Bilbo Hero Essay

Bilbo The Hero

For most people, going on an adventure is taking a hike in the woods with little trouble, but for Bilbo it was the exact opposite. The little, hairy footed hobbit was picked to go on an intense journey with 13 dwarves to search for the dragon Smaug to get Thorin’s gold back. Along the way, the hobbit and dwarves encountered man-eating creatures that they needed to outwit . J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of The Hobbit, expresses the three traits, cleverness, bravery and responsibility, that Bilbo develops throughout the adventure helps him learn that you don’t need to be big and magical to be a hero.

Bilbo puts his cleverness to the test during the adventure to help save the lives of the dwarves and himself. When escaping from the

Bilbo fits that description more and more as the story progresses by risking his life to help his friends, the dwarves. When trying to get through Gollum, Bilbo doesn’t just use his cleverness, but also bravery when he agrees to play the riddle game with Gollum even though the rules were that,“If Gollum asks, and Bilbo doesn’t answer, he gets eaten, but if Bilbo asks, and Gollum gets it wrong, he has to show Bilbo the way out”(p.74). This is brave because he is willing to die if he doesn’t get a riddle right. Bilbo deals with Smaug in a brave way when he goes to visit him. Bilbo has no way of being safe, even with the invisible ring because Smaug has, “a great sense of smell, and can sleep with one eye open,”(222). Finally, another way Bilbo shows his bravery to express his heroism, when he agrees to go on the adventure. Hobbits are, “Half the size humans, and have little or no magic, besides being able to disappear quietly,”(2). He is also a Baggins, and they are known for being against adventurous, so for him to go with, took a lot of thought, commitment and

One of the ways Bilbo shows leadership is when he saves the dwarves from the Wood-elves. Since Bilbo put on his ring of invisibility when the dwarves were caught, he was free to roam around the halls of the Elvenking 's dungeon. One day he stumbled upon a little stream that goes out into the open. When Bilbo discovered this, “He sat and thought about the water-gate, and how it could be used to help escape his friends,”(177). This showed his responsibility because he didn’t give up when they were caught, he explored his options and eventually found a way to save everyone. Something else that the hobbit did was helping the dwarves escape from the spiders. He had his ring of invisibility on at this time also, and had to untangle all the dwarves from the spider webs. Bilbo achieved doing this by distracting the spiders with songs and calling them, “Attercops.” The most responsible thing Bilbo did was he took over when Gandalf left. He is even told by Gandalf, “There was always more about you than anyone expected,”(274). When Gandalf left, there is a change in Bilbo as he becomes more of a leader. He begins telling the dwarves what they needed to accomplish and took matters into his own hands no matter the risk.

At the start of the adventure, Bilbo Baggins was just a normal hobbit. He was shy, non daring, timid and unknown. Throughout the journey, he turned into a hero by