Obloquy, you have provided a wealth of information in those links. Thank you.
My apologies: for coming late to this debate, but also (and especially) for not providing numeric references for these letter quotes, below. I remembered the gist of the quotes and searched online for them, so they are not as complete as I would like. I hope to return to the letter during some spare time
and glean for further information; perhaps another member of this thread will beat me to it. For those who do not have a copy of Letters, I cannot recommend the book highly enough. But then, I am known for my Letters-bias.
These quotes are simply the first thought that came to my mind pondering the question, and I hope they provide further impetus for the discussion.
(J.R.R. Tolkien in a letter to Mrs. Eileen Elgar - September 1963):
Quote:
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"Gandalf as Ring-Lord would have been far worse than Sauron. He would have remained 'righteous', but self-righteous. He would have continued to rule and order things for 'good' and the benefit of his subjects according to his wisdom (which was and would have remained great)."
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J.R.R. Tolkien in a letter to Mrs. Eileen Elgar - September 1963
Quote:
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"Of the others only Gandalf might be expected to master [Sauron]--being an emissary of the Powers and a creature of the same order, an immortal spirit taking a visible physical form."
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