A hundredth re-read of the LotR

[Nogrod]

So, from the fitting numbers we get into a world guided by providence? Or is it a world of necessity? Where everything just has to happen the way it does?

Originally Posted by Ibrin

there is no true coincidence in Middle-earth, that all things happen for a reason, even if that reason is never known.

Even if I have quite a strong distaste for Matrix II and III (I liked the first one though) that was a question they brought forwards nicely: the world of the Matrix was just "cause and effect" like the character Merovingian put it (with the necessary anomalies in the form of agent Smith and Neo) but the "real world" was guided by providence; in a very fatalistic way the prophecies just came true - even if the minute details were often baffling and didn't seem to contribute to the greater fate of things.

Yes, this will come more important later in the book when Gandalf voices his concern about pity and letting Gollum live...

But looking at the way one may jump from 111th & 33rd birthday - coincidentally or contrivingly happening - to these considerations it really arouses the question whether Tolkien wished, by the selection of those "fitting" birthdays to address the reader that we are in a fantasy or mythical landscape now and there the providence rules supreme? And whether that as a myth portrays to us more what the world should be like, not what it is like?

To put it in Matrix-terms, is the Middle Earth the "real world" vs. the Matrix of the actual world of natural sciences of cause and effect?

[Tuor in Gondolin]

Posted by Nogrod

Looking at Gaffer Gamgee one easily finds a servant venerating his master who in turn is "very polite" to him. Even if the relation between the two have been described as somewhat informal with a few examples (Bilbo calling Gaffer "Master Hamfast" etc.) one gets a relation of a servant and a master - however benevolent the master is towards his servant - and the servant is acknowleding his place however the master asks for advice from him.

But could you imagine a similar relationship between Frodo and Sam? In a sense, in the beginning of the journey, their relationship is something reminding one of that and Tolkien indeed keeps on reminding us of it throughout the story, oftentimes in Sam's lines and reactions.

I really don't see the Shire society, and especially the Gamgees, as
socially and politically rigid as many seem to. After the quest,
Frodo virtually adopts Sam, has Sam inherit Bagend, and Sam
(if he is indeed considered lower class socially) rises to the top
political (and social?) post in the Shire. And the Gaffer seems economically
on a par with Bilbo (not counting Bilbo's Excellent Adventure gold and
silver). To me, the Shire is, by far,in "feel", closest to present times.

Of course, I must say I side with Tolkien, and against just about everybody
else-including a young Rayner Unwin, in quite liking "Hobbit talk,"
and not minding a bit more.

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

Originally Posted by Nogrod

But looking at the way one may jump from 111th & 33rd birthday - coincidentally or contrivingly happening - to these considerations it really arouses the question whether Tolkien wished, by the selection of those "fitting" birthdays to address the reader that we are in a fantasy or mythical landscape now and there the providence rules supreme? And whether that as a myth portrays to us more what the world should be like, not what it is like?

This makes me hear Rod Serling's voice intoning, "There's a signpost up ahead. Next stop...." Middle-earth?

But I do think this might be a reasonable assessment, that Tolkien wished the readers to know that this was no longer what they think of as the "real world," that they had crossed over into the realm of Myth and Legend -- into Faerie. I suspect that this was why his eventual attempts to rethink his myths in terms of real science (as in the "Myths Transformed" portion of Morgoth's Ring), it ultimately failed. He himself -- his creative mind, that is -- had conceived the whole as Myth, and it was too tightly constructed to take it apart and reinterpret it in Real World, scientific terms. It is a world as it should be in terms of its own subcreational reality, not in any other way. The introduction of the hobbits and the Shire incorporates elements that feel like the world we know, but other things, like the coincidental birthdays, wizardly fireworks, and a magic ring let us know that though we have not entirely abandoned the familiar, we are moving into a world that is not our own.

[Groin Redbeard]

I've tried but I just can't come up with anything worth saying for this chapter, other than I enjoyed it! I love all the mentioning of the magical toys made by the dwarves and such.

