Epic Tolkien Bookclub: Week Four

[sigridhr]

  Epic Tolkien Bookclub: Week Four (The Hobbit)
Chapter VII: Queer Lodgings 
Chapter VIII: Flies and Spiders

Rules

I very much doubt we'll require much in the way of formal rules, but just for the sake of formality and clarity:

• Discussion is welcome and encouraged, as is disagreement. Name-calling and personal attacks will be punished by forced attendance at the Vogon-Orcish Poetry Recitation Competition in Minas Morgul.  
  
• There is no spoiler policy in place. Although we're reading the Hobbit, please feel free to bring in things from other Tolkien works, any of the films, the History of Middle Earth, the Letters of JRR Tolkien, and, if you should like, other literary sources. 
• There is no such thing as too much geekery. Or taking the text too seriously.  
• If you have any concerns at any point, I'm the closest thing this gong show has to a mod, so feel free to get in touch. I can be reached either by PM through this site, or directly by email at sigridhr.lokidottir@gmail.com. 

Discussion on this post will officially run from Friday 1st February 2013 to Friday 8th February 2013. However, the post will remain open after that point, so you're more than welcome to continue discussions on. 

Comments

[j_quadrifrons]

SO this is probably only relevant/interesting if you've read the Silmarillion, but I have two theories about how the Sil crept its way into the Hobbit while Tolkien was writing, and this is where the first of them comes in. I think Thranduil (the elf-king of The Hobbit, who's never actually named until the Appendices of LotR) was originally meant to be Elu Thingol, Elwë, and when Tolkien wrote Lord of the Rings and further developed the Sil stories he relocated some things in time and space.

Thranduil and Thingol are the only Elves who live in caves, which is pretty damn unusual for Elves - heck, even Legolas does a lot of complaining about caves in LotR, and he presumably grew up in Thranduil's cave-palace. The story about theft and/or payment causing a rift between the elf-king and the dwarves is damn near identical to the story in "Of the Ruin of Doriath" about Thingol and the Nauglamír, except for the part where Thingol gets killed.

Exactly how much of the story of Thingol and Doriath was written when Tolkien wrote The Hobbit is hard to say, but the similarities positively drip. Of course, by the time of LotR, Tolkien reconciled the two by naming the elf-king Thranduil, son of Oropher. Oropher was a refugee from Doriath, a survivor of the battle which killed Thingol, so now the two stories resonate nicely together. Thranduil has as much reason to distrust Dwarves as Thorin has to distrust Elves.

[sigridhr]

I LIKE THIS THEORY A LOT. A LOT A LOT.

[j_quadrifrons]

Wait until the next one comes in!

Also, thanks entirely to this theory, I have now started rewriting the whole history of the Fall of Doriath with added Thingol/Telchar. My brain insists on the parallel.

[sigridhr]

THINGOL/TELCHAR. OH GODS YES.

*flails about like a flaily thing*