Did Gollum deserve death?

[davem]

Originally Posted by The Might

Of course a threat is not equal to a deed, but let's be serious, Tolkien was pretty clearly saying that Gollum would have eaten Bilbo.

And let's not forget that Gollum did not know 'what' Bilbo was, after having spent half a millenium in a cave. What's being forgotten is that by this time Gollum was insane, & hardly responsible for his actions. Gollum is a tragic figure because he has been driven mad, psychotic, by something far more powerful than he was. His mind was broken by it. Hence, he was a victim. To simply state that 'he deserved to die' is to place oneself on the level of those decadent upper class types who visited mental asylums to laugh at the 'lunatics'.

It could well be that the Ring had a great influence, and that the old Smeagol was a pretty nice guy, still, the thread topic is "Did Gollum, and not Smeagol, deserve death?"

This again is reducing things to a simplistic 'Good' vs 'Evil' judgement. Except this is dividing a person into a 'Good' part & an 'Evil' part (just 'cos Sam does it it doesn't mean its an insightful or compassionate approach). How can one say that 'Gollum' deserves to die & 'Smeagol' does not? How would you kill the one without killing the other? There are not 'two' different 'spirits' inhabiting one body, but a person with a broken mind. Can you imagine the nightmare horror of 'Smeagollum''s existence? Put yourself in his place - your every thought, every perception, is fractured, one desire, hope, dream constantly 'attacked' by an opposing one - every thought you have immediately smashed by its opposite. And all the time you are driven by an overwhelming desire for something you hate.

Anyone who responds to such a supremely tragic remnant of a once whole person by saying 'Well, he certainly deserves to be executed' has missed Tolkien's point by a mile.

[The Saucepan Man]

This debate is (as so often seems to be the case these days) getting to the point where I no longer wish to take part.

My own interpretation is that Gollum was responsible for snatching babies from cradles. Despite the fact that Gandalf picked this up from Woodmen's tales, he clearly concluded that Gollum was responsible (or else why raise it). The Woodmen were not telling him that it was Gollum, as they had no idea who Gollum was. All they knew was that children were disappearing from their cradles and they attributed it to a mysterious ghost (rather than one of the other horrors of Mirkwood, with which they were no doubt familiar). I acknowledged before that Gandalf may not get everything right, but he is one of the most reliable sources of information that we have in LotR. In this case, I choose to accept his conclusion. And I believe, in light of all the circumstances, that Tolkien intended his readers to do so.

I also fully accept the influence of the Ring on Gollum's behaviour. But the fact that he, uniquely among all those who came into contact with it, committed murder almost immediately upon first catching sight of it leads me to conclude that he was not the purest of beings, even before it crossed his path.

These are my opinions. I have no problem if others interpret the relevant passages differently or reach a different conclusion from me concerning Tolkien's intentions in the way that he chose to portray these scenes. And I have no problem in debating these issues with those who hold an opposing view.

I do, however, resent the implication that my interpretation of these matters and my conclusions derived from it are somehow "unfair" or "overly-simplistic". And I also greatly resent the suggestion that my intepretation of a fictional tale is somehow akin to the lynch mob mentality that leads to the victimisation of those who are suspected of being paedophiles or (in the past) of being witches on scant evidence.

It seems impossible to discuss anything here these days without some people questioning the character or literary nouse of those putting the opposing view.

And that is all that I have to say on the matter.

[Folwren]

Originally Posted by davem

Some readers do seem to prefer to divide the inhabitants of M-e into 'Good' & 'Evil', refusing to believe the 'Good' can do any evil & that the 'Evil' are capable of any attrocity imaginable. Personally, I find such an approach overly simplistic.

Some readers, p'raps, maybe, but who here has voiced such thoughts? To whom do you refer, sir? Everyone, so far as I know, evil or good, has some tendancy to both evil and good. Boromir, I strongly believe, was a very noble, very good character, but he definitely had his faults and was capable of doing evil. Frodo was an infinitely good character, and yet, he, too, made mistakes.

Gollum...yes, he was a terribly evil character, but no, I never, ever said in this thread that he did not have some good left in him. Every character worth writing about has some shred of goodness that could somehow be redeemed, if the author so wished.

Every murderer usually has some soft spot left in his heart, I don't deny, but that doesn't mean that he hasn't done a crime.

Gollum was evil, with perhaps some tiny shred of goodness left in him by the time of the LotR, and Gollum, with all his murders, his lies, his treachery, and his whole evil self deserved death.

Originally Posted by Mansun

I think you are hugely mistaken here. Read the quote carefully & explain where he says Gollum should die. At best, one can only make an opinion on what Gandalf meant, but as mentioned earlier in England the spoken word is often different in context to the written one.

I would say that Gandalf said he deserved to die when he said this:

Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death.

I would ask you to tell me what Gollum had done NOT to deserve death, but I won't, because I seriously am leaving this thread and this argument.

Saucepan Man is right. But I am guilty, I think, of what he accuses everyone of. Got too fierce and argument here. I do apologize. Of course everyone is entitled to their own interpretation of the story, but this question...! My word, it drives one nuts!

-- Folwren