The Paris Review has republished this book review of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit , written by C.S. Lewis shortly after the book was released in 1937. Unsurprisingly, Lewis nailed it: “Prediction is dangerous: but The Hobbit may well prove a classic.” Lewis praised the book for it’s surface appeal to younger readers, but also the “deft scholarship and profound reflection” that makes it even better “at a tenth or a twentieth reading.” This C.S. Lewis guy sure does have a good eye for literature …
