Little Bilbo's Superpower: Seeing the End of the Road
- Miriam Ellis
- Sep 30, 2025
- 3 min read
This simple painting is set in the long span of years between Bilbo's great adventure and his even greater deed. He looks out from the familiar front door of Bag End across Hobbiton, to the East Road, and the green countryside beyond.
Bilbo knows something about where the Road leads. He spends much of his life thinking about the Road, talking about it to anyone who will listen, and composing poetry, song, and even a book about it. As he regards the view below the Hill, he can remember where the Road took him, and his feats of daring in the name of Tookish-ness, and one-fourteenth total profit in treasure.
He has trodden with dwarves, tarried with elves, climbed trees, dined with Beorn, battled spiders, and faced a dragon. He's walked miles and miles in the company of a sub-created divinity. Yet, all this is the smaller part of his story.
Bilbo's great deed
We may think of Mr. Baggins as the one who finds the Ring, but I like to remember him as the one who gives it up. Not without struggle, not without doubt and pain, but with a strength which eludes so many seemingly-mightier folk.
Bilbo is stronger than Boromir, who falls prey to the schemes of the Ring. He is stronger than fallen Saruman. Bilbo is, in fact, stronger than Sauron, who becomes the utter thrall of his own self-made devices.
How is it that Bilbo gives up the Ring with less dramatic strivings than an ancient elf like Galadriel? Unfortunate Gollum seeks revenge when he loses the precious, so how is it that Bilbo continues to love Gandalf, who is instrumental in parting him from his treasure?
The Road as gift
Perhaps it has something to do with Bilbo's true vision of the Road as it relates to mortality - the gift of Ilúvatar. Bilbo's last known version of the Road Song is full of wisdom.
The Road goes ever on and on
Out from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
Let others follow it who can!
Let them a journey now begin,
But I at last with weary feet
Will turn toward the lighted inn,
My evening-rest and sleep to meet.
Bilbo has no delusions about wanting to become a vast, ruling power, a hoarder of luxury, a dominator. Again and again, he gives up wealth, be it the Arkenstone or the money he is said to be so free with in the Shire. He is not even particularly attached to the longevity the Ring is bestowing, unbeknownst to him. He doesn't feel well possessing it, and craves rest from worldly things.
It seems to me that Bilbo learns from the Road that it has an end, and that we cannot take power or riches with us. Many of his companions, both mortal and otherwise, have the hardest time learning this lesson. Somehow, for the truly humble, the lighted inn at journey's end becomes more appealing than the promise of thousands of years on a dark throne.
Solemn themes in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings
From the security of his faith, Professor Tolkien deeply explored the theme of death in his masterworks to such moving effect. What do we do with the time we are given, whether it be a hobbit's hundred years or the ages of the elves here in Middle-earth?
Bilbo is by no means unscathed by the Ring, but a life spent in unselfishly giving things away seems to be good armor on the journey. In this, the little hobbit is somewhat reminiscent of St. Francis, ultimately ridding himself of the weights of this world in renouncing material things.
Bilbo understands that he can leave it up to the next generations to take to the Road after him. His lack of grasping is why he exits Bag End so gracefully after a brief struggle, free of the Ring and able to sing as he sets out for his golden years at Rivendell and eventually to an elven-ship for rest.
We, who are still on the Road, can hope to live as well as Bilbo did, with courage in a pinch, vision of higher things, loyalty to his friends, respect for the poor, kindness to the young, and generosity towards his community. Our paths hold these same possibilities, stretching out before us to a distant horizon.
I hope you will enjoy this video short on the threshold of Bag End. You might think about large themes in Tolkien while you view it, or you might just imagine where you would walk to down the Hill and into the lovely Shire.