Although, I did like the way that Tolkien introduces the thought of the Ring being evil with the confrontation between Bilbo and Gandalf. I remember when I read the book for the first time it through me for a spin the way Bilbo reacted.

[Nogrod]

All the playfulness lightens the mood considerably - all those presents given after Bilbo had left with their pointy choices and finding the three young hobbits digging for the treasure etc. bring us back to the innocent or "unspoiled" Hobitton - like one would be in the Hundred-acre Wood...

But the last two pages yet again change the general mood. Discussions of Bilbo's versions of the story and Gandalf's sudden urge to leave while being quite vague but clearly worried about the Ring are a perfect ending for this kind of introductory chapter yet again reminding the reader that there are bigger and more serious things bubbling under the sunny surface.

[Nogrod]

Okay, I'm beginning a new chapter as the discussion is - to put it mildly - a bit slow...

I have indeed been too busy to read all of it yet (believe it or not) but there is a classic in the beginning I'd like to make an observation on to get this running.

It's the row between Sam and Ted Sandyman of course.

It's a great example of a traditionalistic & conservative society facing news / ideas they're not too keen to take in as those things could imbalance the beliefs of the group and their basic security on their shared worldview.

I don't find it too far-fetched to compare the discussion between Sam and Ted to one that could take place in RL in some rural community today.

Think of a youngster that has gone to a big city to study and who comes on holidays back to his childhood village pub and starts to tell people of atoms or quarks - or evolution. The jokes might be quite similar indeed. "Can you see those atom-things? Like in this table? No? So there ain't no such things!" (applauds for a score made from the crowd), "You say these atom-things dance around each other... but this table is staying right where it is. You must have taken a pint too much if it looks to you this table is dancing!" (the crowd bursting to laughter with the wit of that one), or "So we're descended from apes and before that another life-forms you say... well that explains why they said my uncle was a bit fishy!" (the crowds getting wild with appreciation of "proving" these weird thoughts wrong) etc.

Okay. I know some people would interpret this scene between Ted and Sam more readily as a discussion between faith and empiricism - and it might be closer to Tolkien's personal ties as well... but the way he writes this part really seems to draw nicer parallels with the example of modern physics than with belief in God.


Second thought (and I promise my last one on social inequality in Hobitton... I mean I'm getting ashamed of bringing this forth time after another...)

Originally Posted by Tuor in Gondolin

the Gaffer seems economically on a par with Bilbo (not counting Bilbo's Excellent Adventure gold and silver).

Now in the beginning of "the Shadow of the Past" it's made quite clear that Frodo is not doing anything for living. He just wanders around and gets anguished (like rich people with nothing to do, do). The Gaffer and his son really need to do work to pay for their living. I wouldn't call that being "economically on par".

At this point in the story a many occupations have been already introduced: there are millers, inn-keepers, gardeners (servants?), cooks, postal workers etc. but clearly Frodo needs to do nothing. He can idle himself from the early morning to the late-night. So there are classes in Hobitton. Some own property and/or treasure enough while the others need to work for their living. The Gaffer may make his living - and probably does - with his own merits aka. work and thence be self-subsistent, but the difference is that Bilbo (or Frodo) need not to.

Now one might argue that Bilbo has earned his wealth with his work (the expedition to the Lonely Mountain) and I'm not too eager to go against it right here - even if it seems he wasn't the poorest hobbit before that either (the question concerning the equality of the starting points is the crucial one for any economic liberalism). But Frodo is just chosen by Bilbo, from a whim one might say, to inherit all - well, most of - he had and so became luxuriously rich with no merit of himself but only that Bilbo happened to like him and his parents got to an accident.

I agree with Tuor in Gondolin that the relations between the classes were not hammered in stone - as the example of Frodo and Sam let us see quite clearly. That was indeed what I was pointing at: that Frodo and Sam broke a pattern there. But for that to happen Frodo had to be the "higher one" to graciously give the part to Sam. If they were equals Frodo could not be generous as they would both be at the same level and neither could "out-present" the other with grace.

Only that one who has power or position over another can indeed be gracious!


PS. Did elves have to work for their living?