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Originally Posted by SpM
Tolkien's purpose (or, to exclude any C-thread style debate ( ), one of his purposes) is to tell us, his readers, a story. In doing so, he relays certain events to us. Some of those he intends us to take as fact. In my view, this is one such event.
Why would Gandalf seek to influence Frodo's impression of Gollum with tales of infant cannibalism if he did not himself believe them to be true? If Gandalf considered them to be mere Woodsman gossip, it would be highly irresponsible for him to colour Frodo's opinion of Gollum in this way.
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Why would he seek to influence Frodo? I don't think he was doing anything of the sort, as you say, this is story-telling. And Gandalf does say that this is a tale of the Woodsmen, not something he has seen or experienced. The whole little section of story is told in poetic language with metaphor which immediately makes you think "ah! a folk tale!" Beings creeping into nurseries at night is a common 'bogeyman' tale - told nowadays by grannies trying to get restless grandchildren to go to bed and in olden days by villagers frightened of the fairies swapping their babies for changelings. The times Gollum was abroad were times when there were many 'nasties in the woodshed', and in the woods. It could have been anything...
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Originally Posted by SpM
Hang on. I would say that we are perfectly entitled to form a view as to what Gollum did and whether such things were right or wrong. The point that Gandalf (and Tolkien) was making was that Frodo (and we, the readers) should not be hasty in dealing out death in judgment. In other words, whatever view we might come to as to the rights and wrongs of Gollum's deeds, we should not be so hasty as to condemn him to death for them.
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Isn't that the exact question at stake though? Did Gollum deserve death? I guess your answer there would be no or don't know. We're not discussing his rights and wrongs - if so then we'd all probably agree that Gollum did many 'wrong' things, that's not really in question. But what is, is if he
deserved death, as a
punishment for these deeds.
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Originally Posted by Folwren
Hang it all, Boromir, that's exactly it - if given the time. Smeagol didn't have time. His mind was so defiled and twisted before even seeing the ring that it instantly captured him, and if he couldn't get Deagol to give it to him, by golly, he was going to take it!
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The problem with this approach, that Gollum was already twisted, entirely sidesteps the fact that Gollum had that Ring for 500 years, so anything we see of him, anything we know of him is irrevocably coloured by the twisted, damaged Gollum we see. The old Smeagol is very, very difficult to find - and in those instances when we do find him, he is seen to be guilt-ridden for what he did to Deagol, which would not be the reactions of a cold-hearted killer.
And of course yet again, we're ignoring the immense power of the Ring. Not only that, but we are demeaning and diminishing that power. That it acted so quickly is testament to what a terrible thing it is. If we take onboard the argument that the Ring itself has some kind of sentience (which the jury is out on for me!) we can also see just how perfect it is that after being left dormant for centuries, the Ring, on its reappearance instantly provokes violence and murder - what a perfect way, for an evil Ring of power, to begin its journey in the waking world once more? Not only that, but it will then give the new bearer, the new murderer, an incredible sense of guilt and hence an impetus to keep the Ring safe - "if it was worth killing for it is worth keeping it well".
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Originally Posted by Mithalwen
There is a case being reported currently in Oxford, of a man with severe learning difficulties having been drowned by a group of people who decided he was a paedophile... a couple of years ago a mob attacked the home of a paediatrician because they couldn't tell the difference.... tales start very quickly even here, even now...
I am not ignoring anything I am merely distinguishing between rumour and fact.
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Good example. It's well known that worries soon escalate into paranoia and into myths. And the same can quite well have happened in Gollum's case - as I say he is the classic 'bogeyman'. There is no evidence that he was a cannibal, save his threat to eat Bilbo, and that's exactly that, a threat. He eats goblins, but that is not cannibalism as they are not his 'species', and is really no more wrong than the Rohirrim hunting the Woses just for a bit of a laugh.