O tom de O Hobbit difere significativamente daquele de Senhor dos Anéis?

Palavras do próprio Tolkien ( fonte ):

My work did not 'evolve' into a serious work. It started like that. The so-called 'children's story' was a fragment, torn out of an already existing mythology. In so far as it was dressed up as 'for children,' in style or manner, I regret it. So do the children.

E a mesma fonte afirma que ele começou como um "escritor de livros infantis".

Mudanças dramáticas em seu estilo de escrita ocorreram quando ele chegou a escrever O Senhor dos Anéis - na medida em que ele gostaria de revisar O Hobbit e reescreva-o no mesmo estilo do Senhor dos Anéis .

A biografia de Carpenter, como citada aqui , nos diz:

[Tolkien] found The Hobbit to be "very poor" (according to Humphrey Carpenter's biography). There are glimpses of Tolkien's dissatisfaction with The Hobbit in some of his letters. He felt he was too condescending to children in the early part of the book, and he would have preferred to rewrite it completely, had there been time to do so.

Não tendo a biografia de Carpenter à mão, não posso fornecer uma cotação em primeira mão, mas talvez alguém que a tenha fornecido ...

Excelente resumo de O Hobbit aqui , que nos diz:

The Hobbit was originally a story Tolkien told to his children. [...] It is described as a fantasy novel, a story of heroic quest, and a children's story.

The narrator and the tone of the narration are sometimes comic, and sometimes condescending to the reader. This condescension was not unusual in books for children in the early 20th century.

Basicamente, a resposta é sim .

Todo fã sério de Tolkien concordaria.

Relevante: esta pergunta SFF.SE e suas respostas.

Tolkien falou sobre isso em sua carta # 33 para seus editores em Allen e Unwin, observando que o tom do SdA é substancialmente mais escuro e "mais velho" que o do Hobbit:

In the last two or three days, after the benefit of idleness and open air, and the sanctioned neglect of duty, I have begun again on the sequel to the ‘Hobbit’ – The Lord of the Ring. It is now flowing along, and getting quite out of hand. It has reached about Chapter VII and progresses towards quite unforeseen goals. I must say I think it is a good deal better in places and some ways than the predecessor; but that does not say that I think it either more suitable or more adapted for its audience. For one thing it is, like my own children (who have the immediate serial rights), rather ‘older’. I can only say that Mr Lewis (my stout backer of the Times and T.L.S.) professes himself more than pleased.

Em Carta # 34 , ele declarou que achava que o SdA seria " aterrorizante " crianças mais jovens que poderiam ter gostado do livro anterior de Hobbit:

When I spoke, in an earlier letter to Mr Furth, of this sequel getting ‘out of hand’, I did not mean it to be complimentary to the process. I really meant it was running its course, and forgetting ‘children’, and was becoming more terrifying than the Hobbit. It may prove quite unsuitable. It is more ‘adult’ – but my own children who criticize it as it appears are now older.

e em sua carta nº 131 ele falou sobre a grande mudança de estilo:

The generally different tone and style of The Hobbit is due, in point of genesis, to it being taken by me as a matter from the great cycle susceptible of treatment as a ‘fairy-story’, for children. Some of the details of tone and treatment are, I now think, even on that basis, mistaken. But I should not wish to change much. For in effect this is a study of simple ordinary man, neither artistic nor noble and heroic (but not without the undeveloped seeds of these things) against a high setting – and in fact (as a critic has perceived) the tone and style change with the Hobbit’s development, passing from fairy-tale to the noble and high and relapsing with the return.

e na sua carta # 163 para W.H. Auden ele critica alguns dos escritos no hobbit como sendo ambos juvenil (em estilo) e juvenilia:

I went on after return; but when I attempted to get any of this stuff published I was not successful. The Hobbit was originally quite unconnected, though it inevitably got drawn in to the circumference of the greater construction; and in the event modified it. It was unhappily really meant, as far as I was conscious, as a ‘children’s story’, and as I had not learned sense then, and my children were not quite old enough to correct me, it has some of the sillinesses of manner caught unthinkingly from the kind of stuff I had had served to me, as Chaucer may catch a minstrel tag. I deeply regret them. So do intelligent children.

e se você quiser uma crítica mais detalhada (e descontroladamente severa) de seus próprios trabalhos, você não pode realmente fazer melhor do que sua Carta # 215 para Allen e Unwin (recusando-se a participar de um simpósio sobre "escrever para crianças":

When I published The Hobbit – hurriedly and without due consideration – I was still influenced by the convention that ‘fairy-stories’ are naturally directed to children (with or without the silly added waggery ‘from seven to seventy’). And I had children of my own. But the desire to address children, as such, had nothing to do with the story as such in itself or the urge to write it. But it had some unfortunate effects on the mode of expression and narrative method, which if I had not been rushed, I should have corrected. Intelligent children of good taste (of which there seem quite a number) have always, I am glad to say, singled out the points in manner where the address is to children as blemishes... The relation between The Hobbit and its sequel is I think this. The Hobbit is a first essay or introduction (consideration will admit I think that it is a very just point at which to begin the narration of the subsequent events) to a complex narrative which had been brewing in my mind for years. It was overtly addressed to children for two reasons: I had at that time children of my own and was accustomed to making up (ephemeral) stories for them; I had been brought up to believe that there was a real and special connexion between children and fairy-stories. Or rather to believe that this was a received opinion of my world and of publishers. I doubted it, since it did not accord with my personal experience of my own taste, nor with my observation of children (notably my own). But the convention was strong. I think that The Hobbit can be seen to begin in what might be called a more ‘whimsy’ mode, and in places even more facetious, and move steadily to a more serious or significant, and more consistent and historical. . . . . But I regret much of it all the same. . . . .

O tom é diferente. O LOTR é uma fantasia épica. Os heróis sofrem e têm momentos de dúvida. Embora não seja tão sombrio quanto The Children of Húrin em sua forma fragmentária, também não é um conto de fadas moderno. Bons triunfos, mas há um custo alto e muito sofrimento. É uma história de um mundo através dos olhos de alguns personagens.

O Hobbit, por outro lado, é mais uma história de aventura . Centra-se em um núcleo relativamente pequeno de personagens, a história é um pouco mais focada em pequenos eventos relativamente falando, e é significativamente mais despreocupada. Eu não a considero tão profunda ou bem escrita quanto a trilogia principal, mas não é um livro ruim

Você vai gostar? Depende. Ele preenche um pouco da história de fundo. Seu legível (tho eu li isto uma vez , e poderia ler isto novamente. Eventualmente). Isso aumenta o prazer da trilogia propriamente dita.

Sim, o tom é um pouco diferente, como você já parece suspeitar. Mas, se você vai ficar desapontado é inteiramente com você. Para mim, ainda é uma boa história e uma leitura divertida apesar do tom mais leve.

Bem, eu estou lendo O Hobbit agora, e é quase como eu temia. Diferenças notáveis:

• Tudo é mais tolo.
• As raças são menos interessantes e respeitáveis, especialmente os Anões (menos corajosos, mais propensos a canções estúpidas sobre talheres rachados), os Elfos (menos inteligentes e sérios) e os Orcs (menos assustadores - eles cantam <, ffs).
• Gandalf é uma espécie de idiota.
• As músicas são infantis e estúpidas.
• Todos - bons, maus ou intermediários - são um palhaço, em maior ou menor extensão.
• A partir de onde estou agora, o tom é menos sério e mais irreverente, e a narrativa é escrita em tom quase conversacional.

Infelizmente, estou realmente um pouco desapontado. Oh bem.