The Hobbit

The title of this article is ambiguous. Further meanings are listed under The Hobbit (disambiguation) .

The Hobbit - Front cover of the first American edition

The Hobbit or There and Back (English original title: The Hobbit or There and Back Again ) is a fantasy novel for children by JRR Tolkien , which he wrote between 1930 (or 1931) and 1936 and which was published for the first time on September 21, 1937 by George Allen & Unwin appeared. It was later supplemented by the novel The Lord of the Rings . The work was first translated into German in 1957 by Walter Scherf under the title Der kleine Hobbit (initially: Little Hobbit and the Great Magician ). The translation by Wolfgang Krege from 1997 uses the translation of the original title as the title.

The background for these two fantastic works is the mythology devised by Tolkien (see Tolkien's world ). The Hobbit was originally conceived as a story for Tolkien's own children. After the publication of The Lord of the Rings , Tolkien made changes to the Hobbit , primarily to resolve factual contradictions to the other works.

action

In the idyllic Shire in the west of the continent of Middle-earth , the humanoid people of the small, cozy, peaceful and sedentary hobbits live .

One day the magician Gandalf and 13 dwarfs in his entourage ( Thorin , Bifur, Bofur, Fili, Kili, Dori, Nori, Ori, Oin, Glóin , Balin , Dwalin and Bombur) appear in the cave of Bilbo Baggins to stop by him . This event turns the previously well-ordered world of the hobbit on its head. Because his thirst for adventure seizes him for a moment, he suddenly sees himself appointed as a master thief: He is supposed to help the dwarves to regain their treasure stolen by the dragon Smaug . As payment, he is promised a fourteenth of the treasure. Not only does the existence of dragons appear questionable to hobbits and their adventures are loathed: Mount Erebor , where the dragon lives with the stolen treasure, is also located in a distant land in the east of Middle-earth. Despite all doubts and later repentance, Bilbo sets off to the east with the dwarves and Gandalf.

The arduous journey leads through eerie landscapes and mountains that are made unsafe by strange beings. One evening when they decide to take a rest at dusk, they notice that Gandalf is no longer with them. In a small wood they discover a firelight and send Bilbo out to scout the place. There are three big trolls frying mutton. They discover Bilbo and catch the dwarfs. But before the trolls can eat their prisoners, they are outwitted by Gandalf and finally freeze to stone when the morning sun rises. Finally the tour group finds the trolls cave in which they hid their prey. This is how Bilbo got his elven short sword Stich (in the translation by Walter Scherf it is called a sting .)

Runes used by JRR Tolkien in the Hobbit . k , oo and sh are extensions of the runic alphabet through him.

After this experience, the community seeks out Rivendell , where the half-elf Elrond lives with his elven people . This place is called “Imladris” in the Elven language or “the last cozy house east of the sea”. There they learn from Elrond that there is a secret inscription on Thorin Oakenshield's card , which his father Thrain left him. It is written with moon runes and can only be read in the moonlight on a particular night. So they find out about a side door in the flank of Mount Erebor, through which one can get into the mountain unnoticed.

The tour company sets off to cross the Fog Mountains . They find a cave they want to stay in. There they are surprised and captured by orcs . The magician Gandalf initiates an attempt to escape, in which Bilbo is lost and finds himself alone in the cave system. Gandalf and the dwarves escape the orcs.

In a remote corridor, Bilbo finds a ring and takes it. At the edge of a lake in the middle of the mountain, he meets Gollum , a mysterious and cunning creature who lives on a small island in the middle of the lake. Gollum, who previously owned the ring that Bilbo had found, hadn't even noticed its loss at the time. Gollum proposes a puzzle game to Bilbo in which he offers to show Bilbo the exit from the underground caves in the event of a victory. However, should Bilbo lose, Gollum would have the right to eat him. Bilbo wins the game, but Gollum doesn't want to keep his promise, he wants to kill Bilbo anyway. Under a pretext, he goes back to the island to get his ring for help. Only now does he notice the loss of the ring he is obsessed with and suspect that Bilbo has found it. Full of anger, he paddles back to the bank, Bilbo recognizes the danger and flees. He falls, accidentally slips the ring over his finger and recognizes its ability to make the wearer invisible. He pursues Gollum, who is desperately looking for him, and thus finds an exit from the cave labyrinth.

