The Hobbit and The Snerg

[Andorinha]

Contrasting and comparing the narrative themes, styles, and characters of JRRT's The Hobbit and E.A. Wykes-Smith's The Marvellous Land of the Snergs.

[Andorinha]

Just got my copy of E.A. Wyke-Smith's "The Marvellous Land of the Snergs." A short couple of years back there were few copies of this book in circulation and could only be purchased for $165.00. Now, with the Dover republication of 2006, the price has been nicely reduced to a trifling $6.50. All the original 1928 George Morrow illustrations are presented here as well.

The book, just like The Hobbit, features a narrator who guides us through the tale with many explanatory asides directed to the reader.

"The Snergs" also starts out, similar to The Hobbit, with an explanation of the title creatures:

"The Snergs are a race of people only slightly taller than the average table but broad in the shoulders and of great strength. Probably they are some offshoot of the pixies who once inhabited the hills and forests of England, and who finally disappeared about the reign of Henry VIII. ... The Snergs dress in tight-fitting woolen hose, with a jerkin of the same material and a leather belt, and little round leather caps... When at home most of them live in the town; some few have their mills and farms a little distance away, but they come in pretty often for they are gregarious people, loving company. ... They are long-lived people; roughly they live as long as oaks... They are great on feasts, which they have in the open air at long tables... truth is they get slightly tiddledums [tipsy-drunk] and laugh far too much..." p. 7

Compare this to JRRT's introduction for the race of Hobbits:

"The mother of our particular hobbit -- what is a hobbit? I suppose hobbits need some description nowadays, since they have become rare and shy of the Big People, as they call us. They are (or were) a little people, about half our height, and smaller than the bearded Dwarves. ... They are inclined to be fat in the stomach; they dress in bright colours... and laugh deep fruity laughs (especially after dinner...)." p. 30 Annotated Hobbit

LOL Tolkien did mention the Snergs in several Letters, an extract from one is actually printed on the cover of this 2006 edition, and is expected, no doubt, to increase the sales considerably: "I should like to record my own love and my children's love of E.A. Wyke-Smith's Marvellous Land of the Snergs."

As I get further into this book, I bet I find even more comparative material and I'll spill it all here!

[Andorinha]

I am having an enormously good time reading MLS. What strikes me most, comparatively with The Hobbit, is the sense of FUN that the narrative conveys. The story moves along very quickly, lightly, and (at least for my mind) produces bright, detailed mental images, so that the reading experience is almost like watching a super-excellent movie. I felt the same way reading Bilbo's tale, sort of "lived" rather than read both these books.

It may simply be the way my mind is bent, but I like "natural history" descriptive passages. Tolkien sets the stage for his readers by describing in convincing detail the actual geographic scenes his characters move through. Wyke-Smith does the same:

"In parts where the trees were not so very thick the grass was all dappled with spots of sun, and sometimes there were great shafts of light through the trees to make a guide for them... They got up and went on again, following the gleam of the sun as well as they could, until at last it went out altogether and they could only see a red glow from the open parts where there were mostly bushes. And still they went on and on and on, until Sylvia said her legs began to feel all wobbly and she had to sit down. There it was: those silly things [Joe and Sylvia] were deep in the lonely woods and the shadows were creeping up from the far places. Joe climbed a tree to see if he could see something worth seeing..." pp 29 -31)

LOL -- Reminds me of Bilbo's tree climbing episode; and in general, I think of the passage of Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin along the margins of the Old Forest, before they met Old Man Willow.

I am thinking now that the "tone" of the Snergs' tale, the "spirit" of the thing, is the closest match to JRRT's best writing that I've found so far. I'll think some more on this similarity of "style," as I guess it would be called. MLS really seems VERY "hobbitish" in its "taste," if that makes sense?