A very nice point about Aragorn/Eomer,
Boromir88. But we can go further with this. Aragorn and Eomer are the returning/triumphant Kings and they are meeting in the midst of a conflict between their chief adversaries (Saruman and Sauron. It’s Gandalf, isn’t it, who says that their two foes conspired to bring Merry and Pippin to Fangorn?). So how does this sound: Aragorn is to Eomer, as Sauron is to Saruman? Obviously, the relationships involved are completely opposite in nature insofar as Aragorn and Eomer meet and begin with distrust but look forward to a time when they will fight together, whereas Saruman and Sauron are pretending to be allies while each plots the downfall of the other. But while we thus have the good rulers on the one hand and the evil on the other, it does point to some kind of interconnectedness I think: Aragorn is unquestionably good to Sauron’s evil, but he is clearly more powerful and noble than Eomer. In fact, now that I think about it, Aragorn presents Eomer with pretty much the same kind of choice that Sauron presents Saruman with: “help me or hinder me. Choose swiftly!” Just like with Sauron, there’s really only two choices with Aragorn: either you are with him or against him, and upon your choice depends your fate – good or evil. In this sense, I think that the Sauron/Aragorn pairing might be one of the most important in the book, in that this pairing represents in starkest (purest?) terms the choice and difference between good and evil??
Davem: as always, count on you to take a thread topic and make it even better! I very much like the idea of an evolution from masculine partnerships to domestic marriages, but as is usual with ‘tidy’ patterns, I think this one might be a bit too limiting. As your own list of negative pairings demonstrates, there are lots of ways for two men to be bound to one another that is bad (Gandalf/Saruman – what about slinker/stinker?). What’s more, there is at least one unholy and monstrous ‘marriage’ between Shelob and Sauron. That is, I realise, a perversion of the ideal expressed best by Aragorn/Arwen and Sam/Rosie, but it still is a union of masculine and feminine, but of a much darker and evil nature. So while I’m not attempting to refute or reject your point, I think there’s probably more to say.
On the topic of Eowyn and Galadriel, raised by
Mithalwen, there’s another neat indication of their paired relationships that actually furthers the pairing of Merry and Frodo I spoke about earlier. Galadriel is the one who defends, and even in a sense accompanies, Frodo in his contest with Shelob; Eowyn does the same for Merry against the Witch King. The more I think about it, the more I like this Frodo/Merry pairing – and this Eowyn/Galadriel pairing.
Fascinating tidbit
Encaitare: it really does show how this dependence upon pairing, particularly between genders, goes to the very heart and root (to mix metaphors) of Middle-Earth!
But to address a question I posed in the initial post: why so many pairs? I still don’t have much of an answer, but could it have something to do with the fact that evil is so consistently organised around and identified with singularity?:
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them.
And is this perhaps the mistake that Boromir, Denethor, Eowyn and Gollum all make? To think that they can and should be alone in their lives’ journeys? That they only need rely on themselves? If I’m getting this right, then Eowyn’s ability to recover from this mistake when the others do not bears attention…