Bilbo gets outside again and after a short time finds his way back to the dwarves and Gandalf. They lost all their equipment. Bilbo reports on his escape, initially keeps the secret of the ring and its properties to himself and thus gains the respect of his companions for his successful escape. But they are not yet safe and have to flee from the orcs who are chasing them and are supported by wolves. So the persecuted take refuge on tall pine trees , from where they are to be brought down by fire or burned. But at the last moment they are saved by great eagles.

The big birds drop the rescued people on a rocky island in the Anduin River called Carrock. From here, Gandalf leads them to Beorn fur converter (in the filming skin changer called), which has the ability to transform into a bear. There they rest for a few days before Beorn equips them with new equipment, provisions and ponies and continues on their way. You get to the night forest (also called gloomy forest). From there they have to continue their way on foot and without Gandalf, who supposedly has something urgent to do.

Without Gandalf's guidance, Bilbo and the dwarves wander along the endless forest path until they run out of supplies at the end. Eventually they meet giant spiders , by which the dwarfs are caught, spun into and almost eaten. However, Bilbo manages to distract the spiders and free the dwarfs.

Desperate and hungry, the tour group tries to finally find a way out of the forest. They come across the wood elves, a shy people who live in a cave fortress. As unwanted intruders, the dwarves are captured and imprisoned. After all, they are now being supplied with food again. Bilbo is able to hide with the help of the ring and frees the dwarves by hiding them in empty storage barrels, which are then pushed through a hatch into the forest river in order to raft them to Seestadt (also known as Esgaroth ). In this way they leave the night forest again.

The dwarves don't like this kind of travel and are very happy when Bilbo finally frees them from the barrels again. In the meantime they are given a warm welcome in Seestadt, because the people there believe in an old prophecy, according to which the dwarves will return and so that the old splendor and wealth of bygone days will shine anew.

After their stay with the people, they head to Mount Erebor. The former dwarf settlement inside the mountain is now used as a dwelling by the dragon Smaug. But now the dwarves know that there is a secret side door, and they begin to search the slope of the mountain for it. You enter the mountain through the secret door. With the help of the ring, Bilbo manages to steal a golden cup from the dragon from his hoard during an initial exploration . The dragon then becomes enraged and searches for the invisible intruder. In his anger, he smashes the mountain side on which the secret door is, and flies to Esgaroth to devastate the city, because he suspects that the people from Seaside Town were behind the theft.

Because the exit is destroyed, Bilbo and the dwarves venture down into the hall and discover that Smaug is no longer there. You search the hall and examine the treasures, including the famous Arkenstein , an heirloom of Thorin Eichenschild. By chance, this jewel fell into Bilbo's hands, as Thorin allowed him to choose some of the treasure as a share. Only later does Bilbo find out that this stone was excluded from it.

Smaug is killed in Esgaroth by the archer Bard, a descendant of the ancient kings of the destroyed city of Thal . This only succeeds because Bilbo had previously seen the only vulnerable point on the dragon's body and Bard was informed of this through a speaking thrush. In his agony, Smaug ravages and destroys the city and falls into the lake. Now the people from Seestadt are homeless and urgently need help. So they ask the wood elves for help and set off to Erebor to recover the treasures there. They believe the dwarves were killed by Smaug.

Meanwhile, Bilbo and the dwarves are enjoying the treasure they have recovered. After the death of Smaug and the destruction of Esgaroth, elves come from the night forest who want to help the people of Seestadt by bringing the citizens of the city to the gates of the old dwarf settlement. They too claim part of the liberated treasure, because Smaug had also hoarded valuables from Thal there. However, Thorin refuses to give them any support.

Bilbo sneaks out to negotiate secretly with Bard and the Elf King . Here he uses the Arkenstein because he knows that Thorin would give anything to get this gem back. A short time later Gandalf reappears and tries to get Thorin to give in. But this is only more stubborn than before due to the alleged betrayal of Bilbo.

