New Republic Article

[The Mirrorball Man]

Originally posted by Carannillion:
Morgoth coveted and hated the creation of Ilúvatar, and if you read the Silmarillion - and read 'between the lines' - you will indeed learn the secrets and motivations of his heart. They are primal and basic, yet Melkor - being a divine life form - is also very complex.

As my old professor of literature used to say, if what is between the lines were so important, books would just be twice as long. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

Seriously, I was talking purely on a literary level. Of course Morgoth is a very complex being within the context of Middle-Earth. But as a character, he is quite simple, a very powerful force of nature similar to The Great White Melvillian Whale That Shall Not Be Named. We can invent the complex workings of his ego, but Tolkien did not write about them.

It's true, as a character, Morgoth is probably more developed and three-dimensional than Sauron. He displays some emotions, like jealousy and hatred. But he's not more complex a villain than, say, Doctor Doom. He's certainly not as interesting as Iago or Javert (or Duryodana, if we want to talk about mythology.)

[Mister Underhill]

TMM wrote: I think he failed, yes.

Just as a side note, while paging through Letters yesterday for info on another topic, I came across the letter regarding JRRT’s mythological ambitions. Seems he realized that his goal was pie-in-the-sky:

Do not laugh! But once upon a time (my crest has long since fallen) I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of romantic fairy-story -- the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the vast backcloths – which I could dedicate simply to: to England; to my country.

Whatever we may think about Jenkyns, I don't think that his ambition in writing this little article was to be remembered as one of the giants of the 21st Century.

Can’t argue with you there. His ambition seems to have been to earn a quick, lazy buck with some tabloid-style author-bashing. You’ll forgive me if I don’t feel inclined to show his opinions much respect.

And once again, Hermann Melville is a victim of automatic censorship.

Poor Hermie. I think he’ll shake it off. It’s interesting that you raise Moby D, though. Shall we criticize Melville for failing to provide us with an insightful meditation on the Nature of True Evil? I don’t think so, anymore than we should criticize JRRT for the same supposed deficiency in his work. It explores questions of evil according to its measure and no more. It’s not meant to be a meditation on the Nature of True Evil any more than Moby D is. The criticism here reveals more about the critic and what he’s interested in than about a deficiency in LotR.

[Thingol]

Well first off Moby **** is not an evil character, quite the contrary Moby **** is a metaphor for the power of God and the ultimate futility of attempting to attack God or usurp ones place in the universe. Sauron on the other hand seeks to dominate and destroy the entire world, all for the sake of gaining power. Gaining power is certainly not the goal of God, (represented by Moby **** ) he is already supreme. I agree with Carannillion that without reading The Silm. the reader can not fully appreciate the scope of the relationship between good and evil. Sauron has indeed made a great sacrifice for the sake of gaining power. He gives up the bliss of Valinor, he becomes trapped in a terrible form, and loses his humanity (he could no longer interact with other beings, save through fear and intimidation. He was once indeed beautiful to behold and apparently a very eloquent and convincing fellow). We do get a glimpse of this in The Lord of the Rings; Sauron sacrifices a great deal of his native power to create the One Ring. The One Ring itself represents the type of power (evil power) that Sauron possessed, not only enhanced physical power, but temptation and corruption. After Sauron is corrupted by Melkor he further diminishes his own native strength to create a weapon (The One Ring) that enhances his power to dominate others. Zeus' lust transforms him into a jealous, cruel and impulsive villain, while Sauron's desire for power transforms him from a beautiful, god like being to a hideous and terrifying monster. Mr. Underhill raises the point that I was trying to make at the beginning of the thread, just because The Lord of the Rings does not address sexuality or faith in the same in depth and realistic manner that other more modern novels do does not take anything away from the book. In one of my other posts I asked what people’s favorite theme in The Lord of the Rings was, in my opinion it is the theme of change. Tolkien’s elucidation of every theme that is mentioned in that post is brilliant. One can not ask what is the greatest book of the century because no two books deal with exactly the same theme in the same manner. A book can not really be judged on the themes it presents, it must be judged on how it presents them, and The Lord of the Rings does a hell of a job presenting its themes. What right does anyone have to say that the theme of sexuality is more important than the theme of change, that is merely a matter of preference. However a critic may criticize the manner in which an author presents his themes. For Mr. Jenkyns to criticize The Lord of the Rings for not presenting two themes in the modern sense(sexuality and faith, which are not even designed to be dominate themes) is ludicrous. I was also a little bit offend by Mr. Jenkyns' hints that Tolkien fans do not enjoy any other literature. This is not true of me and from the extremely intelligent discussion of not only The Lord of the Rings but of other books as well I can see that it is not true for the vast majority on this board. Maybe this is true for some fans, but not the majority. I’m sure there are Shakespeare fans that prefer nothing but Shakespeare, that does not mean that they are the majority.

