Unorthodox Heroes?

[Anguirel]

Of course, we can all tell when reading LOTR and the Silmarillion whom we are meant to like and whom disapprove of. Those who show humility and yet still courage, like Frodo and Sam, are feted to the skies. Those blinded by their own power, overweening and proud, like Saruman or Denethor, are doomed to ignominious disgrace or death. Then there are the contemptible, like Wormtongue and Gollum, Lotho Sackville-Baggins.

However, it seems to me that Tolkien is an author whose characters his readers feel free to disagree with him about. Many of us find Gandalf rather irritating; a few devotees want to marry Denethor. For myself, I idolise Celegorm, Caranthir, Curufin, and Maeglin. I know that none are nice, that all are dangerous, that perhaps inviting two of them to a Downer Dinner Party would be a bit risky; and first and foremost that Tolkien himself largely condemns them.

But in this way, Tollers really does act, not as an author, but as a mere guide to Middle-Earth, fully formed and chronicled already. We appreciate what he tells us, but we can disagree with him as we would with any other History tutor; I feel I have as much right to praise Celegorm as I have to praise Richard Coeur-de-Lion. (Lord-purely by accident, I've stumbled on how similar those two are...)

It is this, surely, that helps to explain the vast body of fanfiction and RPGing around Tolkien; other, probably lesser, historians at work, but even if inferior to the definitive scholar, still eager to get their theses across, their interpretations.

It might be said that this is a sign that, as critics so monotonously burble out, Tolkien's characterisation lacks power; that we can so easily agree and disagree with these paper figures, whereas in, say, Evelyn Waugh we have absolutely no choice, his masterful, bitter wit directing us exactly where he wants us. I would prefer to call it another kind of power; power to create a crossroads but let us pick the path.

What do you think? Do you regard going counter to the Prof as misreading or bounden right? Where are your blind spots, where your unusual passions? Or do you distribute admiration exactly where Tolkien does?