The dwarves call their relatives for help, and soon three armies face each other on the Erebor: elves and humans on one side, the dwarves on the other. Because of the dwarves' refusal to share the treasure and their great dislike for the elves, the battle breaks out. But shortly after the first fighting began, a huge army of orcs unexpectedly approaches and turns the previously hostile parties into allies in need. Unexpectedly, Beorn rushes to help, and the Eagles of the Misty Mountains also appear, and so together they manage to defeat the orcs in the Battle of the Five Armies . Thorin Eichenschild, the leader of the 13 dwarfs, and his nephews Fíli and Kíli are killed in the battle.

Bilbo comes home with the magic ring and a box of gold and silver each from the treasure, accompanied by Gandalf. After a final visit to Rivendell, they finally reach the Shire again at the end of a long journey back.

When he arrived in Hobbiton, Bilbo had to find out that he had meanwhile been declared dead and that he was auctioning his belongings on that very day. Bilbo can just prevent this from happening. To the annoyance of his greedy relatives, the Sackheim-Baggins, he repossesses his comfortable cave. From now on, eyed suspiciously by the hobbits because of his escapade, Bilbo tries to return to his leisurely life. For him, this means eating six large meals a day, smoking his pipe and also writing down his adventures in a book.

Influences

→ Main article : European history and mythology in Tolkien's world

The names of the dwarfs and Gandalfs are taken from a place in the Old Norse Völuspá , the so-called Dvergatal , in which a number of dwarf names are listed. Individual plot elements (for example the thief who steals a cup from a dragon's lair ) come from the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf .

The Hobbit was probably written around the same time that the story Roverandom was written . In Tolkien's drawings for the two works in particular, there are some striking similarities.

Translations

As early as 1938, George Allen & Unwin negotiated with the Potsdam publisher Rütten & Loening about a translation of the Hobbit . However, a contract was not concluded because Tolkien refused to provide the Aryan proof required by the German publisher .

There are two German translations of the book: the older one by Walter Scherf (1957; again comprehensively revised by Scherf in 1971) under the title Der kleine Hobbit (appears in the editions of dtv Verlag) and the newer one by Wolfgang Krege (1997) under the Title The Hobbit or There and Back (in the editions of Klett-Cotta Verlag ).

The more recent translation ( Wolfgang Krege ) follows the text of the third edition from 1966, revised by Tolkien, matches many proper names, formulations and the narrative tone to the German translation of The Lord of the Rings by Margaret Carroux and contains - albeit partially abbreviated - the Poems and songs from the original, some of which were left out in Scherf's older German translation. In contrast to his controversial new translation of The Lord of the Rings , Krege's translation of The Hobbit met with more approval, even if some of the deficiencies criticized there (the "sifting" of the characters, the "flippant" tone) can also be found in his Hobbit version. Some of the newly translated songs in particular are considered to have not been optimally translated into German. For example, he translates

"Old Tomnoddy, all big body, / Old Tomnoddy can't spy me!" With
"Lazy old wiggle bitch / Do you need a flashlight?"

On the occasion of the launch of the first part of the Hobbit film series in December 2012, Klett-Cotta Verlag also brought new editions of the book onto the market this calendar year. Posthumously - Wolfgang Krege had already died in 2005 - some translations that were often criticized by Middle-earth fans were again brought into line with the films: As in the original and in the Scherf translation, the trolls from Chapter 2 are called William ("Bill"), Tom and Bert whereas Krege had named her Hucki, Toni and Berti in the previous editions of his translation. Small things like the flashlight in the line of poetry quoted above were also corrected. Since the 2012 editions, this has been a “little lamp”.

Adaptations

The first filmic implementation was the 12-minute, animated short film The Hobbit from 1966 by the US illustrator Gene Deitch , produced by William L. Snyder . Snyder had acquired the film rights from Tolkien in 1964 and owned them until 1966.

In 1977 the directors Jules Bass and Arthur Rankin Jr. filmed . the Hobbit as an animated version for Canadian and Japanese television, under the name The Hobbit . Well-known filmmakers such as John Huston as Gandalf and Otto Preminger as King of the Elves could be won as speakers . Since this film, like The Last Unicorn, was produced together with Tokyo Movie Shinsha , it is stylistically very similar to the unicorn film adaptation.

In 1985, a real- life Soviet film was made for Leningrad television by the director Vladimir Latischeff . In the film shown on Soviet television, the actor Zinovi Gerdt leads the story as the narrator.

