Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Bb
Of course, I have no idea if this saying would have been known to Tolkien, but it was handed down in my family by those as old as Tolkien who hailed from his side of the pond.
|
Over here its
shepherds rather than sailors who are either delighted or warned, but it is (or was) a common saying.
There is an essay in the 1992 Centenary collection which I've referred to before which goes into Legolas' ability to instantly discern that there are 105 Rohirrim at such a great distance, & how this would seem to imply that Elves' brains function differently - how could his eyes pick up on such detail at that distance or his brain calculate at that speed?
Or what is the nature of Elven 'sleep' - are there different kinds of 'sleep' for Elves. Is there what we would call 'normal' sleep & a kind of half-sleep half meditation? Whether this ties in with Tolkien's ideas about the Elves existing at once in 'both' worlds is another question. Are there two (or more) kinds of 'waking' for Elves. When they 'remember' past events (which Gimli says is is more like to the waking world) are they 'awake' or 'asleep' or in some third state which is different from either full waking or true sleep?
What would it be like to exist in two worlds at once, & how different are those two worlds - do they have different
physical laws? Were there
always two seperate worlds, or have they become seperated - maybe at the time when the world changed at the fall of Numenor? Is the 'other' world still the original flat earth - which would perhaps explain why they can still find the Straight Road into the West? Do Elves like Legolas walk on both a straight & a 'curved' world? Maybe Legolas can see the Rohirrim at such a great distance & calculate their number instantly because the physics of the Other World are different to the physics of this world?