LotR -- Book 4 - Chapter 08 - The Stairs of Cirith Ungol

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Lathriel

Of all the scary places in this book MInas Morgul is the scariest place in ME. At least I have found this place the most terrifying.

Interesting that you say that, because now I've started thinking...

Minas Morgul does not seem to be the most evil place in The Lord of the Rings, from my point of view. Mordor seems entirely more evil and dangerous, but in this chapter on Minas Morgul, the evil seems present in a way that is not, to me, as immediate as anywhere else in the book.

When Frodo and Sam are in Mordor, I felt their fear of capture, their loathing of the evil land, but although I saw its effects on them, I never really felt the evil of the place. It was more like a big desert than a place where evil was omnipresent.

But in this account of Minas Morgul, the evil felt very near to me. The possibility that the side of evil might capture, thwart, or end Frodo and Sam seemed a lot more real to me. The element of immediate danger presented by Shelob and the orks only a couple chapters later is not present, but the whole chapter leads me to feel that the entire evil of Minas Morgul was there to search them out, and could very well have done so, had things gone only a little different.

But I didn't feel this in Mordor. I knew Mordor was hostile. I knew Mordor was evil. But I didn't get the sense that Mordor was bearing down on Frodo and Sam, that it was actively seeking them out. Was this because Mordor was distracted by the Army of the West? Or is it that as the reader, once I saw Frodo and Sam safe of Cirith Ungol, I knew that they would make it to Mt. Doom?