# Contrast in Elves: Hobbit and LOTR



## Flammifer (Jun 16, 2003)

It's pretty obvious that in the Hobbit the Mirkwood Elves are arrogant, and unreliable (for example the butler who gets drunk at the barrel-storing place) and flawed. This is very contrasting to LOTR, who Tolkien portrays as flawless and wise and kind. 

Also, the King of the Elves of Mirkwood talks about how strong the magic on his door is. Magic is a concept totally foreign to all Elves in LOTR. An elf in Lorien says "I do not know what you mean by that [magic]", when one of the hobbits asks if the cloaks are magic. In LOTR, Elves of course have some sort of magic or power, but it is subtle. 

It is the same with Dwarves in the Hobbit. The door to the Lonely Mountain is said to be magic, although I don't know of any magic Dwarf-doors other than this one. That's besides the Moria doors which were made by Elves.

Is this simply because The Hobbit is a children's book and The Lord of the Rings is not?


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## Celebthôl (Jun 16, 2003)

it is more to do with the fact that the Hobbit, was made much earlier, and wasnt meant to be part of a series until much later, it was when it was first published just a "childrens book" not part of anything else, it was a common fantsy book, that is why there are discrepancies etc...


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## Lantarion (Jun 16, 2003)

Yes, the Hobbit was written a very long time before Tolkien had any clear conception of the Sylvan Elves. He had been working on the Noldoli (Noldor), Solosimpi (Teleri) and Teleri (Vanyar) and their exploits in the First Age, but hadn't concentrated much on the Third Age Elves (AFAIK, I'm not sure now).
Most concepts, in fact, are quite preliminary in the Hobbit as I see it.. But it is yet another interesting period in the evolution of Tolkien's ideas from the Book of Lost Tales to the published Silmarillion.
Gosh, maybe this should be in the HoME section..!


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## Khalid (Jun 16, 2003)

First of all, I personally find _The Hobbit_ much more than a children's book. It is indeed written in a fairy tale style, but that does not imply anything about the depth or the impressive style.

Magic is a floating concept. What I would consider magical is different than what you would consider magical, and that is due to what each of us is able to explain. 

For the reader of _The Hobbit_, who is considered a normal new age human (And there is much indication of that, like the mention of the sound of gun powder and Christmas trees), much of the things occuring are magical.

However, _The Lord of the Rings_ uses a different style of writing, and it does take more of a fact stating style rather than story telling. Hence less usage of the word magic. 

You mentioned in the first post that the doors of Moria were created by Elves, magic, and Elves? Another example would be the elven blades, that shine with a specific color when orcs are around, those are magical, aren't they?

I believe that this part of _The Mirror of Galadriel_ has something interesting to say about different people's different preception of magic:



> `And you? ' she said, turning to Sam. 'For this is what your folk would call magic. I believe; though I do not understand clearly what they mean; and they seem also to use the same word of the deceits of the Enemy. But this, if you will, is the magic of Galadriel. Did you not say that you wished to see Elf-magic? '
> 'I did,' said Sam, trembling a little between fear and curiosity. `I'll have a peep, Lady, if you're willing.'



About flawlessness, I never assumed Elves are flawless, and it does not imply that in _The Lord of the Rings_. For instance, in this dialog: 



> `Well, here we are at last! ' said Gandalf. 'Here the Elven-way from Hollin ended. Holly was the token of the people of that land, and they planted it here to mark the end of their domain; for the West-door was made chiefly for their use in their traffic with the Lords of Moria. Those were happier days, when there was still close friendship at times between folk of different race, even between Dwarves and Elves.'
> 'It was not the fault of the Dwarves that the friendship waned,' said Gimli.
> 'I have not heard that it was the fault of the Elves,' said Legolas.
> 'I have heard both,' said Gandalf; 'and I will not give judgement now. But I beg you two, Legolas and Gimli, at least to be friends, and to help me. I need you both. The doors are shut and hidden, and the sooner we find them the better. Night is at hand! '



Gandalf's response, and even Legolas's, would have been different, if any flawlessness was assumed.

And _The Silmarillion_, there is much to show that Elves are flowed. The whole story is based on flaws of Elves in my opinion.

It is just that _The Lord of the Rings_ is not a story of the Elves, and little of their current deals was mentioned. They were few, and most probably the best of them still remained, and the best took part in the destruction of the Ring. I do not see any contradiction with what is mentioned in _The Hobbit_.

