The Hero's Journey In The Hobbit Vs. The Sword Of Shannara

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The Hobbit vs The Sword of Shannara The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien and The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks are very similar in nature. Both books are set in a fantasy world, with a magical figure that starts the journey to defeat an evil figure. Both books follow the Hero’s Journey archetype, and share many other common characteristics. The Sword of Shannara starts with the main character, Flick, being approached by the Druid Allanon. Allanon alerts them that they are being tracked down by a skull bearer, one of the Warlock Lord’s minion. They must find the and retrieve the Sword of Shannara, the only weapon that can defeat the warlock lord. You can already see the similarities between The Sword of Shannara and The Hobbit. Both …show more content…

Allanon being equivalent to Gandalf is only the beginning of the similarities between the two series. Both contain Elves, Dwarfs, and Humans. In both books, the party splits into groups, and then are reunited at the end. In both books, they are forced to take a detour. Again and again, we see similarities between the two books. But it doesn't stop there. The elfstones (they reveal themselves when used) can be equated to the one ring, Brona (he was good and then fell to the magic) replaced by Sauron, Shea is Frodo, Stenmin is Wormtongue. The list goes on and on, for every item in the LOTR, there is an equivalent object in The Sword of Shannara. It is obvious that Terry Brooks borrowed a few things from Tolkien. But does it really matter? Most fantasy books take many parts of Tolkien's work, as he was one of the pioneers of the genre of fantasy fiction. Dungeons and Dragons takes a lot of races and other elements out of the LOTR. What The Sword of Shannara did was show that people would buy and enjoy other fantasy books than The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. In conclusion, there are many elements that are similar between the series. You can safely assume that Terry Brooks used Tolkien’s work as a major inspiration. What The Sword of Shannara did well was open up the fantasy genre to new books. Despite being very similar in nature, The Sword of Shannara is still very important to the

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