The dragon is dead, the treasure won, and the adventure seemingly complete. What then would possess J.R.R Tolkien to write five more chapters? I have always detested authors, in past novels that I have read, that decide that they need to continue writing when the adventure is done. This brings up an interesting thought though. Why does it seem like the killing of Smaug is the end? Is it really?
The first time I read those chapters I was with Bilbo sitting up on the hill looking down at the war going on bellow. Army after army kept appearing. Why couldn’t the dwarves just share their gold and treasures? Why did there have to be a war. I thought that this was completely idiotic of the armies. They were all just killing each other over treasure that could be shared. It was a pointless. Killing each other left and right over a treasure and then a mutual enemy shows up so they all kill them. Was the treasure that important after all? This was simply a hot mess in my mind. Then Brother Ward made me read those chapters again.
After the second time of reading these chapters, and after sitting for a while just mulling over them I have an epiphany. My roommate was discussing with me a different book entirely. The Great Gatsby to be exact. This book is one I did not enjoy. The greed behind the American Dream was evident in every chapter of this book and that really bothered me. That’s when the insight occurred. Tolkien wasn’t just simply filling pages he was making a point. It is said that Tolkien didn’t ever make up what his characters did but he put them in a situation and then watched them. When presented with a mass of treasure everyone does something different with it. Bilbo wanted to share, the dwarves wanted to keep them for their own want, the men wanted it to rebuild their town with it, and the elves just wanted to be compensated for dealing with the dragon for so long. By showing these last few chapters Tolkien shows us ever layer of greed, and what it can do. Most of the group died in their greed while Bilbo lived safe. Sometimes it isn’t the journey to the treasure that truly helps an adventurer grow but the journey home. By presenting this war of greed Tolkien shows his audience that while there are many different paths to choose it is still our choice. Will we then choose to complete our journey and hoard our treasure, die in our greed, or maybe just go home? It is our choice.
Thus, we see that the last five chapters really did have a point. If they were simply left to journey home we have never discovered the meaning of the adventure. The adventure was to discover what a Hobbit is. In the same the journey was to discover who we were. As we follow Bilbo on his journey we are also put in those situations. We were on that journey too. We thought the journey was done because the treasure had been won but really we hadn’t won it. Every army had a claim on the treasure. The task is what to do with those claims. Situations and choices, this is how Tolkien writes. It seems only fitting that he end a novel of such with yet another situation. So, what would you have done?
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