LotR -- Book 6 - Chapter 5 - The Steward and the King

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by davem

Apropos of absolutely nothing - I used to work with a man who was obsessed with the movie 'Aliens', to the extent that he had a recurring dream of Ripley 'all tooled up', as he put it.

(Wouldn't want anyone to think I'm suggesting that Fordim has an unhealthy obession with Miranda Otto in chainmail carrying a big sword, or anything )

Well, there are a fair few Tolkien artists who have depicted Eowyn as a muscled amazonian uber-babe with strategically ripped outfits, so it's not uncommon...

Originally Posted by Fordim

Eowyn begins by rebelling against her constrained role as a woman by violating the boundaries put up between female and male by going to war; but she ends by announcing that it was wrong of her to go to war because she is a woman, and thus needs to move back into the constrained role that she originally rebelled against. Don't get me wrong, though, her life is immeasurably better being married to Faramir than under the thumb of Grima!! I just wish the transition had been more complex and allowed Eowyn some way to integrate her two identities (female/healer/home and male/warrior/road) rather than reject the latter in favour of a better version of the former.

This depends on whether you think Eowyn was specifically rebelling against a feminine role laid down for her or not. Remember she was originally supposed to have been left as leader of Rohan while the King was away - a role which might have been expected to have gone to one of the Marshalls. And I also think that in her going to war, it was not necessarily an act of rebellion, but more of desperation. It was also in no small way inspired by Aragorn's leadership; she sought the glory which he represented in her eyes. It makes me think that Aragorn may have represented her animus in some way and have stirred this up.

The other point is that being a healer in Middle-earth is most definitely not a prescribed feminine role. The best healer in Middle-earth seems to be Elrond, and Aragorn himself is extremely skilled in the art.

[Alphaelin]

Lalwendë wrote:

It was also in no small way inspired by Aragorn's leadership; she sought the glory which he represented in her eyes. It makes me think that Aragorn may have represented her animus in some way and have stirred this up.

Excellent point, Lal! I hadn't taken it quite that far, but it makes sense to me. And I agree with your next sentence:

The other point is that being a healer in Middle-earth is most definitely not a prescribed feminine role. The best healer in Middle-earth seems to be Elrond, and Aragorn himself is extremely skilled in the art.

Not to mention the Chief Warden of the Houses of Healing.

I think the main reason that Eowyn's integration of her anima & animus are incomplete in LOTR is that much as some of us love her, she is one of JRRT's supporting characters, so he's not going to spend as much time fleshing her out as he does the Hobbits, for example, or Aragorn. LOTR is about the Quest, not a love story, and even the plotline of 'Aragorn and Arwen' takes a back seat to the main story. At least Eowyn has a quest of her own, not like poor Arwen, who is relegated to an appearance in Imladris, a reference in Lorien and then, hey presto! shows up in time to provide the reader with a wedding and the assumption that Aragorn will have heirs of his body to inherit the North and South Kingdoms. Pretty poor treatment of a High Elven princess and the Evenstar of her people!

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Alphaelin

I think the main reason that Eowyn's integration of her anima & animus are incomplete in LOTR is that much as some of us love her, she is one of JRRT's supporting characters, so he's not going to spend as much time fleshing her out as he does the Hobbits, for example, or Aragorn.

Yes! It's a shame that we do not get to see more of Eowyn, and Faramir for that matter, as both these characters are very complex with real hang-ups and problems, and strong inner personalities which struggle for expression. That's the impression I get, anyway. Whoever says that Tolkien's characters are flat and dull ought to be pointed to look at these two (and, for that matter, Gollum and Frodo).

One thing to remember about Eowyn is that she is a young woman, and Tolkien underlines this fact. She still seems to be learning about the ways of the world, and she still has her dreams. Those dreams have been damaged at an early age, and she is filled with anger by this. Perhaps an older woman may have taken this more stoically? Perhaps not? It might be worth discussing if Eowyn's age is relevant to her actions, as I have found that as I grow older myself, I feel differently about her in the light of my own experience.

[Lathriel]

As a fan of Eowyn and Faramir I also would have liked to read more about their relationship and how Faramir healed Eowyn.
I always shed a few tears because it is all so beautiful. The romance, the crowning, the fellowship as close to complete as it can be if only for a little while.
And Faramir...well, his relationship with Eowyn is so Romantic! If that happened to me I would swoon. (read the last part of Morte D'arthur, all the characters do there is swoon) Well maybe not but I would certainly be very touched.
I have no problem with Eowyn denouncing her former want to be a queen because I think it would not make her happy at all. She wanted to be queen before so that she wasn't helpless and she hoped it would bring her happiness. However, when Faramir came along she realized that that was no longer the caseand she also realized that she would never find true happiness with Aragorn. After Theoden's death and the other horrors she experienced I don't think it is a good idea to return to the battlefield. Although she has been healed she will always remember the trauma she went through during and after the Pelennor fields.

