[The Squatter of Amon Rûdh]

That's what I meant: it makes Tolkien sound so ruthlessly calculating about his characters. Boromir's a classic tragic hero: brave, honest and noble, but cursed with a human frailty, namely pride, which, along with the virtue of wanting to save his city, lays him open to the Ring's influence. I think that Tolkien has him die out of mercy: Boromir would never have been able to live with his failure at the Falls.