I'm kind of jumping away from the topic at hand, namely the names of the River and Bucca... While I have a love for languages, I am no ace at entymology. I'm young, give me time. So my situation being as it is, I have nothing of value to add to that particular discussion, save to say that it is fascinating. I feel like I'm always learning when I log on at the BD's. Now, with apologies, I turn back to more familiar territory...
Ahh yes, another of my absoloute favorite chapters (A statement that I think I will be repeating over and over as we move through the beginning of the story)!
I love reading about the Hobbits back before all the horrible things that happen to them are much more than a trailing dark shadow, or grim foreshadowing.
This chapter really shows the three supporting Hobbits at their very best. So much fun to read! Especially the revelation of Sam as the spy. Frodo's surprise at how much Merry and Pippin know is absoloutely priceless. It's also sad in a way. They force Frodo to take them along, but none of them know the danger, or just how long and dark their journey will be...Frodo has a more accurate preception of it than the rest, but none of them know what they're in for in the long run, and Sam certainly has some sense of it. Pippin has encountered a Black Rider, and certainly is afraid of it, but how much of the danger he precieves, I do not know. Merry is really out of the loop as far as Riders are concerned. He hasn't encountered them over and over as the others have, but he is older than all but Frodo, I believe, and will probably be next to grasp the full seriousness of the situation. All three that have been on the journey have grown and changed, Frodo the most noticeably.
Each time I reread LOTR, my mind grabs onto some details it previously missed, rushed through, or just plain forgot. This time, what I fixated on was that Frodo has some really interesting dreams, at least throughout FOTR. Rereading this chapter gave me the chance to notice this paragraph, one that had somehow escaped my notice, or at least, my memory on my many other readings of this book...
Quote:
Eventually [Frodo] fell into a vague dream, in which he seemed to be looking out of a high window over a dark sea of tangled trees. Down below among the roots there was the sound of creatures crawling and snuffling. He felt sure they would smell him out sooner or later.
Then he heard a noise in the distance. At first he thought it was wind coming over the leaves of the forest. Then he knew that it was not leaves, but the sound of the sea far off; a sound he had never heard in waking life, though it had often troubled his dreams...
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It goes on to describe his sudden longing to see the Sea.
I find that so intrigueing because Tolkien seems to make a point of describing it, and of making it the last thing we read about in the chapter. I'm still not sure what it means... I was thnking he was on the Tower Hills, where Sam's daughter Elanor would someday live. I think that's where the Arthedain were located, correct me if I'm wrong: I'm not particularly good at geography, and Middle Earth's history at times gets a little foggy and confused in my mind. I'm not quite sure what significance that has, but it would appear that Frodo is seeing a real place in his dream, one that he has never been to before. Also, a connection to the Sea, even a longing for it, has been established. Thoughts?
OK, now you're free to go back to the deeper linguistic discussion. I'll go back to lurking around on this thread and learn all I can from it.
