Failure and Punishment

[Lush]

In Middle-earth, good and evil are pretty well-defined. In almost every situation which Tolkien portrays, the good guys are opposed to the evil guys, and there is generally little difficulty in identifying which side any particular individual falls on. Anything that is done to further the cause of the good guys may be categorised as good, and therefore virtuous. Anything done to further the cause of the evil guys is evil, a transgression of good and so a sin. For the reader, at least, it is generally fairly easy to tell which is which.

But this is why I like Gollum; because his character challenges and complicates this structure. In my opinion, he does this more so than Bilbo and Eowyn. Of course, he's never really as "good" as either of the two, but there are moments that disclose his capacity for being good. And whether or not he is punished when he dies in the end is also something worth pondering...