Chapter Text
Chapter 1
[Bilbo has conquered Rancière and made banana muffins with cream cheese frosting . . .]: Jacques Rancière (b. 1940), Bilbo's reading The Emancipated Spectator, a book of French philosophy on theatre
[The B-52’s are relentlessly cheerful out of the Volvo’s tinny speakers . . .]: The B-52’s, an American New Wave Band from 1976; Thorin is listening to “Lava” from their 1979 debut album; incidentally, Thorin's Volvo is a 1980s station wagon, something like the one pictured on the Wikipedia page for "Volvo 200 Series"
Chapter 2
[The kettle whistles and he makes his tea, drinks it while scanning a chapter of Forster . . .]: E.M. Forster (1879-1970), English Modernist/Realist novelist; Bilbo’s reading Howards End (1910); the epigraph to that novel reads, “Only connect . . .”
[. . . a half-hearted dinner with Ford Madox Ford and theories of national representation]: Ford Madox Ford (1873-1939), English Modernist novelist; Bilbo’s reading the tetralogy Parade’s End (1924-28) and writing a paper on the representations of the English countryside & English nationalism and patriotism in the novel
[I thought I’d get some elevations done tonight . . .]: Thorin’s drawing elevation views of his project, depicting 3-D detail in 2-D to convey the exterior appearance of a building, or the views of its walls if you were to look at them straight-on
[I only have a thesis for one of them, and it’s a stretch, really, because it’s more about Borges than Brunanburh and I’m not sure what my professor will think, and I was considering adding Tennyson but . . .]: The Battle of Brunanburh is an Old English poem of disputed originary dates and an unknown author, preserved in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, recording an English victory over the Norse & Scots in 937; Jorge Luis Borges was an Argentine writer, philosophical literature & magical realism, and in 1974 he wrote a translation/adaptation of the battle poem titled “Brunanburh 937 AD,” the process of which he discusses in a series of lectures collected in This Craft of Verse (2000); Alfred, Lord Tennyson was a Victorian poet and he, too, wrote a translation, titled “Brunanburh,” which is now very well-known and respected for its linguistic & stylistic faithfulness to the original, though his son did a lot of the leg-work for that project
[I was bruised and battered, I couldn’t tell what I felt . . .]: Bruce Springsteen (b.1949, American singer-songwriter, founder of the E Street Band, heartland rock and Americana sentiments), “Streets of Philadelphia” (1994) was an Academy Award-winning song, originally written for the 1993 film Philadelphia
[The next song is more of the same . . .]: I think the song I had in mind here was Springsteen’s “Secret Garden”; replace the “She” in the lyrics with a “He” and you might guess why; “She’ll let you in her house / if you come knockin’ late at night. / She’ll let you in her mouth/ if the words you say are right, / if you pay the price. / She’ll let you deep inside, / but there’s a secret garden she hides.”
Chapter 3
[N/A]
Chapter 4
[Jacob’s Room sits neglected on his lap . . .]: Bilbo’s reading Virginia Woolf (1882-1941); the book is Jacob’s Room (1922), an English Modernist experimental novel
[Thorin is handing him a triangle and a scale-rule . . .]: tools used in drafting/architectural drawing
[It’s just a drumbeat, low and then a scattering of high, light hits, and a slow three-note bass pattern.]: Thorin’s playing “Glass, Concrete & Stone” from 2004’s Grown Backwards album by David Byrne, a Scottish expat living in the United States, founding member of the art rock/pop/New Wave band Talking Heads (1975-1991)
[He reads for a bit but Women in Love is tedious . . .]: Bilbo’s reading D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930); the novel is Women in Love (1920), an English Modernist text, the sequel to The Rainbow, about the lives & relationships of 2 sisters—it’s about 540 pages long
[He writes a lousy paper on Defoe’s mapping of early eighteenth-century London’s narrow alleyways qua escape routes for thieves in Moll Flanders . . .]: Bilbo’s reading and writing on Daniel Defoe (c.1660-1731); the novel is The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders (1722), an 18th century English tale of a lower-class female criminal who attempts to raise herself up in the world through a series of ill-fated relationships with men
Chapter 5
[Thorin has taught him about groundplans and elevations, about foam-core models and the many uses of balsa wood. They’ve tossed around theories and Bilbo’s learned how to spot an Eames chair, a house in Le Corbusier’s style, while Thorin sketches Norman arches and grumbles about limestone.]: more architectural drafting terms; foam-core and balsa wood are used for building scale models; a quick Google image search will show you the iconic Eames chair, dating from 1956 (mid-century Modern); Le Corbusier (1887-1965) was a French by- way-of-Switzerland architect and designer, one of the pioneers of modern architecture, and many of his houses exhibit characteristic box-shapes, right angles, long panels of windows, flat rooftops, etc. (again, Google image search can help you out here); Norman architecture makes use of the Romanesque rounded arch over windows or doorways and massive proportions, typical of 11th and 12th century architecture in England for castles/churches/abbeys/etc.
