Enemies

[davem]

So, I'm reading a collection of Kipling's short stories (I'd only been familiar with this writer through his children's 'Fairy' novels, Puck of Pook's Hill & Rewards & Fairies up till now, so I was unfamiliar with his reputation of 'right wing, proto-Fascist celebrator of the British Empire'). Being very impressed with the stories I today picked up a volume of his Collected Poems, & in the Introduction came across an interesting passage about one of the Barrack Room Ballads:

’E rushes at the smoke when we let drive,
An’, before we know, ’e’s ’ackin’ at our ’ead;
’E’s all ’ot sand an’ ginger when alive,
An’ ’e’s generally shammin’ when ’e’s dead.
’E’s a daisy, ’e’s a ducky, ’e’s a lamb!
’E’s a injia-rubber idiot on the spree,
’E’s the on’y thing that doesn’t give a d**n
For a Regiment o’ British Infantree!

The marks of non-standard diction would suggest some kind of realism. It is true that a certain appreciation of a worthy opponent can be found, in favourable circumstances, among British & other soldiers, & there is a respectable tradition behind the speaker's sense of proffessional duty to give praise where praise is duue - especially tp opponents whose own military organisations do not adequately provide for public recognition & commemoration of exceptional valour.

’E ’asn’t got no papers of ’is own,
’E ’asn’t got no medals nor rewards,
So we must certify the skill ’e’s shown
In usin’ of ’is long two-’anded swords (RT Jones: Collected Poems of Rudyard Kipling)

Now, the poem itself is difficult reading in some ways - (you can read it here - but the poem is not the point of this thread. It was the point the writer made about the respect shown for the enemy - he may be an 'eathen, but by his reckless courage he broke the British Square (infantry formation in battle) & his courage was therefore deserving of both respect & commemoration.

It struck me very forcibly that the enemies encountered by the heroes in Tolkien's work are never shown as deserving of respect - the heroes never face a brave, heroic enemy who is deserving of respect for his courage & resourcefulness & self sacrifice. The enemies are cowardly, win by cheating (either overwhelming numbers or magic or trickery).

Ok, you say, the enemies are in the service of absolute evil & we shouldn't expect them to be portrayed as in any way heroic. Yet, the reality of our world is different. In wartime there are heroes & villains on both sides. I note that when Tolkien first began writing his tales & developing his languages during WWI the Germans were associated with words in Qenya (sic) for monsters & demons, but soon, even during the conflict, this changed.

So, Tolkien's heroes never face an enemy they can respect as a 'worthy opponent'. This , of course, plays up the 'good' vs 'evil' dimension, but what does effect does it have on the heroes themselves - does this constant battle against oppenents who are cruel, vicious, vindictive & evil affect the way they think of themselves? If the enemy they faced was a worthy opponent, with right (to some degree) on their own side, would this make the fight they fought both more 'honourable' & more tragic?

All through the ages of Arda the enemy the heroes face is literally 'vermin' to be eradicated.

Actually, thinking about it, the closest we come is Sam's speculation about the Southron - yet we are never told that Sam is right in his speculation.

So, enemies, & the effect the type of enemy he faces has on the hero. Would the story affect us in the same way if it was a case of two sides, both of whom are to some degree in the right, & would such a war affect the heroes - make them more doubtful of the morality of their actions?

We're told often that the Legendarium is a War Story - yet to what extent does it truly reflect war in our world - & more personally, how does it affect our perception of war generally? Are we lead down the dangerous road of thinking (even subconsciously) of our 'enemies' as Orcs, rather than as (whatever the rights & wrongs of their cause) 'heroes' in their own way, whose reckless courage may 'break the British Square' & is deserving of acknowledgement for that (if for that alone).

So, lots of questions there. Any thoughts?

[Sir Kohran]

During ROTK, aren't we told that the Southrons proudly fought to the death? They sound like 'respectable opponents', especially when one considers the cowardice of the Orcs in fleeing. Also, if they had been truly evil, then Aragorn could never had made peace with them after the war. Of ocurse, then we get a different problem - the Southrons aren't really evil - they are essentially forced to fight for Sauron. I get the impression that had they been situated nearer Gondor, they would have fought with them, instead of Sauron.

