LotR -- Book 2 - Chapter 09 - The Great River

[Estelyn Telcontar]

This is a transitional chapter. It takes place on the river that forms the border between two enemy forces, that demands a choice of goal before it ends. It is relatively short and seems to have less weighty content, compared to other chapters. There is much description of the lands through which the Fellowship passes on this part of the journey.

The scene is being set for future developments - Gollum shows up, Boromir resists Aragorn's decisions, and an orc attack comes dangerously close to injuring them. Aragorn shows his kingly side once again when they pass the Argonath.

What do you find particularly interesting about this chapter? What feeling does reading it give you?

[Boromir88]

I'm going to try to sneak in a quick post before I need to get going.

"I am out of my reckoning," he (Aragorn) said to Frodo. "I did not know that we had come so far: Anduin flows faster than I thought. Sarn Gebir must be close at hand already."

You can draw parallels here, with Gandalf's "misleading" of direction in Moria, and Aragorn's "misleading" direction. Aragorn didn't really "mislead" he just didn't anticipate on hitting the rapids this fast, which I think shows the connection that Gandalf and Aragorn aren't perfect.

I don't have enough time to get in what I wanted (I'll be back, lol). But, here's a bit more on Boromir's wittiness, which may be the funniest one yet.

But the Enemy holds the eastern bank," objected Boromir. "And even if you poss the Gates of Argonath and come unmolested to the Tindrock, what will you do then? Leap down the Falls and land in the marshes?"

[davem]

They were drawing near to the grey hill-country of the Emyn Muil, the southern march of Wilderland.

I don't know whether Tolkien intended it, but this mention of the grey hill-country made me think of the Green Hill Country on the map of the Shire. It brought home to me how far they've come, & what they've all been through since leaving Bag End. Its odd how such 'echoes' are so powerful in stirring memories. The lands they're now passing through are so different to the ones the Hobbits had grown up in. Its like, after leaving Lorien the Land becomes truly strange - a new phase in their journey has begun. So far we've been travelling through landscapes familiar to us from Bilbo's journey. Now we'll enter the world of Men.

This is, as Esty says, a transitional chapter - a journey by river, various dangers faced & overcome, the appearance of the Nazgul on a Fell Beast, & the sight of the Eagle, whose significance will become apparent later. And yet, in the midst of this 'travelogue' Tolkien gives us one of his most profound explorations of Elven psychology, in Legolas' account of the Elves relationship to time:

‘Nay, time does not tarry ever,’ he said; ‘but change & growth is not in all things & places alike. For the Elves the world moves, & it moves both very swift & very slow. Swift, because they themselves change little, & all else fleets by: it is a grief to them. Slow, because the y do not count the running years, not for themselves. The passing seasons are but ripples ever repeated in the long long stream. Yet beneath the Sun all things must wear to an end at last.’

Time is not a constant for Elves. It moves both very swift & very slow - they seem to have a dual perception. they seem to be out of synch with the world outside their realms. The passing seasons are simply repetitions. Its as if they are watching a film loop, with the same events passing endlessly before their eyes.

How many other writers could introduce ideas like his into a ‘transitional’ chapter & make it work?

[mark12_30]

Originally Posted by Boromir88

But, here's a bit more on Boromir's wittiness, which may be the funniest one yet.

When I was in high school, my friends would see me off alone walking, laughing merrily. They used to wonder what I was laughing about. Now you know.

On the other hand, it's sad, isn't it, that that's what Boromir does in one of the elven boats?

[the phantom]

for Boromir sat muttering to himself, sometimes biting his nails, as if some restlessness or doubt consumed him

Poor Boromir. I'd be muttering and biting my nails too if I thought that a powerful weapon that would kill my people was about to be delivered to my enemy.

I always bite my nails though.

Even when the paddles were in use they did not trust Sam with one.

I always laugh when I read that.

