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Old 02-20-2006, 12:06 AM   #20
Formendacil
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Sorry, Ms. Skywalker, no offence is intended, but I have to disagree with you on all points. Please don't take the following personally:

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Originally Posted by Eowyn Skywalker
In the same manner, I believe that Tolkien may very well have masked bits and pieces and perhaps little clues into his writing about the Entwives. I'm a skim reader and cannot offer incredibly wise quotes and scientific manner, but I can offer this. Tolkien never intended on making his writings into such an exceedingly deeply debated arguement. He wasn't trying to write allegory into everything. I forget the source for that idea. But yet, it's heavily inspired by myths and such.
As a matter of fact, Tolkien deliberately said that he wasn't writing allegory at all. How that proves the following, I'm not sure:

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It's quite possible to assume that there could very well be hidden findings. Easter eggs, shall we say?
Is it indeed? Aren't allegories "hidden meanings"? What is the difference between an allegory and an Easter Egg, other than the topic? An Easter egg, by definition, is a hidden prize for the reader, which furthers the STORY not at all. In the same context, an allegory is a real world, typically more reference. Although placed in the story, it similarly has no real point with regards to the furthering of the STORY.

Note: I am speaking, of course, of allegory such as is found in C.S. Lewis's The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, an example being the correspondence of Aslan to Christ. From an internal perspective, Aslan and Christ's similarities have nothing to do with the workings of the tale. It is only to the outside observer -the reader- that the similarities have any meaning. Similarly, the Easter eggs you say exist have no internal purpose in the story: hidden clues about the Entwives have nothing to do with the story. Only to us, the outside readers, do they mean anything. Again, if they exist.

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Which leads me to another theory. Why weren't there five rings of power, and if there were, did the entwives receive them? Maybe they're invisible, the remaining entwives stalking the eaves of Middle-earth, searching their entish husbands with mournful voices...
Only five Entwives? There were quite a few more Ents than Entwives then! Furthermore, if there had been Five Rings for the Ents, there would have been mention of it by the Wise, would there not? Or is this ANOTHER Easter Egg?

One, Three, Seven, and Nine are all numbers that tend to have symbolic meaning, in both the Judeo-Christian tradition to which Tolkien belonged, and among other cultures. The number five, although a proper part of an odd number sequence, does not. If Five is to be included, then why not two, four, eleven, and thirteen?

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But I love the theories concerning the idea of Tolkien's wife. But an idea—is it explicitly said, anywhere, that entwives looked exactly like Ents?
Entwives may or may not have come from Tolkien's marital life. To be INSPIRED by something, whether consciously or unconsciously, does not make something a direct copy. The Entwives can have sprung from his own married life without being a direct reference back to that married life.

Again, my apologies if I have offended, such is not my intent. But I find myself in complete (it seems) disagreement.
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