So yes, it does seem impossible to rectify the 'worthy opponent' with the selfish, crude scum that serve Sauron. Anyone else got any thoughts?

[Mithalwen]

I often think about this and it surely deeply linked with the nature of orcs and the problems that create. Killing an orc is regarded on the level of swatting a fly - less even since surely having a game in which you competed to kill the most flies would be regarded as a little tasteless. Yet somewhere I seem to remember there is a conversation between a couple of orcs about what they would like to do when the war is over which humanises them a little...

[The 1,000 Reader]

In Middle-Earth, it is the slimy, cowardly figures who cause all of the problems in the world, which is why there is no worthy opponent for the men, elves, and dwarves to fight. Orcs are disgusting things that kill each other for a shirt. The men of Harad and Rhun were convinced that Sauron was a Eru-esque god and were twisted over the ages. Therefore, Middle-Earth was far more black and white than any place, despite Gandalf's philisophical words.

[davem]

Of course - Tolkien sets up a situation where the 'bad' guys are (in most cases) irredeemably 'BAD', or deluded by Sauron. The Uruks who attack Helm's Deep are accused of 'reckless hate', not 'reckless courage'. And perhaps this is why the siege of HD fails to rise to the heights of the siege of Troy - there is no bitter & terrible conflict of Achilles & Hector. Aragorn wins, but he, & the rest of the heroes (& this is a central point, so I'll seperate it out)

have no need to feel remorse - yet it is his remorse that humanises Achilles & makes him a tragic hero rather than merely a 'superhero'. No-one ever questions the morality of the fight - because Tolkien has given us an 'easy (in the moral sense) war. Of course in such a war no-one on the 'good' side will question the morality of their actions - or even the necessity of slaughtering dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of the enemy, because the enemy deserve it, & there is nothing good to say of them. One cannot even respect their courage in defence of a wrong cause, because they are all cowards.

Does this situation actually reduce the heroes to a little more than Rent-o-kill operatives & make them a little less than fully human - they can slaughter without thought or necessity for remorse - Aragorn will never have to sit while the father of an Orc pleads to be allowed to retrieve the body of the son Aragorn hacked to pieces on the Pelennor, & Eomer will never have to choose whether or not to allow an Orc's sister to retrieve the head he stuck on a pole for proper burial.

So, our heroes can slay the enemy & never have to face the consequences of having taken a life - if only because the lives they take are not worth counting. There is no real horror or ugliness in the killing, & there is, one could argue, no moral or ethical growth in the characters because there is no necessity to question what one has done.

Yet, Tolkien had seen real war, seen real human beings riddled with bullet holes & blown apart (who knows if he himself had taken a life (or many lives)). The more I consider this the more it intrigues me.

[Raynor]

yet it is his remorse that humanises Achilles & makes him a tragic hero rather than merely a 'superhero'.

Although I really liked Achilles' story, it is nowhere near impressive as the task that Aragorn takes: the most gifted of all the living Men, going to almost certain death, so as to give humanity, what am I saying, life a second chance. Compare this to going to war to get back a wife, as a general reason, and most likely glory for himself, as was trendy among the "high heroes" of the day.

[davem]

Originally Posted by Raynor

Although I really liked Achilles' story, it is nowhere near impressive as the task that Aragorn takes: the most gifted of all the living Men, going to almost certain death, so as to give humanity, what am I saying, life a second chance. Compare this to going to war to get back a wife, as a general reason, and most likely glory for himself, as was trendy among the "high heroes" of the day.

Of course - & I'm not questioning that. I'm asking about the nature of the enemies he faces. In comparing the heroes Tolkien gives with the ones Homer presents us with I'm not comparing the causes for which they fight, but the effect of the fight on them. I still think the point I made stands - Aragorn & the rest never have to question the morality of the killing they do. Their enemies are not deserving of any respect. It seems to me that while the cause for which Tolkien's heroes fight is beyond question, what they have to do to achieve it doesn't require them to ask the deep questions Homer's heroes do. Which is possibly why Homer's work has a greater air of tragedy, because it is humans slaying humans, & the sin of Cain never arises.....

