Lord of the Rings I

Bibliographical Information:

J.R.R. Tolkien , Lord Of The Rings. New York: Ballentine Books, 1965

Cast of Characters:

• Frodo- the main character and new owner of the ring.

• Sam- Frodos brother

• Sauron- and evil being

• Gollum- stole the ring the second time

• Bombaldi- old friend of Frodo

The story starts with the twentieth birthday-party for Frodo Baggins, a Hobbit who lives with his brother Sam in a mythical land called the Shire. Frodo owns a magic Ring which makes him invisible when he wears it, a gift from his cousin Bilbo who stole it from the hoard of a Dragon years ago.

One day the old wizard Gandalf comes to the Shire, and he tells Frodo of an evil being named Sauron who wants to capture the Ring for himself. In ages long past Sauron stole the Ring from the Elves, to protect him from the Powers of Good; but the Ring was stolen from him by a creature named Gollum,and then stolen from Gollum by the Dragons, and then from the Dragons by Bilbo, who finally gives it freely to Frodo. "Sauron has been searching for the Ring for years," Gandalf tells Frodo, "and now he has sent his ally, the evil Witch-king, to the Shire to look for it." Frodo and Sam consult with their loyal friends Merry and Pipsqueak, and when the evil Witch-king appears with his nine servants the clever hobbits trick them into going into a mushroom-patch, disorienting the witches just long enough to escape the Shire.

But the tone of the book rapidly becomes more serious as the Witch-king and his evil servants pursue the hobbits through the forest. Frodo discovers that the witches have destroyed the village of Bree, and the Witch-king uses a magic spell to burn down the home of their old friend Tom Bombadil. Frodo, horrified, wants to go back and fight the evil witches, but at a hill called Weathertop he meets a noble man named Aragorn who convinces him to go to the city of Rivendell. "In Rivendell you will be safe from their magic," Aragorn tells him, "for Elrond is a sensible man, and does not believe in it." With that Aragorn leads them rapidly to Rivendell, with the witches in hot pursuit. As they ford the last river between them and Rivendell the Witch-king casts a spell on the river-water, causing it to rise up and try to drown them; only Frodo's quick thinking can save them, and he uses the power of the Ring to make all the water evaporate into fog. The fog is so thick that the Witch-king and his servants become hopelessly lost, and our heroes make it to the safety of Rivendell.

At Rivendell, Elrond holds a Council where the fate of the Ring is discussed. The only way to keep Sauron from recovering the Ring, they decide, is to throw it into the volcano of Mount Doom where it will be destroyed. During the Council Gandalf arrives late, saying that he had been held prisoner in the tower of Orthanc, the Wizards' Tower. Curiously, he refuses to describe how he escaped. "But it is more important than ever that we destroy the Ring," Gandalf says, "for now the other Wizards know of it, and seek it as well." He tells of how the dark wizard Saruman, once an ally of the forces