Did Gollum deserve death?

[davem]

Originally Posted by alatar

I'm with you, but (and this may be off-thread and opening a can of worms) at what point is someone culpable for their actions? One could make the case that anyone murdering another is insane, as only the insane would commit such an act. Do all criminals end up in the asylum?

No, I don't think so. Smeagol could have been judged guilty of murdering Deagol immediately after the act - but after 500 years alone on the dark with the Ring I'm not sure how one could judge fairly of his actions - how 'sane' was he? Were there still some 'fragments' of his original self which could have been judged guilty? Yet were those parts the ones responsible for the 'evil' acts he committed, or was it the 'insane' parts.

Its interesting that his own people chose banishment over execution - implying that they felt that they did not have the right to do execute him - or that he was not fully culpable - maybe they saw into his soul & realised that he had always been slightly 'mad'.

There is a difference between someone who commits murder (or any other crime) out of simple wickedness & one who commits murder because they are insane. One of the most heinous crimes in British history was the 'Moors Murders'. Ian Brady & Myra Hindley tortured & murder a number of children. Brady was judged insane & sectioned to an asylum for the rest of his life. Hindley was judged to be quite sane, but irredeemably wicked & was sentenced to life in prison.

As to the 'daresay' issue, my own feeling is that Gandalf's response could be summed up along the lines of 'Er, yes, OK Frodo.....Now let's grow up & take this thing seriously shall we?'

[Aiwendil]

Davem wrote:

Smeagol could have been judged guilty of murdering Deagol immediately after the act - but after 500 years alone on the dark with the Ring I'm not sure how one could judge fairly of his actions - how 'sane' was he? Were there still some 'fragments' of his original self which could have been judged guilty? Yet were those parts the ones responsible for the 'evil' acts he committed, or was it the 'insane' parts.

I think you make an important point; one cannot view the actions of a person under the influence of the Ring in exactly the same way that one would view the same actions in an un-influenced person. But I would not err on the other extreme either. Just as the Ring cannot be seen as exclusively a sort of 'psychic amplifier' (to use Shippey's term), it also cannot be seen as an indomitable force that takes over or possesses its victims wholly and utterly. There is something almost paradoxical about the way the Ring works; its bearers seem simultaneously to have and not to have free will. And yet it is believable; it is as though in the Ring domination by fate and freedom of choice are unified and made into one and the same thing. I think that this sort of justified paradox, this synthesis of antitheses, if you will, is one of the most brilliant features of Tolkien's writing.

But as far as the morality of any Ringbearer's actions, as far as our judgement of their culpability - the paradoxical nature of the Ring makes these things difficult if not impossible. Moral philosophy is tricky even in the real world. It's hard enough to judge the actions of real people; how can we hope to judge Smeagol's?

And is that not, perhaps, a lesson to be learned from Tolkien's Ring? Maybe the union of guilt and guiltlessness, of culpability and of justified excuse, in the Ringbearers reflects the nature of misdeeds in general.

As to the 'daresay' issue, my own feeling is that Gandalf's response could be summed up along the lines of 'Er, yes, OK Frodo.....Now let's grow up & take this thing seriously shall we?'

I do not mean to suggest that your interpretation is wrong - but why not take Gandalf at his word? If you ask me, Gandalf does think that Gollum deserves to die - but Gandalf also recognizes that it is not his place to judge such things.

[Morwen]

"Its interesting that his own people chose banishment over execution - implying that they felt that they did not have the right to do execute him - or that he was not fully culpable - maybe they saw into his soul & realised that he had always been slightly 'mad'."

I don't recall Gandalf telling Frodo that Smeagol's people knew that he had killed Deagol. I don't have the book in front of me but IIRC Gollum's grandmother kicked him out of the family hole because he was causing problems in family. Far from seeing into his soul they seemed (if Gandalf's tale is accurate) to consider him a nuisance and wanted him gone.