The Hall of Fire :: View topic

In stead of launching an overview of this 'link' chapter, I thought I'd simply go into the aspect of pursuit and unseen threat, the enemy machinations.

While Tolkien gives us some more of his characteristic sense of history -"high they builded us" - and distance - Sam's confusion of the Mountains of Moria with Orodruin, an echo of The Hobbit - what gives the travelogue narrative urgency is the sense that the Enemy is vaguely present, just out of sight (I'm reminded of Kubrick's shots in The Shining, where you get the creepy feeling that there's something lurking just out of frame)..

Everything is watchful, no animals, no bird song (tho it is January!)- "it's quiet. Too quiet." Four times the something comes into view, but vaguely. The first is the "shadow" which passes over; the second the flock of crebain, which appear directed, and tied to Saruman, but whether the Co. hid from them successfully is left vague. The third, ramping up the threat, is the blizzard on Caradhras- but T remains deliberately ambiguous over whether this was 'enemy action' or an historically malignant mountain. Finally, (actually the next chapter), we have the (directed?) Warg attack. Wargs are intelligent, "Hounds of Sauron"- but is this a hunting pack, or a specifically Suronian intervention? And why do the bodies vanish? T again hints at a unified hostile mind, but never gets explicit.

The film's attributing the snowstorm to Saruman is a major weak point, another example of PJ just not 'getting it.' Because there is an aspect to LR, especially the actions of the Enemies (largely offstage) which perhaps moderns don't quite appreciate: lack of information.

Maybe because we live in an age of TV and spy satellites and reconnaissance drones, we 21st centuriates I think have a tendency to assume that knowledge is instantly available. But Tolkien was a WWI signals officer who worked with carrier pigeons and Very lights. (One of the many, many problems at the Somme was that HQ simply had no idea what was going on after the Tommies went over the top). If you wanted to communicate more than the most elementary information, you had to rely on a runner or dispatch rider.

And so in Middle Earth T was working in a world in which information was limited and very far from real-time. Look at this from Sauron's perspective: he had sent out the Riders in June, with nothing more to go on than Shire and Baggins, and the assumption that Baggins was a Gollum-like creature. The Witch-King didn't learn of Gollum's escape until July, when he met with the Nazgul of Dol Guldur, and there is no evidence of contact with Barad-dur. Sauron sent messengers in September, ordering the WK to go to Isengard- this change was prompted by Sauron's having learned of Boromir's dream and departure long after the fact.

After this Sauron was completely in the dark. He may have learned of the BR's visit to Isengard from Saruman via palantir- but Saruman almost certainly was no more truthful than he had to be. After that- Sauron knew nothing about where the Shire was, nothing about Frodo, nothing about the journey to Rivendell or the Battle of the Ford. Sauron first learned any of this when the Witch-king made his way back to Mordor, not long before the Fellowship set out.

So Sauron was groping. The most he had to go on was the existence of the natural choke-points: nobody could cross the Misty Mountains in winter north of Caradhras/Moria, and so to Moria S sent a detachment of Uruks. This ultimately would pay off, since the *first* fix Sauron would get on the ring would be after these agents sent bird-messages reporting the Coy's escape into Lorien.

Thanks, soli. I've stickied the thread (and unstickied the last one).

You make a good point about Tolkien's perspective about information-gathering. Although Sauron should have been able to have gathered more information from the Palantir than just what he gleamed from Saruman. The palantir was, of course, the true "eye of Sauron" and I have always assumed that he had obtained some kind of information about the Nine Walkers from that source. Still, I think the vague and ambiguous nature of the storytelling here is definitely one of it's strengths; it is part of what allows the work to mean different things to different people. As I discuss briefly in in Arda Reconstructed, both Shippey and Flieger talk about Tolkien's use of the technique of withholding information. Shippey points out in The Road to Middle-earth that this offers “the assurance that there is more to Middle-earth than can immediately be communicated.” Flieger observes in Interrupted Music that Tolkien wrote in a letter to Christopher that “it is the untold stories that are the most moving.” (Letters, 110.)

I wonder if there is any significance to the fact that Tolkien, being Catholic, chose December 25th as the date of the Fellowship's departure from Rivendell.

I have a feeling that there was significance. But I daresay we could argue till the cows come home as to what that significance was.

