A hundredth re-read of the LotR

[Nogrod]

If anyone has time, please post about the first chapter. I'm going to be more than busy up to Monday so don't you wait for me...

[Nogrod]

Okay. I'll start with two thoughts from just the first pages of the chapter to get this rolling again. I probably have time tomorrow to read the rest of it and to hopefully join a discussion already on its way then...


The chapter begins with the description of Bilbo's reputation and stature in Hobitton. Now some said it was unfair that someone was so rich and blessed with such an old age well-preserved.

"It will have to be paid for," they said. "It isn't natural, and trouble will come of it!"

Now one might say here an author is laying grounds for what will come; kind of hinting to the future and the whole affair, setting the gloomy feeling to the background from where it would eventually come forth.

But is it also Tolkien's own world-view? Do good fortunes need to be earned? Is that the way how a rich man justifies his riches; by suffering or fulfilling a noble destiny? Or is it how things should be? Or is Tolkien just posing the question?

So, is there an eventual balance where normal life (Hobitton way) is easier or requires not the heroical sacrifices which in turn justify the more "nobler lifestyles" or opportunities?

Are there theological implications involved? The mainstream christians who just lead their lives and receive the grace with not too much effort or thought of it and then those existentially anguished romantical "burning souls" who need to take their fill which somehow makes their lives at the same time a torment but also much more rich and fulfilling?


A second thought.

Looking at Gaffer Gamgee one easily finds a servant venerating his master who in turn is "very polite" to him. Even if the relation between the two have been described as somewhat informal with a few examples (Bilbo calling Gaffer "Master Hamfast" etc.) one gets a relation of a servant and a master - however benevolent the master is towards his servant - and the servant is acknowleding his place however the master asks for advice from him.

But could you imagine a similar relationship between Frodo and Sam? In a sense, in the beginning of the journey, their relationship is something reminding one of that and Tolkien indeed keeps on reminding us of it throughout the story, oftentimes in Sam's lines and reactions.

But still in the end it's a lot different even if they never get to be kind of equals as Frodo was the Ringbearer and thence of "nobility" of sorts. But is that a same kind of difference? Sam is indeed given some bits and pieces of the nobility - through him bearing the ring for a while at least - and Frodo openly declares his worth by giving him the mastery of Bag End when he leaves.

What kind of intrigues me is that even if they journeyed along and faced all those troubles together - and Sam saved Frodo and the whole mission a few times - they didn't end up as equals even if they ended up as friends rather than just a master and a servant.

(Something which quite bugs me indeed is that Frodo treats Sam like one who is generous, loving, friendly - I'm not denying his earnest feelings of gratitude or friendship even - and Sam goes along the same route, being the one to receive the honour of being treated that way.)

Is the barrier un-breechable? And which barrier is it? Inherited noblesse as a birthright? Fate-ordered thing? Just something growing from their different socio-economic backgrounds?



A third one just to lighten things up.

Don't you think Bilbo turning 111 and Frodo 33 on a same year is just a bit... well how does one say it... "fantasy-like"? Like a bedtime-story or a fairy-tale where all the numbers must match (or Hegelian philosophy for that matter... )? What did the story gain from that instead of Bilbo having his 114th birthday while Frodo turned 31? Is it a reminder that we're now entering the magical kingdom of myths and tales?

[Nogrod]

And btw.

Happy Birthday Bilbo and Frodo!

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

I think the word you might be looking for is "coincidental" (possibly "contrived"). And perhaps in contriving this remarkable coincidence, Tolkien was making his first essay into the concept that there is no true coincidence in Middle-earth, that all things happen for a reason, even if that reason is never known. Frodo coming of age at this particular time -- when Bilbo was finally feeling the negative effects of keeping the Ring -- made it easier for Bilbo to pass it on to Frodo, along with Bag End and his other possessions. Frodo needed to be old enough to be totally undisputed as Bilbo's heir, and Bilbo needed to be old enough for other hobbits not to question the fact that he never returned (especially since he had gone off once before, and returned at a most inopportune moment for those who had been buying his possessions). Contrived, certainly, but one wonders whose finger within the subcreation caused it to happen in just that convenient, coincidental way.

