How Tolkien Turned Boredom into a Bestseller

Be alert for creativity to strike in the midst of the mundane. Even an unexpected blank page can hold the beginning of your next masterpiece.

You don’t have to be working in a cabin in the woods to have creative insights. You don’t have to be a hermit, or to wake up before sunrise and meditate.

You don’t even have to be doing something creative.

In fact, creative insights sometimes strike in the midst.

In the midst of cleaning your kitchen. In the midst of driving to work. In the midst of formatting TPS reports.

JRR Tolkien tells a cool story about how he started writing The Hobbit. Tolkien wrote some of the most beloved fantasy novels of the twentieth century. But, like me, in his day job he was a university professor.

In a BBC interview in 1968, ​he recalls​ how the first line of his book The Hobbit came to him.

It hit him in the midst of a boring but necessary work task that every professor knows well: grading papers.

“The actual flashpoint [of the Hobbit] was, I remember very clearly, I can still see the corner in my house in 20 Northmoor road where it happened. I’ve got an enormous pile of exam papers there. And marking school examinations in the summertime is very laborious, and unfortunately also boring.”

So here is Tolkien, doing his job, bored, probably wishing he was doing something else.

Then he was given an unexpected “gift” by one of the students he was grading. An unanswered question.

The student had left an entire page of the exam blank. Perhaps the student hadn’t studied. Perhaps they had run out of time.

But instead of being frustrated by the student’s poor performance, Tolkien was elated.

“And I remember,” Tolkien said, “picking up a paper and actually—I nearly gave an extra mark for it, an extra five marks actually—because one page on this particular paper was left blank. Glorious. There was nothing to read.”

And it was in that moment that Tolkien’s creativity bubbled over. Past the boredom. Past the everyday. Past the grind.

His creativity struck him in the midst, and he responded.

“So I scribbled on it—I can’t think why—‘In a hole in the ground, there lived a Hobbit.’ I think that was eventually published in 1937.”

Tolkien's story reminds us that creativity can strike at any moment, even during the most mundane tasks. Be open to these moments of inspiration and to act on them when they come.

So, the next time you find yourself in the midst of a boring task, remember Tolkien. Keep your mind open to the possibilities that might arise from unexpected sources. That blank page in your life might just be the canvas for your next great idea.

Embrace these moments. Whether you're grading papers, waiting in line, or doing household chores, stay alert for that spark of creativity.

And when it comes, don't hesitate—scribble it down, just like Tolkien did. Your “In a hole in the ground, there lived a Hobbit” moment could be hiding just under that stack of papers you have to sort through.