The Structure of The Lord of the Rings

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

I've already broached this topic once before in another thread (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=10717), but I did so in a relatively restrictive way. The discussions in the Chapter by Chapter (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/forumdisplay.php?f=41) forum have been broadening my understanding of the structure of LotR and I thought it worthy of a thread of its own.

The Lord of the Rings is, as the Professor himself once admitted, "a funny old thing" (and who here could say "boo" to that? ;) ): it's not really a novel, nor is it any of the other tags that usually get thrown at it (epic, myth, legend, etc). It is simply, and powerfully, a story. I do not want to start a discussion on the genre of LotR (since that would be an argument over which label to apply; although the topic may very well come up here) but about how it is structured. That is, what holds it together? How is it built? How has Tolkien managed to write such a vast and complicated story, really, a series of connected stories, and yet have them work and meld so seamlessly (is it seamless?) into a single narrative?

At times the story seems almost hopelessly episodic, particularly in the earlier chapters where there are a series of disconnected adventures that have nothing to do with the principle action; sure, there are thematic resonances, but these episodes are not an integral part of the overall structure and yet they make up almost 100 pages of the tale.

At other times the narrative becomes almost grippingly linear as the action rushes forward, but then the story breaks and swerves away to another story.

Sometimes, it's as though we are listening to an oral tale, being spoken to us by someone who is relating events as they occur to him; at others it reads like a legendary account transcribed by a careful monk or scholar from historical records.

There are jarring shifts in tone of voice, perspective, focus -- everything. So again, I ask, how is it that Tolkien manages to unify the whole?

As a first attempt at answering this, allow me to put forward a few possibilities. None of these is particuarly well worked out yet. . .hence the thread!

Imagery: This is probably the most significant way in which Tolkien holds things together, particularly through the central image of the Ring itself, insofar as all the action is directed toward the Ring in some way. But is it not problematic that the story would be centred upon/organised around an image of evil?

There are many many other images that recur throughout the story as well: trees, the Road, water, towers, vision, light, and on and on and on. To what extent do these images hold things together? Are they the primary means whereby this odd mishmash is united into a single tale? Does not the whole thing begin to become something of a dream-like experience inasmuch as the only things that unify the experience are the relatively non-linear, non-narrative images?

Thematic Concerns: Just as there are a number of recurring images there are a number of recurring themes and ideas that keep cropping up. Just a brief list would be friendship, time, evil and good, magic, art, nature, duty, loyalty, kingship, authority, and on and on and on. Like the images, however, these themes do not seem to be 'going anywhere' insofar as I don't see any one of them taking centre stage, nor do I see any of them really being advanced and developed in a linear way. Just like the episodic plot, themes are picked up by particular characters or particular moments (or particular images) explored for a time, developed in a particular way, and then left. It's more of a cumulative effect rather than an evolutionary one as the thematic concerns accrue and gain new views rather than being 'resovled' or 'concluded' in some absolute way.

The Circular Narrative: The story ends where it begins (the Shire), and this is just one instance of 'return' or even 'regressing'; is the story held together simply because we keep going around and around the same sorts of stories and action. One of the clearest structural devices in the story is the repeating pattern of escape-danger-refuge. This is an effective and economical way of telling a story, but does it not tend to imprison the action to some extent? How can the story be 'going' anywhere when it keeps reworking the same pattern of action, and then going back to its beginning?

Pairings and Twinnings: Again, I've already raised this topic elsewhere (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=11084), but I think it deserves being readdressed as part of a larger discussion. In addition to the sense of eternal return/recurrence in the action, the characters themselves do not seem to have a wholly independent existence, in that each one of them is mirrored/reflected or repeated and completed in other characters: Merry and Pippin are a pair who reflect Frodo and Sam; Sauron and Saruman -- Aragorn and Gandalf; Galadriel -- Eowyn; Theoden -- Denethor; Boromir and Aragorn -- Aragorn and Faramir; Smeagol and Gollum; and on and on and on. Given this, how can we look at the story as one centred upon individual heroes? It seems to be the story of Aragorn and Frodo, but we cannot discuss these single heroic figures without reference to other heroes and types of heroes -- so how is the heroic narrative being structured: around individual experience or groups of people?

There are a lot of questions here, and much to consider (I think) but I would love to see what others make of all this. How is the story of LotR put together? What kind of a story is it? What holds it together? What takes its various parts and pulls them together into a single tale?

[Boromir88]

I think some other things we can add about structure are parallels, irony and personification.

Parallels of the Amons (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=11364)

There is a thread about the parallels I was thinking of.

On the ironic side...
"And even if you pass the Gates of Argonath and come unmolested to the Tindrock, what will you do then? Leap down the Falls and land in the marshes?"
Ironic how it is Boromir who finds himself leaping down the falls and landing in the marshes :eek: .

Then for personification..
This is a quote of mine from the chapter by chapter discussions on suggesting that Aragorn is a personified hope for Gimli.
Then the Lady unbraided one of her long tresses, and cut off three golden hairs, and laid them in Gimli's hand. "These words shall go with the gift," she said. "I do not foretell, for all foretelling is now vain: on the one hand lies darkness, and on the other only hope. But if hope should not fail, then I say to you, Gimli son of Gloin, that your hands shall flow with gold, and yet over you gold shall have NO dominion.
There's a lot here Galadriel is saying. She says "in one hand lies darkness, the other only hope." Is Aragorn the symbolism of Hope, for he was just given Estel.

"This stone I gave to Celebrian my daughter, and she to hers; and now it comes to you as a token of hope.

Gimli had two choices, darkness (which may be going home or abandoning the company who knows), or hope (Aragorn). Gimli can follow hope (which he does through the rest of the story), and if hope does not fail, "his hands will flow with gold, yet over him gold shall have no dominion." Indeed that's a big deal, concerning the dwarves, greed, their greed for more and more riches. Which is why I believe here, Gimli would have been last of the Fellowship to fall to the ring, due to Galadriel's statement, and indeed, in Gimli hope does not fail. As he chooses to stick with "hope" (Aragorn), and not go with darkness (which I feel darkness would be abandoning the company).

I think all three of these aspects (and there are probably many others) Tolkien uses for his books.

[Bêthberry]

For now, the briefest and perhaps even too flippant a reply to a question which will receive further thought...

Despite its episodic nature, one way this marvellous yarn holds together so well is through the very careful and laborious effort of Tolkien at ceaselessly revising his drafts, coordinating dates, times, phases of the moon, distances. I think in particular the maps were not just a secondary inspiration, but became for him a way to help manage the tapestry. The temporal and geographical features are so precise that the looseness of the narrative structure is overcome--or compensated for, or held together, however one wishes to consider it.

I also think Tolkien had a very clear idea of audience as he was writing, in particular in the person of his son Christropher. But this is a harder thing to explain...

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Despite its episodic nature, one way this marvellous yarn holds together so well is through the very careful and laborious effort of Tolkien at ceaselessly revising his drafts, coordinating dates, times, phases of the moon, distances. I think in particular the maps were not just a secondary inspiration, but became for him a way to help manage the tapestry. The temporal and geographical features are so precise that the looseness of the narrative structure is overcome--or compensated for, or held together, however one wishes to consider it.

I also think Tolkien had a very clear idea of audience as he was writing, in particular in the person of his son Christropher. But this is a harder thing to explain...

Excellent points, both. I do recall hearing Tolkien in his BBC radio interview say something to the effect of, "Of course when one is writing a really complicated tale you must have a map." In this sense, I think you are absolutely right Bb the geography and sense of place (and placedness) we have in LotR is crucial to the narrative cohesion. The story is 'about' Middle-earth rather than the people walking and warring across it?

And I very much like this idea of audience, for there are a number of points in the narrative at which Tolkien allows the story to become conscious of itself as story. In addition to the more obvious examples (such as Frodo and Sam's conversation upon the Stairs of Cirith Ungol) there are those odd moments in which the narrative steps outside itself (the narrative 'present') and acknowleges that there is an ending, and even hints at it. The two examples that come to mind here are the reference to the brown scar that Merry "bore to the end of his days" (giving away that he is going to survive and go on to live out his life) and the revelation that when Aragorn leaves the hill in Lorien where he and Arwen pledged troth (can't remember the name of the place) he "came there never again as living man". In each case, it looks as though the story is tilting its hand and giving something away, but of course it isn't as we know that Aragorn and Merry are going to survive and win -- we know that the good guys will triumph because that's just the kind of story this is. In this way, the story itself announces itself as story, which highlights to the audience that it is unified in and by and through our own reading act.

Hmmmm. . .and back to the maps: since it is a readerly act of turning to the maps and referencing them that makes the experience of the story both interactive and unified. How many times I looked at the map to find where Frodo and Sam were, then looked as well to figure out where Merry and Pippin were as well; and then even, in later readings, ploughed into the Appendices to seek out dates etc to co-ordinate things in my own mind.

Is all this just a much longer way of saying what you meant Bb?

[Lalwendë]

Maybe casting myself back into the mindset of my 12 year old self will help me to see what it was that gripped me so about the books.

Story - the plot can never be underestimated, it is what makes us want to go on, to persevere with reading, as it is essentially a complex and difficult activity, even to a compulsive reader. We have to believe the plot, it has to be surprising, even if it is based upon plots we may have seen many times before. I am always envious of writers who can master the true complexities of a magnificent plot; in LotR there are many plot twists, there is narrative which drives us on, there is death, there is urgency. I could not leave the books alone once I had started on them and still cannot leave them alone now, but on that first reading, the surprises of the plot were vital.

World Creation - Tolkien literally invented a completely immersive world. Languages, natural history, maps, cultures, all of these opened up this world as something real. Even now I often read with my mouth hanging open, startled at the sheer scale of this world, and as we all know, it is so complex that you can go there every day and see something new.

Description - this is a vivid world, it sometimes seems clearer to me than my own world - especially when I am reading. I have heard some say that they do not like too much description in novels but LotR proves them wrong. I think that the effectiveness of this description is due in no small measure to Tolkien's own knowledge of poetry, particularly the old epics, which were related orally; vivid description is vital to this art, and Tolkien has picked up on it well.

Characters - even though there seems to be no one central character, the story still works. Everything is centred around the mission to get Frodo and the Ring to Mount Doom, so even when we are not with him, we still know that if say, Theoden does not win out at Helm's Deep, then the risk to Frodo, and hence to the world we have invested our time in, and which we have grown to love, will be too much to bear.

Thinking with my adult mind, I see that there are more reasons to the success of this great rambling story.