[Thorin has Billy Bragg on the stereo because Bilbo had vetoed The Rolling Stones in the early morning hour.]: Thorin is playing the Mermaid Avenue album that Bragg (b. 1957, English singer-songwriter and left-wing activist), Wilco (American alternative rock band, formed 1994), and others put together in 1998 of previously unheard lyrics from Woody Guthrie (1912-1967, American singer-songwriter and folk musician, major musical influence, associated with communism and the Dust Bowl) set to music, under the organisation of Nora Guthrie
[“I’ve always liked ‘Pastures of Plenty,’ ” he says.]: One of Bilbo’s chosen top-ten songs is Guthrie’s “Pastures of Plenty,” particularly, the cover sang by Judy Collins (b. 1939, American singer-songwriter and social activist) with Ani DiFranco (b. 1970, American singer-songwriter and feminist icon); when Thorin says, “I know what it’s like to want a—” he’s referring to the lyrics about longing for a homeland (“All along your green valley, I will work till I die. / My land I’ll defend with my life if it be, / ‘cause my pastures of plenty must always be free.”)
[“ ‘Sunday Morning Coming Down,’ ” Thorin answers, quick, like he doesn’t even have to think about it.]: Thorin’s favourite Johnny Cash (1932-2003, American singer-songwriter, highly influential, country and rock & roll as well as blues, folk, gospel, etc.) song, whose lyrics Bilbo calls him out on (“Well, I woke up Sunday morning / with no way to hold my head that didn't hurt. / And the beer I had for breakfast wasn't bad, / so I had one more for dessert.”)
[“I think I would say, ‘I Hung My Head,’ if I had to choose.”]: Bilbo’s favourite Johnny Cash song is very different, as the narrator sings about his regrets over shooting a man (“I begged their forgiveness, / I wish I was dead. / I hung my head, I hung my head.”)
[Billy Bragg plays on, unperturbed.]: The Mermaid Avenue album has moved on to the song “Eisler on the Go”
Chapter 6
[Bilbo has read enough Dickens to know all about orphans.]: A lot of the works of Charles Dickens (English Victorian novelist, 1812-1870) deals with orphans, but here Bilbo’s thinking specifically of Pip from Great Expectations (1861) and Oliver from Oliver Twist (1838)
[. . . settles down on the couch with a book on William Morris and British Socialism . . .]: Bilbo’s reading some criticism & theory surrounding William Morris (1834-1896), an English designer, artist, writer, and libertarian Marxist, about whom far too much could be said here
[Choosing it more because he recognises the name and less because it suits his mood, Bilbo slips Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks from its sleeve . . .]: American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan (b.1941), whose Blood on the Tracks album (1975) is hailed as one of his best albums, dealing with heartache, anger, and loneliness
[“The Magnificent Seven.”]: possibly my favourite American western, 1960, directed by John Sturges, a remake of Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai (1954), with a fantastic musical score and a stellar cast: Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter, and Horst Buchholz
Chapter 7
[It’s quiet in the studio, Van Morrison grainy in the background with the volume turned low . . .]: Van Morrison (Irish singer-songwriter, b. 1945), whose music drawis on soul and R&B and folk; I’m not sure which album I was imaging the guys listening to
[He has a slim book in his lap, Aragon’s Une Vague de Rêves.]: Bilbo’s translating Louis Aragon (1897-1982), a French poet, novelist, and communist; the text is a 1924 Surrealist essay in the original French, and the quotes that crop up in this chapter later are from that text
[So now he’s not sleeping, but he’s reading Lacan for the first time . . .]: Jacques Lacan (1901-1981), French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist, working in the Freudian tradition, highly influential and highly confusing
[. . . anyway, we still have to finish your education in Indiana Jones.”]: Thorin is making Bilbo watch George Lucas’s Indiana Jones franchise (but not The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, because we don’t talk about that one), starring Harrison Ford as Indy (and Sean Connery as his father), an adventuring archaeologist
