The Hobbit
The Hobbit is a tale of high adventure, undertaken by a company of dwarves in search of dragon-guarded gold. A reluctant partner in this perilous quest is Bilbo Baggins, a comfort-loving unambitious hobbit, who surprises even himself by his resourcefulness and skill as a burglar. Encounters with trolls, goblins, dwarves, elves, and giant spiders, conversations with the dragon, Smaug, and a rather unwilling presence at the Battle of Five Armies are just some of the adventures that befall Bilbo. Bilbo Baggins has taken his place among the ranks of the immortals of children’s fiction. Written by Professor Tolkien for his children, The Hobbit met with instant critical acclaim when published.
Stats for nerds
36recommend
136mentions
118people
2007–2026years
27% recommend71% neutral2% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Even a library with all the books ever written, even those forever lost to time, would be very much finite. And even if such a library was possible - I would really be careful in using the term such as infinity with anything that is in anyway dependant of physical resources - the first ”bias” or rather a filter limiting the books you can read would be the languages you can read. Then time you have to read it. Whether you understand the subject matter. Etc. This already starts to resemble an algorithm of sorts, yes.
I think the mistake you are making is that you believe you can know what decisions and on what basis algorithms on platform apps make for you. Well you cannot. First of all they have again and again been shown to have a hidden agenda’s and besides, they change all the time. In the end it is basically same as letting Zuck or Musk select everything you read.
Instead you can select your own algorithm. It is pretty simple, I did one at age of ten at our local library before I even knew what algorithm was. Only think I knew was that I really liked this book Hobbit by someone named JRR Tolkien.
- Mary Renault. Fire From Heaven. I think she was ahead of the curve in recognizing that Alexander had monstrous qualities at a time when he was still seen as a kind of superhero.
Tolkein. The Silmarillion. I’ve bounced off this book a dozen times over decades, despite deeply enjoying The Hobbit and LoTR. This time I discovered that the best way to read it is backwards, tracing connections to characters you already know.
Stephenson. Anathem. I think I’ll skip the end next time. The first time I read it, I was confused; this time I understood exactly what was happening but I thought it was a bit pointless. Still worth it for the first 3/4 of the novel.
Lots of short stories. I was expecting to like Mark Twain better, but ours is a much more earnest era, and no match for his Gilded Age cynicism. What passes for cynicism today is Twain in his sunniest mood. At any rate, I appreciate Twain, but I enjoy EM Forster, Henry James, JG Ballard, William Gibson, and lots of others I’m forgetting at the moment.
- Sounds like skill, as opposed to talent.
Alignment is a good term, but it seems fairly simple: do we want to do something?
I had a wonderful English teacher, in 6th grade. He had us read The Hobbit, and other fantasy books, as opposed to the usual “classic” literature.
It made all the difference, and I’ve been a voracious reader, all my life. Other factors also came into play, but I credit Mr. Martin, for helping me to become interested in reading.
In seventh grade, I had Mrs. Broadbent, and she forced us to read “classic literature.” It was awful, after my sixth grade experience.
Wanting to do stuff has always been important to me. And encouraging people to want to do stuff is a vital aspect of training and managing.
- Have Space Suit Will Travel (Heinlein)
Stranger in a Strange Land (Heinlein)
Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption (one story in the book "Different Seasons" by Stephen King)
Of Mice and Men (Steinbeck)
The Martian Chronicles (Bradbury)
Roadside Picnic (Strugatsky)
Frankenstein (Shelley)
Brave New World (Huxley)
Farenheit 451 (Heinlein)
Never Cry Wolf (Mowatt)
A Whale for the Killing (Mowatt)
The Machine Stops (Forster)
Heart of Darkness (Conrad)
Starship Troopers (Heinlein)
The Jungle Book (Kipling)
Lost in the Barrens (Mowatt)
The Republic (Plato)
Rendezvous with Rama (Clarke)
Ringworld (Niven)
The Stainless Steel Rat (Harrison)
The Hobbit (Tolkien)
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (Stevenson)
The Odyssey (Homer)
The Man who Would be King (Kipling)
The Pearl (Steinbeck)
Thus Spake Zarathustra (Nietzsche)
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (Dick)
A Scanner Darkly (Dick)
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Adams)
Dracula (Stoker)
To Kill a Mockingbird (Lee)
The Count of Monte Cristo (Dumas)
Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare)
The Wind in the Willows (Grahame)
A Christmas Carol (Dickens)
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass (Carroll)
Watership Down (Adams)
Gulliver's Travels (Swift)
Animal Farm (Orwell)
- The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings both stand alone as unparalleled fantasy novels. Buy a version with no foreword or footnotes and just, immerse yourself.
- The Hobbit is written well enough to read aloud. Breaking the fourth wall helps.
The Lord of the Rings isn't.
CS Lewis was a much better writer.
Tolkien made a franchise because his ideas were novel (non of Lewis's bible stories) and we've been seeing new products since he died.
Related
The Lord of the Rings
59 recommend · 277
The Fellowship of the Ring
5 recommend · 58
The Silmarillion
28 recommend · 171
The Children of Húrin
7 recommend · 23
The Jungle Book
8 recommend · 18
Harry Potter
55 recommend · 271
The Two Towers
2 recommend · 12
