LotR - Prologue

[Fingolfin II]

But Tom, does he even age?

Probably not. The Istari, who are also Ainur, aged with the burden of their labours in the form of old men, but we know Tom isn't one of the Istari. As to the aging of immortals, I can't really answer, but it is interesting what Tolkien meant by that comment about Celeborn.

[davem]

There are some interesting points made by Christopher Garbowski as regards the socieites of Middle Earth:

In the Hobbit, along with its residents, Tolkien discovered the Shire, the almost archetypal small homeland, a geographical unit that adorns the entire Middle Earth of the thrid Age from the Grey Havens to Fangorn Forest & beyond. The geographical distances may be reminiscent of Europe ... but the social geography is based on what the Germans call Heimat ... Large as the Kingdom of Gondor is, it actually constitutes a federation of small states rather than a uniform one. The only large state can be said to be Mordor, which is centralistic to say the least ... Milosz writes that 'in comparison with the state, the homeland is organic, rooted in the past, always small, it warms the heart, it is as close as one's own body' ...Different homelands introduce genuine diversity, while the large state, whether benign or threatening, imposes uniformity....

Not that the small homeland is without faults. A well known example is the all too familiar division of orbis-interior/orbis-exterior, where those who are from outside the community are frequently the unwanted other, to be treated with suspicion ... Even within the Shire there is a mistrust of citizens from far flung parts; Breelanders consider hobbits from Hobbiton strange & vice versa ... Much of the conflict between Elves & Dwarves can be considered along this orbis-interior/orbis-exterior fault line.

A journey develops, or at least requires, openness & brings withit the risk of change ... The journey (in LotR) often leads from one small homeland to another. The heimats of the other are the repositories of values that often challenge cherished beliefs of the traveller, & lead to an awareness unavailable from the limited perspective of home ... Dialogue is infact a precondition for the survival of the free peoples who must overcome their isolation if they are to adequately deal with the danger facing them. (quoted in Rosebury 'Tolkien: A Cultural Phenomenon')

So, we have Tolkien offering us a vision of a world of smal, effectively self contained communities, which all the samemust interact with each other if they are to survive. So he seems to be condemning the attitude of the Shire Hobbits, not because they have a self contained, self supporting, society, a 'heimat' - which is good, but because they have shunned all interaction with 'outsiders'. 'United (as a collection of small, autonomous, communities) we stand. Divided (cut off from other 'heimats', letting them go hang) we fall.

This, as Rosebury points out, reflects Tolkien's political stance - 'anarchism'. The nation state (even if 'benevolent') threatens, & will ultimately destroy, the Heimat - 'the homeland (which) is organic, rooted in the past, always small, it warms the heart, it is as close as one's own body'. Its summed up, perhaps, in Merrry & Pippin's conversation in the Houses of Healing:

'Dear me! We Tooks & Brandybucks, we can't live long on the heights.'

'No,' said Merry. 'I can't at any rate. But at least, Pippin, we can now see them, & honour them. It is vest to love first what you are fitted to love, I suppose: you must start somewhere & have some roots, & the soil of the Shire is deep. Still there are things deeper & higher, & not a gaffer could tend his garden in what he calls peace but for them, whether he knows about them or not. I am glad thatt I know about them, a little.'

The end of the book seems to present us with the ideal - the Shire is not cut off totally - the hobbits have been brought into the world, played a part, & are acknowledged by the Great, yet the Heimat remains.

[HerenIstarion]

Prologue

…My dear Bagginses and Boffins, and my dear Tooks and Brandybucks, and Grubbs, and Chubbs, and Burrowses, and Hornblowers, and Bolgers, Bracegirdles, Goodbodies, Brockhouses and Proudfoots…

And I hope I’m not too late, as week dedicated to each part is nearly over…

Nonetheless…

Having in mind lot of what preceeding posts are concerned with, I’d dare your scorn and say that this particluar discussion is mostly engaged in details, and leaves the thing and the whole of the thing aside. And he who breaks the thing to find… well, you know what said 'he' is up to. After all, what is the prologue about? True, we have author’s statement that it is ‘mostly about hobbits’, but should we take such statements at their face value? I believe not, and I’ll be explaining why in a short while

Any time I reread the prologue (as I’ve done it yesterday, what with it being Sunday and blessed day for one’s freelance activities, reading included), three things inevitably pop up to mind.

1. It includes a mighty load of things not essential to the plot whatsoever
2. Things it concerns (i.e., hobbits and their habitat) feel essentially English
3. Such a prologue is unprecedented to my reading memory

One at time than.

Entry #1: I can’t help remembering A.P.Chekhov, Russian playwright with his saying: “if there is a rifle on the wall in act 1, it should be firing off at least in act 3”. And all the books I’ve read usually follow this scheme up neatly. I.e., there usually are no unneeded things. Tolkien, even apart from prologue, which is the treasury of such 'things unrequired for the development of the plot', is placing them here an there (wait till wer reach Bombadil, heh!). Tolkien is hinting to older history of the world he brings us into, and does that not only via ancient and neatly worked out names (which feel solid even for the unconscious), old legends and bits of untranlsated poetry, but by means of those unrequired things, those Hornblowers and Bracegirdles, which are completely unneeded, but form a background, some feeling on the border of one’s consicousness, that there is more to it than the plot we are about to read, that plot is just a tiny friction of the whole world. All of that is forming first in the prologue, where the walls are covered up in rifles and guns of all sorts, which, apart from firing, never make later appearence at all!


Entry #2: I haven’t been to England ever. (To be honest, most westward of my journeys took me as far as Poland). So, the mental image I’ve got of England must be blurred and improper. But what strikes me right away, is how much English Shire feels. Apart from chronology, and Marcho-Blanco/Hengist-Horsa connotations indicated by Squatter, there is a feel of England in there (even for a man, (or especially for a man?) who’s mental image is formed by Donald Bisset, Edward Lear, Arthut Conan Doil ,Alan Alexander Miln and their set). And hobbits feel modern, too, quite apart frome the rest of the book, where guys in armour wonder about with great swords and do ‘deeds’. They are spatially and temporary out of place. Deliberate anachronisms, I daresay, what with all their 'waistkins', pipeweed, five'o'clocks and nearly modern social system. Now that is done on purpose, I believe, and strongly on purpose. Tolkien revealed part of his mind in his “On Fairy Stories” essey:

Stories that are actually concerned primarily with “fairies,” that is with creatures that might also in modern English be called “elves,” are relatively rare, and as a rule not very interesting. Most good “fairy-stories” are about the adventures of men in the Perilous Realm or upon its shadowy marches.

(emphasis Tolkien’s)

Now that is very true. But the truth can be extended to include humans that are alienated from us by depths of time. I believe that ‘modern’ and ‘English’ hobbits are necessary as conductors, as bridge to cover the gap between us with our ‘democracy’ and ethical code down to chaps with swords doing deeds. Those latter would seem strange and alien, if not for hobbits connecting us with them, who, by and by growing (but that happens later on), show that values of ‘deeders’ are not very far from our own, that we, after all, are of the same world, makes us feel for them by comparison.

And now I’m smoothly on my Entry #3. Such a lengthy, maybe even boring (to some) prologue is there for that purpose. It hammers into reader's head the sense of ‘reality’ of the world to be opened up, besides that of ‘modernity’ and Englishness of the heroes to be, sets a stage for us to feel for heroes, not to look at the whole thing as another peculiar and antique thing, to make it ours.

And that’s about the shape of it.

cheers