Chapter 8
[. . . Schubert scratchy on the record player. Apparently Die Winterreise is Thorin’s idea of Christmas music . . .]: Thorin’s playing the 1828 song cycle Austrian composer Franz Schubert (1797-1828), for voice and piano, most likely a recording sung by Dietrich Fischer Dieskau (German lyric baritone, 1925-2012)
[It’s all very West Side Story . . .]: American musical with music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, first produced on Broadway in 1957, about the Upper West Side of New York City in the mid-1950s and rival teenage street gangs
Chapter 9
[. . . they sit on the couch and—true to Thorin’s word—finish off Bilbo’s education Indiana Jones with The Last Crusade.]: from 1989, the last of the Indiana Jones films (that we talk about), in which Indy & his father fight off Nazis in a race to get to the Holy Grail, and Sean Connery scares some seagulls with an umbrella
[Bruce Springsteen is loud, almost painfully so, on the Volvo’s lousy speakers, singing “Jungleland” as if his heart depends on it.]: More Springsteen, this time 1975’s epic “Jungleland” (about 10 minutes long), about love and gang violence and the ultimate futility of living fast and dying young, featuring the late great Clarence Clemons on sax; considered one of the most important 20th century songs and one of Springsteen’s best
Chapter 10
[ . . . this was a text, out of the blue: Cue up R.E.M., New Adventures in Hi-Fi.]: Thorin’s telling Bilbo to listen to R.E.M., an American alternative rock band formed in 1980 with Michael Stipe’s distinctive unclear vocals and Peter Buck playing guitar in an arpeggiated style, often dealing with political and environmental concerns, New Adventures in Hi-Fi is from 1996; the title of this fic is taken from the first track (see next note)
[The album’s first song is something called “How the West Was Won and Where It Got Us.”]: see previous note
Chapter 11
[Whatever song is loud on the stereo has some kind of high, metallic percussion and it’s all he can hear.]: Thorin’s listening to English progressive rock musician Peter Gabriel, “In Your Eyes” from the 1986 album So; I’m particularly fond of the a cappella cover by The Brown Derbies
[“Reading Badiou. Eating a bagel.”]: Bilbo’s reading The Century (2005) by Alain Badiou (French far-left communist philosopher, b. 1937) on 20th century politics, philosophy, and literature
[There’s a song that’s been on his mind these days, and it’s almost certainly the wrong song to play now . . .]: Bilbo plays “O Children,” by Australian alternative rock band Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, formed 1983; this track is the last from the 2004 double album Abattoir Blues/The Lyre of Orpheus
Chapter 12
[. . . some re-run of Lonesome Dove on the television . . .]: an Emmy Award-winning Western television miniseries that aired in 1989, based off of Larry McMurtry’s novel, following the former Texas Rangers Gus and Call in a small Texas town
[“Like the morning sun your eyes will follow me. / As you watch me wander, curse the powers that be. /‘Cause all I want is here and now, / but it’s already been and gone. / Our intentions always last that bit too long.”]: the song is “Full Moon” (2009) by The Black Ghosts, a UK-based electronic music duo
[. . . a sheaf of papers—notes for an essay he is meant to be writing, photocopies of passages of Benjamin on story-telling and memory.]: Bilbo’s working on a paper dealing with the great literary critic & philosopher Walter Benjamin (1892-1940), a German-Jewish intellectual and Western Marxist associated with the Frankfurt School
Chapter 13
[Contamination: that’s what Azog is. Like a stain, or a disease. A spot—out, damned spot! out, I say!]: Bilbo, like all good lit grads, subconsciously quotes Shakespeare at least 12% of the time (it's Macbeth here, in case you're wondering)
[“Do not pass Go.”]: Thorin has clearly played Monopoly (board game originally published by Parker Brothers, now under the toy company Hasbro. Players buy & trade in real estate and try to control the board and drive everyone else into bankruptcy, passing the “Go” square nets you $200 each round—there is a certain card that can be drawn which reads: Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200. You don’t want that card.
