How can hope and despair be akin?

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

Not sure if this is related to Tolkien at all but I'm not sure I agree with you, Roa. From a biological perspective, I don't think there's any difference between rage and anger, or between joy and happiness.

Joy, and my dictionary backs me up, is just a strong happiness.

Although this is an interesting discussion, perhaps it's gone too far past that Aragorn quotation.

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

My initial thought is that both hope and despair are directed toward the future so in that way they are alike. You hope for a good outcome and are in despair when you fear a bad one.

More specifically both are wrapped up in desire -- you hope for the outcome you desire but despair that your desire will not be achieved. When I look at it this way it seems to me that perhaps rather than representing opposite states of mind or emotion hope and despair are two ways of describing the same feeling...? Or more simply, you can't have one without the other because both exist upon the same precondition: imperfect knowledge.

If you know for an absolute fact that your desire is going to be fulfilled then you aren't experiencing hope but expectation. If you know for an absolute fact that your desire is going to be denied then you aren't experiencing despair but sadness. Hope is made hope only insofar as it exists alongside the fear that you won't gain your desire; despair is made despair only insofar as it exists alongside the possibility that maybe you could were circumstances different.

So perhaps when Aragorn find at the "brink" that "hope and despair are akin" he is confronting the fact that the future is at an absolute crisis -- the future is itself torn between the conquest of evil and evil's triumph. The hope (rather than the absolute knowledge) that Sauron will fail exists only because of the despairing thought that he won't; the despair (rather than the absoulte knowledge) that he will triumph exists only because there's still hope that he won't.

To desire something necessarily engenders hope and despair: having something to desire gives you hope that you will have it, but it also becomes something that you despair about losing. At the moment Aragorn makes his statement the desire felt by himself and his followers is as painfully accute as it is profound -- they don't just desire a precious object or another person or even a better future but the fall of Sauron. Their desire is that the whole course of history will be altered from bad to good -- that the fundamental nature of their world will be changed forever and that evil as an incarnate force in their lives will disappear.

[HerenIstarion]

hope and despair are directed toward the future

Verily, but not solely. More often than not they both look back to the past, but despair more so - I hope (amdir) things will go well as they always did go well in the past, I despair for everything is already lost (in the past, even if this 'past' was minute ago), and there is nothing to look forward to - hope (amdir) for any more.

Estel is in present - I believe that all His designs are for my good (and for my joy), and I do the 'believing' now. Both Amdir and despair need reason or cause (coming, again, from the past), Estel does not - there is no reason to believe, one just does or does not. I agree with davem - Estel can not be akin to despair, the very belief excludes possibility of despair, whilst Amdir surely can.

PS Almost forgot about 'akin' - they are akin as they cross at one point - Frodo is Aragorn's reason to hope or to despair. Hope-estel makes him fight, but he can't help going on hoping (amdir) and despairing, for here he has cause and reason - frail thread (as Gandalf told Theoden) on which the fate is suspended:

As I have begun, so I will go on. We come now to the very brink, where hope and despair are akin. To waver is to fall. Let none now reject the counsels of Gandalf, whose long labours against Sauron come at last to their test

There are all three here - estel, amdir and despair. The way of action (for hope and despair here are not expressions of idle state, but of the action) chosen at the Council of Elrond is the mix of hope and despair - for every step they take through the book is indeed 'walking on the brink'. And estel (Hope in Eru) is expressed through Gandalf - 'let none now reject...'

PPS I've been a bit hasty yesterday - I did not intend to say that the meaning Aragorn may be putting into the phrase comes down only to my PS. As in other matters, Tolkien is like Shrek and onions - many-layered. For two, Aragorn may indeed be 'being clever' - meaning that highly paradoxical turn of phrase is intended to wind up his listeners, make them feel urgent importance of matters being discussed.

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

I know it doesn't matter any more, but just in case anyone was wondering, I've changed my mind on the topic. Life is meaningful, I do believe. See what study and contemplation can do? Now I'm much more in keeping with the spirit of Tolkien.

Stay in school, kids.