LotR -- Book 1 - Chapter 12 - Flight to the Ford

[Beren87]

But how different are the two? The winning of the Grail in the legends doesn't deny the Second Coming of Christ - in a sense it 'foreshadows' it. The Second Coming cannot be brought about by man, but man is on a spiritual quest, symbolised by the Quest for the Grail - the two are not mutually exclusive.

I both agree and disagree with you here. The peoples of M-E, in a sense, [just like those in the grail legends] have no control over when such things happen [things being the returning of the Silmaril/second coming], but in grail lore, there was a greater connection to the divine. The ring quest is fundamentally one of destruction, they are fighting against Sauron. The grail quest was simply finding a lost artifact [Yes, I realise this can be argued, it had to be "rescued" in a sense], and the outcome of which had no real bearing on when the second coming *would* come, nor how. The only real plus was for those involved, it was a spiritual cleansing. The ring quest, on the other hand, was an instance of prolonging the world of men. The Simarils would be returned no matter what, but it the Valar would not interfere in M-E, and men could go "extinct" in a fashion. The ring quest parallels the grail quest in that both are activities forshadowing a later "second coming" [both of the trees and Christ]], but the ring quest also a direct connection to whether Men would go on, as there is no undying land for Men. Had the grail not been found, Christ would still come, and the world of men would still be here [although, possibly more wicked?].

[Nilpaurion Felagund]

Sorry for breaking the flow of the topic, but such deep lore is not for me. Indeed, my thoughts would seem mundane and mediocre compared to previous posts.

But still . . .

This time, I actually read the chapter, so I have better ideas. (Last week, a friend of mine loaned the Fellowship, so I was not able to read the chapter concerned.)

Anywhen, here goes . . .

Dim Echoes of the Next Journey

There seems to be many parallels between Frodo’s journey to Rivendell and his quest to Mt. Doom. Here are some:

• Meeting Strider at the Prancing Pony = Meeting Faramir in Ithilien.
  These two were unexpected company, and at first were much distrusted, but they gave unexpected aid in Frodo’s journey.
  
  
• The attack on Weathertop = The attack on Cirith Ungol
  These two events gave Frodo wounds that “would never really heal.”
  
  
• The beryl on the Last Bridge = The water found in Morgai
  They were signs that Frodo’s journey is not hopeless, that there are some people (even the Valar, it seems; I remembered from Saucie's post that the water found in the walls of Morgai may have come from Ulmo) that would aid them.
  
  
• The confrontation at the Ford of Bruinen = The test at Mt. Doom
  Frodo failed at the threshold of the journey’s end, yet providence came to his rescue. Or, as Fordim said:
  

  . . . he does not have hope in his own abilty to resist them . . . but he obviously has hope that something will defeat the Nazgul. (Fordim Hedgethistle)

Then there is Sam and Bill.

[Bill] was developing a expected talent for picking out a path, and for sparing its rider as many jolts as possible. (LotR I 12)

Wow. The same can be said of Sam, too, during their journey through Mordor.

Aragorn the Herb of Kings

This is the first time we are introduced to athelas, and, during the course of the tale, it seems to describe something else . . .

[Aragorn: ]These leaves . . . I found . . . in the dark by the scent of its leaves. (ibid)

[Ioreth: ] Why, I have not heard that it had any great virtue . . . (LotR V 8)

[herb-master: ] It is but a doggrel, I fear, garbled in the memory of old wives. (ibid)

Let’s see . . . from the West, undistinguished, but has great virtue. Aragorn, perhaps?

Just a Few Tidbits

~ Revenge of the Barrow-blade

Can swords avenge their comrades? Looks like they can.

The Witch-King broke Frodo’s sword in the Ford of Bruinen. Then Merry's sword struck him at the Pelennor Fields.

First, we have talking swords, then emotional swords. Now avenging swords?

~ Trolls: if you’re quick you’ll see they’re false.

It was a bit of a mind teaser. After Pippin saw the trolls in the clearing, Tolkien started the next paragraph with this sentence:

The sun was now high, and it . . . lit the clearing with bright patches of sunlight. (LotR I 12)

~ Why I am here

Glorfindel was one of the reasons I’m here poring over Middle-earth, instead of . . . gee, I don’t know where I’ll be. My sister kept on talking about a Glorfindel that was on that river, not Arwen as on the movie. That tidbit (plus a little conundrum concerning the location of Rivendell in relation to Mordor and Isengard) piqued me enough that, on the eve of New Year, 2003, I picked the Fellowship up and began reading it.

[davem]

Originally Posted by Encaitare

How exactly would you consider the Old Forest to be such a 'feminine' presence?