[Thorin has the first-aid kit of an Eagle Scout . . .]: The highest rank attainable in the Boy Scouts of America, created in 1911
Chapter 14
[N/A]
Chapter 15
[I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed / And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane. / (I think I made you up inside my head.)]: Sylvia Plath, “Mad Girl’s Love Song” (1951); read the full text here
[. . . Bilbo baking bread . . .]: in case you’re also of the baking ilk, the recipe is here
[. . . Bilbo fighting with the NYT crossword . . .]: NYT = The New York Times, an American daily newspaper published in New York City since 1851, the most popular newspaper in the nation. New crossword puzzles appear every day in the Arts section, with the difficulty increasing as the week goes (easiest on Mondays, then progressively harder). Bilbo’s university provides free papers for students, so he does/attempts the crossword daily, and at least makes an effort to read the actual news.
[He never did finish Badiou.]: see Chapter 11
[It’s fitting, Bilbo thinks, closing his eyes, that Thorin’s note should have closed with lyrics, and that they should have been Springsteen . . .]: The song is “Youngstown,” from the fantastic album The Ghost of Tom Joad (1995). Like many of Springsteen’s songs, it’s about a town that’s fallen upon hard times, about the effects of war and history via one family’s tale. As Springsteen said before one live performance, “This song is about losing everything you had, if you’ve played by all the rules.”
Chapter 16
[Ford Madox Ford lies open on Bilbo's lap . . .]: see Chapter 2
[. . . he has to do the first 90 lines of "The Dream of the Rood" . . .]: One of the earliest Christian poems (possibly the oldest poem in general) in Old English lit, a "dream poem" in alliterative verse. The narrator dreams a vision of himself speaking with the cross. "Rood" translates to the modern "crucifix." Author unknown, though speculated to be possibly Caedmon or Cynewulf.
[. . . a facsimile of the Peniarth 16 manuscript]: I think Ori explains this fairly well
[Rōd wæs ic āræred . . .]: Modern English translation, roughly: "Rood was I reared. I lifted a mighty King, Lord of the Heavens, dared not to bend. With dark nails they drove me through; on me those sores are seen, open malice-wounds; I dared not scathe anyone."
[You got a fast car, I want a ticket to anywhere.]: Tracy Chapman, "Fast Car," from her 1988 self-titled debut album; I also really like the cover by Boyce Avenue feat. Kina Grannis
[They end up watching an old Steve McQueen movie . . .]: though Bilbo doesn't remember, they watched Bullitt (1968)
Chapter 17
[. . . the U-W-C National Forest]: The Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest, in north-eastern Utah. It really is 2,169,596 acres. I think you can guess who the anonymous author of The Arrow's articles is
[If his life were Norse & Anglo-Saxon literature, Bilbo thinks Thorin would be the berserker, he would be Cúchulainn mid-warp spasm, he would be Sir Gawain starting a war over the deaths of his brothers and bringing the entire perfect kingdom to its knees.]: The berserker in Norse literature are warriors who fought in trances of fury, often associated with bears or wolves, acting in a frenzy. Cúchulainn is an Irish mythological hero from the Ulster Cycle, son of the god Lugh, called Setanta until he killed Culann's guard-dog and then took the hound's place (translated, his name means "Culann's Hound"). He defended Ulster against Queen Medb and the armies of Connacht basically single-handedly in the Táin Bó Cúailnge ("Cattle Raid of Cooley"), and was known for his battle frenzy or warp spasm (in Thomas Kinsella's translation). Other interesting bits about Cúchulainn: he killed his own son, unknowingly, and when he was mortally wounded he tied himself to a standing stone in order to die on his feet. Sir Gawain is, of course, one of Arthur's knights of the round table, a son of King Lot of Orkney, brother to Agravain, Gaheris, Gareth, and Mordred. Depending on which version of the mythology you're reading, he is sometimes Arthur's heir to the throne of Camelot. Beyond Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, in which he takes on a doomed quest, in the works of Sir Thomas Malory, Gawain's brothers (except for Mordred) are killed in battle when Lancelot tries to free Guinevere from execution (she's just been found unfaithful to Arthur). In revenge, Gawain convinces Arthur to start a war against Lancelot in France--during Arthur's absence, Mordred takes over the throne, and Gawain stands in the middle and tries to fight both Morded and Lancelot and absolutely everyone else. He's eventually mortally wounded by Lancelot, and repents on his deathbed to ask for Lancelot's forgiveness and his pledge to save Camelot. I have a lot of feelings about Sir Gawain. In case you couldn't tell.