Chapters - these are clearly delineated. Each has a central theme, and in particular after the Fellowship breaks up, are self contained adventures. This was necessary to carrying on the story with several disparate groups each carrying on their own tasks. Yet in other novels I have found this to have a disruptive effect on my reading enjoyment. Why not in LotR? I think because we constantly receive reminders of the central core of the tale, that story of two hobbits going to Mount Doom.

Narrative - as opposed to pure plot, Tolkien makes clever use of narrative. We have episodic chapters where an 'event' happens, but these are then interspersed with movement. We don't suffer from stasis at any point because the tale must go onwards, and we've got to go with it, and when we go with it, we too see the changing scenery through the eyes of the characters.

Suspense - Tolkien makes great use of this, one such example being the 'death' of Gandalf. Who remembers their first reading when Gandalf was taken by the Balrog? After this happened, there was nobody who could wrestle the book from my hands until I had found out more, and it was a huge relief when he returned. But Tolkien filled the book with suspense. Just some examples include Gollum pursuing the Fellowship, Frodo's capture by Shelob, the tension at Helm's Deep, whether Saruman will yield to Gandalf...

What a topic!

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

What a compendium Lalwende!

Correct me, please, if I misrepresent your post, but it seems to me that there are two aspects of the story that you are paying particular attention to as structural devices: the Ring (properly, the quest to destroy the Ring) and the land.

You come back several times to these two devices, and if it be not too bold to interpret you, could I say that you 'see' (you have a highly visual imagination!) the story as a circle about a single point? The circle being the 'horizons' of Middle-earth as Tolkien creates it for us, and the single point being the Ring.

If this is not too far wrong from what you are suggesting, it would appear to me that the essential structure of the story (in this view, if it is your view) is a largely moral one, in which the 'blot' of evil at the heart of an essentially 'good' creation must be expunged.

[Boromir88]

Wonderful points everyone :) .

One more small detail to add about the plot, typically in a story after the climax the story will just fall and end with a resolution. It will rise with the conflict, at the height hit the climax, and then fall to the resolution.

In LOTR it rises to the climax (destruction of the ring), then falls with the french term (lal help me again :) deneument, but then with the scouring it has another rise, another conflict, then another resolution. So the line sort of goes, up (conflict), height (climax), down (deneument), up (another conflict), down (resolution). And this goes along with Lal's point about plot twists, some extra curveballs made by Tolkien.

[Lalwendë]

there are two aspects of the story that you are paying particular attention to as structural devices: the Ring (properly, the quest to destroy the Ring) and the land.

The central aspect to the whole tale is that of the need to destroy the Ring; even when we are not with the Ringbearer, he is still in our minds, and he is in the minds of the characters we meet, no matter how far away they may be. He is effectively 'lost' to them, and for us too, when we get to Book 3. Yes, the Ring is the focal point, yet we are not with it at many turns in the narrative, we don't know where it's gone to. The reason that moving the focus away from the Ringbearer's quest works is that we still have it in mind, through the other characters' minds.

And then we follow the characters as they move through this world, we see the changing scenery with them, even discover it as they discover it for the first time. When we see Lothlorien for the first time, we see it through Hobbit eyes, we are there with them and get that same sense of wonder. Is this kind of structure linear though?

could I say that you 'see' (you have a highly visual imagination!) the story as a circle about a single point?

When I say that I 'see' Middle Earth, I mean that is so vividly described, the entire landscape jumps straight off the page for me. The addition of maps makes it even more real, as journey and distance can also be traced. Every 'world creation' book ought to include a map!

it would appear to me that the essential structure of the story (in this view, if it is your view) is a largely moral one, in which the 'blot' of evil at the heart of an essentially 'good' creation must be expunged.

I think it is an essentially moral story, and on the surface this morality is clear, as it must be, to make a take of good/evil work. And yet, underneath, there are so many grey areas that at its heart it is no simple tale of good versus evil. The only truly 'good' force is the earth itself, the stage on which all these events happen (and is it good, if you think of the innocents who may have died when Numenor was drowned?), I find it impossible to say that one race or another is essentially good, as they all have their failings.

(lal help me again deneument

Oh heck! I wish I'd paid more attention in my French lessons, I still can't get my head round these spellings.

denoument, denouement, denoumente....beauracrat, beurocrat, beaureaucrat....

[Bêthberry]

Well, Professor Fordim, Sir, I hardly need hazard a reply since you have so cleverly reinvented my points. ;)


In this sense, I think you are absolutely right Bb the geography and sense of place (and placedness) we have in LotR is crucial to the narrative cohesion. The story is 'about' Middle-earth rather than the people walking and warring across it?

. . . .

Hmmmm. . .and back to the maps: since it is a readerly act of turning to the maps and referencing them that makes the experience of the story both interactive and unified. How many times I looked at the map to find where Frodo and Sam were, then looked as well to figure out where Merry and Pippin were as well; and then even, in later readings, ploughed into the Appendices to seek out dates etc to co-ordinate things in my own mind.


I don't think I would go so far as to say the book is about Middle-earth rather than the people in it. But I do think that, without the geographical lynchpins, it would be difficult to follow such an episodic plot, even given the rivetting suspense with which Tolkien builds chapters, particularly with the variety of battlescenes towards the end. But I also mean that Tolkien himself worked hard to provide that kind of consistency to the physical world. Here's a line from Letter 85:


I have been struggling with the dislocated chronology of the Ring, which has proved most vexatious, and has not only interferred with other and more urgent and duller duties, but has stopped me getting on. I think I have solved it all at last by small map alterations, and by inserting an extra day's Entmoot, and extra days into Trotter's chase and Frodo's journey (a small alteration in the first chapter I have just sent: 2 days from Morannon to Ithilien).

Isn't it interesting here that Tolkien refers to his story by its central image, the Ring. And he clearly identifies plot here with place. Other than having everything rely on the success of Frodo and Sam's quest, there is not much interconnectedness to the plot, but then tightly controlled plots are a feature of the late eighteenth and nineteenth century novels. LotR has always reminded me of the idea that what matters is not the planning ahead but the living at each moment. It does not 'move foreward' so much as circle around various ideas. The only progression is geographic--everyone moves south and then back again-- and so I think for this very reason is is valuable to have the Scouring of the Shire. It underscores that this is not, in fact, a 'modern' narrative, but a very old one. It is T.S. Eliot's line in "Little Gidding": to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. (Maybe I need to go find the quote and copy it here.)


And I very much like this idea of audience, for there are a number of points in the narrative at which Tolkien allows the story to become conscious of itself as story. In addition to the more obvious examples (such as Frodo and Sam's conversation upon the Stairs of Cirith Ungol) there are those odd moments in which the narrative steps outside itself (the narrative 'present') and acknowleges that there is an ending, and even hints at it. The two examples that come to mind here are the reference to the brown scar that Merry "bore to the end of his days" (giving away that he is going to survive and go on to live out his life) and the revelation that when Aragorn leaves the hill in Lorien where he and Arwen pledged troth (can't remember the name of the place) he "came there never again as living man". In each case, it looks as though the story is tilting its hand and giving something away, but of course it isn't as we know that Aragorn and Merry are going to survive and win -- we know that the good guys will triumph because that's just the kind of story this is. In this way, the story itself announces itself as story, which highlights to the audience that it is unified in and by and through our own reading act.

It was only upon rereading that I began to see how often, in fact, this story talks about itself as story. (Here I might go back and find a link to a post of mine on that Cerin Amroth scene.) But it is probably very instructive to recall a point here which Tolkien made to his son Christopher in one of their wartime letters. Christopher had, apparently (we don't have access to his letters to his father, only the father's replies) been very discouraged by his experiences in South Africa with his training there. I cannot now find the specific letter, but the gist of it was that Tolkien Sr. advised Christopher to take heart by recalling that he was in the midst of a story. Perhaps I just ought to post this now and try to find that letter!

EDIT:

Here's the letter # 66, 6 May 1944, written to CT:


We don't mind your grousing at all -- you have no one else, and I expect it relieves the strain. ... [my ellipsis]
Not that in real life things are as clear cut as in a story, and we started out with a great many orcs on our side .... [ellipsis here in the text] Well, there you are: a hobbit amongst the Urukhai. Keep up your hobbitry in heart, and thing that all stories feel like that when you are in them. Youare inside a very great story!

In terms of structure, though, there's another commend from Tolkien which I think pertains to his manner of plotting, which is to say, not much plotting per se. This is Letter #69, 14 May 1944, again to CT.


I suddenly got an idea for a new story (of about length of 'Niggle")--in church yesterday, I fear. A man sitting at a high widow and seeing not the fortunes of a man or of people all down the ages. He just sees it illumined, in borders of mist, and things, animals and men just walk on and off, and the plants and animals change from one fantastic shape to another but men (in spite of different dress) don't change at all. At intervals all down the ages from Palaeolithic to Today a couple of women (or men) would stroll across scene saying exactly the same thing (ie It oughtn't to be allowed. They ought to stop it. Or, I said to her, I'm not one to make a fuss, I said, but ... ) .... [ellipses in text].

Well, I've rambled on enough now. Back to you, Professor Fordim.

[Mister Underhill]

Interesting topic, and interesting replies!

The structure of LotR, eh? I must confess that I'm a bit puzzled by criticisms of LotR as being overly episodic. In my view, the story has an uncommonly strong narrative spine, namely, the quest to destroy the Ring. Now, admittedly, several plot threads evolve into something more like "can we protect the things we're fighting to save until the Ring is destroyed?", but even these threads get back on task as the climax approaches and the characters not directly involved in the destruction of the Ring strive to keep Sauron's attention diverted from the real stroke.

Almost all situations in the plot -- both in terms of external action (we must take a long journey into the heart of the enemy's kingdom) and internal conflict (shall I claim this precious thing as my own?) -- are driven by the Ring.

One thing that I do find to be quite interesting and unusual about the structure of the piece is the complete division of the Frodo-Sam thread (Books 4 and most of 6) from the War of the Ring threads (Books 3 and 5). After the breaking of the Fellowship, one might expect the author to roughly alternate chapters, breaking the action at a suspensful moment in Frodo's quest to cut away to the action in the West, and vice versa. Instead, Tolkien follows each thread to a rough midpoint before alternating. In this sense, the narrative is most definitely not linear: we follow the War of the Ring all the way up to Gandalf's journey with Pippin to Minas Tirith before going back in time to see what has become of Frodo and Sam.

What a surprising choice! I think the overall effect of it is to add to the book's feeling of history or memoir. The expected alternating construction would, I think, feel more "modern", more geared towards manipulating suspense in the reader. Although Tolkien is still able to achieve suspense, his unusual structure feels more like a recounting of events than like a tale designed to titillate the reader.

