J. R. R. Tolkien: The Hobbit

HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.tolkien.co.uk

This new reset edition is based on the edition

first published in 1995

First published by HarperCollins Publishers 1991 Fifth edition (reset) 1995

First published in Great Britain by George Allen & Unwin 1937

Second edition 1951

Third edition 1966

Fourth edition 1978

Cover design by Holly Macdonald © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2020

Cover photographs © Shutterstock.com

Copyright © The Tolkien Estate Limited 1937, 1965

®and ‘Tolkien’ ®are registered trademarks of The Tolkien Estate Limited

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Source ISBN: 9780007525492

Ebook Edition © MARCH 2009 ISBN: 9780007322602

Version: 2020-03-23

The Hobbit is a tale of high adventure, undertaken by a company of dwarves, in search of dragon-guarded gold. A reluctant partner in this perilous quest is Bilbo Baggins, a comfort-loving, unambitious hobbit, who surprises even himself by his resourcefulness and his skill as a burglar.

Encounters with trolls, goblins, dwarves, elves and giant spiders, conversations with the dragon, Smaug the Magnificent, and a rather unwilling presence at the Battle of the Five Armies are some of the adventures that befall Bilbo. But there are lighter moments as well: good fellowship, welcome meals, laughter and song.

Bilbo Baggins has taken his place among the ranks of the immortals of children’s fiction. Written for Professor Tolkien’s own children, The Hobbit met with instant acclaim when published. It is a complete and marvellous tale in itself, but it also forms a prelude to The Lord of the Rings .

‘One of the most influential books of our generation’

The Times

CONTENTS

COVER PAGE

TITLE PAGE

COPYRIGHT

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

NOTE ON THE TEXT

AUTHOR’S NOTE

CHAPTER I: AN UNEXPECTED PARTY

CHAPTER II: ROAST MUTTON

CHAPTER III: A SHORT REST

CHAPTER IV: OVER HILL AND UNDER HILL

CHAPTER V: RIDDLES IN THE DARK

CHAPTER VI: OUT OF THE FRYING-PAN INTO THE FIRE

CHAPTER VII: QUEER LODGINGS

CHAPTER VIII: FLIES AND SPIDERS

CHAPTER IX: BARRELS OUT OF BOND

CHAPTER X: A WARM WELCOME

CHAPTER XI: ON THE DOORSTEP

CHAPTER XII: INSIDE INFORMATION

CHAPTER XIII: NOT AT HOME

CHAPTER XIV: FIRE AND WATER

CHAPTER XV: THE GATHERING OF THE CLOUDS

CHAPTER XVI: A THIEF IN THE NIGHT

CHAPTER XVII: THE CLOUDS BURST

CHAPTER XVIII: THE RETURN JOURNEY

CHAPTER XIX: THE LAST STAGE

KEEP READING

WORKS BY J.R.R. TOLKIEN

ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

Thror’s Map

The Trolls

The Mountain-path

The Misty Mountains looking West

Beorn’s Hall

The Elvenking’s Gate

Lake Town

The Front Gate

The Hall at Bag-End

Map of Wilderland

T he Hobbit was first published in September 1937. Its 1951 second edition (fifth impression) contains a significantly revised portion of Chapter V, “Riddles in the Dark,” which brings the story of The Hobbit more in line with its sequel, The Lord of the Rings , then in progress. Tolkien made some further revisions to the American edition published by Ballantine Books in February 1966, and to the British third edition (sixteenth impression) published by George Allen & Unwin later that same year.

For the 1995 British hardcover edition, published by HarperCollins, the text of The Hobbit was entered into word-processing files, and a number of further corrections of misprints and errors were made. Since then, various editions of The Hobbit have been generated from that computerized text file. For the present text, that file has been compared again, line by line, with the earlier editions, and a number of further corrections have been made to present a text that, as closely as possible, represents Tolkien’s final intended form.

Readers interested in details of the changes made at various times to the text of The Hobbit are referred to Appendix A, “Textual and Revisional Notes,” of The Annotated Hobbit (1988), and J. R. R. Tolkien: A Descriptive Bibliography by Wayne G. Hammond, with the assistance of Douglas A. Anderson (1993).

Douglas A. Anderson

May 2001

This is a story of long ago. At that time the languages and letters were quite different from ours of today. English is used to represent the languages. But two points may be noted. (1) In English the only correct plural of dwarf is dwarfs , and the adjective is dwarfish . In this story dwarves and dwarvish are used *, but only when speaking of the ancient people to whom Thorin Oakenshield and his companions belonged. (2) Orc is not an English word. It occurs in one or two places but is usually translated goblin (or hobgoblin for the larger kinds). Orc is the hobbits’ form of the name given at that time to these creatures, and it is not connected at all with our orc , ork , applied to sea-animals of dolphin-kind.

Runes were old letters originally used for cutting or scratching on wood, stone, or metal, and so were thin and angular. At the time of this tale only the Dwarves made regular use of them, especially for private or secret records. Their runes are in this book represented by English runes, which are known now to few people. If the runes on Thror’s Map are compared with the transcriptions into modern letters † †, the alphabet, adapted to modern English, can be discovered and the above runic title also read. On the Map all the normal runes are found, except for X. I and U are used for J and V. There was no rune for Q (use CW); nor for Z (the dwarf-rune may be used if required). It will be found, however, that some single runes stand for two modern letters: th, ng, ee ; other runes of the same kind ( ea and st ) were also sometimes used. The secret door was marked D . From the side a hand pointed to this, and under it was written: