Quote:
Originally Posted by Inziladun
Well, I'm not saying Morgoth could have brought about such havoc on anyone's life. That truly would have given him power worthy of what he boasted to Húrin.
But a great deal of the ruin wrought on Túrin was accomplished by Glaurung, who was acting on Morgoth's instructions. If not for Glaurung, could the curse have been realised?
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That's why I think Morgoth's curse does not really qualify as "curse" with the same meaning as e.g. in Isildur's or Mim's case.
Let me present my current theory summed up (it is largely a repetition of what I have said above, but I am trying to put it in a little bit more coherent picture - let's see if I succeed):
We have stumbled upon several cathegories of "curses". But what is a "true curse" in my opinion, is when somebody says "may you
X for the
Y that you have done" (that's the core point of the curse, of course there can be more amendments and addittions, usually for example if the curse is spoken beforehand, then there might be "
if you do Y...", but these two basic elements are in some form always present there). Usually, "X" and "Y" are similar in effect (e.g. Khim dies by bow, Andróg dies by bow). Also, I believe there is always a chance to lift the curse somehow - if somebody somehow compensates for the "Y". This is a speculation based on e.g. the case of the Oathbreakers and on my belief that the curses generally all operate on the same law. This "law" is simply a metaphysical law which works generally in Middle-Earth and "checks" if you can make the curse, but is not purely mechanical and takes into account wider circumstances, not just cause-effect.
Examples: Mim's curse qualifies perfectly, Isildur's one as well (I don't think I need to explain this). The rest of the curses we have been speaking about here basically can be divided into two categories, and they do not fulfil the rules of "true" curses.
Thorin's curse to Gandalf for giving him Bilbo as a companion violates the "code" in several ways. First, there is very little logical "Y-X" relationship between what Gandalf (through Bilbo) caused to Thorin and having a beard withered. Second, according to the "law of curses", it's hard to see that Gandalf would be in any way responsible for Bilbo's behavior in this particular case (however, this particular point I think is the most disputable, as after all, Gandalf probably knew or even planned something like that). Nevertheless, thirdly and most importantly, Thorin probably didn't mean it, or wouldn't have said the same thing if not in the momentary affect. Like I said above, in his right mind he would either have cursed Bilbo himself ("may your Bag End be robbed when you're not at home" - now had he said that, it would actually fit the story rather well, wouldn't it?) or not pronounced the curse at all (more sort of out of resignation than for forgiving Bilbo/Gandalf).
So this curse belonged to the cathegory "would be a true curse, if only it had better grounds". Morgoth's curse is something different - it's not a curse at all, it is a mixture of evil spell (i.e. curse in the meaning of spell, not manipulating somebody's "karmic law" to allow a curse to work on him just like that) and making things look
like a "true curse" in Húrin's eyes. There is fundamentally lacking the cause, "Y", for Morgoth to curse Túrin. In other words: Morgoth, with all his boasting, does not have the power to manipulate the "curse policy" of Middle-Earth, he can only concentrate his evil will to bring harm to somebody. And that can be done in a quite prosaic way: sending Glaurung or Orcs to chase after a certain person etc. Morgoth was also of course intentionally twisting the perception of many events in Húrin's eyes to make them look worse than they actually were. If you substract all Morgoth's (Glaurungs etc.) intentional contribution with the aim to harm the Children of Húrin from Túrin's tale, I think you won't get much more than a set of coincidences which were brought to their evil end by Túrin's own foolishness. If you want to see a curse in it (and that's what Morgoth wants you to see), it's easy to see it that way. But that's only Morgoth's trick to make it seem that he somehow has the power to wilfully curse (in the sense of "true curse") anybody he wants, which is a tool to intimidate his opponents. "Master of Fates!" Yes, Morgoth can accomplish a lot with his evil will, he is a Vala after all, but that comes from his power - and has nothing to do with the "balance" maintaining the cause and effect of curses, that is something even Morgoth cannot influence. (If he could, he could have easily cursed all Elves and Men and be done with it, with curses being so powerful as we see it.)
And, at last, to mention Saruman's curse, which could as well have been an empty threat, but assuming it was not, I believe it violated the "curse law" needed for it to work as a "true curse" in several ways. Most of all, there was no "Y-X" relationship on whose basis Saruman could have the "right" to curse the Shire, taking into account that Saruman himself had harmed the Shire
already. So the "balance of the scales" was on
his side, actually. So if Saruman wanted to harm the Shire in any way, I think he would have had to use his own power (which he, most likely, didn't have) - the same thing as Morgoth did.