I'm getting a little long-winded here, so I'll just briefly hit a few other points:

I tend to disagree with the idea that the (allegedly) loose narrative structure is overcome by features of the setting -- details of geography or chronology. I think that for Tolkien, the world-building in Middle-earth was always subordinate to, and in service of, the story. So, rather than alter his story to fit the geography, he instead would solve problems with "map alterations" (letter 85). In letter 163, he proclaims: ...I met a lot of things on the way that astonished me. Tom Bombadil I knew already; but I had never been to Bree. Strider sitting in the corner at the inn was a shock, and I had no more idea who he was than had Frodo. The Mines of Moria had been a mere name; and of Lothlórien no word had reached my mortal ears till I came there. Far away I knew there were the Horse-lords on the confines of an ancient Kingdom of Men, but Fangorn Forest was an unforeseen adventure. I had never heard of the House of Eorl nor of the Stewards of Gondor. So rather than a story inspired by history and geography, I daresay we have the opposite -- geography and history inspired by the needs of the story.

Lalwendë, your shotgun tactics paid off: it's denouement (or if you prefer, dénouement). Nice breakdown of the story's elements up above, btw.

Fordim, I'm a bit confused by the idea of a story with an essentially moral structure. What does that mean in terms of organizing the story and how it works? I certainly agree that there is a strong moral thematic component, but I'm not entirely clear on how you feel that plays into how the story is actually constructed or how it functions.

[littlemanpoet]

I keep on getting in trouble whenever I mention this, but this thread is uniquely suited to it. Orson Scott Card detailed in his book, Characters and Viewpoint, that any story, no matter the type, is going to have four basic elements:

Milieu - the setting
Idea - the "what-if" question (for example)
Character - self-explanatory
Event - the plot

Thus, the handy acronym, MICE.

But what he said next, speaks to some points Fordim has raised: ONE of these four story elements is going to serve as the centerpiece on which the other three hang. He goes on to assert, specifically, that LotR is a Milieu story; its centerpiece is Middle Earth at the end of the Third Age. The destruction of the Ring is that which will bring the Third Age to an end. This ending is both needed and regretted (or at least mourned) especially by the Elves, who nonetheless deem it necessary.

This milieu centerpiece aspect of LotR take nothing away from the great characters, great plot, or the scope of the idea; something had to serve as the centerpiece.

This explains why there needed to be a scouring of the Shire; the story of Third Age Middle Earth coming to an end was not finished being told until after the story of how Sharkey is defeated in the Shire; indeed, the story is not finished being told until all the characters whose lives were all about the now-destroyed Ring, had passed over sea or (in the case of Sam) resolved at least for the time being.

The episodic nature serves not as a weakness of the story, but as a structural tool. Music has a similar counterpoint in "theme and variations".

Just off hand, it seems to me that such a Milieu story could not have been written before the advent of whole world awareness that arrived with the 20th century and its world wars. All parts of Middle Earth are included in the tale, at least as far as they affect the story of the Middel Earth at the end of the Third Age, which is all about the destruction of the Ring.

Okay, I've laid it out. Now you may protest, reproach, or whatever. *ducks* :eek:

(I really don't know why people find this such an offensive - or impossible - explanation). :confused:

LMP

[Mister Underhill]

*Underhill sets out MICE traps.*

We'll get those pesky buggers this time!

[Boromir88]

I wanted to bring up some extra points I recently discovered. This passage in the Uruk-hai chapter has an interesting tone. I'm not one who knows indepth what Tolkien believed in. I simply know he was a religious man, and he incorporates religion in his writing. This paragraph (and don't ask me why), but to me just sort of has a biblical tone. Sounds like something you would actually read from the bible, has that sort of sentence structure.
So ended the raid, and no news of it came ever back either to Mordor or to Isengard; but the smoke of the burning rose high to heaven and was seen my many watchful eyes.

In one of your threads a long time ago Fordhim you discussed the circular/straight pattern of LOTR. I found this discussion interesting and to point out the total 360 found in the story.

We start out in the Shire, which is portrayed as a happy/safe place to live. Then we get a sense that things in the Shire aren't what they used to be, and it is no longer safe. However, they leave the danger of the Shire, and plunge into more danger, the rest of Middle-earth. I would say at the beginning of the story the Shire is a safe place, it's not corrupted, and it is much safer then the rest of Middle-earth. Even the haven of Lorien is starting to face the Orcs. Point is Frodo leaves the safety of the Shire, and plunges into the danger of Middle-earth.

Now, once the Ring is destroyed we see a bunch of chapters of "good byes." The new "safe havens," are what used to be the dangerous ones. Places like Minas Tirith, Rohan, Lorien, are now ridding themselves of the danger, and are safe places for Frodo to stay. However, when we hit Bree, Tolkien gives us a curveball, the Shire is corrupt. They leave the safety of Rivendell, Minas Tirith....etc and plunge into the now unsafe Shire. A complete turn around, a 360.

I don't know about you, but I don't like when writers give you what you expect, I like that curveball of the unexpected, to throw you off. That is what Tolkien does do. He will give us these curveballs to catch us offguard.

To my final point, setting. Good writers will use setting to their advantage. Writers won't simply use setting to set up the time and place, setting can also be used for other purposes. There are 5 purposes of setting, and as you will see, Tolkien uses a lot of these.

Uses for Setting-
Background for Action-
Create atmosphere-
Antagonist-
Reveals Character-
Reinforces the theme-

Tolkien uses a lot of these functions for setting. The Antagonist, simply where nature, the atmosphere acts as the antagonist to the protagonist(s). Clear example-Caradhras. Creates Atmosphere-Lorien. When we think of Lorien it is a magical, mysterious place. As the Fellowship is in Lorien it is like a dreamworld, remembering of past days. Reveals Character-Frodo in the barrowdowns. When Frodo and his companions are with the barrow wright, Frodo could have easily left his friends to die, and to move on for the greater good. But, Frodo decides not to, revealing his "compassion," and his love for his friends.

If you wish to look a little more into the setting, check out the Importance of Setting thread here (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=11249)

[Turin]

For a good analysis of the Structure of LoTR, read Tom Shippey's "Tolkien - author of the Century".

[Bêthberry]

For a good analysis of the Structure of LoTR, read Tom Shippey's "Tolkien - author of the Century".

Hello Turin, and welcome to the Downs.

Many of us already have read Shippey. But for those who have not, could you elaborate on your recommendation? Ours is to reason why. :)

[ivo]

quote: Now, once the Ring is destroyed we see a bunch of chapters of "good byes." The new "safe havens," are what used to be the dangerous ones. Places like Minas Tirith, Rohan, Lorien, are now ridding themselves of the danger, and are safe places for Frodo to stay. However, when we hit Bree, Tolkien gives us a curveball, the Shire is corrupt. They leave the safety of Rivendell, Minas Tirith....etc and plunge into the now unsafe Shire. A complete turn around, a 360. quote

I think plotwise the story ends with the destruction of the ring. That's the climax (no wonder they left the scouring of the shire out of the movies).
I think of LOTR more as a chronicle, which doesn't explain the structure fully but gives it a name which might help to grasp it.

There is an interesting interpretation of the scouring of the shire though. If we look at hobbits as people who have little knowledge of the outside world and are only interested in themselves, in their own history, the whole quest could be seen as an awareness of the mind. In hegelian terms (german philosopher): The mind becomes conscious as it travels to Mordor. There it faces its ultimate negation, death. But in order to become selfconscious it has to return to where it came from. Only then it is Geist.

Interesting is also that all the three main characters (Gandalf (Balrog), Aragorn (Path of the Dead) and Frodo (Dead Marshes) overcome dead. (to be born again first you have to die).

This is a bit brief, due to little time, but I had to react.
Great topic indeed!

[littlemanpoet]

This paragraph (and don't ask me why), but to me just sort of has a biblical tone.

I know what you're talking about, Boromir88. The term that I'm familiar with in this regard is archaic. Tolkien, who took to language like great swimmers take to water, knew exactly what he was doing, as you probably well know. He was shooting for precisely that feel in that part of the story.

Archaic language is typically used in heroic verse. Whereas this is prose, it gives an account of a heroic battle. Tolkien is harking back to the Anglo-Saxon roots of his Rohirrim, to Beowulf and other old Anglo-Saxon (Old English) works of literature. It's no surprise that the original writers of the King James Version also used this kind of language. In some regards, they were using heroic language in translating the stories of David and Moses, etc.. On the other hand, their "Shakespearian" English seems archaic to us; but of a different kind.

Have you ever read any ancient literature besides the Bible (KJV version for example)?

ivo, it's pretty clear to me that you bring a wealth of knowledge and insight to the boards. Welcome! Are you into, or knowledgeable of, Joseph Campbell?

[Turin]

Hello Turin, and welcome to the Downs.

Many of us already have read Shippey. But for those who have not, could you elaborate on your recommendation? Ours is to reason why. :)

Thank you for your welcome :)

I've not been a particular fan of Shippey in the past, his writing style seemed to be too tedious and pedantic, and he often reads too much into little things. However, Author of the Century is written in more simpler language and with simpler experessions. It is useful for someone who is not that experienced in reading Tolkien. This time round, Shippey breaks things down in easily understandable terms and, as I have said, focuses on less "academic" matters and discusses structure, themes, symbolism etc.

I'll have to refer to the book again to comment on the specifics with regards to the structural elements.

Hope that's not a cop-out :o

[ivo]

Thank you littlemanpoet, very kind.
I'm not familiar with the work of Joseph Campbell, please tell me why I should be.

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Hello Ivo, and welcome to the Downs.

I like your take on this, but I think I will resist the desire to render the complexity of the story in such comparatively ‘simple’ (but certainly not simplistic) terms. It seems to me that this Hegelian idea as you are presenting it is another version of the old Romance ideal of Middle English – something that Tolkien was more than familiar with. In Romance, we have a form of narrative that is akin to allegory insofar as the characters are presented as ‘types’ but these types work together to form some kind of corporate representation of the human mind/soul. In this schema, I wonder what ‘part’ of humanity Frodo represents? Or Aragorn? Or Sauron? I have no doubt that such a schema is possible, but like I said, I resist this as I don’t think that assigning these characters to ‘types’ does them or the story a service, in that the complexity of the whole would seem to slip past such categories. As your own post makes clear, you also want to look at how Gandalf, Aragorn and Frodo all pass through death: which would seem to indicate that you are considering the story as being governed by twinning and repetition at least as much as by some form of progressive schema of evolutionary growth. I’d like to think that story can be apprehended in both ways (that is, as progressive and repetitive) but if we want to do that we have to acknowledge that at some level these two modes of structuring the tale are not entirely compatible (you can’t go forward and back at the same time – at least not easily or comfortably).

Another aspect of your idea I that I very much like is the emphasis that you seem to be giving to what I’ve called above a ‘moral’ structure, in that the shape of LotR cannot be understood in terms of its events (which are disconnected) or even its characters (which are not three dimensional on their own, and need to be related to each other) but that it must be understood in terms of the larger ‘moral framework’ that it is both constructing and dramatizing. In this respect, I suppose that the Ring would be the central structural device insofar as it symbolises the morally bad that the Good is trying to destroy or overcome.

Littlemanpoet, some of the points you raise here about the archaic language of LotR were recently discussed here (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=11401), if you’d like to take a look.

[Aiwendil]

Fordim wrote:
In Romance, we have a form of narrative that is akin to allegory insofar as the characters are presented as ‘types’ but these types work together to form some kind of corporate representation of the human mind/soul. In this schema, I wonder what ‘part’ of humanity Frodo represents? Or Aragorn? Or Sauron? I have no doubt that such a schema is possible, but like I said, I resist this as I don’t think that assigning these characters to ‘types’ does them or the story a service, in that the complexity of the whole would seem to slip past such categories.

This discussion calls to mind one of the few things any of my English teachers has ever said that I found genuinely insightful. We were discussing Moby Dick (never mind that we hadn't actually read it . . .) and she said that the white whale is a complex symbol.

Now I'm not entirely sure what she meant by that, but it did make sense to me in its own way, and I think that it can be useful to think about "complex symbols". What is a complex symbol? Well, it's a symbol that isn't simple. It's a symbol that doesn't map directly and uniquely onto a single "signified". It's a symbol that can simultaneously represent more than one thing. The white whale, for example, simultaneously symbolizes nature, obsession, purity, the sea, and so forth.

I've found this concept useful in thinking about other works that might be classed as "semi-allegorical". It never occurred to me think if LotR in this way, since it was not written with the intent of allegory. But now it strikes me that there may be a great deal of similarity between Tolkien's "applicability" and the idea of a complex symbol.

Take the Ring. It is not a simple symbol, certainly. It does not represent nuclear power or drug addiction or anything else. Nor is it quite right to say that it represents power. In the context of the story, it is merely an example (if an incredibly potent one) of power. One is tempted to show that it is not a symbol by asking, rhetorically, what exactly it symbolizes: Power? Evil? Temptation? Addiction? Artifice?

This is where the complex symbol language becomes useful. We can say that the Ring is a complex symbol that simultaneously represents all those things. Moreover, in the very fact that it simultaneously represents different concepts, it also represents a certain set of relations among those concepts. It represents not only power and temptation separately; it also represents the tendency of power to tempt.

It is as though, rather than simply taking the fundamental "signified"s and fashioning a symbol for each one (as is done in a simple allegory), the artist has taken those fundamental concepts and fashioned his symbols by fusing certain of them together.

In this way, it does make sense to say that, for example, the characters in LotR represent aspects of the human mind - the catch is that they don't each represent only one aspect.

[littlemanpoet]

I'm not familiar with the work of Joseph Campbell, please tell me why I should be.

Should be? That may be saying too much. My question to you was engendered by this:

The mind becomes conscious as it travels to Mordor. There it faces its ultimate negation, death. But in order to become selfconscious it has to return to where it came from. Only then it is Geist.

Joseph Campbell wrote a book entitled Hero With a Thousand Faces. In it, he described how all myths can be boiled down to a few psychological types with which humans deal. His theories have been exploded lately, but that does not lessen his impact on the educated public during his lifetime.

Tolkien considered Campbell's idea frankly spurious. Humbug, even. His thought was that though many mythic stories had similar ingredients, the specifics in each one were at least as important as the similarities between them.

I'm not saying that you think like Campbell. I just noticed your psychological reading into LotR, and wondered if you were familiar with the most famous pyschological reader-into-myth. I would guess that Campbell was well versed in Hegel. You see, consciousness and death were two of Campbell's key "types" in myth.

[Lalwendë]

I intended just to have a quick read as I must away to bed, but what the heck...

The poetry is another vital component in the structure of LotR. Tolkien clearly loved epic verse and he worked it into LotR, yet he did not do it to such an extent that it alienated the reader. He could quite easily have written the whole tale in epic verse, as he was certainly knowledgeable enough about the requirements, but he did not; in many instances we are presented with 'fragments' of longer verses. This not only has the effect of wondering what the rest of the verse is like, but it also presents us with only what we need to know - and it often comes across as though the characters themselves know these verses very well and are giving us an insight into their favourite passages.

I have come across many people who cannot cope with LotR because of the poetry, and one oft heard piece of advice given is that they should 'skip' the poetry. But I think to do such a thing is to miss half of the essence of the story. The inclusion of poetry in the structure adds richness, and not only that, vital detail. Imagine if this detail was not presented in the format of verse - it could quite easily come across as something merely dull than as magical.

I can think of another novel where verse is vital to the tale and that is Possession by AS Byatt - if the reader were to 'skip' the poetry in that novel, then they would miss out most of the meaning and all the secret narrative about the poets' affair, and nobody would argue that to miss out the verse in that novel would be acceptable. So why should it be so for readers of LotR? I find it is vital to the structure - at least if you want to truly begin to understand Middle Earth and those who roam there.

[ivo]

Thanks Fordim and littlemanpoet for your comments. :)

First of all, I didn't mean to reduce the rich and complex tale of LOTR to a (simple)schema. I'm pretty sure that Tolkien didn't construct his tale on Hegelian dialectics. My philosophy prof always came up with Hobbits when discussing Hegel. I just elaborated on that thought and took it a bit further (maybe a little too far).

Hegel describes the way of the Geist as an odyssey, with the Geist finally returning home, to itself, but know complete selfconscious and embodied. That's what Hegel defines as freedom.

So, Hobbits live in harmony, without much knowledge of the outside world. It's a paradise like state. When Frodo embarks on his quest, he gradually learns more of the world and thereby of himself. He becomes self-conscious, as we see at the end of the Fellowship when he gets the clear insight that he has to fulfill this task alone.
Gradually he learns that the quest will claim his life, and that he has to face Sauron, death itself. Thus the self is confronted with its own negation. Frodo goes on. Why? Because he knows that if he doesn't he loses his freedom.
Frodo destroys the ring, but still has to return home. But of course home isn't there anymore. When selfconsciousness is realised, you can't go back to a state of unconsciousness (paradise). The negation of the self cannot be undone. Instead, it is uplifted in a new state of being, which unites both self and not self, thus becoming Geist, thus realising freedom.

So for me the true and saddest lesson (if you want to call it like that) is that freedom is only realised at a terrible cost, that is you lose your (old) self. It's even worse, the whole world changes. Not only the Shire, but whole Middle Earth, because the power of the One was bond to the power of Three. So there's no living happily ever after. No, actually Frodo died, and we see him literally departing to heaven, like Christ at Ascension Day.

This all got me started because of some remark on the scouring of the Shire. My point is that it is a necessary ending, not plotwise (plotwise it sucks), but because of the logic of freedom. So I agree with Fordim that the LOTR has a moral framework, if not to say evangelical framework (like many people pointed out before). Funny detail is that people claim that Hegels Geist is actually the Holy Ghost. (now where getting close to the eucatastrophe theme, which is also very interesting)

[Boromir88]

ivo,
So, Hobbits live in harmony, without much knowledge of the outside world. It's a paradise like state. When Frodo embarks on his quest, he gradually learns more of the world and thereby of himself. He becomes self-conscious, as we see at the end of the Fellowship when he gets the clear insight that he has to fulfill this task alone.
I think that was the sole purpose of Tom Bombadil. If you think of Tom, many people aren't "distraught" on why he was left out of the movies, they find him just as some jolly man that hops around and sings (to some point I agree). I think Bombadil helped the Hobbits realize their's more to the World then the Shire, that people lived in the Shire before Hobbits, and people will live there after Hobbits. We see this same device also from Farmer Maggot, who spent time with Bombadil. We also can see a bit of it from Treebeard, to Merry and Pippin. Treebeard is like that historian, full of stories from the old days, where forests were plentiful, the Entwives, Celeborn's youth, Saruman....etc.

These three characters all help the Hobbits grow, and mature, into the type of characters they become by the end of the book. I love the symbolism behind the entdraught, not only did Merry and Pippin grow physically, but they grew mature wise. We can also see in the beginning chapters, Frodo (and the hobbits) can't face the evils of the world, they must seek help from other sources. Gandalf, Aragorn, Maggot, Bombadil, Rivendell, Lorien. Then as Frodo matures, his "help" from other people decreases, basically after Rivendell, the only person other then Sam that helps Frodo is Faramir. By the end of the story, Gandalf leaves the Hobbits, saying his time is over. And the hobbits are able to overcome the Evil of the Shire, and Saruman, because they have matured, and now learned about the World, it's not just about Hobbits.

I wonder if Tolkien was a satiric writer. If anything I imagine he is a horation satirist, not juvenilian like Jonathan Swift, or George Orwell. Chaucer in his Canterberry Tales, uses both Horation and Juvenilian. Satire gets confused with sarcasm, they are much different. Just for general knowledge, to make sure everyone understands my point :) . Satire draws an attention to a problem using wit or humor. There's horation satire, which is more gentle, "Good toned" satire, and then there's juvenilian which is more spiteful, and hateful. Sarcasm is intended as a personal attack against someone(s), you may get a laugh at it, but you were intentionally trying to hurt somebody else.

There are some cases where Boromir seems like a juvenilian satirist. When the company faces problems, its Boromir who adds in the wittiness, to adress the problems.

The Great river.
And Even if you pass the Gates of Argonath and come unmolested to the Tindrock, what will you do then? Leap down the falls and land in the marshes?"
The problem is where this journey down the Anduin is leading them. And Boromir attacks it with his wittiness. This seems to me as more Juvenilian then Horation.

Another example-
A Journey in the Dark
"We do not know what he expects," said Boromir. "He may watch all roads, likely and unlikely. In that case to enter Moria would be to walk into a trap, hardly better then knocking at the gates of the Dark Tower itself....

[littlemanpoet]

So, Hobbits live in harmony, without much knowledge of the outside world. It's a paradise like state. When Frodo embarks on his quest, he gradually learns more of the world and thereby of himself. He becomes self-conscious, as we see at the end of the Fellowship when he gets the clear insight that he has to fulfill this task alone. - Ivo

I think that was the sole purpose of Tom Bombadil. - Boromir88

Ah, words fraught with peril, Boromir88. There have been enough threads explicating enough other purposes for Tom Bombadil that any such claim is greeted with a knowing smile. For example:

The wrong kinds of details (http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=1053&highlight=Bombadil)

Another one is "It feels different in the Shire", which I can't seem to find with a search. Maybe someone else can help find it?