Well, principally in that the earth, unbound, free nature, has always been seen symbolically as 'feminine' - the Earth Mother, but speaking personally Middle earth has always seemed a feminine presence in the story, which is why I've never felt the story to be overwhelmingly 'male' dominated, as the dominant presence to me has always been Middle earth herself'. As to the Old Forest specifically, the dominant 'presence' for me was not Old Man Willow, but the River Woman, spirit of the Withywindle, the centre from which all the queerness comes. After all, Goldberry is the most mysterious & subtly powerful of all the beings we encounter in the OF.

As to Beren87's points - that would take a week's answer or none at all, so I'll have to come back to that later - though the more I think about it the more I wonder whether it wouldn't rather require a whole new thread.

[Aiwendil]

Davem wrote:

Well, principally in that the earth, unbound, free nature, has always been seen symbolically as 'feminine'

Yet this is something that can to some extent vary from culture to culture. We ought to consider this from the point of view of Tolkien's mythology; if we do, we see that there is a distinction to be drawn. The earth itself - the soil, the rock, the mountains - is associated with Aule and is masculine. But the plant life that covers it - the grass, the forests, the athelas - is associated with Yavanna and is feminine.

While there is some truth in calling nature a feminine presence, I'd be wary of taking that as a simple, unambiguous fact.

[davem]

Well, Tolkien follows the Norse tradition (shared by the Japanese, I believe) of making the Sun female & the Moon male, whereas most cultures saw them the other way round. Yet, I don't know that Aule's (admittedly strong) association with the materials of the earth makes the earth itself 'male'. Even in the cultures that had 'Smith' gods - like the Greek Hephaestos, & the Roman Vulcan - the earth itself was viewed as female. I still can't shake the idea of not just plants, but also the earth itself being symbolically female - maybe I've read too much mythology, & am influenced by that, but in this case I don't think I'm going against what I've said in the Canonicity thread, as I don't think Tolkien ever made a clear statement on the 'gender' of Arda.

[Child of the 7th Age]

The Wasteland is a strange image for Middle earth - where or what is the Grail?

Davem The interesting thing about the chapter discussions is you never know where things are heading! Despite my use of the term, I had not thought about linking the motif of the wasteland with the Grail legends as a whole.

I do want to clarify what I initially meant, since I was coming at this from a quite different angle. I did not mean for "wasteland" to typify Middle-earth as a whole, which your question above seems to suggest. Rather I was speaking of certain specific tracts of land. Leslie Ellen Jones in Myth and Middle Earth has written about Isengaard, Mordor, and the Shire of the Scouring as examples of the wasteland operating in Middle-earth. Her contention is that these represent not the medieval wastelands of the grail legend, but "modern" ones that have been created by the hand of war and technology. The prime ingredient of a wasteland for Tolkien, according to Jones, is for it to be stripped of trees.

What struck me in reading this chapter is that the specific area through which Strider and crew are trudging in this chapter sound suspiciously like a wasteland, but one modelled on medieval rather than modern terms. I wasn't thinking about the wider ramifications of the grail legend per se. Of course, we can look back and know about the Percival of Chretien de Troyes, Eschebach's Parzifal and such. I was thinking not of this literary tradition, but of the pre-Christian myth that preceded it.

Before any of the grail legend was set on paper, there were Celtic tales of myth and faerie that embodied the idea of the wasteland. (The literary embodiment of this earlier mythic tradition does appear in the Third Branch of the Mabinogi, but the legends themselves go back much deeper.)

Unlike the grail legends which would have been accessible only to the literate and privileged, these faerie concepts of wasteland would have been widespread through the general populace. In this "popular" medieval concept, a wasteland is a general term for lands that are of no use to humans. You can't really farm or graze or even make your living by hunting there. The popular wasteland even has monstors or evil spirits. (There are hints of this in the land Gawaine must go through when he meets the Green Knight.)

In the medieval mind, there is very little sense of the wilderness as a place of renewal and beauty which was so often voiced in the romantic era. The feeling is that the best land is domesticated and undomesticated land -- in effect, a wasteland --is a curse.

I have other ideas on this, but I actually want to put them up as a separate thread so will wait to discuss them there.....

[Lalwendë]

I think that there is something in the idea that Middle Earth is a 'feminine' presence. Tolkien was drawing on myths, legends and histories which did hold the earth itself to be female - this is where the phrase 'mother earth' springs from. Ancient cultures regarded the land as a mysterious female power, even going so far as to construct monuments celebrating this - one of the theories behind Silbury Hill is that it was a 'Mother' monument. The feminine was seen as the mysterious bringer forth of life - as an example of archaeological theories, barrows are said to have small openings to symbolise birth. Yes, it does not say explicitly that in ME the land is a feminine presence - but looking at what Tolkien drew upon, i would like to think that it is. But this has made me think...was Eru female?