Frodo at Sammath Naur

[mark12_30]

... this is effectively saying that Frodo fails the test that both Galadriel & Faramir are shown as passing. He seeks to preserve the old ways, his old life, even being prepared to gamble the fate of Middle Earth & all its peoples. Galadriel will lose all she loves. Faramir will risk all he loves. Frodo wont/can't.

I don't believe that of Frodo. Yes, the idea of (basically) destroying Lorien must be devastating to him; but he's followed all that logic through. He's seen what Mordor is firsthand, and knows what the Ring produces. And I don't think he'd buy the logic. That is exactly why the "Save the Shire" idea doesn't sit right with me.

That's why I *still* think it's sheer posessiveness. I go back to the argument that all he could see was the wheel of Fire, even with his waking eyes. He went into the Sammath Naur with the express desire to destroy the Ring; and within the Sammath Naur, the Ring took him. As Tolkien states, I can't judge Frodo for what he decided inside the Sammath Naur, because nobody could have prevailed in there. Once through the doors, his fate was sealed; Tolkien makes that clear; he could not refuse the power of the ring inside those doors.

But I don't see that he ever 'failed the test that Galadriel and Faramir passed'. I don't buy that. Tolkien is clear that within the Sammath Naur anyone: ANYONE: would have failed; Galadriel, Faramir, anybody. That's just not the same "test." Galadriel and Faramir never entered the Sammath Naur. Entering the Sammath Naur was like entering the womb of evil.

letter 191:

If you re-read all the passages dealing with Frodo and the Ring, I think you will see that not only was it quite impossible for him to surrender the Ring, in act or will, especially at its point of maximum power, but that this failure was adumbrated from far back.

In other words, Tolkien's point is that he wouldn't surrender it. Not that he intended to use it to save the Shire or anything else. Simple surrender of it was impossible. And that points back to posessiveness, and ownership, and to the phrase "The Ring is Mine." What made him claim it within the Sammath Naur was the same inability to toss it into his own fireplace. And that was on the first day he found out what the Ring really was and what it could do. He wasn't thinking about using it to save the Shire; he was thinking:

The gold looked very fair and pure, and Frodo thought how rich and beautiful was its color, how perfect was its roundness. It was an admirable thing and altogether precious. When he took it out he had intended to fling it from him into the very hottest part of the fire. But he found now that he could not do so, not without a great struggle....

And the Ring, as we all know, ends up back in his pocket.

I've no doubt that once he claimed it, his head was filled with grandiose ideas; but I do not believe that those grandiose ideas were with him before he entered the Sammath Naur or that those ideas were what made him claim it within the Sammath Naur. Tolkien said that we should judge by the intentions BEFORE THEY ENTERED THE SAMMATH NAUR (yes, I'm shouting, but don't take it personally.) And **before he entered** the Sammath Naur, Frodo did not have the intention of using the Ring to save Bilbo and the Shire; he had the intention of destroying the Ring.

<font size=1 color=339966>[ 9:12 AM January 19, 2004: Message edited by: mark12_30 ]