That said, I think your main point of the Hobbits' growth from dependency to capability is quite apt. I find it interesting that Tolkien only puts juvenilian satire in the mouth of the arrogant Boromir, while he puts much horatian satire in everything having to do with Hobbits.

I wonder if Tolkien was a satiric writer.

In a word, Yes. Check out Farmer Giles of Ham. You will be convinced just what a rip-roaring satirist Tokien can be, poking fun at Oxford philologists, no less (in other words, at himself), the noble class, and much else. Smith of Wootton Major has a certain degree of satire, as does Leaf by Niggle. If you have not read these works, you have new treasures to discover among Tolkien's short(ish) stories.

Ivo: (plotwise it sucks)

What!?! :mad:

;)

Wanna explain your thinking? It's one of my favorite sections.

[ivo]

- [

What!?! :mad:

;)

Wanna explain your thinking? It's one of my favorite sections.

I totally agree, I think it's a necessary and crucial part of the story, as I tried to explain in my post. I just meant that plotwise it's terrible, because it's an anticlimax, it's a 'new' part of the story after the main story is told (that of the Ring). No wonder PJ left it out of the movie.
That is also the reason why I like to think more of LOTR as a chronicle than as a literary story.

[The Saucepan Man]

I just meant that plotwise it's terrible, because it's an anticlimax, it's a 'new' part of the story after the main story is told (that of the Ring). No wonder PJ left it out of the movie.Although it is not, perhaps, consistent with traditional plot structure, an "anticlimax" (or perhaps "sub-climax" is a better word) like the Scouring is not necessarily at odds with the structure of a story such as LotR. As you have suggested, there is more going on here than simply the Quest to destroy the Ring (although that is, of course, the central plot around which everything else revolves). The individual journies of the main characters need resolution, and the Scouring provides this for Sam, Merry and Pippin by showing how they have grown and developed by their experiences. It also provides a valuable insight into the development of Frodo's character and, of course, brings Saruman and Wormtongue's parts in the tale to an end.

Also, it is unlikely to bother the reader who become engrossed in the book. Having possibly devoted some weeks or even longer to reading it, he or she will generally be left with that feeling of wanting more (of Hobbits especially), and the Scouring provides this to a degree.

I agree, however, that it would not have worked at all in the film. One of the main criticisms by traditional (non-Tolkien devotee) critics is that the ending was too long. While a book can be picked up and put down at leisure, a film is an "all in one sitting" experience, and cinema audiences generally tend to get pretty restless after about 3 hours. To give the Scouring the justice it deserved would have taken too long (or required the main climax to occur far too early).

[littlemanpoet]

I've always felt that LotR could not be complete without the Scouring of the Shire and the chapters that follow. Here's where I get to defend the "MICE" thesis, I suppose.

::first looks both directions for Mr. Underhill the Fearless Feline::

Okay, it's safe. ;)

If you posit that LotR is a Milieu story, its subject, as it were, is Middle Earth at the End of the Third Age. All loose strings of MEatEotTA must be tied before the story can be called complete.

One of the primary loose strings is the Shire itself. There have been warnings by means of news (Farmer Maggot as well as in Bree), dreams (at the house of Tom Bombadil), and the Mirror of Galaldriel, that things were not all as they should be in the Shire. When we learn that the Rangers have given up their watch of the Shire in order to fight the War of the Ring, we have been given our most critical piece of information, even if it does seem rather insigificant when mentioned. Every reader knows that when the Hobbits return to the Shire, they are going to find things not to their liking, and not as it should be.

So it is essential to the story, as Tolkien chose (and presumably had) to write it.

[Boromir88]

I've always felt that LotR could not be complete without the Scouring of the Shire and the chapters that follow.
I agree 100%, The Scouring ties up all the loose ends that we had in the beginning. Which, I think is why most people are ok with The Scouring being left out of the movies, because we don't have the foreboding warnings from Maggot, Butterbur, or Bombadil. The destruction of the Ring was a fitting end for the movies, but the Scouring is the fitting end for books. It shows that the Hobbits have grown up, what they weren't able to handle in the beginning of the story (by themselves), they are able to defeat by the end.

[Mister Underhill]

::first looks both directions for Mr. Underhill the Fearless Feline::littlemanpoet, surely you know that the MICE never see the cat coming before he pounces...

I'm away from home on a visit so I'll have to make this quick, but I want to toss out the idea that the reason why the book ending works and the movie ending doesn't (or at least feels too long) is exactly the reason why I disagree with the idea that LotR is primarily a milieu story.

The movie version returns to the Shire -- milieu -- but strips the events of the ending of all their narrative significance and complexity -- story, or plot if you prefer. The ending of the movie is boring precisely because milieu is not story. Simply being in the Shire, or Middle-earth for that matter, is not enough. What's the story?

The Scouring works because the story isn't over when the Ring is destroyed. Evil has been defeated -- but only for now. Tolkien has much more to say on the subject, not the least of which is that evil can never be finally, utterly defeated. Here I could go on, but since I'm pressed for time I'll leave you to imagine in the meanwhile much of what I might say about the significance of the final chapters. To end the story after the destruction of the Ring by simply writing that "Frodo returned to the Shire and lived happily ever after to the end of his days" would contradict much of what the story is about.

[Boromir88]

Good thoughts Mr. Underhill. I would say for movie purposes, leaving out the Scouring was necessary, the movies never went into too much depth suggesting that there was still a threat of evil around in the Shire, plus they killed the two people who started the corruption.

The Scouring works because the story isn't over when the Ring is destroyed. Evil has been defeated -- but only for now. Tolkien has much more to say on the subject, not the least of which is that evil can never be finally, utterly defeated.
An excellent point, there will always be someone else who will rise up and desire more power/wealth...etc. I've been wondering which idea was Tolkien shooting for, if he even intended it to be an idea. One literary age is the reformation, these thinkers believed that people are born with the intent of doing evil, but it's society and government/rules, that keep us in line. Then Renaissance thinkers believed that people are born fully good, and it's society/government/rules that cause us to become evil. I think there are good parts to the government, and bad parts, it's a flawed system, but I think one cannot live peacefully without a form of government (example Shire). A place that seemed so good, and peaceful in the beginning, where there is really no government set up (besides the Mayor), well I should say no laws, and it still becomes corrupted. The hobbits kept to themselves, and were oblivious (and quite frankly did not care) what was happening outside the Shire). Reformation and Renaissance thinkers were complete opposites in their views, but maybe there is this middle-ground between them, if there even can be a middle-ground. I would say government is necessary, and in some aspects does keep us in line, to a "moral" person, if they get ticked and want to commit a crime, they think ahh, I will go to jail, how will people view me, it's not worth it. I also think, that as people, we have an intent to "do evil." Not that we are evil, but we have the capability to become evil.

This is something I've been pondering for a while, and can't seem to figure out yet. Which one was Tolkien shooting for, Reformation, Renaissance, both? If he was shooting for one.

If anyone wishes to look more into the reformation/renaissance, here (http://home.earthlink.net/~pdistan/howp_5.html) is a good website on it.

[davem]

As far as the different endings of the book & the movie are concerned I think both are kind of inevitable given the times they appeared & the individual's who created them.

The book was written by an idealistic young man who had desired to change the world - or at least his own country - through an art that would produce a kind of moral regeneration. That young man returned from the horror of the trenches & found that rather than his sacrifices (& those of his entire generation) having made that desire possible, it had made it more difficult of achieving. In short, Tolkien could not have ended his story in any other way. I doubt that he, or any readers of his generation, would have expected the kind of 'happy ending' that we of a later generation might have. They wouldn't have been surprised by what the Hobbits found on their return.

The movies, on the other hand, were made by individuals from a generation who had never known total war, & the absolute destruction it brings - destruction of their ideals & dreams in particular. We, I suppose, want the movie ending - actually we want it to be a kind of 'prediction' of what will happen during the current 'war'. In that sense the movies are almost a kind of wartime propaganda excercise. Its simply untrue as PJ says that the Scouring would come across as anti-climactic (in the movie sense). Where it would be 'anti-climactic' is in terms of our hopes for what we're currently living through. It would be too much for the current movie audience. We all want to believe that the current 'war' can be won so decisively that the enemy will cease to exist, all the threats disappear, & we can all live happily ever after - apart from a few tragic veterans, who will be left with scars that will not heal - sad, but inevitable, & at least the rest of us can get on with our lives in the new Utopia which will arise from the ashes of war.

Tolkien may have wished for that kind of ending, but he was too honest to give us it. He confronted us with the reality of life in this world. Evil is an indestructible part of this world - at least it is not destructible by anyone within the world. It's part of us, innate, & cannot be eradicated by the defeat of external foes. We may wish to believe that, but its both erroneous & dangerous, because it leads us to extremes - if we just take that extra step, just step over that line, we'll solve all the problems we face, destory the bad guys, & win peace, happiness & freedom for all for ever.

Yet what Tolkien offers is both lacking in hope - there is no ultimate defeat of evil - & at the same time offers the chance of something better, something even 'salvific' for each of us - If evil is a constant, if it cannot ever be ultimately defeated forever, we can accept it, & keep from crossing that line in the belief that we can erradicate it forever.

So, the movie offers us a 'hope' which is both false & dangerous. Tolkien came back from the trenches wiser than that. The struggle against evil is an eternal one - there are no start & end dates to it.

[Lalwendë]

In short, Tolkien could not have ended his story in any other way. I doubt that he, or any readers of his generation, would have expected the kind of 'happy ending' that we of a later generation might have. They wouldn't have been surprised by what the Hobbits found on their return.

This is so very true - Tolkien was one of a generation which was decimated by war in very real terms. He returned to a country which had lost many of its men, and which had been turned on its head by the necessary practicalities of war, from women entering the workplace in large numbers to the mechanisation of agriculture to enable quicker, and cheaper food 'production'. I once stood looking at a war memorial in St Mary's in Whitby and worked out that one small town had lost one third of its young men. It was the end of a dream of a 'safe' Britain, and so Tolkien had to offer nothing less than this complex ending.

The movies, on the other hand, were made by individuals from a generation who had never known total war, & the absolute destruction it brings - destruction of their ideals & dreams in particular.

