J. R. R. Tolkien - The Hobbit (1937)

87 Sourced Quotes

View all J. R. R. Tolkien Quotes
O! Where are you going With beards all a-wagging? No knowing, no knowing What brings Mister Baggins, And Balin and Dwalin down into the valley in June ha! ha!

J. R. R. Tolkien
Is it nice, my preciousss? Is it juicy? Is it scrumptiously crunchable?

J. R. R. Tolkien
Then something Tookish woke up inside him, and he wished to go and see the great mountains, and hear the pine-trees and the waterfalls, and explore the caves, and wear a sword instead of a walking-stick.

J. R. R. Tolkien
He did not go much further, but sat down on the cold floor and gave himself up to complete miserableness, for a long while. He thought of himself frying bacon and eggs in his own kitchen at home - for he could feel inside that it was high time for some meal or other; but that only made him miserabler.

J. R. R. Tolkien
This is a story of how a Baggins had an adventure, and found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected.

J. R. R. Tolkien
The washing-up was so dismally real that Bilbo was forced to believe the party of the night before had not been part of his bad dreams, as he had rather hoped.

J. R. R. Tolkien
I remember nothing about it except a philological fact. My mother said nothing about the dragon, but pointed out that one could not say 'a green great dragon', but had to say 'a great green dragon'. I wondered why, and still do. The fact that I remember this is possibly significant, as I do not think I ever tried to write a story again for many years, and was taken up with language.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Gandalf, dwarves and Mr. Baggins! We are met together in the house of our friend and fellow conspirator, this most excellent and audacious hobbit—may the hair on his toes never fall out!

J. R. R. Tolkien
Never laugh at live dragons, Bilbo you fool!" he said to himself, and it became a favourite saying of his later, and passed into a proverb. "You aren't nearly through this adventure yet," he added, and that was pretty true as well.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Burn, burn tree and fern! Shrivel and scorch! A fizzling torch To light the night for our delight, Ya hey! Bake and toast 'em, fry and roast 'em! till beards blaze, and eyes glaze; till hair smells and skins crack, fat melts, and bones black in cinders lie beneath the sky! So dwarves shall die, and light the night for our delight, Ya hey! Ya-harri-hey! Ya hoy!

J. R. R. Tolkien
Now I know what a piece of bacon feels like when it is suddenly picked out of the pan on a fork and put back on the shelf!" "No you don't!" he heard Dori answering, "because the bacon knows that it will get back in the pan sooner or later; and it is to be hoped we shan't. Also eagles aren't forks!

J. R. R. Tolkien
Victory after all, I suppose! Well, it seems a very gloomy business.

J. R. R. Tolkien
There is little or no magic about them, except the ordinary everyday sort which helps them to disappear quietly and quickly when large stupid folk like you and me come blundering along, making a noise like elephants which they can hear a mile off.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Of the twelve companions of Thorin, ten remained. Fili and Kili had fallen defending him with shield and body, for he was their mother's elder brother.

J. R. R. Tolkien
You ought not to be rude to an eagle, when you are only the size of a hobbit, and are up in hid eyrie at night!

J. R. R. Tolkien
Farewell," they cried, "Wherever you fare till your eyries receive you at the journey's end!" That is the polite thing to say among eagles. "May the wind under your wings bear you where the sun sails and the moon walks," answered Gandalf, who knew the correct reply.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Chip the glasses and crack the plates! / Blunt the knives and bend the forks! / That's what Bilbo Baggins hates.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Escaping goblins to be caught by wolves! he said, and it became a proverb, though we now say 'out of the frying-pan into the fire' in the same sort of uncomfortable situations.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Lazy Lob and crazy Cob are weaving webs to wind me. I am far more sweet than other meat, but still they cannot find me! Here am I, naughty little fly; you are fat and lazy. You cannot trap me, though you try, in your cobwebs crazy.

J. R. R. Tolkien
If you mean you think it is my job to go into the secret passage first, O Thorin Thrain's son Oakenshield, may your beard grow ever longer, he said crossly, say so at once and have done!

J. R. R. Tolkien
It cannot be seen, cannot be felt, Cannot be heard, cannot be smelt, It lies behind stars and under hills, And empty holes it fills, It comes first and follows after, Ends life, kills laughter.

J. R. R. Tolkien
There are no safe paths in this part of the world. Remember you are over the Edge of the Wild now, and in for all sorts of fun wherever you go.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Bilbo saw that the moment had come when he must do something.

J. R. R. Tolkien
It seemed like all the way to tomorrow and over it to the days beyond.

J. R. R. Tolkien
Somehow the killing of the giant spider, all alone by himself in the dark without the help of the wizard or the dwarves or of anyone else, made a great difference to Mr. Baggins. He felt a different person, and much fiercer and bolder in spite of an empty stomach, as he wiped his sword on the grass and put it back into its sheath.

J. R. R. Tolkien