{"id":939,"date":"2020-05-24T17:32:50","date_gmt":"2020-05-24T07:32:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/?p=939"},"modified":"2020-05-24T17:32:50","modified_gmt":"2020-05-24T07:32:50","slug":"reading-the-hobbit-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/reading-the-hobbit-again\/","title":{"rendered":"Reading The Hobbit (again)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/IMG_1345.jpg\" alt=\"The inside covers of The Wind in the Willows and The Hobbit both show landscapes\/maps featuring trees, fields and houses\" class=\"wp-image-944\" width=\"480\" height=\"480\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/IMG_1345.jpg 640w, https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/IMG_1345-420x420.jpg 420w, https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/IMG_1345-220x220.jpg 220w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 480px) 100vw, 480px\" \/><figcaption>The inside covers of The Wind in the Willows and The Hobbit<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Chapter 1:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>You know the deal. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Hobbit&#8217;s famous and the whole Middle Earth thing has inspired so much nerd and gaming culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Despite hanging out with nerds most of my life, I&#8217;ve never read Tolkien &#8230; or more accurately, I&#8217;ve never got through a whole book without getting bored.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With the need to stay inside for the 2020 corona virus pandemic, I&#8217;m finally gtting around to all the things I&#8217;ve been putting off, including (re-) reading The Hobbit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is what has struck me &#8211; it&#8217;s so much like The Wind in the Willows, which I read (&amp; ended up liking) as a child. Here are the parallels: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>a house-proud main character is lured out to adventure (Bilbo or Mole)<\/li><li>they met their adventuring companions just before or in the early part of their adventure<\/li><li>detailed descriptions of their homes and how comfortable they are<\/li><li>home descriptions begin with house cleaning, whitewashing\/freshly painted doors<\/li><li>a strong focus on food, drink, cakes, sandwiches, picnic baskets, provisions<\/li><li>songs in the middle of the text, ugh!<\/li><li>maps and lengthy discussions of geography<\/li><li>in the background, a strong preoccupation with inheritance and wealth<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>And that&#8217;s only the first chapter! <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Tune in next week (or sometime later) for my reactions to the next few chapters of The Hobbit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I don&#8217;t love it so far &#8211; Bilbo feels annoyingly passive, the other characters feel pushy and uncaring. Reading it now, the class consciousness is grating. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Chapter 1: You know the deal. The Hobbit&#8217;s famous and the whole Middle Earth thing has inspired so much nerd and gaming culture. Despite hanging out with nerds most of my life, I&#8217;ve never read Tolkien &#8230; or more accurately, I&#8217;ve never got through a whole book without getting bored. With the need to stay [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[249],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geek-nerd"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=939"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/939\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":945,"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/939\/revisions\/945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ginevra.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}