They were also made by those directly involved in or who grew up soon after the counter-culture era, which was centred upon idealism - which is not wrong in any way, but which would have welcomed the notion that bravery and sacrifice ought to lead to rewards, that an earthly paradise such as The Shire could live on unharmed.

Many films have barely veiled propaganda elements. We all know about Michael Moore's overtly political films, but other examples include Top Gun which could have doubled as an air force recruitment film, Ken Loach's tragic tales of the British underclass and the message of The Day After Tomorrow with a real warning hidden beneath the special effects - this also has a seeming happy ending though in reality the truth would probably be much more grim.

[Mithalwen]

This is another of those threads which is so vast and erudite that I know I will have to take a deep breath before hitting "post" at the end of my ramblings.

First is to point out is to point out the silmilarity between the journeys in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings (cf Paul Kocher ?) Ie Leave Shire at instigation of Gandalf, arrive at Rivendell where Elrond dispenses wisdom, dangerous crossing of mountains , part with Gandalf, cross river into magical Elvish realm, which is left by river... ultimate destination a perilous mountain... of course there are differences to but in some respects the Lotr is a "Grown up" version of the Hobbit. Tolkien isn't afraid to use the same elements and let them play out in diffferent ways (several stories in the silmarillion have similar elements). However it was the separation of the threads in TTT which stalled my first attempt at reading LOTR when I was about 10 (Father Christmas had noticed I had enjoyed the Hobbit ;) ). By the end of the Christmas Holidays I was struggling across the Ephel Duath with Frodo and Sam and by the time I rejoined Gandalf and Pippin I had forgotten what they were up to and they went back on the shelf for a couple of years when I skimmed book 5 ( despite Faramir it remains my least favourite and least read part apart from Bombadil). I wonder if the complete separation of the threads is to stop it being quite so obvious that the main thrust of the plot has relatively little action? In the Radio version where they cut back and forth between the two this is alleviated partly by exploring the psychology of the 3 main protagonists whose mental journey is so much more interesting than the physical journey, and of course in the "real time" version Faramir becomes a muchstronger link between the plotlines. I must reread the relevant parts of HoME.

As for Christopher as audience, I am sure we owe him a fair bit - including the original map (if memory serves correctly). Even as a small boy he seems to have a memory to detail that proved complementary to his father's creative imagination. I really much get "The Letters" - that quote is quite touching and I wonder which Hobbit? Merry maybe.. It also ties in with my theory that the LOTR is the grown up version of the Hobbit...

As for the scouring of the Shire, I understand why some feel it an anticlimax , especially if you have been caught up with all the great deeds and great people- the wondrous elves and the noble men, but I think if you lose the scouring of the shire you lose the "point" of the whole thing. It is the Hobbits, that Tolkien identifies himself with and I sense that he expects us to too - much as we might fancy ourselves as Aragorn or Galadriel, Faramir or Eowyn - and we cannot live on the heights for long. The hobbits have to go home and the reader has to get back down to earth. Again it reprises "The Hobbit". Bilbo returns to find his home in the narrower sense overrun ( albeit non violently) and he has some bother before it is restored to him. Frodo and Co return to find their home overrun.. I think this shows that we cannot insulate ourselves in our own little world and keep the outside out forever (I am sure I have said this elsewhere but cannot remember which thread ) - nor can we leave and return to find it unchanged. Frodo's words about going to save the Shire, and it having been saved but not for him are perhaps the most moving and significant for me and I think that the character of Frodo lost out most of all in the movie version. I know there are cinematic reasons why they simplified the story but I find the book (and Radio) Frodo, facing middle age and making a choices to go (rather than running away all the time) so much more moving. Especially when the other hobbits are able to find a degree of fulfilment in Middle Earth. Enough rambling

[littlemanpoet]

Mr. Underhill, I await your erudition in regard to Milieu or not.

Mithalwen, I found it interesting that you pointed to the similarities between The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Your similarities seem to consist mainly in plot-string, which seem to me to be more on the face of things. Your comment that LotR is a "grown-up" version of TH may have something to do with a rather fundamental difference between TH and LotR: whereas TH is an adventure story, a "there-and-back-again" tale, to use Tolkien's words (as spoken through Bilbo), Tolkien has made quite a point that LotR is a quest story, and not merely an adventure story. To overstate the case, the adventure story is a lark: the hero leaves home, has his adventure, and goes back home again. By contrast, in the quest story, the huge events spread wider until they overtake the humble home of the hero, who is taken up into the quest, against his own will, and only accepts the arduous task appointed to him because he must remain true to himself, knowing full well that he will probalby fail. So the quest nature of LotR raises the story to a more serious level, more mature, more thematically deep and rich, than TH.

[Mithalwen]

I wouldn't say Bilbo quite goes of his own free will..... and the story of the Hobbit is known as the "Quest of Erebor".. :)

[littlemanpoet]

Granted. I still see a difference between the two. Not least is that Frodo can't go home again. Not really. There is, of course, the greater gravity of the LotR quest. And you (or should I say, I) have a sense that Bilbo could have said "no" because it really had nothing to do with him, but really wanted to go; whereas Frodo had no such choice, because his uncle's heirloom made him the steward of the Ring, and thus the one appointed; it had everything to do with him, like it or not. So maybe it wasn't quest versus adventure as much as ...... oh....... fate? or providence? or meant-to-beness?

[Mithalwen]

fair points and which raise various interesting questions which have been aired if not answered in other threads if I remember rightly..... Gandalf (who of course maybe in a better position to judge as a Maia.. implies the intention of a higher power ... "Bilbo was meant to find teh ring but not by it's maker" - andI quite agree that while Bilbo yearned for adventure, Frodo seems to have a sense of destiny

[Boromir88]

whereas Frodo had no such choice, because his uncle's heirloom made him the steward of the Ring, and thus the one appointed; it had everything to do with him, like it or not.
Good point lmp, and Tolkien does draw a lot of connections between Frodo and Bilbo. There birthdays are on the same day, when Frodo met Gildor the first thing Frodo talked about in their conversation was "have you seen Bilbo?," and it mentions in A Long expected Party, how Frodo approaches 50, and yet is still active, and adventurous, which happened to be the same age Bilbo started to get anxious/antsy.

I also love the connections between Gloin/Gimli/Bilbo/Frodo. In Many Meetings we see at the supper that Frodo sits next to Gloin and it states how they talked together for most of the time. Then later on in Lothlorien
"Come with me, Frodo!" cried the dwarf, springing from the road. "I would not have you go without seeing Kheled-Zaram."
Now we see the growing friendship between Gloin's heir (Gimli), and Bilbo's heir (Frodo). So Tolkien is drawing all these connections between Bilbo and Frodo, as well as throughout his stories he draws other connections with (excuse me I don't know the proper word for this) "lineage."

Take the Istari for example. Radagast-Yavanna, so Radagast ends up being known for falling in love with nature, and tending the birds...etc. Saruman/Dwarves/Noldor-Aule, they all greed for something, or some desire whatever it may be. Gandalf-was said to not really to be represented by a Maia but is most like Manwe, so he succeeds in his "task."

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Only time for a very brief post -- there is one 'truism' about LotR that I have seen batted around here for a while that I'm not sure holds much water. The 'party line' seems to be that in the Scouring of the Shire we see that evil will never suffer a final defeat and that the stain of this incident upon the Shire serves as a reminder of that fact.

Well, the problem I have with this theory is that in the Scouring of the Shire the very last of the (Third Age) evil is done away with in the form of Saruman's death. After this (relatively minor) battle, the story is quite clear that life in the Shire actually improves. The crops are better, thanks to Sam and Galadriel's gift, the borders are secured, thanks to Aragorn, and even the really disturbing memories are expunged, thanks to Frodo's decision to leave. I think that the presence of Saruman in the Shire when the hobbits return is an intrusion into their complaisance about the Shire (it can be touched by evil), but they very handily do away with that evil.

Now, I am not suggesting that there is a final defeat for evil – a personage of no less stature than Gandalf tells us the contrary on more than one occasion. Sauron will never die, just lose strength, people are still flawed, there is greed and weakness and desire, the line of Men is failing…but in the Shire, in the incident of the Scouring and its immediate aftermath, I just don’t see any of that. I find the whole incident an extraordinarily purgative/healing (even cathartic) process of regeneration: of the turn from good to better, through momentary worse.

So this leaves me, I realise, with having to contend what function or place the Scouring does hold in the overall structure. I shall have to turn to that in a later and longer post…

[davem]

but in the Shire, in the incident of the Scouring and its immediate aftermath, I just don’t see any of that. I find the whole incident an extraordinarily purgative/healing (even cathartic) process of regeneration: of the turn from good to better, through momentary worse.

Ok, but if we go back to the Prologue we find:

Hobbits are an unobtrusive but very ancient people, more numerous formerly than they are today; for they love peace and quiet and good tilled earth: a well-ordered and well-farmed countryside was their favorite haunt. They do not and did not understand or like machines more complicated than a forge-bellows, a water-mill, or a hand-loom, though they were skillful with tools. Even in ancient days they were, as a rule, shy of 'the Big Folk', as they call us, and now they avoid us with dismay and are becoming hard to find.

'They avoid us with dismay & are becoming hard to find.' Maybe the Hobbits, after the War & the defeat of Saruman felt they had entered a Golden Age of living 'happily ever after', but Tolkien knew better, & wasn't going to let his readers get away with not facing the truth that what happens at the end of the story would be the case forever. He makes sure we'll read that its all over now, by putting it at the start of the book, & not tucking it away in one of the appendices.

The interesting thing is that the defeat of Saruman is only an apparent defeat - they destroy the wizard himself, but actually he brings about their permanent destruction - he's the serpent in their Garden - its what he symbolises with his ''mind of metal & wheels'' that seals their fate - Just as Sauron is not fianlly defeated but remains as a spirit of malice to corrupt men's hearts, so 'Saruman' remains as the spirit of the Machine. The Hobbits ultimate tragedy is foreboded in his appearance in the Shire. And while Frodo may believe Saruman has lost all power & that his words:

'Whoever strikes me shall be accursed. And if my blood stains the Shire, it shall wither & never be healed.'

the Shire does wither. Saruman's 'poison', the poison of 'Machine' thinking, control & coercion of nature rather life in harmony with it is the seed that grows from the spilling of Saruman's blood.

There is a darkness at the end of the story - its the 'shadow' cast by all that 'light & joy' perhaps. However wonderful it all may be, for Frodo its not any kind of Utopia, & Sam by the end longs for the Sea. The story ends with Sam coming home 'as day was ending once more'. After the Scouring there is a brief reward for labour spent, but its no more than that. It will all pass away - after all, as we know, Hobbits are 'becoming hard to find'.

