Dragon-Sickness and Metaphysics from the Hobbit & Silmarillion

And how Dragons' might have come into existence

In the Hobbit the story takes on a darker tone once Thorin has taken residence of sorts under the mountain, that is to say in the lair of Smaug. This slightly darker tone fits rather more with the darkest of the Brothers Grimm’s darker stories, which seems to have been kind of what Tolkien had in mind.

The truth is though that there is an episode in the …