And someone mentioned Boromir's wit but didn't give this quote-

'That would not be easy, even if we were all Men,' said Boromir.
'Yet such as we are we will try it,' said Aragorn.
'Aye, we will,' said Gimli. 'The legs of Men will lag on a rough road, while a Dwarf goes on, be the burden twice his own weight, Master Boromir!'

and later...

'We need sleep, and even if Aragorn had a mind to pass the Gates of Argonath by night, we are all too tired- except, no doubt, our sturdy dwarf.'
Gimli made no reply: he was nodding as he sat.

Also, I was thinking back to the first time I read LOTR (with my father many years ago) and I am fairly certain that it was during this chapter that a particular thought first struck me- Frodo and Sam are going to get seperated from the others.

In Lorien they went to the mirror by themselves and now in this chapter they discuss Gollum privately and decide not to bother Strider about it. I dunno, I just remember thinking that Frodo and Sam had kind of distanced themselves from the others somehow (maybe because they drawn closer to each other).

But on the subject of Gollum, it turned out that Aragorn already knew much more than they did, and had actually tried to catch him during their river journey (without the hobbits realizing it). Aragorn really is amazing.

And I know this might be a bit off-topic, but Aragorn said-

He padded after us all through Moria...

That made me wonder, how did Gollum get out of Moria? Didn't the dwarves design Moria so that the bridge that Gandalf broke was the only way to get in or out from the east? If so, are we supposed to assume that the Orcs had made new exits or what?

Boromir could leave the Company at this point and followed his proposed course, alone, to Minas Tirith. But he does not. Rather he chooses (or is compelled) to follow the same course as the Ringbearer. He explains his decision by asserting that it "is not the way of the Men of Minas Tirith to desert their friends at need" (and there is no doubt still some truth in this), but it is Frodo who is singled out here as Boromir's reason for continuing with the Company.

Yes, I noted this, and I wondered if, had things happenned differently and the Fellowship decided to go east together, Boromir would have gone with them despite his words. The choice would be easy to rationalize.

And I just thought I'd mention that the Argonath and the gorge it is in is one of the things that captured me on my first read. I would empty my checking account to travel that part of the Anduin.

Frodo peering forward saw in the distance two great rocks approaching: like great pinnacles or pillars of stone they seemed. Tall and sheer and ominous they stood upon either side of the stream. A narrow gap appeared between them, and the River swept the boats towards it....
Upon great pedestals founded in the deep waters stood two great kings of stone: still with blurred eyes and crannied brows they frowned upon the North. The left hand of each was raised palm outwards in gesture and warning; in each right hand there was an axe; upon each head there was a crumbling helm and crown. Great power and majesty they still wore, the silent wardens of a long-vanished kingdom. Awe and fear fell upon Frodo, and he cowered down, shutting his eyes and not daring to look up as the boat drew near. Even Boromir bowed his head as the boats whirled by, frail and fleeting as little leaves, under the enduring shadow of the sentinels of Numenor. So they passed into the dark chasm of the Gates.
Sheer rose the dreadful cliffs to unguessed heights on either side. Far off was the dim sky. The black waters roared and echoed, and a wind screamed over them...

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by the phantom

That made me wonder, how did Gollum get out of Moria? Didn't the dwarves design Moria so that the bridge that Gandalf broke was the only way to get in or out from the east? If so, are we supposed to assume that the Orcs had made new exits or what?

Gollum's Exit From Moria

How did Gollum escape Moria?

Gollum exiting Moria

Nothing definitive, but a good deal of informed speculation.

[mark12_30]

(I think Gollum climbed/crawled out of one of those light-shafts.)

The Argonath: Sam's fearful reaction to the Argonath puzzles me. I can't relate to it. I love wind, and cliffs (if I'm at the bottom, and not at the top near the edge) and I love storms, and thunder and rough water...

Anyway, I never understood Sam's reaction. Maybe Tolkien was trying to paint the scene as a sort of "Cape Horn", a dangerous place; but it doesn't seem dangerous to me so much as exhilarating.