[Guinevere]

I started writing this contribution ages ago, but got interrupted at the time, and now I suddenly found the draft gain, so I decided to post it after all. (I don't know if anyone will read this, after all that time... )

This is one of my favourite chapters, since I belong to the category of “Faramir swooners” and am a hopeless romantic. So this beautiful, subtle lovestory appeals very much to me!

Here is something I noticed but nobody here commented on it:
As I read Eowyn’s words to the warden .

“…and those who have not swords can still die upon them.”

I was immediately reminded of the words in the Bible:

“all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.”

What Eowyn says sounds almost like a reply to those words as well as to the words of the warden! I cannot believe that Tolkien wasn’t aware of that... What do you think?

I read with interest the discussion about Eowyn “forsaking her previous identity” and “diminishing” by marrying Faramir and becoming a healer.

Originally posted by Davem:
My reading is different. It seems to me she becomes a warrior because she cannot see any other way out of her situation. She ends up happily married to a man she loves, with a fulfilling, creative role. What is the alternative - would you prefer that she continued living on the battlefield, killing orcs & probably dying at the hands of one of them, bleeding her life away into the mud?

Eowyn the Shieldmaiden is a great character to read about, but if you put yourself in her place, what's so attractive about such a life?

She went to war not because she wanted to fight but because she wanted to die & win some renown in the process, to prove herself 'worthy' in terms of her culture.

What, exactly, does Eowyn 'give up' that's worth having?

I agree very much with what Davem and Lalwendë and Alphaelin have written!

Originally posted by Fordim Hedgethistle:
And I still remember quite vividly my thundering shock when Arwen arrives and Aragorn marries her -- I had no idea from the text that they were engaged. In subsequent readings I see that there are clues, but Tolkien's decision to relegate the love story to the Appendix confounds me. It is a rare case in which -- I think -- his art fails.

Hm, I suspected something between these two when I read about Aragorn’s dreamy behaviour on Cerin Amroth and his words “Arwen vanimelda, Namarië!”
And then I browsed in the Appendices long before finishing the book (I was just too curious ) and read the story of Aragorn and Arwen. So the wedding didn’t come as a surprise to me, but too bad I read the sad ending too!

Originally posted by Lalwendë:
Yes! It's a shame that we do not get to see more of Eowyn, and Faramir for that matter, as both these characters are very complex with real hang-ups and problems, and strong inner personalities which struggle for expression. That's the impression I get, anyway. Whoever says that Tolkien's characters are flat and dull ought to be pointed to look at these two (and, for that matter, Gollum and Frodo).

Yet I know several people who think that Faramir is too perfect, that he isn’t believable because he seems to have no flaws… (This was PJ’s argument for the alteration of Faramir’s character in the movies as well )
Well, he may be an ideal, but he came very much “alive” for me in the book. So I quite agree with Lalwendë! I think Faramir’s most extraordinary character trait is his perceptiveness and compassion.(Also commented upon by Beregond) He recognizes better than Eowyn herself what is going on in her mind!

I thought it also interesting that he, as a descendant of Númenor, had this recurring nightmare about the great dark wave drowning everything. (And stupid of the scriptwriters to give those words in the movie to Eowyn, in quite a different setting¨)
Even more interesting is what Tolkien writes in one of his letters

from letter #163….I have what some might call an Atlantis complex. Possibly inherited, though my parents died too young for me to know such things about them, and too young to transfer such things by words. Inherited from me (I suppose) by one only of my children, though I did not know that about my son until recently, and he did not know it about me. I mean the terrible recurrent dream (beginning with memory) of the Great Wave, towering up, and coming in ineluctably over the trees and green fields. (I bequeathed it to Faramir.) I don’t think I have had it since I wrote the “Downfall of Númenor” as the last of the legends of the First and Second Age.

[Lathriel]

Well, Guinevere, I did read your post and I really liked it.

I read somewhere that somebody(sorry don't remember who) said that he/she didn't see the marriage of Arwen and Aragorn coming. I di see it somewhat since there were hints. However, I like it that Tolkien didn't tell us straight off that Arwen and Aragorn were engaged because this adds more suspense(for lack of a better word) to the story of Eowyn and Aragorn.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Its also interesting to consider the sub text here. Aragorn uses the words of Elendil to begin his kingship. Is this simply an appeal to tradition, or something more? Aragorn cannot claim the kingship by right of inheritance - he’s the heir of Isildur, not of Anarion. What he seems to be doing is to focus the people’s minds on the father of both Isildur & Anarion. This kind of sidelines Anarion, with Aragorn claiming descent not from Isildur but from Elendil - a subtle re-writing of history, perhaps?

He is certainly invoking Elendil here, but precisely because his claim as High King *is* legitimate. Elendil was king of Arnor and Gondor both, but deputed the rule of the South-kingdom to his sons jointly; when Isildur took up his father's sceptre he likewise deputed Gondor to his nephew: but the senior line retained the High-Kingship of both realms. At the time Arvedui advanced this agrgument the Council of Gondor was able to dig up Earnur, but by TA 3019 there's no doubt that the line of Anarion is extinct!