[Lush]

Everyone, be cool.

Personally, I think that for writers such as Tolkien, allegory is impossible to escape. No matter what they say, write, or scream at us. Of course, he didn't want a bunch of loonies with too much time on their hands scanning every line for Satanic messages, looking for anagrams that point to Tolkien's belief in extraterrestrials, or trying to argue that Wormtongue is a metaphor for Mussolini...or whatever else people do with allegorical books. This sort of thing tends to obscure the art.

At the same time, do I believe that Tom Bombadil stood for something? Yes, pretty much. I mostly agree with burra on his interpretation though.

Let the kids talk, littleman, no harm in it, as long as no one suddenly concludes that Tom is really a representation of Churchill...Or, actually...Wait a second... Can it be? [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]