[. . . Newtonian Physics . . .]: I'm not going to attempt to explain this any further; you can look that one up
[But in literature, there is Bergson and durée . . . There is Woolf and there are "moments of being" . . .]: Henri Bergson (1859-1941), French philosopher, champion of experience and personal intuition rather than objective scientific rationalism. Durée or "Duration" is his theory of time & consciousness. Virginia Woolf has appeared in these notes before, and "moments of being" are exactly that: moments in which you feel you are truly "alive," immediately present.
[. . . Bildungsroman . . .]: literally, "novel of formation/education/culture," a genre designation for coming-of-age stories
["The soul's life has seasons of its own . . ."]: The novel Bilbo is quoting here is Olive Schreiner, The Story of an African Farm (published 1883 psuedonymously as Ralph Iron), one of the first feminist novels and definitely a failed Bildungsroman. It follows three children--Waldo, Em, Lyndall--from childhood to adulthood on a farm in South Africa. The section quoted here is known as "Times and Seasons" and appears in the middle of the novel. It's one of the things I've read in recent years that's had the most impact on my life. I highly recommend it. The last line Bilbo remembers is particularly relevant in Hobbit context, I think.
[. . . as if he has stumbled into a game of Oregon Trail . . .]: A computer game produced in 1974, and since released in various editions. It was meant to teach school kids about 19th century pioneer life and trans-migration westward in the United States, along the Oregon Trail. Many kids (myself included) who grew up with early computers in the house or school played this game for hours and hours. You put together your wagon party and supplies, choose your start and end points, and then travel and hunt and face bouts of dysyntery and the like. It's much more fun than it sounds. I still play it, sometimes--the 1996 version.
[The album's called The Lost One . . .]: By North Carolinan musician Barton Carroll. Released in January of 2008, folk and a little twang of southern bluegrass influence, I think. The first lines quoted are from track 2, "Superman." The verse that follows is from track 4, "Those Days Are Gone, And My Heart Is Breaking." If you listen to Welcome to Night Vale, you've heard it as one of the "weather" tracks.
[It turns out that Gandalf drove up here, in a battered Aston Martin DB5 . . .]: the most famous of the Bond Cars (from the James Bond movie franchise); I just felt like giving Gandalf a really cool car, if one that's rather impractical for upstate New York
Chapter 18
[He’s been reading this novel called Remainder in conjunction with his course on psychoanalytic theory . . .]: Remainder is a novel by Tom McCarthy, published 2007. (Incidentally, I did actually write a paper on it in relation to psychoanalytic theory.) Essentially, our narrator is a man who was a victim of some sort of mysterious accident who gets paid damages to an absurd degree and decides to spend his money creating (not re-creating) and enacting (not re-enacting) a series of events from his life, over and over again, until they are exactly as he wants (remembers) them to be. He's obsessed with patterns and the shape of a figure 8 and black cats on red roofs. It's a really excellent novel. Tom McCarthy himself is one of the founders of the International Necronautical Society, which is exactly as cool as it sounds. Here's a link to their first manifesto, which notes, among other things, "That death is a type of space, which we intend to map, enter, colonise, and, eventually, inhabit." The INS is ridiculously fascinating to me, and they've definitely influenced a lot of my own writing projects, this one included.
[. . . a course whose primary topic is something called the “death drive” . . .]: Again, this was actually a course that I took. We read a lot of Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Jacques Derrida, a host of other French thinkers. I don't feel secure enough in my knowledge to explain the death drive to you. It's not as simple as Bilbo makes it out to be here. The concept originates in Freud's Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920), a theory that all organic live strives to return to an inorganic (inanimate) state.
[. . . NPR’s All Songs Considered . . .]: National Public Radio, for any of you not in the U.S. (or, not in parts of the U.S. that can get reception); All Songs Considered is one of many of their shows; learn more here
[Home is where I want to be, pick me up and turn me round . . .]: art rock/pop band Talking Heads, "This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)," from their 1983 album Speaking in Tongues (also known as probably my favourite song in existence)
Chapter 19
[. . . plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.]: "the more it changes, the more it's the same thing" (French)
[What do you know? This house is falling apart.]: indie rock band Walk the Moon, "Anna Sun," from their 2012 self-titled debut album
Chapter 20
[Well, I’ve seen them buried in a sheltered place in this town.]: a verse from Peter Gabriel's "Red Rain" (So, 1986), though here I'm thinking particularly of his live performance with Michael Stipe (of R.E.M.) and Natalie Merchant (formerly of 10,000 Maniacs); listen to it here
Chapter 21
[N/A]
Chapter 22
[He’s not in a Parisian novel, not in Nadja or A la Recherché . . .]: André Breton's Nadja (1928) is a semi-autobiographical French Surrealist novel focused on the question of identity, in which the narrator spends a lot of time at various Parisian landmarks with a young woman called Nadja. A la recherché is A la Recherché de temps perdu, otherwise known as In Search of Lost Time (sometimes translated as Remembrance of Things Past) by Marcel Proust, in seven volumes (1871-1922).
