Lord of the Rings

*warming to my theme and leaning into the challops*: the hobbit trilogy is the only good product of this entire franchise, book or film or lego figurines or game

EXCEPT… this is hott shelob in the game SHADOW OF WAR

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Es7r8MuXIAcDaiP?format=jpG

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Es7r8MuXIAcDaiP?format=jpg

Aware that for anyone who has just seen the movies and thinks "these were good movies" this probably comes across as the worst kind of nerd nitpicking

But that is their fault for not reading the books tbh

Xp *meta comment redacted*

my feeling is all the very right things said above mean that sam and frodo split the bill for the hero slot. you can’t quite be a hero without a flaw or two that gravely tests and transforms you. sam is constant. but you also can’t quite be a hero if the reader doesn’t really empathise with you and for all of frodo’s qualities and personal struggle with the Ring there’s something not really grippy about him as a character. he’s The Bearer but what more? he stole some mushrooms one time? alert theresa may!!

frodo's recessiveness as an identification character for some (me) absolutely locks into JRR's unending 2horny4elfs problem = f is tolk's depressive pixie dreamboy

Frodo, as local hobbyist proddy landlord, is the nearest circle of that which is passing from the world.

Wizards, then elves, then bagginses- tolkien is doing the dwindling-proximity circle thing again but as gyac posts so well about above, its a mature look on loss and a celebration of what is still left to us

No shortage of heroes and different people will identify more or less with em all (tolkien not least himself, the he was hardly ever strider) but the reader is most likely going to feel most in common with sam almost from the off (even if he is cast as the typical manservant role on first reading)

Farmer Maggot did brexit obv

Frodo is very much exactly that; he is reserved and thoughtful and guarded and almost an archetype in some ways. I think he benefited greatly from Sam’s reflective love and loyalty.

"mature look on loss and a celebration of what is still left to us" -- i absolutely agree with this (yet as a reader i will likely never be mature abt it myself)

As readers we have no obligations, tg

sam’s fight goes further than frodo’s. for frodo it was about the destruction of the ring. but in that burnt-out last mile in mordor, sam realises that’s not enough for him. the saving of all of middle earth not enough! he needs rosie, and a fire, and dinner waiting. the job remains undone until we reach that last sentence.

He was still capable of those things because he wasn’t burned out from the inside by the ring. Frodo could never live a normal life because he was destroyed afterwards and it makes me think of Tolkien’s friends he saw return from the war in a similar state. You read about his service and the scars it left on him throughout his life and he’s both Sam and Frodo: he can never forget the things he’s seen, but he was able to return and love and be loved and live.

yeah hard to argue with that.

great stuff gyac and dmac:

Yes and no. I will basically go to my grave resisting the idea that Sam alone is the hero of LOTR. Frodo carried it the longest, you read about what it does and is doing to him. Only at the very very end does the Ring overwhelm him, and that’s at the centre of Sauron’s power, no less.

Which I definitely acknowledged! Frodo had the hardest, longest job, and paid the biggest price! That's why he gets to go to the West even though he is not an elf.

dmac said what I was trying to get at (re Sam):

he is the most immune to the call to dominate anyway (tho arguably in eg sméagol the lure of the ring was purely for possession, so again maybe what we are seeing is Sam as the purest in all middle earth or w/e).

The class awareness comes in here too imo, aside from a general christian message of want not for yourself etc

I don't think it chance that our everyman hero has the only name in the stories that i can think of that wouldnt raise an eyebrow in everyday life.

Also agree with the observations that Tolkien wanted to leave a sense of peace after all of the toil, war, and grandeur. But the other thing I always found interesting about the scouring of shire is while the Hobbits are triumphant and it affirms their experience gained in the war of the ring, Tolkien also makes it clear, and the hobbits (both the main characters and the people) realize, that they can restore the shire, but they can never go back to the pre-war of the ring shire, can never truly get back to the innocence and sheltered life they previously had. There is a bit of the apple of knowledge/growing up thing here.

Frodo was, from the start, loaded with intent and responsibility. He never expected to return, and didnt want anyone coming with him. Aside from everything else it's the two perspectives (and how they meld and support each other in the actual struggle)

Frodo- how we win

Sam- why we fight

xps yeah to all of it

I mean you can hang pretty much anything on it, and the beauty is (imo) Tolkien (both in how he lays it out but also in what we know of him biographically) allows us to do that, it doesn't sag nor stretch at all under the weight of any of this

100%. That war changes and you are changed by it, that you can repair but never. I think of how strongly his views come across in this wherever I’m looking at some jingoistic shite about the glory of war. Tolkien is very blunt about the fact that it’s still shit even if you’re on the winning side.