In 1980 a radio play version four and a half hours was created on behalf of the WDR under the direction of Heinz Dieter Köhler . The speakers included Martin Benrath as the narrator, Horst Bollmann as Bilbo, Bernhard Minetti as Gandalf and Jürgen von Manger as Gollum . In March 2008 the audio book Der Hobbit was published in a translation by Wolfgang Krege as an unabridged reading by Gert Heidenreich at Hörverlag .

In the late 1980s, Alpha Comic Verlag published a German translation of a version drawn by David Wenzel, with a text adaptation by Charles Dixon. It is published today by Carlsen Verlag . In 2003, a parody by literary scholar Adam Roberts appeared in Great Britain under the title The Soddit (German: The Little Hobbnix ).

Video games were quite successful in 1982, 1984 and 2003 in the United Kingdom , Germany and the United States .

Peter Jackson's cinematic adaptation

→ Main article : The Hobbit (film trilogy)

A three-part real- life version of The Hobbit , produced by Warner Bros. and MGM , was released in 2012, 2013 and 2014. There were already considerations during the filming of the Lord of the Rings trilogy . The driving force behind the project was Peter Jackson , who occupied the positions of executive producer and director. Together with Philippa Boyens , Fran Walsh and Peter Jackson, Guillermo del Toro worked on the scripts, which was initially supposed to direct. Due to repeated postponements by MGM, he gave up this plan so as not to jeopardize his other film projects, and Jackson took over.

Shooting started on March 21, 2011 in New Zealand . Some of the actors who had already worked in the film adaptation of The Lord of the Rings were already established as actors: Ian McKellen as Gandalf, Andy Serkis as Gollum and Hugo Weaving as Elrond. Furthermore, were Orlando Bloom as Legolas, Cate Blanchett as Galadriel, Elijah Wood as Frodo and Christopher Lee as Saruman reoccupied. It was only announced in October 2010 that Martin Freeman would play the main role of Bilbo Baggins; Thorin Eichenschild is portrayed by Richard Armitage . Like Gollum , the dragon Smaug is represented by motion capture ; for this Benedict Cumberbatch could be won as an actor.

From a technical point of view, current ideas such as 3D and an increased frame rate of 48 frames / second, the so-called high frame rate , were used for the film . The latter served as an antidote for problems that occur with otherwise common 24 frames / second recordings, e.g. B. Motion blur due to slower shutter speeds, shaking images or the cartwheel effect .

In terms of content, the story of Tolkien was adapted in some places and embellished considerably in order to generate three full-length feature films from the children's book of just under 400 pages, which are also able to captivate adults. The story of the hobbit is far less complex than that of the Lord of the Rings, for example. In order to resolve discrepancies between the novels, Tolkien added some annexes with explanations to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. These appendices served as the basis for some of the side scenes in the film.

Video games

The Hobbit was released as a PC game in 2003 by Sierra Entertainment together with Vivendi Universal Games as an adventure for the following platforms:

• Xbox: November 26, 2003.
• PC: November 28, 2003.
• PS2: December 2nd, 2003.
• GameCube: December 5, 2003.
• There is also an earlier text adventure version for 8-bit home computers such as Amstrad CPC , Apple II , BBC Micro , Commodore 64 , Macintosh , MSX , Oric , PC Booter , ZX Spectrum . (Addison-Wesley Publishing Company 1982)

After the remake of Peter Jackson, Lego released the video game The Hobbit in 2014.

The game was released for the following platforms: Xbox One , Xbox 360 , PlayStation 4 , PlayStation 3 , Wii U , Nintendo 3DS , PlayStation Vita and PC

Radio play version and audio book

As a radio play version

• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit. (WDR production from 1980, newly published by DHV). der Hörverlag, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-89584-918-9 . (270 min. Speakers: Martin Benrath , Horst Bollmann , Bernhard Minetti and others, director: Heinz D. Köhler, in German.)
• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit. (WDR production from 1980, nostalgic edition on vinyl records). The HörVerlag, Munich 2013, ISBN 978-3-8445-1218-2 .

as an audio book

• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit. DHV Der HörVerlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-86717-443-5 . (654 min. Complete reading. Read by Gert Heidenreich , in German. Awarded the Hörkules 2010.)

literature

English language editions

• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit or There and Back Again. George Allen & Unwin, London 1937. (first edition)
• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit or There and Back Again. George Allen & Unwin, London 1951. (Second revised edition)
• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit or There and Back Again. George Allen & Unwin, London 1966. (Third revised edition)
• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit or There and Back Again. Houghton Mifflin, Boston 1938. (American first edition).
• JRR Tolkien: The Annotated Hobbit. Houghton Mifflin, Boston 1988, ISBN 0-395-47690-9 . (The edition, scientifically annotated by Douglas A. Anderson , documents all of the changes Tolkien made in the various English editions of The Hobbit.)