Khalid


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## BlackCaptain (Jun 16, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Lantarion _
> *Gosh, maybe this should be in the HoME section..!  *



Yes, well when you have Teleri being Vanyar and a whos-it-whats being Teleri, ... I forgot what I was going to say! See that's what it does to you! Shame on you!


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## YayGollum (Jun 16, 2003)

I don't like the contrast of nasssty elf personalities, either. I think Tolkien should have stuck to the personalities they had in The Hobbit. LOTR and The Sil. type elves are too perfect. Yes, yes, yes. I know that they're not perfect in every way, but still. They are way too achingly perfect for me. The boring heroic and selfless types that you see in way too many stories. I don't get why so many people like the elves since they read The Hobbit first and the Dwarves were more fun. oh well. *collapses*


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## Illuvatar (Dec 29, 2003)

I think Tolkein wanted to have a wide range of overall personalities, the hobbits being, well, us, and the elves being the perfect people, far away, immortal, the epitome of kindness and goodness for the most part. They are basically there to give counsel. And in the Hobbit, not all elves were nasty. Take Rivendell, for example. Bilbo said that 



> "His house was perfect, whether you liked food, or sleep, or singing, or just sitting and thinking best,or a pleasant mixture of them all. Evil things did not come into that valley."


So, there were obviously different types of elves with diffferent personalities. At least, that's how he intended it. As for the prouder elves, Legolas is one of them, but you don't meet any other of the Sindar, so you have no way of knowing either way, especially since Tolkein didn't develop Legolas as much as Sam or Frodo.


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## Wonko The Sane (Jan 20, 2006)

As someone pointed out Tolkien hadn't yet figured everything out yet, and this early rendering of the elves of Mirkwood (and the elves of Rivendell as wise clowns) is a sort of prototype of what they will later become.

But this face of the elves is not lost. Though the word magic leaves their idiom their attitudes, joviality, severity, are toned down and recycled for use in LotR.

My favourite comparison is between the Rivendellian Elves in the Hobbit (laughing and joking and making silly rhymes, very unlike their later incarnations in LotR) and Gildor Inglorion. Gildor retains some of that mirth and jovial air that the elves of Rivendell lose in the LotR, while still maintaining the dignity and the grace of the later elves.


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## Snaga (Jan 21, 2006)

It is worth noting that Tolkien did not in the first edition of the Hobbit, intend it to have any relation to the large mythology of the Silmarillion. The style is completely different, and is very much more a children's tale. It was only in the writing of the Lord of the Ring, that Tolkien decided to integrate the Hobbit into the wider matter, and at that point a certain recycling of names and concepts in the Hobbit (e.g. Gondolin) proved useful. Or rather, the fact that Tolkien had casually thrown in bits of the wider mythology into the Hobbit, without any real purpose, suggested that integration to Tolkien.

Nevertheless, in may respects, with hindsight Tolkien was most dissatisfied with the Hobbit. The substantial revisions of the 2nd edition did not rectify this.

One of the recycled concepts from the Sil is the temperamental rustic elven king - Thranduil he later named, but in the Sil this is Thingol. The resemblance is most striking from the earliest versions of the story of Beren and Luthien, extant when the Hobbit was written. Thingol later becomes a much kindlier figure as the story is re-written - much more in keeping with say Celeborn (who was also a Sindar - someone overlooked him earlier in the thread). Celeborn too is not right at every point, and is not over fond of dwarves, but is clearly on the side of good.

But I think it is also noteworthy, that the Lord of the Rings deals with darker times, and therefore the elves are more serious-minded, because the times call for it. The Third Age is closing, and for good or for ill their care-free existence is coming to an end. No wonder then, if they are not Tra-La-La-ing in Rivendell. But as Wonks points out there are traces of the earlier humour in Gildor's company, and also some of Elrond's remarks.


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## Thorondor_ (Jan 22, 2006)

> It is worth noting that Tolkien did not in the first edition of the Hobbit, intend it to have any relation to the large mythology of the Silmarillion.


Imo, Tolkien made it clear in his letter to the to the editor of the Observer, in 1938, that the two works were indeed related, more than any other:


> My tale is not consciously based on any other book - save one, and that is unpublished: the 'Silmarillion', a history of the Elves, to which frequent allusion is made.


