Tolkien's beloved novel The hobbit has deep roots in European folklore, mythology, and language. As a reader's introduction to Tolkien's Middle-earth, it contains references to the ancient history of this imaginary world which, though rarely explained, contribute greatly to the effect of Tolkien's art. This revised and expanded edition of The annotated hobbit unobtrusively and authoritatively illuminates the novel's antecedents and curiosities. Douglas Anderson has also collected here wonderful illustrations from all over the world. The many new annotations in this edition reflect more than a decade's additional scholarship on the history and evolution of The hobbit, and the annotations and illustrations are newly integrated with the core text in a handsome reader-friendly format. This edition also reproduces the fully corrected text of The hobbit as J.R.R. Tolkien approved it before his death, in 1973. Anderson has compared every page from every major edition of The hobbit with Tolkien's own last checking copy in the restoration work for this definitive edition.