[Nogrod]

So, from the fitting numbers we get into a world guided by providence? Or is it a world of necessity? Where everything just has to happen the way it does?

Originally Posted by Ibrin

there is no true coincidence in Middle-earth, that all things happen for a reason, even if that reason is never known.

Even if I have quite a strong distaste for Matrix II and III (I liked the first one though) that was a question they brought forwards nicely: the world of the Matrix was just "cause and effect" like the character Merovingian put it (with the necessary anomalies in the form of agent Smith and Neo) but the "real world" was guided by providence; in a very fatalistic way the prophecies just came true - even if the minute details were often baffling and didn't seem to contribute to the greater fate of things.

Yes, this will come more important later in the book when Gandalf voices his concern about pity and letting Gollum live...

But looking at the way one may jump from 111th & 33rd birthday - coincidentally or contrivingly happening - to these considerations it really arouses the question whether Tolkien wished, by the selection of those "fitting" birthdays to address the reader that we are in a fantasy or mythical landscape now and there the providence rules supreme? And whether that as a myth portrays to us more what the world should be like, not what it is like?

To put it in Matrix-terms, is the Middle Earth the "real world" vs. the Matrix of the actual world of natural sciences of cause and effect?

[Tuor in Gondolin]

Posted by Nogrod

Looking at Gaffer Gamgee one easily finds a servant venerating his master who in turn is "very polite" to him. Even if the relation between the two have been described as somewhat informal with a few examples (Bilbo calling Gaffer "Master Hamfast" etc.) one gets a relation of a servant and a master - however benevolent the master is towards his servant - and the servant is acknowleding his place however the master asks for advice from him.

But could you imagine a similar relationship between Frodo and Sam? In a sense, in the beginning of the journey, their relationship is something reminding one of that and Tolkien indeed keeps on reminding us of it throughout the story, oftentimes in Sam's lines and reactions.

I really don't see the Shire society, and especially the Gamgees, as
socially and politically rigid as many seem to. After the quest,
Frodo virtually adopts Sam, has Sam inherit Bagend, and Sam
(if he is indeed considered lower class socially) rises to the top
political (and social?) post in the Shire. And the Gaffer seems economically
on a par with Bilbo (not counting Bilbo's Excellent Adventure gold and
silver). To me, the Shire is, by far,in "feel", closest to present times.

Of course, I must say I side with Tolkien, and against just about everybody
else-including a young Rayner Unwin, in quite liking "Hobbit talk,"
and not minding a bit more.

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

Originally Posted by Nogrod

But looking at the way one may jump from 111th & 33rd birthday - coincidentally or contrivingly happening - to these considerations it really arouses the question whether Tolkien wished, by the selection of those "fitting" birthdays to address the reader that we are in a fantasy or mythical landscape now and there the providence rules supreme? And whether that as a myth portrays to us more what the world should be like, not what it is like?

This makes me hear Rod Serling's voice intoning, "There's a signpost up ahead. Next stop...." Middle-earth?

But I do think this might be a reasonable assessment, that Tolkien wished the readers to know that this was no longer what they think of as the "real world," that they had crossed over into the realm of Myth and Legend -- into Faerie. I suspect that this was why his eventual attempts to rethink his myths in terms of real science (as in the "Myths Transformed" portion of Morgoth's Ring), it ultimately failed. He himself -- his creative mind, that is -- had conceived the whole as Myth, and it was too tightly constructed to take it apart and reinterpret it in Real World, scientific terms. It is a world as it should be in terms of its own subcreational reality, not in any other way. The introduction of the hobbits and the Shire incorporates elements that feel like the world we know, but other things, like the coincidental birthdays, wizardly fireworks, and a magic ring let us know that though we have not entirely abandoned the familiar, we are moving into a world that is not our own.

[Groin Redbeard]

I've tried but I just can't come up with anything worth saying for this chapter, other than I enjoyed it! I love all the mentioning of the magical toys made by the dwarves and such.

Although, I did like the way that Tolkien introduces the thought of the Ring being evil with the confrontation between Bilbo and Gandalf. I remember when I read the book for the first time it through me for a spin the way Bilbo reacted.