Quote:
posted by Guinevere:
But in this chapter I think Lothlorien is presented to the reader as it appears to the eyes of the hobbits in this moment: they would only see the wonder and the beauty.
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Kudos! This is a very helpful way to think of the chapter, as it removes the discussion from simple personal preference of the reader (change/process versus stability/status quo) to one which might be 'applicable' to all. This certainly suggests why we have the final scene with Aragorn and Frodo, as it represents Frodo's increasing movement towards knowledge of elven ways. It might even explain why Boromir is largely absent; his response to Lothlorien is very different from that of the hobbits and so for the time being not something they can perceive. It also explains why so much of the humour of living in the treehouses concerns the hobbits. I suppose it might lessen Aragorn's and Boromir's dignity to make jokes about being afraid of sleeping in trees.
Quote:
posted by SaucepanMan
What really irks me about the Elves, however, is the attitude that some display of indifference to other races combined with an air of superiority over them. In LotR, this is most apparent in Lindir's comment about sheep all looking alike to mortals (which I regard as verging on the racist), but this attitude is also suggested by some of Haldir's comments here (his disinterest in the Shire, for example). Then again, these too are aspects of human nature (albeit, in this case I think, wholly negative ones).
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I thank Sauce for picking up on this second point I had made earlier as grounds for my discomfort with the elves. To me, the two characteristics, that of not wanting change and that of being indifferent to things outside their own sphere of being, are related, as both suggest a state of being uncomfortable with things they do not know or understand. Sometimes the Other, as well as change, can disturb our comfortable terms of reference and it becomes easier to ignore such differences. As you say, an all too human failing.