[ February 07, 2002: Message edited by: Thingol ]

[The Squatter of Amon Rûdh]

I believe that I may have implied that I agreed with Mr. Jenkyn's assertion that

Tolkien is unable to convey anything beyond the fact of a psychic wound--no enlargement or transformation of experience, and no philosophy of grand disillusionment, either.

Whilst, as I mentioned in a past posting, I do not believe that these things are necessary in a classic novel, it is by no means fair to accuse The Lord of the Rings of the deficiency. As regards Frodo's spiritual growth, note the changing attitude to distasteful characters: in The Shadow of the Past he says of Gollum:

What a pity that Bilbo did not stab that vile creature, when he had a chance!

but in The Scouring of the Shire he says of Saruman:

Do not kill him even now. For he has not hurt me. And in any case I do not wish him to be slain in this evil mood. He was great once, of a noble kind that we should not dare to raise our hands against. He is fallen, and his cure is beyond us; but I would still spare him, in the hope that he may find it.

This change is all the more striking in that Frodo's words to Gandalf are spoken when Gollum's wicked deeds are only a matter of hearsay; but the later request is made of a character who has spoiled Frodo's homeland and imprisoned his friends, and who has just tried to kill him. Clearly Frodo has learned a great deal about the nature and need of mercy, as even Saruman admits:

You have grown, Halfling...Yes, you have grown very much...

If this is the nothing that Frodo has learned, I hope that I may learn so little in my lifetime!
As for the grand disillusionment: Frodo knows at the beginning of his quest that his story is to be no "there and back again", so one can scarcely expect him to feel disappointed when this proves to be the case. There is, however, a sense of disillusionment in the situation in which he finds himself, with his efforts unappreciated (he is far too wise in himself by the end to desire appreciation, but Sam feels the sting of it) and his home, long an imagined haven, changed beyond recognition.
Perhaps in this we may catch a glimpse into the mind of "a jobless soldier in 1918":1 Tolkien and many like him had fought a war of mechanical savagery for four years, enduring terrible hardships, wounds, sickness, horror and the loss of close friends. At home, they were accused of everything from incompetence to cowardice, so that by the end poets like Siegfried Sassoon were heaping invective on jingoistic British civilians, whilst the likes of Wilfred Owen were speaking with great sympathy about the German soldiery (as evinced by the line in Strange Meeting: "I am the enemy you killed my friend..." - the italics are mine). The attitude of many soldiers towards their countrymen at home is summed up in the following lines by E.A. Mackintosh:

'Lads, you're wanted, go and help.'
On the railway carriage wall
Stuck the poster, and I thought
Of the hands that penned the call.

Fat civilians wishing they
'Could go and fight the Hun.'
Can't you see them thanking God
That they're over forty-one?

Girls with feathers, vulgar songs -
Washy verse on England's need -
God - and don't we damned well know
How the message ought to read.

'Lads, you're wanted! over there,'
Shiver in the morning dew,
More poor devils like yourselves
Waiting to be killed by you

2

When Tolkien returned home, he was changed by his experiences, and the homes fit for heroes promised by Lloyd-George were nowhere to be seen. Frodo returns to just such a deformed parody of the Shire, tempered by suffering and tired of war, yet unable to rest and unappreciated for what he has already done. If he feels no disillusionment it is precisely because he has grown. The sadness is for Sam to feel and for the narrator to express, so that by his lack of complaint Frodo may seem all the greater, and his homecoming seem all the more bitter to the reader.
I wonder that anyone with any degree of sensitivity could miss this mood on a thorough and mature reading of the story, and for this reason I cannot ascribe such a reading to the Oxford critic.

1: Tolkien's description of himself at the time in his Valedictory Address (1959)

2: First four stanzas of Recruiting, taken from Up the Line to Death - the War Poets 1914-1918,edited by Brian Gardner (Methuen, 1967)