[Aiwendil]

Fordim wrote:
The 'party line' seems to be that in the Scouring of the Shire we see that evil will never suffer a final defeat and that the stain of this incident upon the Shire serves as a reminder of that fact.

Well, the problem I have with this theory is that in the Scouring of the Shire the very last of the (Third Age) evil is done away with in the form of Saruman's death. After this (relatively minor) battle, the story is quite clear that life in the Shire actually improves.


I don't think that these two propositions contradict each other. Yes, the result of the Scouring of the Shire is good - that is, Saruman is defeated and life in the Shire improves. But the first point is not contingent upon the outcome of the scouring. The discovery of such evil in the Shire makes the point that even such a tremendous event as the final defeat of Sauron is not a final defeat of evil, and it makes that point regardless of whether Saruman is in the event defeated or not.

It's the same pattern that we see throughout the Legendarium. Morgoth is defeated, but Sauron survives. Sauron is defeated twice, but he returns both times. He is defeated a third time, this time utterly, but Saruman survives. Saruman is defeated - but based on this pattern we would be fools to expect that no evil will ever return. As indeed The New Shadow shows.

Still, I think you have a good point. Too often is it said that LotR is a tragedy, or that despite the defeat of Sauron it has a sad ending (and the same mistake is made with the Silmarillion). But surely it does have a happy ending, if not a simple one. The great evil is defeated - as indeed is the lesser evil of Saruman. We are reminded that this does not mean that all evil has been defeated; but that hardly makes the ending tragic. Or, to say it in allegory, if someone suddenly gave me 999,999 dollars I would not say "What a stroke of bad luck! I didn't get a million."

[Boromir88]

I think we have all agreed that Tolkien's message is to show that evil will never be fully defeated. But, as Aiwendil points out, the story of LOTR, is not a tragedy, it does have a good ending. The "evil" in the story is defeated, but evil in general is not defeated. Even Sam states:
"I shant call i the end, till we've cleared up the mess," said Sam gloomily. "And that'll take a lot of time and work."
I think this is Tolkien showing us life after a war. The destruction of the ring wasn't the end of the "War." The Battle of Bywater was, but even after the war you have the effects of war. And indeed it will take a lot of time and work, and maybe will never look as it did before. With that being said, I don't classify this as a tragedy.

Throughout the story we still get the reoccuring theme that evil will never be gone. After the Battle of Helm's Deep is won, there is still work that needs to be done. After the Siege of Minas Tirith there still work that needs to be done. Even after the destruction of the Ring, work needs to be done. And even after the end of Saruman. It's like a cycle, time and time again we see evil defeated, there is always more that needs to be defeated.

After reading LOTR I get the feeling that I think a lot of people get after war. It's great, we were victorious, but it won't last forever. But that to me doesn't classify it as a tragedy, it classifies it as the fact of life. A tragedy is a noble hero (or heroes) defeated by overwhelming odds beyond their control. The heroes in this story were not defeated, they just didn't defeat evil.

A true classification of tragedy is what we see at the end of FOTR (well actually beginning of TTT) the death of Boromir. A noble hero that was overpowered by odds he couldn't control.

[Mister Underhill]

Following on the heels of davem, Aiwendil, and Boromir88, I don't need to belabor the point. The Scouring and its aftermath, far from being an anti-climactic, long-winded ending or a mere tieing up of loose strings, serves an important structural and thematic purpose -- arguably as important as the destruction of the Ring itself. Here we have the qualifiers of victory: evil, so lately defeated, rising up again where it is least expected; the warrior who cannot heal; the stained homeland -- stained not only by the depredations of an enemy, but by the shame of collaborators and cowards; the bitter loss of dear friends. ‘This is worse than Mordor!’ said Sam. ‘Much worse in a way. It comes home to you, as they say; because it is home, and you remember it before it was all ruined.’
Mr. Underhill, I await your erudition in regard to Milieu or not.I'm not sure what you mean, lmp. I continue to be puzzled by the concept of a story that is principally driven by milieu and am hard pressed to think of anything even approaching an example outside the works of Michener. In any case, I can't see much value in artificially separating such intertwined elements as character, plot, concept, and milieu, and then deeming one or the other as ascendant over the others. Sorry, but I think Card is all wet on this one.

[mark12_30]

So this leaves me, I realise, with having to contend what function or place the Scouring does hold in the overall structure.

Sam & his helpers (including, indirectly, Galadriel) create a hobbitish earthly paradise with an air of elvishness wafting around the tree branches. The best ale in decades is flowing freely, young hobbits are bathing in strawberries and cream, and prosperity is **everywhere** you look...

Except in the heart of Frodo Baggins. There it has no hold. Frodo is too broken to enjoy it, and must leave Middle-Earth. That he leaves in the midst of this astounding bounty makes Frodo's departure all the more wrenching.

[mark12_30]

Gandalf-was said to not really to be represented by a Maia but is most like Manwe, so he succeeds in his "task."

I remember Child of the Seventh Age saying that Gandalf was (to some degree) associated with Nienna-- the one who weeps so copiously. Perhaps this helps explain Gandalf's compassion-- for instance, towards Smeagol.

Being compassion-oriented towards the smaller folk, he therefore cares about the peoples of Middle-Earth as a whole. And that's a better platform for his task than (for instance) greed.

[Mithalwen]

One of the things that I like most about the Lord of the Rings is that there are few if any simplistic happy endings. Although Tolikien perhaps kills off an unrealistically small number of his major protagonists given the vast slaughter of the War of the RIng, the survivors generally have to pay a price. It is a good versus evil struggle but the battles are not definitive throughout the history of Middle Earth. The war of the ring is no more final than the war of wrath or the last alliance. Each merely hold back the tide for a while. The seeds of evil sown by Melkor and Morgoth cannot be eradicated rather like original sin in the Judeo-Christian view of our own world. Only in the Last Battle when the world is remade can all its ills be put right. However, the Hobbits have to live in the world as it exists at their point of history and so , while it is fitting that the Shire is touched by the evil that threatened all of Middle Earth albeit in the form the minion Saruman rather than Sauron, it is also fitting that the damage is swiftly repaired and the hobbits have a spell of increased peace and prosperity as a reward for the labours of Frodo and Co. I think there is a lot of symbolism in the "only Mallorn west of the mountains and East of the Sea". Only Frodo, Sam and Bilbo will go to the undying lands but an echo of that land lives in the Shire.

Someone pointed out elsewhere on the forum that the White Tree of Gondor and the Shire's Mallorn are echoes of the Two Trees of Valinor and on reflection it "tidies up" the whole history of middle earth. The stories start (near enough) with the Two Trees of Valinor and we leave Gondor with the white tree flourishing as Arwen sings a song of Valinor and we leave the Shire with the mallorn flourishing and Elves singing the paean to Elbereth of the pilgrims. But this gives progression aswell as completion for having started with "gods and angels" in realms of bliss we end in mortal lands that are rapidly losing their "fairytale/supernatural" elements and are closer to the borders of our own history.

[littlemanpoet]

I continue to be puzzled by the concept of a story that is principally driven by milieu...

I could be wrong, but it seems to me that plot and character and idea can drive a story, but setting can't.....very well. Your verb, drive, however, may be pointing up a misconception. Perhaps an analogy may help: the structure of an automobile is that which houses the engine, which drives it. In the same sense, the structure of a story could be that which houses the engine that drives the story. Of course, being an analogy, it's sure to have its limits, but it helps (I hope) to get the idea across. The Milieu which is Middle Earth is the "house" of the plot, characters, and ideas. But of course a story is far more fluid than a car, and that's where the analogy breaks down. The characters and plot move through the setting, interacting with different aspects of it. I admit to thinking out loud here, but it's the best I can do here. At any rate, this is as least part of the sense in which the Milieu of LotR is that upon which plot, character, and idea, hang. By no means do I intend to imply that milieu overshadows plot and character in LotR! They interrelate, of course. Oh well, enough blather about this.

[Bêthberry]

I'm coming in late with a reply here, but I have a very interesting observation about Anglo-Saxon culture which I think might shed some light on this milieu/setting issue.

We seem to recognise fairly clearly the features, of, say, Beowulf which inspired Tolkien--the heroic ideal, the rings and fealty, the camaraderie of the mead hall, the wonderfully robust lines of alliterative verse. We tend not to talk about any influences from OE religious verse, or the riddles, or prose, but those exist also. The poem The Dream of the Rood, for instance, is written in the voice of the cross on which Christ was crucified, a talking tree, if you will. (The Cross, the Rood, that is, refers to itself as a tree.) Then there is the theme of exile and the sea. There are other aspects of Old English literature and Anglo-Saxon culture which also appealed to Tolkien besides the heroic ideal.

For the sake of brevity, I am going to copy a very interesting comment which Peter Ackroyd makes in his book Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination. I won't quote passages from OE texts, but for the time being ask us to consider this idea.


We may identify here a sense of belonging which has more to do with location and with territory, therefore, than with any atavistic native impulses. There has been much speculation on the subject of location theory, in which the imperative of place is more significant than any linguistic or racial concerns. In The Spirit of the People: An Analysis of the English Mind, published in 1912, Ford Maddox Ford suggested that "it is absurd to use the almost obsolescent word 'race'." He noted in particular the descent of the English "from Romans, from Britons, from Anglo-Saxons, from Poitevins, from Scotch..." which is perhaps the best antidote to the nonsensical belief in some 'pure' Anglo-Saxon people. In its place he invoked the spirit of territory with his belief that "It is not--the whole of Anglo-Saxondom--a matter of race but one, quite simply, of place -- of place and of spirit, the spirit being born of the environment." In Ford Maddox Ford's account that tradition is in some sense transmitted or communicated by the territory. It is a theory which will also elucidate certain arguments within this book.

I would suggest it is this "imperative of place" which Tolkien draws upon from his Anglo-Saxon learning. It has much to do with the fullness of detail and specificity of site in LotR. And more: I think it is glorying in this sense of territory which holds all the disparate elements of the story together, the double stranded plot, the rambling, picaresque plotting, the symbolic unity of the Ring and the Shire, the paralleling of so much. Note that I am not saying the Scouring of the Shire is a mistake because we cannot predict it from the earlier anticipations of plot. I am saying that Tolkien's profound sense of the loss of the rural landscape to the machine is part of his lament for a value of this earlier tradition.

