The Hobbit

The Hobbit, or There and Back Again, J. R. R. Tolkien's children's fantasy novel, was published in 1937; its author was English. The Carnegie Medal shortlisted it, and the New York Herald Tribune gave it a prize for the year's best juvenile fiction. It is set in Middle-earth, the world Tolkien later used for The Lord of the Rings.

Bilbo Baggins is a respectable hobbit of Bag End with a comfortable chair, a full pantry and no interest in adventures, until a wizard he has not seen in years marks his door and thirteen dwarves arrive for dinner. Gandalf has arranged the gathering, and the dwarves explain that they mean to take back the Lonely Mountain, the home their people lost, along with its treasure, which the dragon Smaug is guarding. They need a burglar for the journey, and Gandalf has told them Bilbo is the fourteenth member of the company.

The dwarves' leader, Thorin Oakenshield, intends to reclaim what is his, and Bilbo signs the contract. The company sets out east from the Shire, with trolls, goblins and worse between them and the mountain, and the journey carries Bilbo away from the peace of the countryside into country that is far more dangerous. Along the way he finds a ring that changes what he is capable of.

The book was written for children and narrates in a conversational voice. A sequel followed in The Lord of the Rings, and the story of Bilbo's journey was later adapted into a trilogy of films.