Group "A" should answer TWO of the following:
Q1: How is Smaug a lot like the dwarves (especially Thorin) as well as some of the Men in the story? Though he is a great dragon and a creature of old, how has his heart been corrupted by a lack of fantasy and a narrow view of “business?”
Q2: Bilbo exclaims to himself, “Now I am a burglar indeed!” when he finally steals something—in this case, the Arkenstone. Why does he take it and say nothing to the dwarves? Does it do this because it calls to him, the same way as the Ring did? Or does he have a larger plan from the beginning?
Q3: In the passage with Smaug, we learn that “there was one smell [Smaug] could not make out at all, hobbit-smell; it was quite outside his experience and puzzled him mightily” (201). Additionally, Bilbo refuses to tell his name, and instead indulges in a series of “kennings,” an Anglo-Saxon poetic form (clue-finder, web-cutter, etc.). What effect does this have on Smaug, and what might be his purpose in doing this? Why taunt an already awake and angry dragon in this manner?
Q4: Why is Bard able to destroy Smaug when no one else could? How might his seemingly "magical" ability to perform a heroic feat mirror some of Bilbo's accomplishments? If you know Star Wars, why might this be a Luke Skywalker destroying the Death Star moment? (consider how Luke does it, and why George Lucas might have had this moment in mind).
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