The Hobbit - Ramble - Ep 13 & 14

[ach_sss_no]

Livebloggy notes while reading The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien, chapter 13 & 14. These are notes I'm making in the process of assembling a proper chapter-by-chapter review of the book. There was some indication of interest in seeing a liveblog-style thing when I asked on Tumblr, so I'm posting my notes.  

The dwarves are trapped in the still, silent, dark, eerie tunnel in the mountain until they are so distressed that Bilbo risks going to check if Smaug is still there.

 

Bilbo finds the lair empty and calls for the dwarves to come light up the room with their equipment but they’re so scared of Smaug they won’t follow until he SCREAMS at them. Then they still won’t come into the den with him, they give him a torch and tell him to go burgle. This is when Bilbo steals the Arkenstone. 

 

Look: if Thorin wanted to keep that thing, he should have come in here himself.
 

 Faintly the dwarves heard his small cries, though the only word they could catch was 'help!'

"Now what on earth or under it has happened?" said Thorin. "Certainly not the dragon, or he would not go on squeaking."

They waited a moment or two, and still there were no dragon-noises, no sound at all in fact but Bilbo's distant voice. "Come, one of you, get another light or two!" Thorin ordered. "It seems we have got to go and help our burglar."

 

…Yeah This is YOUR TREASURE why don’t YOU go and GET your BURGLAR

 

Fili and Kili were almost in merry mood, and finding still hanging there many golden harps strung with silver they took them and struck them; and being magical (and also untouched by the dragon, who had small interests in music) they were still in tune. The dark hall was filled with a melody that had long been silent

 

Aw, that’s charming. Meanwhile Thorin is searching for the Arkenstone and it’s not here. Serves him right. But then he gives Bilbo the mithril whee it’s the mithril I remember the mithril

 

Thorin leads them out through the abandoned dwarf kingdom and out into the sunshine (and cold breeze). I don’t have a lot to say about this part, it just has a lot of nice visual description.

 

If you want to know what cram is, I can only say that I don't know the recipe; but it is biscuitish, keeps good indefinitely, is supposed to be sustaining, and is certainly not entertaining, being in fact very uninteresting except as a chewing exercise.

 

Well, I know enough now to know I don’t want to try it.

 

Balin leads them to an old lookout post which seems like a safe enough place. The company rests there and wonders:

 

Where is Smaug? :)

 

The chapter ends here and it’s so short let’s go right on to the next one
 

Cut back to Lake-town yesterday when Smaug flew off. As Smaug approaches, the town rushes to defend itself. They shoot arrows but the arrows have little effect and things start to look bad. Even Corrupt Mayor Man is planning to flee. 

 

The thrush shows up and tells Bard the archer (who is new to this chapter) where the weak spot in Smaug’s armor is. RIP Smaug.

 

Now, we actually saw that battle, and it was neat and all, but Bilbo wasn’t there for it and he’s our usual viewpoint character and the hero of the story so I’m still counting it.

 

OFFSCREEN BATTLES: 3

 

We find out that a quarter of the town was just killed (!) Tolkien phrases it as ‘three quarters are still alive’, which is great and all but a 25% percent reduction is pretty disastrous! The survivors are so angry they try to depose their mayor but he tells them it’s Thorin’s fault. 

 

Many took ill of wet and cold and sorrow that night, and afterwards died, who had escaped uninjured from the ruin of the town; and in the days that followed there was much sickness and great hunger.

 

 

That’s… awful! Fortunately, Thranduil is sending help. Unfortunately he wants the dragon’s gold. Unfortunately the Lake-men want it too. Unfortunately Thorin’s not actually dead and he’s been gathering armor and he wants the gold too. 

 

The chapter ends with an eerie description of Smaug’s dead, decaying body under the lake.