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#1 | |
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The LOTR does appear to give a lot of indirect pointers to the fact that a character with a great power of their own COULD wield the Ring & challenge Sauron, & even be capable of casting him from his throne, whilst the challenger would become the new dark lord. Examples are The Council of Elrond where Elrond speaks of his fear of wielding the Ring, when Gandalf refuses to claim the ring from Frodo whilst still in the Shire, & of course when Frodo offers the Ring to Galadriel. All of these 3 characters show enormous signs of distress when the thought of the Ring being offered to them is mentioned. They all mentioned that should they wield the Ring, they themselves would then become like the Dark Lord Sauron. An interesting point is made by Elrond, wisest of loremasters, when he considers Saruman as an example, stating that by using the arts of the enemy COULD lead to the overthrowing of Sauron. It is comments like these which paint a picture inside some readers that a character with a great power of their own, & a strong will, could wield the Ring with time & use the Ring to challenge Sauron - that was Sauron's greatest fear, according to Gandalf when he reappears in the White Rider chapter. So after giving all these hints, all of a sudden we must accept that nobody but perhaps Gandalf may be expected to wield the Ring? It seems unlikely, but then again these comments may be taken to imply that Gandalf was the favourite of all the Wise to be able to wield the Ring (i.e. the one with the best chance of overthrowing Sauron by using the Ring), but that it was still possible for others to do it. That is as near as the truth as far as I am concerned. Last edited by Mansun; 08-14-2006 at 12:21 AM. |
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Regal Dwarven Shade
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And I can hear you even now typing away something to the effect of, “Well, why was Sauron so afraid?” He had lost the War of the Last Alliance even with the Ring. His assault on Gondor had failed. There was cause for concern. As we saw with his earlier belief that the Ring had been destroyed, he doesn’t seem to know all the things that might happen in different circumstances with the Ring. He probably couldn’t be sure what would happen if somebody made a serious attempt to claim the Ring. We can’t say what the exact effect of this would have been. Tolkien’s letter was written from the perspective of authorial omniscience. Simply put, Tolkien had knowledge his characters did not. Quote:
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#3 |
Illustrious Ulair
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Location: In the home of lost causes, and forsaken beliefs, and unpopular names,and impossible loyalties
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Ok, I accept that if you are prepared to completely alter the characters' motivations, attitudes, intelligence level & general honesty, ignore clear & implied authorial statements within the text itself, are willing to invent new motivations for characters which are the opposite of the motives which they are clearly stated in the book to have, make characters renowned for their wisdom into idiots who don't know their Ainur from their Eldar, & are happy to accept Gandalf as a moral coward who would send Frodo & Sam to their deaths (by lying to them & telling them he himself could not master the Ring & would wnd up enslaved to it), in order to destroy something that he himself could have 'mastered', then certainly you can make one line in one private letter (which as far as we know he was never challenged on) 'fit' with the story.
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#4 | ||||
Regal Dwarven Shade
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None of that is the least bit necessary to reconcile the letter to the story. Let’s take a look at each of the characters one at a time.
Elrond He says… Quote:
Galadriel She says… Quote:
Speaking directly about Galadriel, Tolkien said (in his own voice)… Quote:
In other respects she is very similar to Elrond in her desire to see this evil destroyed forever. Just because it would have been impossible for her to successfully challenge Sauron by using the Ring doesn’t diminish the fact that she refused temptation. I see no difficulties reconciling the character of Galadriel between the letter and the books. Aragorn I have to admit that I don’t see that there is a whole lot more to say about him in this context. He didn’t lay any claim to the Ring at all and when Frodo attempted to give it to him at the Council of Elrond he specifically denied it. He won a contest of wills against Sauron over his own property, but Aragorn’s claim of ownership gave him an advantage. Sauron’s fears of Aragorn likely stem from the fact that Aragorn’s ancestors defeated him even when he had the Ring. I think it unsurprising that this alone would cause Sauron concern. Saruman Admittedly, this horse has been pretty well beaten to death already, so just a few high points… Saruman’s will was ultimately proven to have been weaker than Gandalf’s, Aragorn’s, and Denethor’s. Denethor is particularly telling as nobody that I’ve ever seen has put him in the Hall of Potential Successful Challengers to Sauron. Sauron was able to play Saruman like a well-tuned zither. There is no particular reason to believe that Saruman could have been able to enslave/compel/fool the Ring (which was part of Sauron) into serving him and not betray him to Sauron at the first convenient opportunity. The fact that Saruman was deluded by his greed into falling and chasing after something that would never be in his power to have only makes the character more tragic and the story more interesting, in my opinion. The primary issue here appears to be that people just don’t want to give up some of their ideas about him. Gandalf Quote:
All the characters in the story were trying to trying to preserve their freedom and overthrow a terrible tyranny. Whether they did or did not believe that they themselves could have mastered the Ring and set themselves up in Sauron’s place doesn’t, in my view, reflect one way or the other upon their underlying motivations. What they did try was to use Sauron’s fears about somebody else using the Ring against him. (It is interesting to note that in several cases the mere thought of the Ring just being in the possession of another was enough to drive individuals into varying states of frenzy. There is every reason to think that Sauron himself would be consumed with a terrible Ring-lust just for its own sake. It was literally a part of him gone missing). In Gandalf’s case, his fears were completely justified. It may also be true that he feared Gandalf far more than Aragorn. That may even be likely. It would certainly be in keeping with Gandalf’s personality if at the Last Debate he was simply displaying modesty in downplaying the fears he awoke in Sauron and making Aragorn look greater. Gandalf was also thinking about the future of Gondor, which Aragorn embodied. Have to impress the future underlings and all that.
