Tolkien and the Monsters

[Bêthberry]

Well, I am late to the debate here. And I promise, Saucy, that I shan't engage in a formal lecture on literary definitions.

I think it is very tempting to constantly refer to the entire panoply of Tolkien's works. However, what interests me is a more limited question, the one which Fordim sets out initially: what is evil in LOTR?.

To draw in a literary allusion which I am sure will tickle Sauce no end, I want to throw out a comment from a fellow student back in the day when I was studying John Milton's [i]Paradise Lost[/b]:

Well, really a remembered paraphrase: God's problem is that everything He creates has a flaw. He cannot reproduce His perfection so that what he creates is perfect. He always fails and somehow evil comes into His creation. How can he allow this evil in his creation which is supposed to reflect Himself?

Now, in LOTR, as opposed to The Silm, we aren't given an original creation myth, so we have to rely on what the text actually leads us to understand about evil. In this context, I would suggest that it is intriguing to follow first Gandalf's warning about the Ring to Frodo and then the actual appearance of the Black Riders in The Shire, close on Frodo's heels.

The Black Riders are the best demonstration of this -- they begin the book appearing as eerie Men who are frightening, but they end it as terrifying manifestations of the Ring's power and Sauron's domination: they 'grow' and become Nazgul.

I would suggest that this is not quite what happens. We don't see their growth as Nazgul in LOTR at all. What we have is the growing awareness or recognition of the danger they represent. They are always Nazgul in the book; readers--and Frodo--simply are not initially aware of what that all entails. In fact, we don't know what the process was that brought them under the control of Sauron. Elsewhere, we learn that they succumbed through their desire for power, to control others, but we don't really experience their fall and we don't know what it was that motivated or prompted them to accepting the Rings.

I'd say that what we have in LOTr is Frodo's growing awareness of the influence of this very attractive desire. Except that for Frodo, I am not sure it is depicted as a desire to dominate others. Rather, in Chapter 3 at least, it is suggested that the Ring will provide safety, security for Frodo. This is the second appearance of the Black Riders at least.

A sudden unreasoning fear of discovery laid hold of Frodo, and he thought of the Ring. He hardly dared to breathe, and yet the desire to get it out of his pocket became so strong that he began slowly to move his hand. He felt had he had only to slip it on, and then he would be safe.

Now, Sir, may I be excused while I go answer some other assignments elsewhere? I promise to return before the bell rings.