[lindil]

'I just have to laugh at you guys.'<BR>Go right ahead grey istar. But is there a point you want to make? Or do you just want a public record to be made of ridiculing others opinions without contributing meaningfully?<P>Essex just posted: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR> I do not get any levels of complexity from Denethor in the books that some people state above.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>I think much of his complexity is from the Palantir of course but also what after a read or two we can guess some of what was going on in his mind.<P>* His knowledge of Thorongil as probable Heir of Isildur from an early age. <P>*Being burned by Saruman a seeming ally turned enemy of his only substantial allied army.<P>*A justifiable concern that his country could be distracted/divided from/during War by a claimant to the throne, and that the said claimant may be as well suited to ruling Gondor as the heirs of Arnor werre successful in maintaing their realm [always seemingly a sore point with Gondor]!<P>*Denthor knew I think that there was some sort of Alliance between The Northern remnants of the Dunedain and of Lorien and Rivendell but [I think we may assume] he had always been excluded. <P>*He may well also have felt that if the 'northern alliance' was fooled by Saruman for who knows how long then who knows what other traitors and ambitions lurked amongst them.<P>*His not quite knowing who Gandalf is and how he fits into the scheme [though Gandalf comes as close to telling him he is a Maia as he thinks he should with, 'Do you not know that I too am a steward'?]. <P>*Denethor despite serious and in some ways justifiable concerns[listed above] allowed Gandalf to stay in the upper levels and even took [no pun intended] what may well have been otherwise seen as a postential 'spy' [pippin] into his service, to hear every word spoken in front of Denethor.<P>I call all that complex myself.<P>Also added the few times when Denethor's humanity peep through [accepting Pippin, the repentance towards his son].<P>The fact that all of this was replaced by the ill-mannered, one-sided Palantir-less 'Denethor' was a real shame to me. And for me highlights the tragedy of the movies [though I am not saying it outweighs all 'benefits] - that they take Tolkien's 4 dimensional world full of politics, long suffering love, mixed allegiances and fragile alliances, etc, and reduce it to what PJ thinks an 'avg' moviegoer can handle.<P>Instead of trusting that the watcher can deal with a few unexplained references [and heck might even want to read the book to have them explained!] all must be self-contained.<P>Anyway hope some of the above might explain a little of what some might see as Denethor's 'complexity'.