hobbit – a simple man

I saw that a friend of my brother’s, Adam Volle, posted about his seven favorite books. It was an old Facebook challenge, and anyway go read his post and then come back here.

Back? Great. I am doing it myself. I was inspired, and thinking about my seven favorite books has got me really wanting to read all of them again. I have read these seven (twelve?) many, many times. I haven’t read most of them in a while.

I don’t read as much. I used to read voraciously. I know it’s cliche to say it that way, but it’s true. I did. Now I can’t focus, or something, and so don’t read hardly at all. I find it a tragedy. But these books started it all for me.

Star Wars by Various

This is really three books, because forever I’ve had the one volume that collects Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi into one. I know these are novelizations based on screenplays, but they exist as a bit of literature nonetheless. I love the character studies that emerge in Jedi, the diction in Star Wars, and I can’t beat the story of Empire. In all, I’ve read this three-in-one more than any other in this list.

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne

My first science fiction novel. Jules Verne was my gateway drug, my first love, and my first deep dive (ahem) into a vast new world. I wore the cover off my copy and recently hunted down and bought a new version of the same book because I love the translation from the French. I’ve read other translations, but that one was the one that first entranced me, so I’ll always prefer it. (The cover art I’m showcasing here is similar, but I don’t think it’s the same translation as what I’ve mentioned, and mine didn’t have the introduction by Ray Bradbury).

Outcast of Redwall by Brian Jacques

The Redwall series is formulaic, predictable, and hella fun. In this story, Jacques subverts a lot of his own paradigms. For me, that makes it worth mentioning above every other book in the series. The reason why I keep coming back to this story, even more so than Martin the Warrior (the first Redwall novel I read) is the central friendship between the main two characters. Their bond transcends life and death and it gets me every time. The cover art I am showing is the back of the book, and I would frame this art if I could find it large enough.)

The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien

I was late to the work and world of Tolkien. It wasn’t until the films were about to come out, long about 2000, that my mom (who wouldn’t let me read Harry Potter because witchcraft and wizards) suddenly wanted me to read about wizards and hobbits and magic. Go figure. Anyway, I was hooked for life. I read them once every year since 2000 until about a few years after college, when I stopped being able to concentrate on reading so well. But I want to inject Tolkien into my veins. Since I can’t do that, I have it tattooed on my arms, but these books always rank high for me. (By the way, I know I am sneaking four books into one, but they really are one long, long story. So I think it counts, especially if the Star Wars trilogy counts as one. Which it does.)

Shoeless Joe by WP Kinsella

There are few things more magical to me than baseball. This novel catches all of that in one volume. I haven’t read it in years, but it’s on my bedside table because I want to read it again so badly. Alas. But I’ll keep a special place in my heart for Joe and Iowa.

I, Robot by Isaac Asimov

Once I branched out from the Star Wars Expanded Universe (Legacy) I started to read my dad’s collection of Isaac Asimov. First among them was I, Robot, which is a collection of short stories about robots. I know, pretty obvious. Seeing as Asimov is a master of science fiction, it’s ok to be a little on the metal nose. Anyway, these are hilarious, thought provoking and sometimes truly sublime stories, and all somehow about a strong female character that is the great robopsychologist Dr. Susan Calvin. In a world dominated by men, she made them listen to her, and that always stayed with me.

Dune by Frank Herbert

Yes, it is now a major motion picture (again, but let’s not go back to 1984 shall we?) but I read it way before I watched the 1984 film, and have really dug this weird and ecologically religious story. It addicts me every time I read it and I can’t quit it. This book, as much as the others on this list, fundamentally transformed the way I think.

And there you have it: my magnificent seven. Honorable mentions include Moby-Dick, The Martian, Around the World in 80 Days, Ender’s Game, Frankenstein, The Mystery of the Stuttering Parrot, Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIHM, and, well, I could go on.

I really need to solve this focus problem and get reading again. It is very frustrating to not be able to do the one thing I loved above all else once upon a time.

