Gwathagor, I can’t consider it a happy ending because to me a happy ending would have necessitated the entire Fellowship surviving and being happy. Obviously that’s not what happens. Aragorn gets Arwen, but she never gets to see her family (save perhaps Celeborn and the twins) again; Boromir is dead, his father goes insane and tries to burn his brother to death; Legolas gets the sea longing and has to sail, most likely leaving his father behind; Frodo has to sail leaving his friends and family. Sacrifice isn’t happy to me, it is tragic that sacrifice is ever neccesary.
Oh dear
, it appears I’m not expressing my self clearly enough,
davem, if you still think that I think that you advocate graphic violence. I don’t, and agree with you that Tolkien could have expressed more of the reality of war without having to go into graphic detail. What I think you do believe (and please correct me if I’m wrong) is that it is Tolkien’s responsibility to show the reality of war in his books because otherwise people might get the wrong view of war. I have to disagree you that it is his responsibility (and I am probably biased as a writer and artist) because I believe that a writer’s utmost responsibility is to write the story that they want.
In the same way I don’t read fairy tales and expect my love life to end up like a fairy tale princess, Narnia and expect my closet to contain a portal to another world, or Shakespeare and expect everybody to start talking in poetic meter, I don’t read LotR and expect a realistic view of war.
Even the most fantastic of books can teach us something - without having to be realistic to our own world. And truthfully, for my own generation, I am glad that there are books like LotR to stand contrary to such things as Grand Theft Auto and the massive shoot out battles that seem to be in every other movie or video game.