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## Walter (Jan 22, 2006)

In Letter #163 we find a somewhat different statement:



> The Hobbit was originally quite unconnected, though it inevitably got drawn in to the circumference of the greater construction; and in the event modified it. It was unhappily really meant, as far as I was conscious, as a 'children's story', and as I had not learned sense then, and my children were not quite old enough to correct me, it has some of the sillinesses of manner caught unthinkingly from the kind of stuff I had had served to me, as Chaucer may catch a minstrel tag. I deeply regret them. So do intelligent children.



P.S.: Your Eärendel essay is outstanding, Thorondor


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## Thorondor_ (Jan 23, 2006)

The timing of the letters mentioned and of the Hobbit editions would suggest to me that the connection to the greater construction would have occured even during the writting of the first edition of the Hobbit.

P.S. Thanks Walter


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## Walter (Jan 24, 2006)

Thorondor_ said:


> The timing of the letters mentioned and of the Hobbit editions would suggest to me that the connection to the greater construction would have occured even during the writting of the first edition of the Hobbit.
> 
> P.S. Thanks Walter


Well, of course there seem to have existed some connections of the original Hobbit to the legendarium in the late 1920s (though - IMO - there are even more in _Roverandom_). But I tend to see Tolkien's remark in the #25 letter in the context, that Tolkien still hadn't buried the idea to "sell" the Silmarillion as a successor for the Hobbit (which had been turned down flat by the Unwins at first). What Tolkien described as getting _"...drawn in to the circumference of the greater construction..."_ occurred much later, IMO...


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## Sarah (Jan 24, 2006)

Perhaps the Elves' attitude differences in the two books can be explained by Point of View. It's well known that the Dwarves and Elves don't get along. Perhaps the attitudes in the Hobbit Elves are defined by a Dwarven Point of View, granted that Bilbo is telling the story, but he had not known these elves, but the dwarves (to him) apparantly had. Bilbo decided to side with the dwarves as they were his party members, so the elves we saw were elves as seen from a dwarf point of view. Am I making sense?


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## Wonko The Sane (Jan 24, 2006)

Sarah said:


> Perhaps the Elves' attitude differences in the two books can be explained by Point of View. It's well known that the Dwarves and Elves don't get along. Perhaps the attitudes in the Hobbit Elves are defined by a Dwarven Point of View, granted that Bilbo is telling the story, but he had not known these elves, but the dwarves (to him) apparantly had. Bilbo decided to side with the dwarves as they were his party members, so the elves we saw were elves as seen from a dwarf point of view. Am I making sense?



I take your point, but I, for one, disagree. Dwarves dislike elves, but probably don't see them as silly. If Bilbo had been influenced by the dwarve's attitudes I think he probably would have seen them as cold, haughty, proud, condescending, and spiteful. I think that the playfulness of the elves in The Hobbit comes down to the fact that children are the books intended audience.

However, the harsh treatment the company receive at the hands of the elves of Mirkwood may fit in better with your hypothesis. But even here I disagree.
The whole issue of whether or not The Hobbit was originally intended to be a part of the same story begun with The Silmarillion aside, the presence of the Necromancer in Dol Goldur would be enough for even the merriest of elves to become wary, hard, hostile to strangers, especially given the elve's long feud with the dwarves.

But please, correct me if you think this is unreasonable.


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## Rover (Feb 19, 2006)

Flammifer said:


> It's pretty obvious that in the Hobbit the Mirkwood Elves are arrogant, and unreliable (for example the butler who gets drunk at the barrel-storing place) and flawed. This is very contrasting to LOTR, who Tolkien portrays as flawless and wise and kind.
> 
> Is this simply because The Hobbit is a children's book and The Lord of the Rings is not?


 

Some of the difference could be down to the social status of the elven characters - in _The Hobbit_, they're "commoners" while in _LOTR_, the elven characters are nobles and leaders.


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## Barliman Butterbur (Feb 19, 2006)

Flammifer said:


> It's pretty obvious that in the Hobbit the Mirkwood Elves are arrogant, and unreliable...This is very contrasting to LOTR, who Tolkien portrays as flawless and wise and kind. Is this simply because The Hobbit is a children's book and The Lord of the Rings is not?



Tolkien's ideas about these things had evolved quite a great deal between the writing of The Hobbit and LOTR. And he had to make a lot of changes in TH to make it connect to LOTR. So some things jar a bit. I like the Mirkwood elves! Anyone who gets passing-out drunk on the job is OK with me! 

