Fordim,
My post addresses an earlier question you raised. The italics are my own....
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This is, I would have thought, an issue which affects most (if not all of us) since most people's first experience of Tolkien's writings will be the Hobbit and LotR, and they will inevitably form their own impressions of the characters and events portrayed. As serious Tolkien enthusiasts, are we justified in clinging to those first impressions, even when they may be at variance with Tolkien's own views, as subsequently discovered? This is, I would have thought, an issue which affects most (if not all of us) since most people's first experience of Tolkien's writings will be the Hobbit and LotR, and they will inevitably form their own impressions of the characters and events portrayed. As serious Tolkien enthusiasts, are we justified in clinging to those first impressions, even when they may be at variance with Tolkien's own views, as subsequently discovered?
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Live and learn....! I have been posting at the Downs for a number of years, yet not until I saw your paragraph did I suddenly realize that my initial exposure to Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit was probably quite different from that of most people here. Most newbies introduced to the writings are at least somewhat aware that there is a host of material out there that helps us to define 'canon': biographies of Tolkien, his published Letters, other writings such as the Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales, and the published interpretations put forward by a whole host of scholars. Whether or not they actually read these works or can define 'canon' in a technical sense, they at least know such studies exist. Morever, they're aware some interpretations are regarded as "correct" because that's what the Professor told us. You reference to Gollum and Providence is a case in point.
My own experience was very different. I first read the Hobbit in 1963; and LotR in 1965. At that time, there was virtually no supplementary material readily available to throw any light on Tolkien or his writings. There was very little discussion of the "rights or wrongs" of various interpretations, and certainly no internet boards. I did attend an early meeting or two of either Mythopoeia or the Tolkien Society (I don't remember which), but that was it. I remember sitting in my college dorm with Barbara Remington's hallucinogenic poster plastered on the wall discussing with my roomates how Tolkien loved trees and the land, and what it meant to say "Frodo Lives."
What does this have to do with your query? Only this....I did not have the intellectual framework or tools that are now available to all of us. In many ways, I was wholly ignorant! But what I did have was complete freedom to use my imagination and interpret the book any way I chose without anyone telling me I was wrong. A year or two later, when I was in college, I spent a considerable chunk of time in England as an au pair girl and also in Wales as a university student. I tramped around the countryside imagining hobbit holes in every other hillside and even studied Welsh. Yes, I had some very sound academic reasons but deep down I probably thought the language sounded a bit Elvish to my ear.
My exposure to Tolkien came through that creative process as much as anything else. It was a process rooted in imagination rather than in knowledge of text and canon, since the latter for the most part did not even exist yet.
As years rolled by, I was busy with my life, but I also picked up a Tolkien study to read here and there. Gradually, I learned more and more about what the Professor actually intended and also read some of his own works that were first published after his death or became more widely available at that time. I discovered some of my earlier guesses and interpretations had been right; others had been way off center. The real "shocker" came in the late seventies with the publication of the Silmarillion, the Letters, and Carpenter's biography, all in the space of two years. I remember my jaw dropping open in surprise when I realized that there was a whole Legendarium, thousands of years of history to back up those tantalizing references in LotR. I grinned with delight to realize that I had "gotten" Tolkien's interpretation of Frodo pretty much as he had wanted it, just by reading the book itself.
Yet, with all this learning, there was a price. I could no longer rove quite as freely with my imagination as before. It was clear that some interpretations were right and some were wrong. At heart, I did not question that: if Professor Tolkien said the ending was Providence, then it was Providence---not chance or jumping in.
And yet.....I will admit there were impressions I gleaned from my year of tramping around Britain and imagining hobbits in holes that I will never shake off. In my head, the Elves will forever speak a strictly Welsh derivative rather than a tongue influenced by Finnish. Parts of Middle-earth leapt straight out of the Middle Ages, even though I know intellectually that it isn't so. And I am totally convinced that the thatched roofed cottage I rented in the Midlands for a month was definitely modelled on Bag-end!
Perhaps this is a cop out, but I guess I have two answers. When I discuss topics on a public board, I will honestly try to stick to canon as closely as I can. What I see in my own head when I read the books may be a little different, but that's my private prerogative as a reader!
In regard to the related question of fanfiction and RPGs.... This is near and dear to me since I spend considerable time writing on this site. I actually think it's in this realm that I can again exercise that freewheeling imagination that so attracted me to Middle-earth way back when. Only hopefully now I have a bit more knowledge to fill in the holes. It really is a trade-off. I may accept the Professor's definitive word on Gollum's fate but if you read through the Silm, the LotR appendices, and UT, there are so many huge holes just inviting the reader to step inside and imagine what might have been.....