Tolkien's Characters

[Lord of Angmar]

In a normal work, the main character is developed, his friends and accomplices are developed to their own extents and his chief opponent or enemy is developed. In the case of the Lord of the Rings, Tolkien is able to develop dozens of characters without ever actually seeming to try. Every character is different at the end as he was from the beginning. The characters who he does leave undeveloped are never shallow and it is obvious that there is a history behind them that precedes their part in the book.

A good example of this is Gildor Inglorion, whom Frodo meets during his flight to Rivendell. Tolkien is able to craft him and his band of Elves in such a way that we can almost feel their history; their glory as Elves who have seen the light of Aman, their sadness at the troubles of Middle-Earth, and their fear about the coming war with the Dark Powers. This seemingly insignificant character, and others whom we meet in Tolkien's works (another of my favorite seemingly inconsequential characters is Brandir of the tale of Turin Turambar). It is this sign of a true storyteller that Tolkien knows how to space out his character development and he develops characters with such grace and ease that sometimes it is hard to fully see their transformation.

Sam Gamgee, I think, is the character who is changed the most throught LotR, yet at the end we still see him as Sam the Gardner, a simple, loyal hobbit of the Shire. It is characters like the aforementioned that I believe make Tolkien such a brilliant storyteller.