[Boromir88]

I wanted to bring up some striking parallels between the Company travelling in Moria, and the company travelling down the Anduin.

For eight dark hours, not counting two brief halts, they marched on; and they met no danger, and heard nothing, and saw nothing but the faint gleam of the wizard's light,...
In this way they advanced some fifteen miles, in a direct line east, though they must have actually walked twenty miles or more. As the road climbed upwards, Frodo's spirits rose a little; but he still felt oppressed, and still at times he heard, or thought he heard, away behind the Company and beyond the fall and patter of their feet, a following footstep that was not an echo.

This is sort of like as Gandalf would say "the deep breath before the plunge." It's relatively quiet, they don't hear or see anything, but still we get this sense of ill will to come. And Frodo thinks he heres other "steps" following that aren't the Company's steps. We get this sense of foreboding ill, to come, and it does come.

The eighth night of their journey came. It was silent and windless, the grey east wind had passed away.

Right before this we have the bit with Gollum, and him creeping behind the fellowship, so again we get this sense of ill to come. And again we have the "silent and windless night." Not a short while, after the company reaches Sarn Gebir, they are attacked, and then later again at Amon Hen. Both cases there is this unsteady, sort of like that "silent, too silent" phrase, where you get this unsteady feeling before the "big plunge."

Sam looked from bank to bank uneasily. The trees had seemed hostile before, as if they harboured secret eyes and lurking dangers, now he wished that the trees were still there. He felt that the Company was too naked, afloat in little open boats in the midst of shelterless lands, and on a river that was the frontier of war.

More sense of uneasiness. But also, Sam is true, the river is "a frontier of war." On one side is warring Rohan with Isengard, on the other is Mordor, with their own patrols, reaching the edges of Gondor. I wonder if Anduin was a good choice for the Company, it does give them more time to think of the decision ahead, but Anduin is an unstable road, with much danger (The danger of being out in the open, shot at, and its made clear that the bows can shoot across the river, or atleast reach the Fellowship, and the danger of Sarn Gebir). Anduin is a very unstable place right now, one each side lies danger, and even travelling down the river is a danger.

[Encaitare]

I noticed that twice the number eight is used in Boromir's post above...

For eight dark hours, not counting two brief halts, they marched on...

The eighth night of their journey came....

Perhaps, since eight is one less than nine, this number foreshadows a death in the Fellowship. It's used just before Gandalf's death. Then, after Gandalf has returned to life unbeknownst to the rest of the Fellowship, it's used again before Boromir's death, as though their number is destined to be eight.

Or perhaps this is just me reading way too far into things.

As the company leaves the realm of Galadriel, they spy black swans in the sky, a sharp contrast to Galadriel's white swan-ship. The Elves seem to be very much connected to or enamoured of swans -- seen in the name "Alqualonde" and how in the Lay of Nimrodel, Amroth went "riding like a swan." The black swans are almost like the anti-Elf, the negative image of everything they stand for and love: beauty, timelessness, song. The company enters the barren lands south of Lorien and loses all that; their comfortable stay is without a doubt over.

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by Estelyn Telcontar

This is a transitional chapter. It takes place on the river that forms the border between two enemy forces, that demands a choice of goal before it ends.

It seems to me that this sense of transition is heightened by the fact that the Chapter opens and closes with a reminder that the Fellowship faces this choice:

Not that most of the Company were eager to hurry southwards: they were content that the decision, which they must make at the latest when they came to Rauros and the Tindrock Isle, still lay some days ahead; and they let the River bear them on at its own pace, having no desire to hasten towards the perils that lay beyond, whatever course they took in the end.

…

They could go no further without choice between the east-way and the west. The last stage of the Quest was before them.

So this Chapter, and the River itself, represents a kind of "limbo" in which the decision can be delayed. However, the choice must be made in the end, although not in the manner in which the Fellowship (and the reader) imagines. Ultimately, the Chapter represents a transition between the journey of the Fellowship and the separate Quests that they each pursue once it has broken.

