John D. Rateliff > Quotes

“And his house was perfect”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Somewhere ahead is the Last Decent HouseTN4 – I have been there already and they are expecting us.”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“O! tra-la-la-lally here down in the valley!”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“We are not told specifically how the Mirkwood spiders poison their prey”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Hello!’ said Bladorthin ‘what are these do you suppose? There are no other locks or doors in here. These keys were not made for this place’. So he brought them out and hung them on his belt.”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“he greatly increased the number of survivors”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Tolkien’s rejection of ‘Gandalf’ as the name of the chief dwarf no doubt came because”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Riddling’ here indicates not a riddle-game such as Bilbo had played with Gollum but instead the first indication of the ‘riddling talk’ whereby Bilbo identifies himself while refusing to tell the dragon his actual name.”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“What have I got in my pocket?’ he said aloud (but he only meant it for himself). Gollum thought it was a riddle”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“This is not to say that The Hobbit is an allegory of twentieth-century Zionism; rather that Tolkien drew selectively on the history of the medieval Jews when creating his dwarves. Some elements”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Not even a policeman on a bicycle is ever seen this way;”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“It must be potent wine to make a wood-elf drowsy. But this it would seem was the heady brew of the great gardens of Dorwinion in the warm South”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“He was dressed in loose black fur as low as his knees”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“the wizard’s advice to Bilbo and the dwarves on the eaves of Mirkwood was ‘keep your peckers up’ (rather than the more familiar ‘keep your spirits up’ that replaced it),”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Philpot Buggins, Ollum the giant frog, blokes (hobbits), smellers (wolves), the dwarves Roary, Borey, Gorey, Biffer, Trasher, Gasher, Beater, Bomber, Lammer, Throw-in (the chief dwarf), and young Blow-in and Go-in; Albert Bolger the troll, joshers, snargs, and the wizards Kimpu, Mandegar, and Scandalf the Beanpiper.”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“A more famous example of a non-German name of the era preserved only in a Germanic language is Attila”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“in later times a strong human strain was added to the mix;”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“and they can’t make anything for themselves, not even mend a loose scale of their armour.”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“King Herla”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“In fact the wood elves themselves mostly lived in the woods in huts on the ground or in the branches. Their king lived in the great wood-cave because of his treasure”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Tolkien’s portrayal of dwarves exclusively as men”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“He eats wild things often [> sometimes”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Yet a writer is also naturally inclined to include things that he knows from first-hand experience will interest his audience”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“the great werebear Gandalf & Company encounter east of the Misty Mountains is Medwed, not ‘Beorn’.”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“There is the story of the eagle sent by Zeus to carry off Ganymede the Trojan to be his cup-bearer (a tale which gave its name to the Inklings’ favorite pub”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“Tolkien’s source was probably his old mentor”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“These they hate above all things,TN44 and fear for few of them have swords of iron or steel at all. Hardly any at all even now. None I expect in those days. They fight chiefly with clubs”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“The only philological remark (I think) in The Hobbit is on p. 221 (lines 6–7 from end):”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“There was a good deal of wide respectable country to pass through inhabited by decent respectable folk”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit

“if I have to walk from here to [cancelled: Hindu Kush] the Great Desert of Gobi and fight the Wild Wire worm of the Chinese.”
― John D. Rateliff, The History of the Hobbit