[davem]

The Steward

As Esty has pointed out, this chapter begins before the fall of Sauron. It is almost as if Tolkien wants to keep on re-emphasising the significance & impact of that event on all those involved. All reach the depths of despair, experience dyscatastrophe, before Eucatastrophe.

This is the darkness before dawn, the ‘dark night of the soul’ of the mystics’, the ‘night sea journey’. At the beginning of this chapter we see individuals carrying on in the face of hopelessness, not giving in to despair. The Warden of the Houses is a man who has clearly spent many years healing the sick & tending the dying. Eowyn’s gloryfication of the warrior ethic doesn’t impress him.

'There are no tidings,' said the Warden, 'save that the Lords have ridden to Morgul Vale; and men say that the new captain out of the North is their chief. A great lord is that, and a healer; and it is a thing passing strange to me that the healing hand should also wield the sword. It is not thus in Gondor now, though once it was so, if old tales be true. But for long years we healers have only sought to patch the rents made by the men of swords. Though we should still have enough to do without them: the world is full enough of hurts and mischances without wars to multiply them.'
'It needs but one foe to breed a war, not two, Master Warden,' answered Eowyn. 'And those who have not swords can still die upon them. Would you have the folk of Gondor gather you herbs only, when the Dark Lord gathers armies? And it is not always good to be healed in body. Nor is it always evil to die in battle, even in bitter pain. Were I permitted, in this dark hour I would choose the latter.'

Eowyn may have logic on her side, but one gets the sense that the Warden has heard it all before & just wishes people would stop using swords on each other. One also gets the sense that Eowyn feels the opposite. This is a typical interchange between warrior & healer, heard repeatedly in hospitals & in medical tents down the ages.

Between these two stands Faramir. Warrior he may be

He looked at her, and being a man whom pity deeply stirred, it seemed to him that her loveliness amid her grief would pierce his heart. And she looked at him and saw the grave tenderness in his eyes, and yet knew, for she was bred among men of war, that here was one whom no Rider of the Mark would outmatch in battle.

but unlike her, he does not love war - for him it is a necessary evil, not a way out of one’s personal problems. Eowyn tells him she does not desire healing, but clearly she does - she just doesn’t realise it, because she doesn’t understand what form her healing will take. Faramir quickly realises that she needs time, to be gently disabused of her plan to go to the battle. He does this, basically, by telling her that if she rests she will be in a better position to fight, In short, he doesn’t belittle her desire but speaks to her in terms that she will understand & accept. Unlike all the men she has so far encountered he doesn’t tell here her place is in the home, looking after the menfolk. This is possibly the first time a man has treated her as an adult & more importantly as an equal. The result of this is interesting:

She did not answer, but as he looked at her it seemed to him that something in her softened, as though a bitter frost were yielding at the first faint presage of Spring. A tear sprang in her eye and fell down her cheek, like a glistening rain-drop. Her proud head drooped a little.

The first time she doesn’t have to ‘pretend’, to be a ‘warrior’, or an untouchable ‘Queen’, to gain respect, she doesn’t know how to respond, Its clear that for all this time she hasn’t been truly herself. Now that she can be, she doesn’t know what to do, because she doesn’t really know who she is.

The description of the mantle Faramir gives her:

They were clad in warm raiment and heavy cloaks, and over all the lady Eowyn wore a great blue mantle of the colour of deep summer-night, and it was set with silver stars about hem and throat.

made me think of the description of her healing:

hen, whether Aragorn had indeed some forgotten power of Westernesse, or whether it was but his words of the Lady Eowyn that wrought on them, as the sweet influence of the herb stole about the chamber it seemed to those who stood by that a keen wind blew through the window, and it bore no scent, but was an air wholly fresh and clean and young, as if it had not before been breathed by any living thing and came new-made from snowy mountains high beneath a dome of stars, or from shores of silver far away washed by seas of foam.

An made me wonder if there might be a connection.

But still, for all Faramir’s efforts, she is full of fear & despair. She is still drawn to the darkness, but no longer willingly. She has looked into the void for so long that she cannot turn away. Still, she is beginning to think there may be light somewhere:

Let us not speak at all! I stand upon some dreadful brink, and it is utterly dark in the abyss before my feet, but whether there is any light behind me I cannot tell. For I cannot turn yet. I wait for some stroke of doom.'

Faramir understands - he has often dreamt of Numenor.

'It reminds me of Numenor,' said Faramir, and wondered to hear himself speak.
'Of Numenor?' said Eowyn.
'Yes,' said Faramir, 'of the land of Westernesse that foundered, and of the great dark wave Climbing over the green lands and above the hills, and coming on, darkness unescapable. I often dream of it.'

This may simply be a result of his Heritage - but it doesn’t seem to be a common dream among those of Numenorean descent. Both of them are haunted by the idea of a great desroying force, waiting for them, or actively pursuing them. Strangely, it is at this very moment that things change - at first it is no more than a feeling but this feeling is confirmed by the appearance of the eagle. Shippey has pointed out the similarity of the eagle’s song to the psalms of the Authorised Version of the Bible.

Some readers feel that the relationship between Faramir & Eowyn is not convincing - that it all happens too quickly, & is too much like a tying up of loose ends, I think Tolkien commented that in such despereate times people don’t have the luxury of playing games, that all acting & pretense are cast aside in the face of impending doom & individuals are more honest than they would be if they felt that they had all the time in the world. I suspect he is right, but then I was never unconvinced by the relationship of Faramir & Eowyn. They are perfect for one another. He needs her as much as she needs him. His proposal & her acceptance are the final stage in her healing. No longer lost in fantasies of being a warrior, she ‘awakens’

‘I stand in Minas Anor, the Tower of the Sun,' she said; 'and behold! the Shadow has departed! I will be a shieldmaiden no longer, nor vie with the great Riders, nor take joy only in the songs of slaying. I will be a healer, and love all things that grow and are not barren.'

She can even tease her future husband:

'Then must I leave my own people, man of Gondor?' she said. 'And would you have your proud folk say of you: "There goes a lord who tamed a wild shieldmaiden of the North! Was there no woman of the race of Numenor to choose?" '

This is the first time we have seen this side of Eowyn. This is the real Eowyn, Dernhelm has finally been laid to rest.

Faramir, too, is finally able to be himself. He is no longer in the shadows of his brother & his father. He has known much grief, losing mother, brother & finally father. He has no-one till he meets Eowyn. She heals him as much as he heals her.

I’ll come back to The King later.....