness sakes, this is just plain manners! How’d you like it if someone came into your house and stole the teaspoons? Just because a big two-handled goblet is lying there in plain sight is no reason to take it.

  Hobbits

  Hobbits love riddles and have a rich store of them. Except for one or two instances, Bilbo really isn’t at a loss for a riddle when Gollum presses him—except for the very end of the game when he rather unfairly demands to know, “What have I got in my pockets?” Experts and authorities have quite reasonably pointed out that this isn’t a riddle and therefore, by the strict rules of the game, Bilbo has lost. However, when he accepts the challenge to guess the answer to the hobbit’s question, Gollum implicitly also accepts the new rules and obligates himself to abide by the result. Of course he’s not going to. It’s just that from a strictly moral standpoint, he ought to.

  If you challenge a hobbit to a riddle game, and the hobbit is stuck for a riddle (by which right, he ought to surrender the game), don’t give in if he starts asking irrelevant questions like “What have I got in my pockets?” or “What was the first name of my aunt’s mother’s grandmother’s second cousin?” If he can’t think of a true riddle, inform the hobbit that he’s lost; it’s as simple as that.

  What Makes a Good Riddle?

  Some riddles are based on word play; others are about what you don’t know. Bilbo is skilled at both. Others prove themselves somewhat less adept. Tolkien’s stories are filled with riddles, and it would make things easier for many of the characters if they could answer them earlier and more correctly.

  Boromir’s
Riddle

  When he comes to the Council of Elrond, Boromir of Gondor tells the assembled elves, dwarves, hobbits, and men of a riddle that his brother, Faramir, heard in a dream:

  See for the sword that was broken

  In Imladris it dwells.

  There shall be counsels taken

  Stronger than Morgul spells.

  There shall be shown a token

  That doom is near at hand.

  For Isildur’s Bane shall waken

  And the Halfling forth shall stand.

  On the surface, this is pretty clear, especially when it’s all explained to Boromir at the council. Yet he persists in misunderstanding bits of it, even when Tolkien practically hits him over the head with it. The same thing is true of Faramir when, later in the story, he actually meets Frodo and Samwise and learns of the Ring. We can only see Boromir’s failure to understand his riddle as a sign of the degeneration of the races of men and the evil that gnaws at the heart of Gondor. The lesson: When a bunch of elves, dwarves, hobbits, and men tell you something’s true—believe it.

  Aragorn’s Riddle

  When Bilbo first meets Aragon and the Ranger tells him his story, the hobbit is kind enough to make up a poem for the future king of Gondor in the form of riddling verse:

  All that is gold does not glitter.

  Not all those who wander are lost.

  The old that is strong does not wither.

  Deep roots are not touched by the frost.

  From the ashes a fire shall be woken.