And now, on to my current favourite subject: Boromir. There is ample evidence here that, following his experience in Lothlorien, he is suffering inner turmoil:

Merry and Pippin in the middle boat were ill at ease, for Boromir sat muttering to himself, sometimes biting his nails, as if some restlessness or doubt consumed him, sometimes seizing a paddle and driving the boat close behind Aragorn's.

Classic signs of stress. And the object of his internal struggle is clear:

Then Pippin, who sat in the bow looking back, caught a queer gleam in his eye, as he peered forward gazing at Frodo.

Interesting that it is Pippin who picks up on this. Once again, he seems to have some (unconscious) connection with the presence of evil, this time the evil that the Ring is working within Boromir's heart.

Boromir's growing obsession with Frodo, and more particularly Frodo's burden, is also evident when he resolves to continue with the Fellowship to the Tindrock:

Boromir held out long against this choice; but when it became plain that Frodo would follow Aragorn, wherever he went, he gave in.

Boromir could leave the Company at this point and followed his proposed course, alone, to Minas Tirith. But he does not. Rather he chooses (or is compelled) to follow the same course as the Ringbearer. He explains his decision by asserting that it "is not the way of the Men of Minas Tirith to desert their friends at need" (and there is no doubt still some truth in this), but it is Frodo who is singled out here as Boromir's reason for continuing with the Company. Boromir makes clear that he will go no further than the Tindrock and it occurred to me to wonder whether he already has an idea that this might be the place for him to make his move, if he is to make it. In any event, his words which follow are tragically prophetic:

To the tall isle I will go, but no further.

[davem]

Frodo looked up at the Elf standing tall above him, as he gazed into the night, seeking a mark to shoot at. His head was dark, crowned with sharp stars that glittered in the black pools of the sky behind. But now rising & sailing up from the south the great clouds advanced, sending out dark outriders into the starry fields. A sudden dread fell on the Company.

Elbereth Gilthoniel sighed Legolas as he looked up.

Along the coastal strip we passed by numerous negro villages where the people sat talking round tiny fires. Soon the train began to climb. The settlements ceased, & the night became inky black. Gradually it turned cooler, & I fell asleep. When the first ray of sunlight announced the onset of day, I awaoke. The train, swathed in a red cloud of dust, was making a turn round a steep red cliff. On a jagged rock above us a slim, brownish-black figure stood motionless, leaning on a long spear, looking down at the train. Beside him towered a gigantic candelabrum cactus.

I was enchanted by this sight - it was a picture of something utterly alien & outside my experience, but on the other hand a most intense sentiment du deja vu. I had the feeling that I had already experienced this moment & had always known this world which was seperated from me only by distance in time. It was as if I were this moment returning to the land of my youth, & as if I knew that dark skinned man who had been waiting for me forr five thousand years. Jung, ‘Memories, Dreams, Reflections’ (On his journey to Kenya & Uganda)

What Tolkien is giving us in this moment of ‘vision’ is an equally timeless moment within Middle-earth. An Elf, crowned with stars, stands poised against the coming darkness, & utters a prayer. A moment later he will move, & strike down the symbol of that darkness, but that moment of silent, watching prayer, for me, sums up so much of the Legendarium, its mood & its meaning, & the philosophical vision behind it.

(Its also Legolas ‘great’ moment within the LotR for me, so I wanted to single it out before we move on.)

[mark12_30]

Originally Posted by davem

What Tolkien is giving us in this moment of ‘vision’ is an equally timeless moment within Middle-earth. An Elf, crowned with stars, stands poised against the coming darkness, & utters a prayer. A moment later he will move, & strike down the symbol of that darkness, but that moment of silent, watching prayer, for me, sums up so much of the Legendarium, its mood & its meaning, & the philosophical vision behind it.

Indeed; the moment jumped out at me as well, and I thought of the woman crowned with stars in Revelation (Mary <> Elbereth??) and her subsequent conflict with the dragon; a rather odd correlation and one that I still haven't thought through...