This week I ended up at Barnes & Noble a day earlier than I usually go. It was a warm, autumn afternoon, and I was full of poetry ready to be written. This week I had several more French styles of poem to work through: the rondeau redoublè, the roundelet, the roundelay, the triolet, and the kyrielle. These are similar to last weeks poems, and to each other. Each has a simple AB… rhyme scheme and each repeats various lines for effect. The repeated lines are easy to pick out, as are the rhymes because I wasn’t terribly clever in my writing.

This week I picked Lord of the Rings/ the Hobbit for my theme and wrote away to Middle Earth. I doubt Tolkien would be very impressed, but I like my poems.

The Hobbit

Once upon a time in the land of Middle-Earth
Far over the Misty Mountains sheer
Bilbo was a hobbit full of mirth
Thorin and his thirteen set forth with cheer.

The sun shone bright, the air was clear
The company sought gold, memory of mirth
The ponies jangled with weapons and gear
Once upon a time in the land of Middle-Earth

Old were the dwarves, one of great girth
The dwarves were bold, the hobbit full of fear
Many miles from the Shire of his birth
Far over the Misty Mountains sheer.

They fought and ran with sword and spear
A dragon who roared, made the land a dearth
though the goblins laughed and jeered
Bilbo was a hobbit, full of mirth

With magic ring he won in history a berth
Many peoples toasted his name with beer
The wizard, dear little Bilbo showed his worth
Thorin and his thirteen set forth with cheer
Once upon a time

Above you can see that each line of the first stanza repeats as the last line of each subsequent stanza, with the first half of the first line repeating as a refrain at the end. This is a rondeau redoublè. This is a retelling of The Hobbit.

Frodo’s Song

I am not brave
I will take the ring
I am not brave
The business is grave
Doom will failure bring
“Courage, courage!” I will sing
I am not brave

In the above roundelet the first, third and last lines are all the same. This is an imagined song that Frodo Baggins might have sung after accepting the quest of the ring in The Fellowship of the Ring.

The Three

An Elf, a Dwarf, a Man
chased the evil Uruk-Hai
through the vastness of Rohan
under Sauron’s watchful eye.
Tirelessly the three ran,
their friends they’d not bid good-bye.

Through the vastness of Rohan,
under Sauron’s watchful eye,
the hunters the horizon scanned:
the Rohirrim made the Uruks fly.
Tirelessly the three ran,
their friends they’d not bid good-bye.

The hunters the horizon scanned,
the Rohirrim made the Uruks fly,
the orcs fell into the horseman’s plan
the Uruks stood to fight and die.
Tirelessly the three ran,
their friends they’d not bid good-bye.

Here in the above roundelay the end lines repeat, as do a few of the other pairs of lines. This is about Legolas, Gimli, and Aragorn chasing the Uruk-Hai orcs who kidnapped the hobbits Merry and Pippin at the beginning of The Two Towers.

Of Gandalf

Gandalf was a wizard bold
with flashing sword and magic bright.
In appearance: a man now old,
Gandalf was a wizard bold.
Once he quested for dragon’s gold,
trekked o’er mountains, through the wold.
Gandalf was a wizard bold,
with flashing sword and magic bright.

This above triolet gets its name from the trio of repeated lines, the first, and fourth, and next to last. The second line repeats as well to round out the poem. This is of course about the wizard Mithrandir, whom hobbits and men called Gandalf.

Merry and Pippin

Careless, care free, and full of song
May the Valar have mercy on us!

Friend of steward and of a King
The top o’their lungs they’d sing
May the Valar have mercy on us!

Hobbits did save warriors life
Each did evade the orcish knife
And sing of the tree lord’s lost wife
May the Valar have mercy on us!

The dark of night nor point of sword
could dull their merry little chords
May the Valar have mercy on us!

Merry and Pip did dance a jig
May the Valar have mercy on us!

Finally the above kyrielle, written in Iambic tetrameter, has the last line of each stanza repeat which is to be some variant of “God have mercy” (in this case, the gods of Middle-Earth, the Valar). Other than that there is great freedom in the form as long as some manner of rhyme scheme is maintained. This particular kyrielle is about the jolly hobbit twosome of Meriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrin Took and their exploits throughout The Lord of the Rings.

I hope you have enjoyed my poetical side trip through Middle Earth. I certainly did. Until next week.

Tag: hobbit

The Magnificent Seven