The Hero is a Hobbit

The Fellowship of the Ring, by J.R.R. Tolkien

By W. H. Auden, New York Times

Seventeen years ago there appeared, without any fanfare, a book called
"The Hobbit" which, in my opinion, is one of the best children's stories of this
century. In "The Fellowship of the Ring," which is the first volume of a
trilogy, J. R. R. Tolkien continues the imaginative history of the imaginary
world to which he introduced us in his earlier book but in a manner suited to
adults, to those, that is, between the ages of 12 and 70. For anyone who likes
the genre to which it belongs, the Heroic Quest, I cannot imagine a more
wonderful Christmas present. All Quests are concerned with some numinous
Object, the Waters of Life, the Grail, buried treasure etc.; normally this is a
good Object which it is the Hero's task to find or to rescue from the Enemy,
but the Ring of Mr. Tolkien's story was made by the Enemy and is so
dangerous that even the good cannot use it without being corrupted.
The Enemy believed that it had been lost forever, but he has just
discovered that it has come providentially into the hands of the Hero and is
devoting all his demonic powers to its recovery, which would give him the
lordship of the world. The only way to make sure of his defeat is to destroy
the Ring, but this can only be done in one way and in one place which lies in
the heart of the country; the task of the Hero, therefore, is to get the Ring to
the place of its unmaking without getting caught.
The hero, Frodo Baggins, belongs to a race of beings called hobbits, who
may be only three feet high; have hairy feet and prefer to live in underground
houses, but in their thinking and sensibility resemble very closely those
arcadian rustics who inhabit so many British detective stories. I think some
readers may find the opening chapter a little shy-making, nut they must not
let themselves be put off, for, once the story gets moving, this initial archness
disappears.
For over a thousand years the hobbits have been living a peaceful
existence in a fertile district called the Shire, incurious about the world

outside. Actually, the latter is rather sinister; towns have fallen to ruins,
roads into disrepair, fertile fields have returned to wilderness, wild beasts
and evil beings on the prowl, and travel is difficult and dangerous. In
addition to the Hobbits, there are Elves who are wise and good, Dwarves who
are skillful and good on the whole, and Men, some warriors, some wizards,
who are good or bad. The present incarnation of the Enemy is Sauron, Lord of
Barad-Dur, the Dark Tower in the Land of Mordor. Assisting him are the
Orcs, wolves and other horrid creatures and, of course, such men as his power
attracts or overawes. Landscape, climate and atmosphere are northern,
reminiscent of the Icelandic sagas.
The first thing that one asks is that the adventure should be various
and exciting; in this respect Mr. Tolkien's invention is unflagging, and, on the
primitive level of wanting to know what happens next, "The Fellowship of the
Ring" is at least as good as "The Thirty-Nine Steps." Of any imaginary world
the reader demands that it seem real, and the standard of realism demanded
today is much stricter than in the time, say, of Malory. Mr. Tolkien is
fortunate in possessing an amazing gift for naming and a wonderfully exact
eye for description; by the time one has finished his book one knows the
histories of Hobbits, Elves, Dwarves and the landscape they inhabit as well
as one knows one's own childhood.
Lastly, if one is to take a tale of this kind seriously, one must feel that,
however superficially unlike the world we live in its characters and events
may be, it nevertheless holds up the mirror to the only nature we know, our
own; in this, too, Mr. Tolkien has succeeded superbly, and what happened in
the year of the Shire 1418 in the Third Age of Middle Earth is not only
fascinating in A. D. 1954 but also a warning and an inspiration. No fiction I
have read in the last five years has given me more joy than "The Fellowship
of the Ring."