LotR -- Book 1 - Chapter 06 – The Old Forest

[Rumil]

Evening All,

back again at the readthrough, so much to catch up on but you know my unreliability by now!

So again a chapter which has been very thoroughly discussed above, what to add?

I was impressed by the dream-turning-to-nightmare aspect of the Old Man Willow encounter.

It seemed to him that he could hardly hear the sound of his own shrill voice: it was blown away from him by the willow-wind and drowned in a clamour of leaves, as soon as the words left his mouth. He felt desperate: lost and witless.

This sems to me similar to a nightmare situation where one cannot perform ordinary actions. For example, being rooted to the spot when unspecified monsters are creeping up on you.

Another aspect was the singing of Tom's ''spells'', reminscent (in a small way) of the singing 'magic' in the Silmarillion.

Now for some interesting (?) small details.

First we have the ponies, showing how prepared Merry was for the journey, having likely splashed quite a bit of cash to purchase them on the expectation that Frodo would approve the plan on unmasking of the conspiracy.

Next dragonets! Old Man Willow's roots were described as like dragonets. Therefore the hobbits had a word for young dragons. I certainly can't remember any young dragons appearing in the legendarium, for example Morgoth kept Glaurung at home 'under wraps' until he was sufficiently old to be fit for battle (and then withdrew him again until his armour was hardened). So maybe this is hobbit inventiveness, or just possibly they had heard tales of the Dwarves or Eothoed encountering immature dragons around the Grey Mountains or Withered Heath, tantalising!

Frodo's hatchet- reminded me that the company had set out almost completely unarmed on their adventure, (something commented on in a later chapter). It would be a strange RPG where the characters had but one hatchet and presumably some general-purpose knives!

Tom mentions the 'black alder', perhaps another powerful Old Man Willow-like Huorn-ish adversary?

Yellow cream, honeycomb, white bread and butter: Reminds me of the spread at Beorn's house, therefore are Tom & Goldberry vegetarian? However this certainly implies agriculture, cream and butter mean cows, bread means ploughing, growing and harvesting wheat, Tom was a farmer, just like Maggot. The honey could concievably have been taken from wild bees, I bet Tom knew a few bee-calming ditties.