Welcome to the Lord of the Rings lore cast,

the show that explores the background of Tolkien's amazing world from the very beginning. Those of you who are very familiar with The Hobbit know that we are moving through chapter 2, which means we're getting closer and closer to the situation with the trolls.

And I'm excited to talk about this on today's episode, because the trolls in this part of the

story are peculiar.

Have you thought about it?

Have you gone through all the rest of the work that Tolkien has done, and then

never come back to this situation, and then thought about it? These trolls are on a forested

hill, not too far from the shire, speaking in common and wearing clothing.

Not only that, but one of them has a magic purse in his pocket.

Very peculiar.

So let's get into it, because we're going to crack open the trolls and see what's in here.

That's actually pretty gross, but I'm going to leave it in. Here we go.

So the weather is terrible. It's raining. The dwarves and Bilbo are grumpy.

And they're looking for a place to camp. So they decided to go under a group of trees.

And this section is interesting. It says, though it was drier under them, the wind shook the rain

off the leaves, and the drip drip was most annoying. I love that he puts drip drip, he doubles

up a word that comes across kind of humorous and light in a way, even though the situation is

annoying and not fun for the party at all. But it also shows,

I think, that Tolkien had spent some time camping or in the military being in situations where

you are trying to stay dry, trying to make camp, and you're hoping that the trees will bring

some shelter, but the drip drip keeps coming down

from the leaves. This is a person who's experienced this before. The dwarves can make a fire

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