And xps yeah my point wasn’t addressed specifically to you, don’t worry, it is a point I have been stubborn on since I first read the series in my late teens. It’s been a long time since I read the books but I clearly still feel strongly enough about them to have all these opinions and maybe I should reread and see how I feel about them now.

*repair but never restore

Fucks sake i read you wrong in my usual rush through first time gyac

I thought you were *arguing for* sam as the only hero

Anyway its good discussing of a weekend imo whichever way

He was still capable of those things because he wasn’t burned out from the inside by the ring. Frodo could never live a normal life because he was destroyed afterwards and it makes me think of Tolkien’s friends he saw return from the war in a similar state. You read about his service and the scars it left on him throughout his life and he’s both Sam and Frodo: he can never forget the things he’s seen, but he was able to return and love and be loved and live.

― scampish inquisition (gyac), Saturday, January 30, 2021 7:53 AM (five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

great post

Interesting too to think of how the burden (toxicity?) of the ring seems to increase with the knowledge of the nature of it

Bilbo, tho not untouched obv, was a safe receptacle for it for many decades

There's also the (Gandalf's?) angle that a resurgent Sauron's call activates some element of this corrosive influence, but nonetheless those most aware of what the ring is are those most fearful of/desirous of/affected by it

Meant to post this earlier. My copies of the books in question:

http://i.imgur.com/EU0sh2G.jpeg

Was my aunt's from 1970 and obviously well-read.

Tolkien imo whispering that doughty yeoman classes are the safest seat of power, but look

XP good idea

Id the early 90s unwin (iirc) paperback of the three books + silmarillion but how would the man himself put it, lost to fire and flame or whatever, so now i rock:

https://i.imgur.com/lC40S6b.jpg

That looks so nice and proper.

This discussion has me ready to tackle some Tolkien I haven't read when I finish my current book. Maybe I'll read Beren and Luthien?

I was given this set of them at the time
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/510DQ2D1RJL._SX346_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

And I know everyone is going to be UGH FILM VERSION U PLEB but the appendices being separate as a volume you can dip into is really good

The appendices detailing the rest of the characters' lives would make a good low-stakes tv series, in an All Creatures Great and Small vein.

the trope that intellectuals be in more peril of losing their soul than doughty burgers working men or even yokels -- that deeper knowledge is a portal to mortal danger -- is all over the fantasy lit of the late 19th and early 20 century (see m.r.james passim for example)

in the UK some of it is burkean-chestertonian but tbh it goes a long way back and has several variants (it's also what the faust myth is largely about)

it's also -- super-hesitant to go far into this as i don't feel adequately equipped except i just finished the most recent hilary mantel, which delves a lot into the 16th century world of this -- a somewhat maybe catholic outlook? catholic of the period? as in, leave the deep stuff to those who've been properly trained, self-taught is self-doomed and so on, incuriousity is a kind of armour (hence sam > bilbo > frodo etc)

tbh not at all sure how much weight id want to put on this reading tho (well aware that the person likely to fall through the thin ice expounding it in present company = me)

https://www.mytolkienbooks.com/books01/pics/lotr28.jpg

I have these uh characterful late 70s Unwin paperbacks I got from the 2nd hand bookshop on the road I grew up on

Those are cool. I've never seen those covers.

Mark i think that could be read, without necessarily being placed in there

Ive also had a few different paperback versions of varying ages and origin over the years, tho i like the current shiny/weighty tomes

I first read these editions which I borrowed off my best friend and kept failing to return (hence getting gifted my own set of books):
https://www.tolkienbooks.be/tolkien-book-store/images/CLP0298b.jpg

when im back from shopping i will take photos of my dad's now exceedingly ancient (and sadly tatty) hardbacks

I rocked the Darrell K Sweet editions here in the US re my first copy:

https://external-preview.redd.it/0sMAKjGlZicmiqe9nE4fOFqiyAyoH2fUIU4UA3-OEyY.jpg?auto=webp&s=88578030d93f23440e35ec26f40534a589502c17

This has since...changed. Will post a photo later showing how.

the relationship of the ring to power isn't that it has it. it is it.
...
the ring is a trap disguised as an escape. the only person for whom it isn't a trap is the person whose desire is a world made-- like the ring-- coterminous with himself. the only effective strategy against him is fusion and renunciation. it's difficult because renouncing the possibility of exerting your will unimpeded can even for a hobbit be like cutting off a part of the self. but if you're not sauron, or final-stage gollum, it's not very much of the self. it is a strange thing that we should suffer so much fear and doubt over so small a thing.