Barley


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## Starflower (Aug 26, 2007)

Also at the time of the Hobbit, LOTR was still a distant memory as a complete body of work, many ideas that were circulated in the Hobbit were promptly dropped by the time LOTR arrived. For example, the hobbits (Bilbo especially) are portrtayed almost derisively, they are seen as bumbling ignorant fools. But in LOTR, the hobbits are strong and wise and resistant to evil... 

I have always treated the Hobbit as a separate entity to the LOTR, as in it's good to know the backstory, but the discrepancies in the characters is not so important


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## Illuin (May 29, 2008)

> The Sil. type elves are too perfect. Yes, yes, yes. I know that they're not perfect in every way, but still. They are way too achingly perfect for me. The boring heroic and selfless types that you see in way too many stories.


 

I don’t see that. Most of The Sil is based on the flaws of the Elves. Feanor’s clan (with the exception of perhaps Maedhros) were nasty. Remember the Kinslaying at Alqualonde? And how Celegorm and Curufin treated Luthien? Eol and Maeglin were shady. Thingol could be a real ass sometimes (like when he sent Beren to his death - or so he thought), and he became greedy. I see very little in the way of perfect regarding the Elves in The Sil.


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## YayGollum (May 30, 2008)

Hm? I could spin any of your observations of imperfection into something good. Feanor and, minorly, his clan were awesome. Most probably the best of the bunch. Check out that honesty, that charisma, that colossally stubborn pride! Sure, while they obviously weren't perfect in every way, they were great examples of the immortal sorts of heroes from most of the old classics. The obstruction clearing at some swan's haven? Made all kinds of sense, to myself. Feanor, the greatest (and definitely towards the top of list on matters of pride) artist of all time and the guy who tragically loved his dad more than any kid has every loved one of those things, asks the Teleri for some ships. If he wasn't in a hurry, don't you think he would have had fun with making his own, probably better ships? The Teleri, either because they knew little of Feanor's reputation or cause or just because they had no sense of self-preservation, refused. When the Teleri wouldn't move, he solved the problem and, since they had unexpectedly declared themselves to be enemies, his army got some practice at wielding weapons. 

How Celegorm and Curufin treated some spoiled and irresponsible possible tie to a powerful and mostly untapped nation, a unity with which seemed senselessly overdue and beneficial to all? How two naturally talented, productive, and progressively-minded lords sneered at someone who could most probably make much of herself but who decided to throw temper tantrums and herself into incomprehensible danger? Okay, so maybe they could have poured on some sugar coating to their words, but these guys were a bit too honest for that. 

Eol was awesome, easily one of my favorites. How was he shady? Only in that he was the one most frequently called Dark. I have read little to be derisive about. He was an anti-social guy. Didn't like the idea of relying on Melian's magic to allow freedom only to her favorites, so he closed down a famous and plenty profitable shop and moved on. Anybody, especially an elf, that could get along so well with Dwarves is awesome, inside of my tome. One day, he fell in love with a Noldor. It happened in exactly the way that it happened to Thingol, Beren, and Aragorn, and, while those scenes sounded pretty creepy to me, they are generally regarded as romantic. But Eol isn't seen that way, since he boldly took what he wanted without regard for other people's feelings. He wasn't mean to her. He kept her there, tried to introduce her to some cool Dwarves. He wasn't a fan of the subject of her people, since he was a Teleri type and didn't understand the kinslaying, but he didn't hate her for it. He definitely didn't want his son growing up with such reprehensible role-models. She knew that, but she, after he naively left them alone, ran away with the kid. She went through exactly as many hoops to get her way as he had to steal her from her father, which might have brought a sardonic smirk to his lips. But still. It was crueler, based on an emotion less pure, and done to the wrong elf, as he pointed out. 

Yeah, I would agree that Maeglin was shady.  It was understandable but too tragically blind for me. I never liked Thingol, either. Always using the Dwarves, then kicking them out, never giving them their due, acting like he was awesome for letting them lick his elfy boots. The bit about him sending Beren off to his probable death was totally stolen from the sorts of things that fathers did in the classics, too. 

Which is, mayhaps, the perfect that I meant. The characters from the classics, while not perfect, were unapproachable in their convictions, which is heroic, at least to myself. I suppose that I just didn't like Tolkien serving all of that awesome up on an elfish platter (Oo! It is a mysterious platter! So elegant, so wise, so magical! Let us revere it! We couldn't come close and are arrogant to attempt! Ick.). Sure, there are some decent humans in these stories, too, but Tolkien wished to give the show to the nasssty elveses. Whoops. It looks as if I went on a rant.