The runes from "The Dream of the Rood" are carved on the Ruthwell Cross, a stone cross dated to the late seventh centure, which creates, in Ackroyd's words, "a sacred topography of the nation." I felt some of this even this even late in the seventh age when I toured Great Britain last summer. At least, I felt it in England, but not in Glasgow. The sense of historical place I experience in North America is very different: In one city, the historical site of a great find of oil, which brought wealth and prosperity beyond imagining to the province, was in the way of a large, multi-lane highway which would connect the province. What was done? The oil derrick and the tourist site were moved a mile away, to a spot which never produced oil and never will. (Shades of A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.) So much for a tangible, spiritual sense of location. It's rather like saying grape juice will do instead of wine. (Lest I raise any hackles with that statement, let me say my family's religious inheritance is Protestant.)

I cannot imagine this ever happening 'in Middle-earth'. The sense of place is palpable in LotR, in the sanctuaries of the Bombadil household, Rivendell, Lothlorien, in the experience of forest in the Old Forest and Fangorn, in the way Rohan is connected with wide open prairie and plains, or Minas Tirith with the walled city. Every place is a measure of continuity and identity. And even the landscapes of darkness have discriminating topologies which in the very absence of this continuity ironically reconfirms it. Place and space reflect the measure of being connected to Arda. This furnishes not just the characters but readers also with "a communal memory of place".

This might not 'drive' the story, but to me it holds it together like the crisscrossing stone walls which roll up and down over the English countryside.

[davem]

|Bethberry's mention of The Dream of the Rood reminded me of the medieval legend that the wood from which the cross was made was cut from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil in Eden. The tree which lead to Man's fall is the same one on which it's salvation was achieved, so that Christ becomes the 'fruit' hanging from that tree - a fruit that brings life rather than death.

So we have Trees & tree- symbolism running through the Legendarium - which begins with the Two Trees of Valinor & ends with the Two Trees of Middle earth - the White Tree in Gondor & the Mallorn in the Shire. Middle earth becomes an 'echo' of the Blessed realm, & Heaven has come down to earth. It is a kind of 'incarnation'. The world is made 'divine' in a small way because the divine has entered into the world. As Above, so Below. As Then, so Now.

So with all the repetitions of name - 'Minas Tirith' is a name which echoes down out of the First Age - names of people echo down in the same way. Some individuals live on through each age - Elrond, Galadriel, Glorfindel, Sauron & prvide a living link to the past. Connections through time - constant references to heroes of the past, & their stories abound to strengthen this meaning, this link, that people have with the past.

The past is alive in the present, rather than being simply 'memory' - & that's principally because of the Elves (& to an extent to the Ents). When they have passed into the West, or into the Land, that link will be gone, & there will be only memory - which is 'not what the heart desires'. And perhaps that's it - what we have now is not what our hearts desire. They desire a living connection with the past, so that it is not truly 'past'. They desire 'Elves'. Which, I think, is FMF's point. Its also, perhaps, the reason of our dislike of change - if it involves the loss of the old. Perhaps it also explains the desire for destruction that some individuals have. To break free of the past & begin anew is also part of what we desire. We have inherited (within the mythology, at least) an Elvish 'strain'. The Elvish side of us wants that living link, wants to preserve our connection with what we were & where we came from. The 'Mannish' side wants to move forward & explore, & has to break those links. We are pulled in both directions - towards past & future. LotR is a book about endings & loss of what was, but its also one that looks forward to a new future. It is a kind of frozen moment, an eternal 'present' - which perhaps explains why we can continually go back to it - it will never become 'stale', because it's always right at the point we are at as individuals - caught between past & present.

[Lalwendë]

The sense of place is palpable in LotR

I too have to defend the importance of setting in LotR. Without it, the book may not have gripped me in quite the same way. Each place travelled through or visited is very real due in no small part to the description of the setting. I have been to Rivendell, and I have been not only to The Shire, but right into a hobbit hole, and this was done by reading about them. This world is, to put it simply, vivid.

Each place emphasises the characteristics of those who live in those places. Think of how Lothlorien is constructed of tall and beautiful trees, echoing the characteristics of those who reside there, or how The Shire is simple, comfortable and homely, rather like the Hobbits themselves. This sense of place also tells us the history of the peoples of Arda. There are ancient barrows, which tell us that a great people once lived near the Downs, and we have Moria, to tell us of how strong and powerful the Dwarves once were. Yes, it may indeed not drive the story, but the sense of place not only takes us right into the picture of Arda that Tolkien had, but it also tells us what characteristics its people possess, and it tells us their history, and it adds that all important depth which we value so much. Even after the 'race' of men who inhabited the Barrow-Downs have long since departed, we still know they existed because of what they left behind, and we only know that because Tolkien shows us what they left behind.

This is true of our own landscapes. The places where we live or where we grow up really can define our characters. I grew up in a village where people naturally knew each others' business which has made me nosey; those who grow up amongst people of many other cultures often become very open to other ideas. Look at Aragorn, raised in Rivendell, and hence much more amenable to Elven ways than most Men.

This imperative of place is not unique to Tolkien. Two other writers who appreciated the importance of place were Emily Bronte and Thomas Hardy. In Wuthering Heights, we see the contrast between the more elemental and much older house of the title with the genteel elegance of the house belonging to the more socially acceptable Linton family. If the situations were reversed and the Lintons lived at the Heights then the story would not be the same. In Thomas Hardy's Return of the Native the nature of Egdon Heath almost becomes a character in the novel itself; it is brooding and temperamental, it hides people, it even kills.

The essence of place, the resonance it brings for us, is a deep seated sensation, one which is being hurt in this modern world of globalisation and the fragmentation of community. No longer do we linger in the places where our families have lived time immemorial, and we instead have 'progress'. Perhaps the loss of features of our landscape, the demolition of old buildings, cutting down of familiar trees, the building of roads through what to others might look to be ordinary fields, perhaps these losses have resonance to us because we are all clinging to any sign of the past, in a world which is always threatening to take us along with it whether we like it or not. I think Tolkien felt this too, the need to feel 'rooted' in a place, to have a 'connection' to somewhere. One of the great sorrows is that while our world is changing so fast about us, it is in a book that we find a place which is always familiar to us, and it is to a book that we have to go to find that comfort of place which we all seek.

I don't think its so surprising that there is such an interest in genealogy these days as many of us seek to find our roots in something; it is interesting that despite where we eventually end up on the planet, we always carry our names with us, words that give away our history; this too is echoed in Arda. I also think that one reason behind interests in ancient history is that we seek to find meaning within our landscape, to know what might have happened there in the past, and to know who lived there and what they might have shared with us. It is a natural need, at least for many of us, and this need is echoed by Tolkien's work.

[littlemanpoet]

One of the great sorrows is that while our world is changing so fast about us, it is in a book that we find a place which is always familiar to us, and it is to a book that we have to go to find that comfort of place which we all seek.

Lalwendë, this is the only thing you said that I disagree with. Tolkien addressed this in On Fairy Stories, in his section on Escape, Recovery, and Consolation. A good fairy story helps us to "recover a clear view", as Tolkien put it, so that we see trees and clouds and even our neighborhood, with fresh eyes. Come to think of it, it's not only fairy stories that achieve this. Anyway, LotR sends us back into our own world with a fresh appreciation and hunger for those things the story revealed to us as beautiful and worthwhile. And we go and look for them in our own world. I find myself, for example, with an unstoppable hunger to go north, where there are fewer people and more trees and cleaner air. And so I go. I think that it's a good thing that I mourn the loss of a small forest that just got leveled to make room for a parking lot near my home. So rather than this being a sorrow, I consider it a gift that I have these books in my life to help me recover a clear view.

[Lalwendë]

LotR sends us back into our own world with a fresh appreciation and hunger for those things the story revealed to us as beautiful and worthwhile

lmp - I do agree with you there. Thinking back to when I first read LotR one of the profoundest effects on me was that I viewed the world around me with new eyes. I don't think I was alone as many environmentalists and outdoors enthusiasts seem to have derived their interest from reading LotR. I did already have a keen interest in history before reading LotR but I also gained a deeper interest in archaeology and ancient history - and a thirst to know about how the past affected us, and still affects us.

What I mean when I say we have to resort to literature to find the comfort of place is that LotR is familiar. It is a book and hence the setting does not alter (unless it is affected by new input to our own imaginations from visiting new places), unlike the world about us which is ever changing and being lost.

[littlemanpoet]

Lalwendë, thanks for your clarification. It is very much in the spirit of Tolkien ... which comes as no surprise, eh? ;) The older I get, the more I understand - on a feeling level - this aspect of Tolkien's themes. Fighting the long defeat, as it were. :(

[Lalwendë]

Thinking again about the essential aspects of LotR and what makes it so successful, there is a real paradox within the book. It is at once utterly simple and outrageously complex.

It is simple because at the heart of the narrative, it is a tale of good against evil, and the plot is nothing more than the tale of one person taking a journey at the end of which he hopes to destroy evil. Everything else ultimately centres upon and supports this one aim. It is the core of the tale, the focus of the narrative, despite everything else, and it is an ancient tale, seen in many other works. In some ways it reminds me of The Canterbury Tales, which is also centred upon the journey of several pilgrims, using this as the basis on which to build a whole series of other stories. It also reminds me of Huckleberry Finn, another seemingly simple tale of an adventure, a journey, onto which is layered meaning.

But LotR is also incredibly complex. We are taken not just along this journey, but into the myriad aspects of the world it takes place in. This one journey is supported by many other journeys and tales. It is enriched by the place it happens in, a place of history, cultural differences, and natural wonders. It has languages and maps. There is philosophy and poetry and art. And death, disaster, darkness. There are people who are noble, those who are mad, those we struggle to comprehend. There is a character for everyone to identify with in this world, a mirror for all of us. It is also the output of a lifetime's work, and into it are poured all the imaginings, and all the intellect, of one life.

Through all of this complexity we move inexorably onward towards the end of that one simple story. What holds this whole immense body of words together, even at the points where it all threatens to shatter into many incomprehensible pieces, is that Tolkien never at any point loses sight of that one central tale. Everything is intricately linked to it and ultimately contributes to it, and we cannot forget that.

The journey down the River Anduin symbolises this paradox. Here we have the remains of the Fellowship doing nothing more, on the surface, than travelling towards their ultimate destination. Yet on this journey we have shadows of the past in the shape of Gollum, we have portents of the future with the Orc attack, we see the myriad of other stories going on, all in microcosm, as we read of Boromir's ideals, Aragorn's worries, regret and hope, so many things.

Tolkien took an utterly basic and fundamental theme and then layered many other tales, histories and characters upon it to create something vast and expansive yet at its heart really quite simple. I think that we respond on a deep level to the fundamental tale, and then we take on the rest as we travel through the book, our sense of wonder growing as we go. The combination of a classic narrative theme with real depth is ultimately what holds LotR together.