Bilbo's Personality

 Oh, man. I sat on this question for a long time, but even after lots of thought I feel that it’s just way to broad a topic to write a “real” post about. So, what I’m doing instead is just listed a few main points to pay attention to when it comes to Bilbo’s personality/character.

• Incorruptible: Bilbo’s most important quality, I think, is the fact that he’s pretty much incorruptible - at the very least, he’s more incorruptible than his companions. We see several events during the story when the dwarves’ behavior changes because they’re feeling greedy, or proud, or vengeful. Bilbo doesn’t have this same problem. He isn’t particularly impressed by any of the treasure they find during the journey, he completely doesn’t understand the point of the Battle of Five Armies, and even after all that he goes through, and all that he learns about himself and his own abilities, all Bilbo wants to do in the end is go home to his hobbit-hole. Of course, this incorruptible nature is something that’s expanded on a great deal in LOTR, as Tolkien basically makes that a common hobbit trait, and a huge factor in Frodo’s quest to destroy the One Ring.
• Brave and Clever: For all that Bilbo is basically a stuffy homebody when the story starts, he does a lot of really brave and heroic things during the story, and proves several times how clever he is. He handles the entire troll situation a lot better than most people would, he navigates the encounter with Gollum carefully, and he stays alive a lot longer than most of the dwarves expected, I think. He saves everyone from the giant spiders (which is really quite impressive, when you think about it), he basically holds a battle of wits with Smaug, which is reallyimpressive. And when all the armies arrive, Bilbo is brave and wise and honorable enough to risk losing his friendship with Thorin and the dwarves in an attempt to avoid what he recognizes is pointless violence. Not bad for a simple hobbit.
• The Baggins vs. Took Conflict: A lot of Bilbo’s personality comes through in the “Baggins vs. Took” conflict that Tolkien brings up many times during the story. Bilbo constantly feels that the influence of both of his families play out like a tug-of-war for his behavior. Sometimes he feels a lot like a Baggins, and doesn’t want to do anything weird, and gets upset about missing breakfast, and misses his bed and his armchair and hates Gandalf and the dwarves for making his life complicated. But then other times he feels a lot like a Took, and is excited to be on an adventure and wants to see new places, and meet elves and big folk, and do amazing things, and he’s actually pretty happy that he met Gandalf and the dwarves. And he switches back and forth between these two sides throughout the story. I don’t think that any one family “won”, but I do think that, by the end of the story, Bilbo is comfortable with both sides of himself, and doesn’t feel quite so much anxiety over the conflict.

SOURCES: The Hobbit

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How to Pronounce "Smaug"

 According to Tolkien’s description of general pronunciation rules (which you can find in Appendix E of LotR), “au" is pronounced like the vowels in "how" or "loud" (not like in "laud")

So, Smaug should be pronounced “sm ow g.” If it helps, remember that the “au" in Smaug should sound the same as the "au" in Sauron ("s ow ron”)

That being said, I personally grew up pronouncing Smaug so that it rhymed with “smog.” And, in writing this post, I realize that this is probably because the 1977 Rankin/Bass animated Hobbit movie that I grew up watching also pronounced Smaug like “smog.” You’ll probably find a lot of fans (especially, I think, in the US) who pronounce it “Smog” ((EDIT: Also, many non-English translations either write it as “Smog”, or otherwise encourage this pronunciation)), but the correct version is how the Peter Jackson movies are pronouncing it, which is “Smowg”

SOURCES: LOTR Appendix E

Originally posted on askmiddlearth.tumblr.com

Ghosts in Middle Earth

 Yes there are! (This is the short answer.)

The long answer goes something more like this: There are undead spirits that linger in Middle Earth. There are also mentions of phantoms. Whether or not these two concepts combine to create a “traditional” ghost is unknown, though.

We see a few examples of what could be generally labelled as “ghosts” in Middle Earth. There are the Oathbreakers of Dunharrow, who haunt the Paths of the Dead. These are the spirits of deceased men who are trapped in Middle Earth because they broke their oaths. They basically just wait around for a couple thousand years until they have the opportunity to fulfill their oaths. After that, their spirits disappear (probably having finally passed on to the Halls of Mandos.)

There are also the lights that Frodo and Sam see in the Dead Marshes. Though the Peter Jackson adaptation showed actual ghostly figures in the water, in the book they see flames flickering over the marshes, and later faces staring up at them from the water. Gollum tells them that the faces appear when the lights do, and that the faces can only be seen, never touched. We know that the marshes themselves were created when a battlefield from the Second Age flooded over, and that the faces belong to the elves and men who died there. So they definitely count as some sort of ghosts.

Furthermore, Tolkien mentions in other writings that, occasionally, a spirit does not go to the Halls of Mandos after its body dies. He says that these spirits

Wander houseless in the world, unwilling to leave it and unable to inhabit it, haunting trees or springs or hidden places that once they knew. Not all of these are kindly or unstained by the Shadow. Indeed the refusal of the summons is in itself a sign of taint.

He then goes on to say (in the closest thing we have to a cultural discussion of ghosts in Middle Earth):

It is therefore a foolish and perilous thing, besides being a wrong deed forbidden justly by the appointed Rulers of Arda, if the Living seek to commune with the Unbodied, though the houseless may desire it, especially the most unworthy among them. For the Unbodied, wandering in the world, are those who at the least have refused the door of life and remain in regret and self-pity. Some are filled with bitterness, grievance, and envy. Some were enslaved by the Dark Lord and do his work still, though he himself is gone. They will not speak truth or wisdom. To call on them is folly. To attempt to master them and to make them servants of one own’s will is wickedness. Such practices are of Morgoth; and the necromancers are of the host of Sauron his servant.

SOURCES: LOTR, Histories of Middle Earth vol. 10 (“Laws and Customs Among the Eldar”)

Originally posted on askmiddlearth.tumblr.com