All-of-us Express Children's Theatre on-line resources for The Hobbit

Welcome to the on-line resource page for the study guide made for use with the All-of-us Express Children's Theatre's 2004 stage production of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit. The script we used was written by Patricia Gray, and is available from The Dramatic Publishing Company of Woodstock, Illinois. (From whom the hobbit figure at the left also comes.) The works of Tolkien are copyrighted, and commercial use of character names and so on is ultimately controlled by Tolkien Enterprises. It might be useful to discuss in class what it means for a literary work to be copyrighted, and where the line is drawn between commercial and non-commercial use of a popular work such as The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings.

If, fate forfend, you have not read the book itself, you can read a synopsis from the Wikipedia (free, no strings attached) or the Barnes & Noble SparkNotes study guide (free, but you have to create an account to have access to all the information).

As one might imagine, there is a longstanding world-wide interest in Tolkien and his works. The Tolkien Society in England is probably the preeminent group of admirers and fans. Their site includes a good biography of J.R.R. Tolkien.

The Mythopoeic Society is a group dedicated to "the study, discussion, and enjoyment of fantasy and mythic literature," particularly that of the group known as the Inklings, of which Tolkien was a member. There are many, many web pages around the world with themes taken from the Tolkien books. Here are just a few: The HoBBiT Site, Peder Langlo, Norway The Hobbit, a site with over 700 pages put together by a teacher in New Zealand. Includes a neat interactive web maze! Theatre New Brunswick, Canada, production of The Hobbit J.R.R. Tolkien in Oxford a private site with a great deal of information A few questions

You can answer these questions by following links from this page. You'll soon learn which links lead to what kinds of information.

1. For what do the initials J.R.R. stand?
2. Many of Tolkien's tales began as stories told or written to his children. How many children did he have?
3. Who were some of the other members of the Inklings? Have you read anything they have written? Was it anything like The Hobbit?
4. Tolkien is popularly known as the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, but writing those books is probably not what he considered his main work. What else did he do?
5. Why is The Hobbit so popular? Why do you like this story (if you do)? Why do other people say they like this story?
6. Hobbits, and other non-human characters, are portrayed in many different ways by various illustrators. What do you think hobbits look like? Why?
7. The Hobbit is a prequel to The Lord of the Rings, and was revised how many times to better fit in with the latter book?
8. An immense quantity of music has been inspired by Tolkien's tales. Find one of the lists on the web. Have you heard any of this music?
9. Use a search engine (such as Google or Lycos) to see how many pages are found for each of the words gandalf, gollum, hobbit and tolkien (do four separate searches). What word had the most hits? Are you surprised?
10. If you are studying, or have studied, a language other than English, search for a web site in that language that is about The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings.

We hope you have enjoyed using this web page!

It is the mission of All-of-us Express Children's Theatre to provide young people with an opportunity to produce plays of a professional quality, and to provide the community with an opportunity to enjoy live family-oriented dramatic activities.

The home page of All-of-us Express Children's Theatre is www.allofusexpress.org
All-of-us Express, P.O. Box 1871, East Lansing MI 48826, (517) 394-4118