I have been reading these fascinating and contradictory posts from a distance and feel rather delighted that as work kept me away others still pondered the question.
Now, I will have nothing to do with
Eomer's wargery--er, roguery--in suggesting a less than heroic motivation for Frodo, a motivation which
Lal has expertly exploited.
Rather than focus just on one episode when Frodo wore the Ring, I'd like to consider what we know of Frodo when he wears it. The Ring, like Galadriel's Mirror, gives premonitions of another world.
Sam, for instance, has visions, and when he attempts to free Frodo from the Orcs, he believes that the Ring distorts his senses in these visions. Frodo, we are shown in Weathertop and told later during his recovery in Rivendell, actually sees into the Wraith world.
It is terrifying, as he has a full vision of the Ringwraiths and they of him. Yet he also sees Glorfindel and at Rivendell Gandalf tells Frodo that the elves indeed live in two dimensions at once.
What is this twilight zone that includes both the Dark Lord's minions and the elves, who apparently have their finest, richest, fullest form in this alternate world? The wraith world apparently partakes of some aspects of the immortal world the elves know--perhaps its terrror is that the Riders are there under false and terrible means. We know that Frodo is "Elf friend". Is it his sensitivity to the elves and their world, his openness to other things, which both allows him to carry the Ring as far as he does, and then which ultimately swallows him?
I wish we had more than the words Gandalf speaks to Frodo in Rivendell about
the other side.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Many Meetings
You were in the gravest peril while you wore the Ring, for then you were half in the wraith-world yourself, and they might have seized you. You could see them, and they could see you.
'I know,' said Frodo, 'they were terrible to behold.. . . .'
. . . .
'The Elves [Gandalf again] may fear the Dark Lord, and they may fly before him, but never again will they listen to him or serve him. And here in Rivendell there live still some of his chief foes: the Elven-wise, lords of the Eldar from beyond the furthest seas. The ydo not fear the Ringwraiths, for those who have dwelt in the Blessed Realm live at once in both worlds, and gainst both the Seen and the Unseen they have great power.'
'I thought I saw [Frodo here] a white figure that shone and did not grow dim like the others. Was that Glorfindel then?'
'Yes, you saw him for a moment as he is upon the other side: one of the mighty of the Firstborn. He is an Elf-lord of a hounse of princes. . . . '
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So, what is this world which the Ring holds out to Frodo?
I write in haste without much clarity. Sorry. Thanks all for your replies.
PS. I don't think the Nazgul speak to Frodo to put the Ring on at Weathertop. They telepathicly urge him to wait for them when at the Ford, but I think it is the Ring which tempts Frodo at Weathertop.