THE RING and corruption

[Dain]

I admit, it's a little while since I read FotR, so I may have been overly influenced by wonderul Sean Bean. When I said Boromir was the only representative of his people, I meant Gondor, and possibly his point of view on it. I mean, Aragorn is, as you noted, a sort of threat to him--but the film portrayal also brought out the fact that Boromir didn't think much of Aragorn for staying away. So, the only two men in the party don't have much chance of getting along, which further isolates Boromir. He, who used to command, now has to follow Gandalf and then Aragorn and listen to the council of Elrond, all of whom he respects, of course, but he's so obsessed with Gondor and it's struggle that he has problems with anyone he sees as not actively helping. Basically, Boromir is a much more "ordinary" man than Aragorn or Denethor or Faramir, who are all embued with the last sparks of the greatness of Numenor.

About Dwarves, I don't think Gimli would have had any better chance at resisting. The Dwarf rings were tainted and made Thrain and Thror eventually go mad, and I don't know what the one would have offered a Dwarf, either. See my earlier posts about Dwarves and the ring in the Hobbit. Anyway, it just wasn't his (or Legolas) burden to take up, so I think that's the main reason they didn't pick it up. Plot-wise it would have been very silly; the hobbits were meant to do it.