 First editions (UK) | |
| Editor | John D. Rateliff |
|---|---|
| Author | J. R. R. Tolkien & John D. Rateliff |
| Illustrator | J. R. R. Tolkien |
| Cover artist | J. R. R. Tolkien |
| Language | English |
| Series | The History of The Hobbit |
| Genre | Literary studies |
| Publisher |
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Publication date | 2007 |
| Media type | |
| Pages | 905 |
The History of The Hobbit is a two-volume study ofJ. R. R. Tolkien's 1937 children'sfantasy novelThe Hobbit. It was first published byHarperCollins in 2007. It contains Tolkien's unpublished drafts of the novel, with commentary byJohn D. Rateliff.[1] It details Tolkien's various revisions toThe Hobbit, including abandoned revisions for the unpublished third edition of the work, intended for 1960, as well as previously unpublishedoriginal maps andillustrations drawn by Tolkien.[2]
The work provides the same sort ofliterary analysis ofThe Hobbit thatChristopher Tolkien's 12-volumeThe History of Middle-earth provides forThe Silmarillion andThe Lord of the Rings. In Rateliff's view, the work is complementary toDouglas A. Anderson's 1988 workThe Annotated Hobbit, which presents and comments upon a single text of the novel.
The History of The Hobbit consists of a collection of Tolkien's draft versions ofThe Hobbit, together withJohn Rateliff's commentary upon them. Rateliff organises the material into five phases of writing.
Phase 1 contains "The Pryftan Fragment" (6 pages, named for its early name forSmaug the dragon, representing the second half of Chapter 1) and "The Bladorthin Typescript" (12 pages, named for its early name forGandalf the wizard, representing the first half of Chapter 1, and overlapping with the Fragment).[3]
Most of the book is filled with a composite text of the manuscripts of phases 2 and 3 ofJ.R.R. Tolkien's drafting ofThe Hobbit, phase 2 being a nearly complete draft (continuing from the Typescript) and phase 3 being mainly afair copy of that.[3] Phase 3 consists of two typed versions (the incomplete "First Typescript" made by Tolkien, and the complete "Second Typescript" made byhis son Michael after he had injured one of his hands) of Chapters 1 to 12 and a piece of Chapter 14, all based on the phase 2 manuscript. Tolkien found his son's typescript inaccurate and returned to the "First Typescript", correcting it in manuscript and sending it to the printers.[3]
Phase 4 is Tolkien's rewritten version of the novel, ten years after its publication, in 1947. Phase 5 is his 1960 rewriting of Chapters 1 and 2, attempting to explain Gandalf's selection ofBilbo as the story's burglar.[3]
The book has numerous illustrations, including bothmaterials that Tolkien intended to use to support the text (maps, Bilbo'scontract written inTengwar and supposedly preserved after being left byThorin on the mantelpiece inBag End,paintings), and images of Tolkien's manuscripts and letters.[3] Rateliff has added detailed notes and appendices.[3]
WhenChristopher Tolkien began publishingThe History of Middle-earth, a 12-volume series documenting his father's writing process in the creation ofMiddle-earth, with texts dating from the 1910s to the 1970s, he made a conscious decision not to issue a volume detailing the creation ofThe Hobbit. Instead, it focuses onTolkien's legendarium, spanning the stories ofThe Silmarillion andThe Lord of the Rings.[4]
The task of creating a history ofThe Hobbit was given to Taum Santoski in the 1980s. Santoski had connections to theMarquette University collection of Tolkien material, which is where the original manuscripts reside. He died in 1991, and ultimately the task passed to theInklings scholarJohn D. Rateliff.The History of The Hobbit is in a similar vein to the "literary archaeology" of Christopher Tolkien'sThe History of Middle-earth.[5]
Rateliff states in the introduction thatThe History of The Hobbit is intended to complementDouglas A. Anderson's 1988The Annotated Hobbit. That book is a single text of Tolkien's novel, accompanied by Anderson's marginal notes, with over 150illustrations by Tolkien and other artists. In contrast, Rateliff's book has three goals: to present and explicate the earliest manuscript of Tolkien's novel; to document the novel's close connection toThe Silmarillion legendarium; and to explain what Tolkien was doing in the 1947 and 1960 revisions, the latter abortively seeking to harmonise the novel withThe Lord of the Rings.[6]
The Tolkien scholarTom Shippey welcomed the book, noting that until its appearance, the best-known history ofThe Hobbit was contained inHumphrey Carpenter's 1977biography of Tolkien, which was clear, famous, and left several questions unanswered. Rateliff's account goes into much greater detail. Shippey commented that the two volumes "lead us into the very engine-room of [Tolkien's] creation."[3] He was surprised to discover that Tolkien was initially "rather unconcerned about names"; for instance, Thorin's grandfather, who made the map of theLonely Mountain, was initially called "Fimbulfambi" rather than "the appropriately dwarvish name Thror". "Fimbulfambi" is Eddic, but it means "great fool, a person who cannot make conversation".[3] Shippey discussed whether the text ofThe Hobbit could now be described as final, given all the variants that Rateliff documents, and noting Tolkien's struggles with the mistaken corrections made by proof-readers and copy-editors; he concluded that it was possibly now time to leave the text alone. He added that they "will take a great deal of digesting", providing "vital primary evidence for scholarship" and "great entertainment" forTolkien fans.[3]
Jason Fisher, reviewing the book forMythlore, said it was worth the very long wait (from 1991), describing the account as "riveting". The book had three purposes: to present the earliest manuscript version; to show that it was,pace Christopher Tolkien, connected to the tradition ofThe Silmarillion; and to examine both Tolkien's revision of 1947 giving the familiar text, and his abandoned 1960 rewrite, which would have refashioned the whole book "to bring it into greater harmony with the mood, language, and geography ofThe Lord of the Rings." Fisher describes the books' layout as "meticulously systematic" and comparable to Christopher Tolkien'sHistory of Middle-earth. He finds the book rich in "wonderful surprises", among them thatThorin Oakenshield would have been Gandalf the Dwarf, while theWizard of that name would have been called Bladorthin; and Tolkien considered havingBilbo Baggins thehobbit navigateMirkwood using a ball of rolled-up spider silk "likeTheseus in theMinotaur's labyrinth". He enjoyed, too, the appendices with previously unpublished illustrations, including a facsimile of the Dwarves' letter which Bilbo found under the clock on his mantelpiece. For Fisher, however, the most interesting addition was the unfinished 1960 rewrite of the first three chapters, adding detail of passing throughBree, for example, but losing much of the humour. In his view, it was just as well that Tolkien abandoned the attempt. He was more critical of Rateliff's essays, which he found generally but not uniformly illuminating and erudite. All the same, the book was in his view ambitious, brilliant, and indispensable.[6]
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