[If he were Orpheus, and Thorin were Eurydice . . .]: Thanks to tumblr user northerntrash, the Orpheus myth was on my mind while writing this chapter. If you're unfamiliar with it, Orpheus was a legendary Greek musician who set out to bring back his wife Eurydice from the Underworld (she fell into a nest of vipers and died), and so he sets out to charm Hades and Persephone with his music and they agree to let him guide her out provided that he walks in front of her and doesn't look back until they're out of the Underworld. Orpheus is too anxious, and glances back when he's left the Underworld but she's still there, and Eurydice gets trapped here. I'm most familiar with the Monteverdi opera, L'Orfeo (1607), and haven't read the original myth in a while. The opera is excellent.
["In the last twenty-two years, twenty-nine people . . ."]: Many of you have already guessed that the guys are studying at Cornell University. There's some debate over the number (27, 29, 30, depending on your source), but what's indisputable is that there's an unfortunate history of suicides in the gorges. The other fact Elrond mentions, of the series of 6 student suicides in one year, is sadly true, and occurred in the 2009-2010 academic year. If you're ever in Ithaca, you'll see the fences over the bridges across the gorges, and now nets are hanging underneath most of the bridges as well. Two students, that I know of, have died in my time here, though neither of them have been ruled as suicides. It's obviously a massive problem, and it's devastating, and if you're ever in a position where you're considering suicide, please wait, please talk to someone (you're welcome to talk to me; though I'm not certified by any means, I'm more than willing to listen), please take care of yourself and stay around another day.
[". . . when Milstein was built the year after . . . the third floor of Rand . . ."]: Milstein Hall (the architecture studio) was built in 2011, and Rand Hall is another building that houses studio space, classrooms, and the Fine Arts Library. Both, in addition to The Foundry, are right on the corner by the bridge over the gorge that separates North Campus from Central Campus.
[Four in the morning seems the right time for Kierkegaard.]: Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a Danish philosopher, theologian, existentialist (1813-1855) who wrote primarily on how to live as an individual, privileging concrete humanity rather than abstract "all of humanity," and dealing with questions of angst and despair and faith. Bilbo is reading Stages on Life's Way (1845), ostensibly on religion and love and marriage, but the third section, "Quidam's Diary," proposes to be a manuscript discovered by a monk and telling the story of a young man whose engagement was suddenly broken off, and he has lost his love. I kind of love Kierkegaard a lot, and will gladly quote him at length to you, but that is probably not what you're here for.
[“distant bodies eclipsing each other / with versions of gravity and light”]: A line from Bruce Smith's poem "What Are They Doing in the Next Room" (2014). Bruce is fantastic, a really sharp guy and a wonderful reader and about one of the coolest poets you might ever meet. He teaches at Syracuse University. Check out his work, particularly his book Devotions.
[Hannah Arendt]: German-American political theorist and "philosopher" (1906-1975); though she didn't like the term, in some ways it does apply. Best known for her work on the banality of evil, the vita activa, and Homo faber. Bilbo's writing on the chapter on "Action" from The Human Condition (1958).
[“Here is a place of disaffection”]: A line from T.S. Eliot (1888-1965, born in America but became a British Subject in 1927 and is often counted amongst the Brits, a major 20th century poet); specifically, from "Burnt Norton," the first of the Four Quartets (1943).
[Bilbo climbs past the oaks, coasts down past the lilacs . . .]: Yes, the Arboretum does really have a hill of oaks, followed by a lilac grove. The symbolism was irresistible. Oaks, of course, for Thorin Oakenshield; purple lilacs for the first emotions of love.
[Well, if it's better that way . . .]: Bilbo is listening to Lauren O'Connell's album Quitters (2012). The first track, quoted here, is called "Every Space." Tracks 1-4 (but really, all of her work) are particularly relevant to this story. I highly recommend listening to it.