Table of Contents

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: Thag You Very Buch x

Introduction: Never Laugh at Live Philosophers 1
Gregory Bassham and Eric Bronson

PART ONE DISCOVER YOUR INNER TOOK

1 The Adventurous Hobbit 7
Gregory Bassham

2 “The Road Goes Ever On and On”: A Hobbit’s Tao 20
Michael C. Brannigan

3 Big Hairy Feet: A Hobbit’s Guide to Enlightenment 32
Eric Bronson

4 Bilbo Baggins: The Cosmopolitan Hobbit 45
Dennis Knepp

PART TWO THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE SLIMY

5 The Glory of Bilbo Baggins 61
Charles Taliaferro and Craig Lindahl-Urben

6 Pride and Humility in The Hobbit 74
Laura Garcia

7 “My Precious”: Tolkien on the Perils of Possessiveness 90
Anna Minore and Gregory Bassham

8 Tolkien’s Just War 103
David Kyle Johnson

9 “Pretty Fair Nonsense”: Art and Beauty in The Hobbit 118
Philip Tallon

10 Hobbitus Ludens: Why Hobbits Like to Play and Why We Should, Too 129
David L. O’Hara

PART THREE RIDDLES AND RINGS

11 “The Lord of Magic and Machines”: Tolkien on Magic and Technology 147
W. Christopher Stewart

12 Inside The Hobbit: Bilbo Baggins and the Paradox of Fiction 161
Amy Kind

13 Philosophy in the Dark: The Hobbit and Hermeneutics 176
Tom Grimwood

PART FOUR BEING THERE AND BACK AGAIN

14 Some Hobbits Have All the Luck 193
Randall M. Jensen

15 The Consolation of Bilbo: Providence and Free Will in Middle-Earth 206
Grant Sterling

16 Out of the Frying Pan: Courage and Decision Making in Wilderland 218
Jamie Carlin Watson

17 There and Back Again: A Song of Innocence and Experience 235
Joe Kraus

CONTRIBUTORS: Our Most Excellent and Audacious Contributors 251

INDEX: The Moon Letters 257

About the Author

Gregory Bassham is Chair of the Philosophy Department atKing's College and a professor of philosophy. He edited The Ultimate Harry Potter and Philosophy and co-edited The Chronicles of Narnia and Philosophy (Open Court) and The Lord of the Rings and Philosophy . Eric Bronson is a visiting professor in the HumanitiesDepartment at York University in Toronto, Canada. He is the editorof Poker and Philosophy (2012), and co-editor of The Lordof the Rings and Philosophy (2003) and Baseball andPhilosophy (2011). William Irwin is Professor of Philosophy at King'sCollege. He originated the philosophy and popular culture genre ofbooks as coeditor of the bestselling The Simpsons andPhilosophy and has overseen recent titles including Houseand Philosophy, Batman and Philosophy, and Alice inWonderland and Philosophy.

Reviews

The value in this approach, of course, is that these essays are simple; they are incredibly short (each runs about five pages), and they are clear and accessible. (Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, 1 February 2015) Gregory Bassham and Eric Bronson s anthology of essays, 'The Hobbit and Philosophy', may have an overblown title, but the authors do a good job of focusing on themes like possessiveness, providence and free will, courage and decision-making. (The Times Literary Supplement, 21 December 2012)