Frodo calls the shadow Cold, as opposed to the balrog. That sent me back to Weathertop and other nazgul encounters, and the words cold, chill, icy are pervasive throughout the Nazgul encounters and discussions of Frodo's knife-wound. Still thinking about when evil in M-E is hot, as opposed to cold. The B-W was cold as well so it's not a Nazgul-only thing. Death-cold versus demonic-hot perhaps. Morgoth's servants hot, Sauron's servants cold...?

(it might make more sense in the morning... I may edit then)

[Boromir88]

Originally posted by SpM:
Precisely. But, like the Fellowship, there is a danger in letting ourselves be carried through space and time for too long. There comes a time when we must take positive action to "go against the flow"

Reminds me of that saying "Don't be a follower, be a leader." Sometimes being a leader, means you can't be a "follower." In these closing chapters Aragorn really begins to struggle about being the "leader," and taking on himself the role of Gandalf. Instead they follow down the Anduin, and as already pointed out, follow too far, bad things can happen. The next two chapters we get to see Aragorn really sort of fall apart, and hit rock bottom, as he seems to break to the pressure of being that "leader" of the company, being a "Gandalf." Not good news considering he's the future King of Gondor (of course we all know what a great leader Aragorn does become), I think when Aragorn and Eomer meet, there is great symbolism between the strength and friendship between the two future kings, and it helps Aragorn become the Leader we see at the end of the story. But, these next two chapters, I'll get to some quotes when the time comes, we really get to see Aragorn down on himself for the decisions he made. Maybe he's trying to be too much like Gandalf, and not like himself? Who knows?

[Aldarion Elf-Friend]

Originally Posted by Boromir88

In these closing chapters Aragorn really begins to struggle about being the "leader," and taking on himself the role of Gandalf. Instead they follow down the Anduin, and as already pointed out, follow too far, bad things can happen. The next two chapters we get to see Aragorn really sort of fall apart, and hit rock bottom, as he seems to break to the pressure of being that "leader" of the company, being a "Gandalf." Maybe he's trying to be too much like Gandalf, and not like himself? Who knows?

I would go a step further and say that the events of the next few chapters, as set up in this one, serve to refine and galvanize Aragorn. He is reluctant at first to take the mantle upon him, but finally does so as he chases down the Urek-Hai. By the time he reaches Helm's Deep he is ready to lead men without Gandalf (ironic, since Gandalf is back with them at this point, although not at the Deep itself).

I would even say that without the events at the end of FotR and begining of TT, Aragorn would not have been ready to assume his throne in Gondor. His blaming himself for his indecisiveness leading to the capture of Merry and Pippen taught him a valuable lesson that served him well for the rest of his life.

[Boromir88]

Well said Aldarion. That is why I'm glad Aragorn didn't go to Minas Tirith at this stage of the journey, because clearly he wasn't ready for it. But, by the end of the story he has become a changed Character indeed.

I know I've said this many times, and I'll say it again, because I think it supports another point. In one of Tolkien's earlier writings, Aragorn goes to Minas Tirith, with Boromir. Boromir goes against Aragorn's throne claiming and starts stirring up a civil war. Aragorn then has to kill Boromir before he gathers too much support. This is similar to the Arvedui claim. Where Arvedui clearly had the "proof," and the "right" to the throne, but he didn't have the support of the Steward, or the full support of the people, causing the Kin Strife. I'm afraid if Aragorn goes with Minas Tirith with Boromir, he only has the "proof" to the throne, he doesn't have the support of the people. How does Aragorn get this support, his battle experience, at the Morannon, and at Pelennor. Then, the people are rallied behind him, and even the Steward Faramir, knowing it is wise to step down, because Aragorn has the right to the throne, and seeing Aragorn's battle experiences he has the support of the people. Where if he simply went to Minas Tirith at this stage, and took claim to the throne, the people would see him as a nuisance, and could try to go against him.