Concerning Hobbits
This is the first in a series of essays: Frodo’s Journey, in which I analyze Frodo from a mythic perspective.
When I was in my teens and read Lord of the Rings, I thought Aragorn was the hero of the story. In many ways, this makes a lot of sense. He is the classic model of the hero. He is the noble son hidden away in the rags of a commoner, destined to be king of the land. His path to that kingship makes for an epic tale. And indeed, it is a tale that has been told many times before, perhaps most famously with King Arthur.
As a medievalist, Tolkien no doubt intended Aragorn to fill the role of such a figure. To a modern reader, he is a lofty figure, elevated far above the concerns or capabilities of our lives. If Aragorn had indeed been the primary hero of the story, it still would have been a great story. But like the Silmarillion, it likely would have been difficult to connect with. We would have been quite removed from it and could only admire it from a distance.
In the film versions, Jackson made some serious changes to Aragorn’s character, making him a self-doubting person who obsessed over his weaknesses, who wasn’t sure if he was fit to be king, etc. This is quite different from the book, where Aragorn announces that he will retake the throne at the council of Elrond.
It wasn’t until much later did I realize that the awesome figure of Aragorn is not what makes the Lord of the Rings great. It is the hobbits, especially Frodo and Sam. Now, much could be said about Samwise, but here I want to focus on Frodo.
Frodo is, without question, a hero. But first, let us understand the different categories of the heroic. Because the LoTR is so epic and vast, Tolkien gives us many different types of heroes, and on several levels.
At the top we have the mythic heroes, such as Gandalf and Galadriel. These figures are so far removed from normal human life that reading about them is much like reading mythology. These figures seem to have one foot in heaven and the other on earth. Their vision spans eons and their words are sometimes cryptic, as their view of existence is so far elevated beyond the everyday. These figures are important, as they allow Tolkien to have a word that shades into the divine through a Great Chain of Being, but they are not figures we can really relate to.
Below these giants, there are the legendary heroes. These figures are mortals who exist in our world, but exist as the apex of mortal life. This is where Aragorn resides. As a man, he eats, sleeps, feels doubt, falls in love--just as we do. But he does all these things on a scale that is quite larger than us. Aside from his length of years, the figure of Aragorn represents the possible, no matter how unlikely. He is an idealized vision of masculinity, a perfect archetype. Much as we might aspire to live like the saints, we can in some ways connect to Aragorn. But his story doesn’t really reflect ours.
With hobbits we get everyday heroes. These hobbits, which Tolkien sort of accidentally invented, that allows his entire legendarium to work. In part, this is true for a simple narrative reason. It allows Aragorn and Gandalf to explain the world to the hobbits, and therefore to us. If it were just Gandalf and Aragorn, Tolkien would be faced with two awkward choices: either Aragorn is explaining things to Gandalf that he knows quite well, or else we would need huge blocks of exposition to explain things. This is partly why the Lord of the Rings is readable by the average person and the Silmarillion is not, as the latter has no hobbits, and hardly any humans even.
But the presence of the hobbits is more important even than this narrative device. Because the LoTR is more than a simple story, as fans of the work will be quick to tell you. It is a work of art that brushes up against something so profound and deep that it is difficult to even put it into words. Sadly, many will just see “silly fantasy” and never touch those depths. But such was the case even in Tolkien’s time.
It is no small fact that Middle Earth was ultimately saved by hobbits, and not by the great and wise. While we can be awed and inspired by Aragorn returning to the throne, it isn’t a path that we are likely to follow. And again, there is value in being inspired by his path, even for those of us who must tend to the world by going to work, caring for our families, mowing our lawns, and any number of other unepic duties. There is value even here. For in such figures we are given a taste of our birthright, our ultimate capability. Aragorn is, to use a Jungian idea, an image of the Self.
But for most of us, while we can admire such a man, the distance is to great for us to really know what to do with it in a practical sense.
With a character like Frodo, an everyday hero, we can finally find some common ground. Frodo is a middle-class bachelor with no great destiny before him (or it seems). He is not a wizard or one of the wise. He is the heir to a nice hobbit hole, not a throne. And yet...we are told that he often had a sense that he was indeed meant to do something with his life. That even though he was not really strong, or a genius, or rich, or anything else, he had a purpose. He was meant to have the ring.
I know a number of people who in our times have felt despair because they feel like the world is coming a part, that all is falling into darkness. This sentiment is quite strong with people from all sorts of backgrounds. And here I think that works like the Lord of the Rings shines like the light of a distant star, because it shows us a vision of Frodo, who constantly struggles towards The Good, in a seemingly hopeless world. For ultimately, there is indeed still good and beauty in the world, and it is worth fighting for. Perhaps the struggles we face in life are struggles we were meant to face.
