A Quest with Sarah and a Hobbit

After (and while) reading this chapter I realized how many movies, stories and books I’m familiar with are centered around a quest. Now I know that it should be obvious, but I’ve never paid much attention or thought about a story that in depth. And since I am so obsessed with this movie it was what first popped into my mind while reading: The Labyrinth (with David Bowie, of course). The whole movie is about a teenage girl going on a journey to take back her baby step-brother that the Goblin King has kidnapped.

To give a little more information about the movie, the teenage girl, Sarah, goes to take back her step-brother from the Goblin King, Jareth, before he turns him into a goblin. Despite the fact that Sarah did not like her step-mother or brother in the beginning, she still goes to get her step-brother because, well, you don’t know what yah got till it’s gone. So once Jareth takes the baby Sarah must travel through this labyrinth to find and take back her brother. Except Jareth makes the Labyrinth harder and harder as she gets closer to his kingdom. Finally, in the end she gets her baby step-brother back and she is sent home as if it all were a dream.

So that basically puts all the parts of a quest into one summary. The quester obviously being Sarah and her stated reason to go is take back her stolen step-brother who is held in the Goblin King’s castle (the place to go). Her challenges and trials are the ones that are put in place by Jareth to stall Sarah. Then at the end she in a way realizes her real reason to go on this journey; to see how important her family really is, especially her step-mother and brother.

Another quest that is quite famous is the one in The Hobbit. In this story Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit, is asked to go on this quest to help take back a dwarves’ kingdom from a dragon that has settled down and rested within the castle. At first Bilbo is definitely not comfortable with this idea. They came to Bilbo since he is a hobbit and hobbits have a knack for sneaking into places without being noticed and that is exactly what the dwarves were looking for. So at first Bilbo denies, but once he has rested and thought about it he agrees and tags along. Right there is the questers (Bilbo and the dwarves, but mainly Bilbo) as well as the stated reason, take back the kingdom, and the place, the kingdom. The challenges they face are battling Orcs and trolls and also actually facing the dragon. With all that happening Bilbo finds his true reason he’s on this journey; to overcome his fears. Bilbo never strayed too far from his home so going on this long journey with dwarves and a wizard he barely knows is a huge leap for him in gaining courage. Plus, he made an impact on quite a few people who had little faith in him.