German editions

• JRR Tolkien: Little Hobbit and the Great Wizard. Paulus Verlag (later: Georg Bitter Verlag), Recklinghausen 1957. (later: Der kleine Hobbit. First German translation by Walter Scherf )
• JRR Tolkien: The Little Hobbit. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1974, ISBN 3-7903-0133-7 . (Translation by Walter Scherf)
• JRR Tolkien: The Little Hobbit. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-423-08559-2 . (Translation by Walter Scherf)
• JRR Tolkien: The Little Hobbit. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-423-59079-3 . (Translation by Walter Scherf)
• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit or There and Back. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-608-93818-4 (new translation by Wolfgang Krege )
• JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit: or There and Back. The original of the film. Klett Kotta, Stuttgart 2012, ISBN 978-3-608-93977-4 . (Translation by Wolfgang Krege)

Secondary literature

• John D. Rateliff: The History of The Hobbit . HarperCollins, London 2007, ISBN 978-0-618-96847-3 .
  • Volume 1: Mr Baggins. ISBN 978-0-00-723555-1 .
  • Volume 2: Return of Bag-End. ISBN 978-0-00-725066-0 .
• Matthias Bode: JRR Tolkien: The Hobbit. (= King's Explanations and Materials. Volume 402). C. Bange Verlag, Hollfeld 2002, ISBN 3-8044-1688-8 .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Michael Everson, Andrew West: Proposal to encode additional Runic characters in the UCS. (PDF) Unicode Consortium, April 1, 2011, accessed on January 1, 2017 (English). 
2. ↑ letters. No. 29, 30.
3. ↑ On the making of the film "The Hobbit" and link to the film
4. ↑ BP v. Weymarn: The Hobbit from the Soviet Union. In: Russia Today. December 13, 2012.
5. ↑ The Hobbit. at the Hörverlag.
6. ^ Heat Vision Blog, film start postponed from April 28, 2010.
7. ↑ The one Ring.net : Director del Toro quits May 30, 2010.
8. ↑ Ben Child: Week in geek: Why Peter Jackson must step in to direct The Hobbit. In: The Guardian. Retrieved December 29, 2015 . 
9. ^ Wall Street Journal: 'The Hobbit' Gets a Date. Retrieved March 3, 2011 . 
10. ↑ Elbenwald: Gandalf exudes anticipation in an interview about Hobbit shooting on October 14, 2009.
11. ↑ Elbenwald: Andy Serkis as Gollum in the Hobbit with him again from December 14, 2009.
12. ↑ collinder: Orlando talked about how excited he is to work with Peter Jackson again for The Hobbit, which he just received the full script for. dated April 6, 2011.
13. ↑ viviano: Elijah Wood & Cate Blanchett grope in the dark! dated April 11, 2011.
14. ↑ MovieGod: moviegod.de of January 12, 2011.
15. ↑ Film starts : "The Hobbit": Peter Jackson confirms Martin Freeman as Bilbo
16. ↑ Website with articles about the Hobbit film. ( Memento from December 1, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) on tolkiens-welt.de, accessed on June 18, 2011.
17. ↑ Film technique: The Hobbit officially begins shooting on epic cameras from March 21, 2011.
18. ↑ Peter Jackson: 48 Frames Per Second. Retrieved July 13, 2011 . 
19. ↑ magazin.GesundSuchen.de . The Little Hobbit: Revolution in Middle-earth and Insights into the Video Diary. Retrieved January 2, 2012.
20. ↑ mobygames.com
21. ↑ LEGO.com VideoGames What's New - LEGO® The Hobbit (TM) - About the Game - News. In: videogames.lego.com. Retrieved November 4, 2016 . 
22. ↑ "The Hobbit" on vinyl In: Die Zeit . from October 25, 2013.