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Originally Posted by Rumil
Yes, obviously no graphic descriptions of horrendous injuries.
No, the clues are there if you look for them
What on earth am I on about? Well, JRRT wrote when every adult knew more than they wished about the reality of war, his generation, what was left of it, served in the horror of trenches, then everyone was exposed to total war and strategic bombing in WW2. So he doesn't need to describe it all in graphic terms.
Those that know are given the cues - Sam deploring the battle of men versus men, the dead marshes, the decapitated head missiles, it is plain that there are atrocities and 'grossness' in Middle Earth warfare, but they are left, mostly, to the imagination. Surely this is even more disturbing? I'm thinking Alien (horror film) versus Aliens (action film). The less you describe, the more you force the reader's imagination into overdrive.
On the other hand, could the book have been too graphic? Was Tolkien writing for children, teenagers or adults? If it were in any part the first two, then graphic violence would not have been permitted in the 50s.
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There's no need for graphic descriptions of injuries, but likewise, there was no need for Tolkien to simply gloss over the fact that Eomer, Aragorn, Legolas etc must have done things like cut the arms and legs off Orcs, put arrows in the eyes of Variags and decapitate Men of Khand. Our heroes simply disappear and a couple of pages later there is a battle won. It's interesting looking in HoME as the final product is not too much different from the notes he wrote.
That's particularly pertinent when it comes to Tolkien's writing style as he is so often accused of lingering descriptions of landscapes and so forth, and we all know he can write lingeringly and effectively of horrors, but when it comes to battles, we almost get little more than a synopsis. Especially with Pelennor. It was OK for people of Tolkien's generation to simply read a rough outline and then fill in the gaps, but to people born since 1945 and who have never served or read much about warfare then battle is just something out of a video game - filling in the gaps isn't possible.
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Originally Posted by Morthoron
And if anyone has spoken at length to any war vet (like my father, a WWII vet, for instance), they recall the glorious events or the fun times they had. You have to literally pry any reminiscences of horror out of them with a crowbar (if they'll reveal them at all). They don't want to talk about it unless they are forced to (and this is particularly true of WWI and WWII vets for some reason). Tolkien's reminiscences of horror (like the faces in the Dead Marsh) are subtle reminders of his personal war experiences, rather than the overt statements made by Owen, Sassoon or Erich Maria Remarque.
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I think this goes to the heart of it. It's likely that Tolkien had
no artistic reason for leaving out the details of battle at all, it's probable that he simply did not like to write about it because it was painful.
So we know that Eomer got a blood lust on him, but we don't know what atrocities he commits. We know there must have been a body count as the good guys won, but we don't know
how they won beyond the kind of description of strategy you might find in a text book. And our heroes must have been brutal - can you imagine the Orcs giving any quarter? Not a bit. And so nor would our heroes have done.
It was Tolkien's perogative to do this of course, but if he was intending to portray war as bad, as something to be avoided, then did he do the right thing?