EDIT

Actually, we do have such a tragedy now I think about it - the Kinslaying - the only example that leaps out to me at the moment... And there Tolkien does seem to touch the Homeric heights: and yet while it echoes down the ages, it is not really dealt with in an Achilles-Priam confrontation.....

[Raynor]

I wouldn't say that Men never fight Men, nor that these mannish enemies are always unredeemably corrupt. Some of the inhabitants of Umbar used to be numenoreans too.

Beside this, another level of drama we witness in Tolkien is that of the deceptions of the Enemy which turn humans against each other or at least against good causes - whether this the lies of Melkor/Sauron turning elves against the valar, men against elves, men against men, men to almost side with Saruman, etc. It seems that these lies are one of the most enduring weapons of evil, with some of the most tragic effects too.

Edit: I also remembered this interesting passage from Myths Transformed, which may be relevant:

...though of necessity, being the fingers of the hand of Morgoth, [orcs] must be fought with the utmost severity, they must not be dealt with in their own terms of cruelty and treachery. Captives must not be tormented, not even to discover information for the defence of the homes of Elves and Men. If any Orcs surrendered and asked for mercy, they must be granted it, even at a cost.* This was the teaching of the Wise, though in the horror of the War it was not always heeded.

* Few Orcs ever did so in the Elder Days, and at no time would any Orc treat with any Elf. For one thing Morgoth had achieved was to convince the Orcs beyond refutation that the Elves were crueller than themselves, taking captives only for 'amusement', or to eat them (as the Orcs would do at need).

[Sir Kohran]

Yet, Tolkien had seen real war, seen real human beings riddled with bullet holes & blown apart (who knows if he himself had taken a life (or many lives)).

Yet he was disgusted by it. Tolkien hated 'real war'. He hated the slaughter of men; the waste of young life; the indiscriminate killing, the spilling of fresh blood; the mutilated corpses, the rats in the trenches; the madness of the destruction; the lack of reasoning for any of it. Real war is almost by definition a terrible war.

And at the same time, the German soldiers he and his fellow Britons were fighting against were in exactly the same position - real suffering humans, not Orcs cackling at the thought of murder. They were young men just like himself, with their own hopes and fears, their own losses in the trenches; their own desparation. They showed the same qualities and bravery that Tolkien and his own men believed in. They were, essentially, the worthy opponents davem has described.

So when Tolkien was creating his own war, he wanted a 'good' war - a war with clear objectives; fought for the right reasons; clear-cut heroes that knew what they had to do; brave actions everywhere; leaders that struggled alongside their comrades; men fighting and even dying for a better future. But none of this could work if the enemy were equal, 'worthy' opponents - if Aragorn had to kill Orcs weeping for their mothers, whilst archers mowed down desperate, helpless enemies in their thousands, as wounded, moaning half-Orcs were executed out of pity by the Rohirrim, as Legolas found a diary on an Uruk's decapitated body, and Gimli found a wedding ring on a Troll he hacked apart, then the war would lose all sense of 'goodness' - it would just be a fantasized version of the real war Tolkien hated so much.

So Tolkien gave it a more controversial spin - he made the enemies not just opposing forces but actual bad guys, who enjoyed killing and burning and were grotesque parodies of the heroes he idolized. It was acceptable to kill these monsters because it was right to - they were evil, malicious beasts who invaded innocent and normally peaceful people. Tolkien wanted to show that some wars were right - and also that wars should only happen when there is a good reason to - in this case, to bring down the evil, dominating Sauron. Otherwise, Gondorians and Rohirrim and British and Germans should all live happily in peace.

But wait! - there is an anomaly. What of the Southrons, the humans who were forced to march far from their homes and families to fight on a foreign field for a lord they maybe feared or even hated, and yet even then still made an honourable show of themselves, going down fighting? They sound exactly like the Germans of the real world, and Sam's bitter and sad thoughts on the slain Southron are all the more relevant and tragic because of it. To me, they repesent the Germans - the worthy opponents that should not really be suffering; that were going through the same torment as the 'good' soldiers. Tolkien was showing that even his 'idealized' war wasn't perfect - that no matter how right and justifiable any conflict is, it is still a conflict and so people on both sides will suffer, and that is the true tragedy of war.