― difficult listening hour, Saturday, January 30, 2021 1:52 AM (twelve hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

*white guy blinking.gif*

DLH is on fire and all y'all are GOOD itt.

Is this where I admit I never warmed up to Tolkien? Not my jam. ilxors talking about it is WAY more my jam. :)

I wish I were at home because I also, somewhere along the way, picked up a verrrry 1970s paperback fantasy trilogy clearly modeled on LOTR? Straining to remember the details but I'm about 80% the wizard's horse was ALSO named Shadowfax?

The covers were trippy iirc.

I am currently living the samwise dream of stove on, teapot steaming, feet up and about to open the red book of westmarch (ed. tolkien, from notes collected by b. baggins)

Oh never mind, it was this:

https://i.etsystatic.com/9030433/r/il/df6eee/1136028440/il_794xN.1136028440_7qc4.jpg

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/sci-fi-fantasy/the-completely-bonkers-world-of-niel-hancocks-circle-of-light/

Its no duncton wood tbh

"Hancock was a veteran of the Vietnam war and used his experiences in writing his fantasy books. His world, however, does not seem to have the automatic weapons and helicopters of that war.[citation needed]"

There’s something strangely, weirdly subversive about the original cover art
Created by the author’s wife, the original covers are just… well. Take a gander at the cover for the second volume, Faragorn Fairingay. Look at those tiny bedroom slippers on the floor—for the otter in the bed—and feel reality slipping away from you.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/sci-fi-fantasy/wp-content/nas-uploads/sites/4/2015/01/faragornfairangay.jpg

lol

faragorn 🤔🤔🤔

Ned, I remember those versions from either the bookstore (Waldenbooks RIP) or library.

https://i.imgur.com/4q0fHzT.jpg

those were my dad's and they are OLD: he was in on the ground floor as a teenager tolkwise and two of them are in fact first edns, plus all three endpaper maps have by a miracle somehow survived

they are also as you can see extremely er pre-loved and thus extremely non-valuable as heirlooms: the pictures in the hobbit have been "coloured in" aka scribbled on by some aunt or uncle as a tot and the three lovely deep crimson covers of LotR (paper jackets long lost) still bear the quickly wiped-up splashmarks of where mark s as a tot (with whooping cough) threw up all over his bedroom oops

(just between us if i ever try and sell them on ABE i will probably say it is spilled water)

That's awesome.

I have the same edition as gyac, but never actually realised that they form a triptych! Partly because the fronts also continue on to the spines and backs:

http://www.tolkienlibrary.com/tolkien-book-store/images/CLP0298.jpg

The appendices detailing the rest of the characters' lives would make a good low-stakes tv series, in an All Creatures Great and Small vein.

I mean, detailing is very much what they don't do - something that slightly complicates the Sam story is that one of the Appendices says that 61 years after he returns home, later in the year that Rosie passes on, Sam goes to Grey Havens and (rumor has it) over the sea. It's all presented as a chronological record, so you can read it that Rosie's love overwhelmed the PTSD, or that this was simply an option always available to him but not her.

(also of course the last chronological event is that Legolas goes to the Havens, builds a ship singlehanded and stripped to the waist and goes on one last gay cruise with Gimli)

I’m already 1/3 of the way through Fellowship (they’re just parting with Bombadil to skirt the Barrow-Downs). I meant to take it slow & actually think about the books as they progressed this time, but I find I can’t help myself hurtling through them — I feel myself fairly dragged along, compelled to page-turn.

I have, however, forced myself to actually read all the words mostly, as opposed to my usual habit of skimming long descriptive paragraphs & landing on the next bit of dialogue or action. Can’t stress enough what others observed upthread, that this book about walking is situated in a landscape so thoroughly imagined that it might as well be describing an IRL place.