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## Aisteru (Sep 7, 2008)

I think the differences in the portrayal of Elves can be explained through a few things.

1) Tolkien did intend The Hobbit to be a child's story. Elves in mythology before his time are most often protrayed as tricky creatures. Imps would be a better word to describe them than elves. Tolkien's story carry a little bit of that background in them. 

2) Mirkwood was inhabited by a number of less than savory people throughout the ages. It went from the Green Wood to Mirkwood which is pretty basic color symbolism. Therefore, the creatures in the forest could be expected to be corrupted forms of their untainted counterparts in other areas of Middle Earth.


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## Alcuin (Sep 8, 2008)

Maybe we can explain away this difference in Elves inside Tolkien’s subcreation without any reference to the “outside,” real world.

_There and Back Again_ (i.e., _The Hobbit_) was written by Bilbo Baggins (in Tolkien’s world) as a more or less private account or journal of his travels with Thorin & Co. It was not meant to be published: Merry and Pippin reported having trouble getting a look at the book: Merry said (_FotR_, “A Conspiracy Unmasked”) he


> “only had one rapid glance, and that was difficult to get. [noparse][Bilbo][/noparse] never left the book about.”


Bilbo’s descriptions of the Elves could be relied upon to be quite candid, and perhaps even a little flip: he was, after all, extolling his own adventures, not the grave business of the fate of all Middle-earth. The Elves, for their part, were living as they had always lived for nearly all the three thousand years of the Third Age: at the time of Bilbo’s Adventure with Gandalf and Thorin, the majority of them perceived few threats (or ignored them), and they appeared light-hearted, probably because most of them were. Elrond, for his part, seems both grave and serious. Even the Elvenking (Thranduil) comes off very well at the end, particularly in his declaration (_TH_, “The Clouds Break”),


> “Long will I tarry, ere I begin this war for gold.”


Tolkien puts into Bilbo’s pen the statement (_ibid_, “A Warm Welcome”) that,


> [noparse][The Elvenking][/noparse] was a wise elf, and wiser than the men of [noparse][Laketown][/noparse]


Moreover, Bilbo was in the company of the Dwarves, who found the Elves “foolish” and certainly resented their treatment at the hands of the Elves of Mirkwood. (Though in retrospect, they seem not to consider that they had no reason to complain about their treatment in Rivendell!) Even so, in the Elvenking’s “dungeons,” they were well-fed and reasonably-well treated, as far as prisoners go. 

The point is – and I am slow in getting around to it – that Bilbo’s opinions and descriptions in _There and Back Again_ may well have been influenced by the opinions of the Dwarves in whose company he spent that year. 

In Tolkien’s telling, Frodo wrote most of the material in _Lord of the Rings_. He was brought up to respect Elves by a hobbit who knew them (Bilbo), and was heavily influenced by Gandalf and Aragorn, in whose nearly-constant company he spent a year. He saw the Elves in their autumn of their splendor in Middle-earth, and more than once owed his life to them. He was in the company of Legolas son of Thranduil, and so likely heard in full the other side of the story of Thorin’s imprisonment over a campfire (which may go far in understanding Gimli’s love of Elves: his father, Glóin, recalled the experience with some bitterness at the Council of Elrond). Legolas himself was a fine example of a noble Elf: in _The Book of Lost Tales, Volume II_, “The History of Eriol or Ælfwine”, Tolkien writes of him,


> He was tall as a young tree, lithe, immensely strong, able swiftly to draw a great war-bow and shoot down a Nazgûl, endowed with the tremendous vitality of Elvish bodies, … hard and resistant to hurt …, the most tireless of all the Fellowship.


That is a tremendous description: no doubt Frodo was impressed. Besides, the gravity of the situation, the enormity of the task before them, the burden that their leaders realized was placed upon Frodo, meant that the Elves recognized in him, as Elrond said (_FotR_, “Council of Elrond”),


> though all the mighty elf-friends of old, Hador, and Húrin, and Turin, and Beren himself were assembled together your seat should be among them.


From a creature nearly 6,000 years old, that statement of sentiment is a compliment of rare beauty and without par, one of honor and respect. 