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#5 | |
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Boromir & Sam cannot be likened to the loremasters in this manner, as they do not have a great power of their own, & are not strong willed enough. And I believe that what Elrond said, that by using the arts of the enemy one of great power could ''overthrow'' (& not just challenge) Sauron & take his seat on his throne to become yet another Dark Lord is not just a mere thought or prediction, it is the truth. Elrond afterall is greatest of all the loremasters, & is telling it as it really is - the Ring is a threat to the Wise as they may seek to use the Ring to overthrow Sauron & become new darklords themselves, which is Sauron's worst fear (hence the power of Mordor falling on Minas Tirith like a storm for this very reason, as told by Gandalf in the White Rider). Sauron knows (& he should do - he is the lord of the Ring afterall!), therefore, that he CAN be overthrown by a power such as Gandalf if the Ring is used against him, or otherwise Tolkein is not making much sense in his works & is contradicting himself to an extent - maybe a case of Tolkien juggling with his own ideas but not being explicit enough about them perhaps (hence this debate!). I believe the former to be the case, however, although I would not put Aragorn in the category - why could he be able to wield the Ring if Isildur could not? He has no great power of his own or the knowhow to be able to unlock the power of the Ring as far as I am concerned (& I bet someone will try & qoute this & comment on it with something like ''you are just stating your thoughts'' - the answer to that is, well so are you because you are only stating YOUR interpretations of the book & the Letters!!!). This thread was about whether Saruman was for or against Sauron. It seems that in the end there was no friendship between them, only a link to see what each other was up to, & how one could get information out of each other to achieve the same goal. I am a little suprised that Sauron even bothered with Saruman, as I would have thought he would have been too proud & ignorant, having great power & resources of destruction at his disposal. It just shows that Sauron was a legend in playing mind games to control the will of others. Last edited by Mansun; 08-16-2006 at 06:05 AM. |
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#6 | |||
Regal Dwarven Shade
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#7 | |
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One thing Sauron probably did know - the Ring could be used to overthrow & replace him as Darklord of Mordor by another mighty power. Otherwise what was the point in going after Gondor in such a hurried fashion if the Ring could not be used against him? He bent is power towards Gondor for great fear that the Ring would be sent there to be wielded as a weapon against him. If Sauron did know that the Ring could not be used against him, surely he would have bent all his guile to the hunting of the Ring, even after the initial attempt by the Nine Black Riders had failed? He would have already known that Mordor forces were far too strong for Gondor & Rohan, & could afford to use his armies to lure the Ring to him again, surely his uttermost desire above all others. The only other way that things could be explained is if Sauron didn't know whether his Ring could be used against him, but judging by his choices & actions it seems as though he thought it likely that he could be defeated if it were used against him. Infact, Saruman, Gandalf, Galadriel, Elrond & even Sauron generally believed the Ring could be used to overthrow the Dark Lord. Although we cannot be absolutely certain of this, one would have to agree that it would be likely that Sauron could be overthrown by another power with the Ring. Aside from this being Sauron's great fear, none of the above characters speak of there being a chance that by wielding the Ring they would likely as not be fooled by the lure of the Ring's power to such an extent that they would just end up succumbing to Sauron in one way or other. The fear amongst these characters was that ''another Sauron'' would form, rather than the Ring wielder entering the service of the Darklord after being corrupted by the Ring. Last edited by Mansun; 08-18-2006 at 12:46 AM. |
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#8 | |||
Laconic Loreman
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In Tolkien's letter to Milton Waldman, he makes clear that the Ring could be used against Sauron: Quote:
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To wield the Ring, would be to just carry it and use it against Sauron. I think wielding goes more along the lines of using the Ring and gathering a large army to go and overthrow Sauron. This is what it appears Sauron feared the most, especially with Aragorn being Isildur's heir. He feared that Aragorn had the Ring and was coming with an army to overthrow him. This is also what Boromir and Sam had envisioned, 'armies would flock to their banner's' and especially Boromir it would give him the power to 'Command.' Sauron was defeated when he had the Ring, so I don't see why he couldn't be defeated without it, in the hands of someone else. But, to 'wield' the Ring wouldn't be the same as 'mastering' the Ring. I don't think 'wielding' the Ring would be breaking that bond between the Ring and Sauron. You are just using it as a weapon against him, not in fact mastering it's powers. So, to use the Ring against Sauron in this manner, Sauron would be able to return, as the Ring's powers would still exist and be tied to Sauron.
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#9 | |||||||
Regal Dwarven Shade
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And the Ring was certainly eager to betray everybody else, why couldn't it betray one of them? Quote:
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Also… Quote:
B) This is another reason why the Wise didn’t consider trying this to be a viable alternative. Quote:
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