I chose then, and still do choose, to think it was The Solstice, if you follow me. Not so much the end of the old year, but the beginning of the new. But it certainly marks the end of the sun's journey for that year; for that one terribly long night, there is the fear that the Sun may not return, that the next day could be even shorter, until all is cold and dark forever.

I also think he chose the 25th rather than the actual date of the solstice to tie it into the commonly celebrated birth of the promised messiah.

A few more thoughts that occured to me as I reread the chapter:

Were Merry and Pippen really irate at Sam just because he sneaked into the council or because he sneaked into the council without them?

If Elrond's original plan to send Merry and Pippin to warn the Shire of the coming danger had been followed, could the desolation of the Shire as seen in the "Scouring of the Shire" have been avoided or at least diminished?

Did Bilbo really forget to have the elven smiths fix Frodo's sword, or was that just an excuse that he used to make sure that Frodo would take the "magical" sword sting with him?

Actually the original departure date for a long time was November 24, one calendar month after Frodo's awakening. T later shifted it back a month to make the chronology work: "Too much takes place in winter. They should remain longer at Rivendell." The date was then shifted to Dec 24; later it was adjusted one day to keep the 1419 dates intact (since December has 31 days vice 30 for November).

"As a matter of fact, December 25 occurred strictly by accident, and I left it in to show that this was not a Christian myth anyhow. It was a purely unimportant date, and I thought, Well there it is, just an accident."

But he was very much aware of the seasonal symbolism (it's in Letters somewhere); and he couldn't have been unaware that (*after* much date-shifting) it was appropriate to have Barad-dur fall on the Julian New Year (also "Lady Day" or the Feast of the Annunciation).

I have a Google widgety thing on my startup page that shows me the phase of the moon. It's waning gibbous right now, 99%, just past full. . . .

It is important. That moment after Lothlórien when Sam sorts out the moon phases and realizes they've lost track of time is just wonderful.

And keeping the moon phases straight gave Tolkien absolute fits! But he felt he had to get them right. Throughout his time-schemes he duly notes the lunar phases (w/ much correction) down the margin, and in the crucial period leading up to the Pelennor he even kept track of moonrise and moonset.

He does however cheat once- in the next chapter, when the moon shines on the ithildin traceries on Moria gate- it's impossible for a waning moon in the early evening. But Tolkien liked the scene so much he left it in anyway. And I don't think anyone ever noticed.

I certainly didn't, and I usually do. Maybe it was that he was so careful everywhere else. A lot of writers don't bother; the full moon can rise at midnight if it makes a pretty scene.

I shoulda figured. And yes, Christopher noticed it first (see The Treason of Isengard, pp. 179-180 and the LOTR Reader's Companion, pp. 278-279.)

There is one thing Tolkien does supremely well, although it is sometimes difficult to catch him "in the act" as it were, and that is to create a vast melancholy sense of loss, as time flows relentlessly and takes away much of the wonder of Middle-Earth. This chapter contains one example of this, with the Fellowship's visit to Hollin, sandwiched between their time in the still living Elven-kingdom of Rivendell, and their catastrophic entry into the ruined Dwarf-kingdom of Moria.

Hollin, where, we learn, that a race of elves once dwelt. Now - all gone. I love this:

Biblbo's song in this chapter, "I sit beside the fire and think", is one of my favorite bits of Tolkien poetry.

Reading back over it today got me to thinking about all of the changes that have taken place in the world in just my lifetime.

Many of the homes in the rural community where I grew up did not yet have indoor bathrooms (some had no indoor plumbing at all) and a few didn't even have electricity.

Just up the road from where I grew up there were many miles of farms and orchards which are now covered by housing developments and shopping malls.

TV's were black and white and recieved just a few channels through an antenna mounted on the roof if the weather conditions didn't interfere too much.
There was no internet and no cell phones.

From a technological standpoint, we have seen much progress over the last half century, but I wonder if in many ways we were not better off before.

I suspect that Tolkien would have agreed with you!

Any interest in continuing this discussion?

This is a busy time of year for a lot of people, including anyone in school, anyone teaching, or anyone with children in school. I suggest allowing some time for the crush of events to pass and things to settle down.

This discussion has had a hiatus or two, and yet it has always resumed.