The point is – and again, I am slow in getting around to it – that Frodo’s opinions of Elves, at least at the time he wrote his book in respect to the earlier time in which Bilbo had written, was almost unquestionably much higher. The differences in the portrayal of Elves in _The Hobbit_ and in _The Lord of the Rings_ can be attributed to different “authors” within the body of Tolkien’s subcreation.

And, yes, of course, there are reasons arising from considerations in the real world, too, and many other perfectly sound explanations as well.


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## Aisteru (Sep 8, 2008)

Excellent reasoning, Alcuin. I hadn't even thought about it from that angle.


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## adpirtle (Feb 8, 2011)

YayGollum said:


> I don't like the contrast of nasssty elf personalities, either. I think Tolkien should have stuck to the personalities they had in The Hobbit. LOTR and The Sil. type elves are too perfect.


 
The elves in the Silmarillion are far, far,far from perfect. All the sorrows of Middle Earth come from their screwing things up, or buying into the lies of Melkor. The only reason the high elves in Rivendell and Lorien seem perfect in LOTR is that most of them have had thousands of years to brood upon their own tragic mistakes, and the mistakes of their kindred, and thats why they are loathe to act, I suspect. 

As for the topic of the thread, I think that we're talking about two very different groups of elves. The elves of Mirkwood are dark elves (except for Thranduril and his son Legolas, who are elves of the twilight), and so just as the Silmarillion tells us, they are less wise and less powerful than the elves who came back from Valinor, but at the same time more merry. I think that suits them to a tee.


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## Edheldae (Feb 8, 2011)

Yay for resurrecting old threads! Took some time to read through the old posts. I agree there are two different groups but also with the concept of different perspectives. For Bilbo, the main elvish interactions were with moriquendi/avari, those who refused the summons. At that stage in his life he was a minor character in the events, not exactly the type to have a long conversation with Elrond or even Thranduil, though that was chaning by the return journey.

Frodo more often interacted with Eldar still resident in Middle Earth. But even of these, they were far from perfect. Elrond faced some hard choices but was rather indecisive, for all his lore he wasn't ready for the Ring to turn up on his doorstep. The elves of Lorien nearly turned the Fellowship away and then Galadriel faced a great personal trial she almost failed.

An interesting theme to follow is the distance between people who are not familiar with each other's cultures, then a growing appreciation as time and events force people with different backgrounds to spend time together. I think we see this in both the Hobbit and LOTR. Bilbo's perceptions are due in part to unfamiliarty and being a stranger. Frodo's are due to a wise uncle who introduces him to elves and then Frodo gets to spend significantly more time among them then when we see Bilbo in the Hobbit. But even later, after dwelling at Rivendell, Bilbo's perspective is quite different.


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## Imagineer (Oct 19, 2011)

Hi, new here. Just now, today.

When is it ok for an Author to edit an old book? I suppose it would have to be an entirely new edition with corrections. There would be the original, well marked as such.

There are so many things I'd like fixed, but once printed, I suppose that's it. Fini.


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## PaigeSinclaire88 (Dec 16, 2016)

Flammifer said:


> It's pretty obvious that in the Hobbit the Mirkwood Elves are arrogant, and unreliable (for example the butler who gets drunk at the barrel-storing place) and flawed. This is very contrasting to LOTR, who Tolkien portrays as flawless and wise and kind.
> 
> Also, the King of the Elves of Mirkwood talks about how strong the magic on his door is. Magic is a concept totally foreign to all Elves in LOTR. An elf in Lorien says "I do not know what you mean by that [magic]", when one of the hobbits asks if the cloaks are magic. In LOTR, Elves of course have some sort of magic or power, but it is subtle.
> 
> ...




In my opinion the Hobbit is considered to be more of a childrens book, but it still is apart of the history of middle earth so it's still apart of the mythology. I do think that LOTR's is more intricate and it's a lot more to take in at once, then you have the fact that there are side adventures with Tom Bombidil and that takes you away from the journey at hand and distracts you for a time, just for it to go back to the story and goal again. Which as a kid reading it is a lot to take in at once. 

That being said I think the change in the Elves in the Dwarfs shows their change over time. The fact that the Elves were fluent in magic and so were the Dwarfs show that one time in their history they practiced something sacred to middle earth. And that the magic of middle earth is maybe like in England when they had druids and now magic is referred to as "the old ways" and it's my line of thinking that perhaps thats how the magic in Middle earth is seen that it was once apart of their old ways that have since faded out.


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