Tag: Lord of the Rings

That Should Be the Plan

photog Current Events, Trump , , , ,

Donald Trump’s All Star Barnstorming Travelling Medicine Show is approaching its one-month milestone.  And I think it’s fair to say its hallmark is that he keeps the hand grenades flying and that keeps his opponents off balance.  And kudos to him and his all stars for all their good work.  Bravo.

What that made me think of was how for the last fifty years our leaders have been keeping us off balance with one crisis after another.  There’s always another war or a banking crisis or stagflation, or COVID or Climate Change or civil rights or women’s rights or gay rights or you name it.  For all of my adult life we have had to forget about normalcy and prosperity and instead we had to give up our rights or our way of life or mortgage our future or our children’s future or lately our grandchildren’s future to save the world or destroy our enemies or cure some “original sin.”  It occurs to me that this is not an accident.  This is the means of controlling us and keeping us from prospering.

If Donald Trump and his successors want to save this country their assignment should be to restore this country to normalcy.  They need to allow us to get our feet back underneath us again and get back a sense of balance.  End all of the emergencies.  Give us some peace and quiet and allow us to live like Americans again instead of like serfs.

Fans of the “Lord of the Rings” know that the Shire is the most boring place imaginable.  All of the adventure and excitement happens in places like Rohan and Gondor that are full of battles against the agent of evil; orcs, trolls, evil men and the like.  But it’s also true that the greatest sense of loss for the hobbits is when they return home to the Shire only to find that these enemies have spoiled the boring peace and quiet of the Shire and replaced it with fear and danger.  Because what you discover is that safe, boring, prosperous, well-ordered communities are the only place where healthy people can exist.  Because they’re the only place where you can raise a family and earn a living and leave something behind for next generation.

And the only way to make that happen is to end the chaos.  End the protests and the grievances.  End the rancor.  People in the 1960s were always making fun of the 1950s.  They said it was boring and repressed compared to the sexual revolution and the revolution in the streets that came a decade after.  They mocked the bland image of Dwight Eisenhower as the father of the country overseeing a boring but prosperous nation chasing after and realizing the American Dream.

Well, that sounds just about like heaven to me right now.  Donald Trump and anyone who wants to follow him should be selling us on the idea that Washington should be moving heaven and earth to stop the chaos and give Americans a chance to be boring and happy.  They should arrange for the people in this country to have a generation when the priority is to earn a living, raise a family and maybe watch a baseball game on a Saturday afternoon without thinking about war, crime, or civil unrest.  The pursuit of happiness.

That should be the plan.

Sympathy for Sauron

photog Current Events, OCF, Science Fiction / Fantasy ,
Fall of Barad-dûr

The Compound has been invaded by an army.  They have occupied many of the high points and they have laid siege to the citadel.  Actually, I have a contractor doing major surgery on the foundations of an extension of the main building that was rotting out.  The floor of a room had rotted away and the only reasonable solution was to replace a column-on-pier foundation with a poured slab.  Suffice it to say that it is fiendishly expensive and extremely ticklish construction in that the three stories on that part of the building will need to be jacked up off the piers and the columns truncated to accommodate the new height of the foundation which will also be the new floor for that room.  I daily expect the whole building to collapse like Barad-dûr after the destruction of the One Ring.  Poor Sauron.  A ring makes a damn poor foundation for a tall structure like that tower.

But while all this is going on I’m kept amused at just how little insurance companies are willing to admit is within the scope of their policies.  Regardless of how much we pay in premiums their responsibilities are hemmed in by endless deductibles and limitations on liability.  Their favorite retort to almost anything I say is, “You’re not covered for that.”  It’s to the point I’d almost hope that a catastrophe would be truly apocalyptic so that I could see them cower at the size of their payout.  But deep down I know I would still be the loser.  You can’t beat these people.  Compared to them the Mafia are boy scouts.  Poor Sauron.  I’ll bet he got nothing from his insurance company when the Barad-dûr came crashing down.  They probably had a waiver for unforeseen termite or hobbit damage.

So daily I have to reassure Camera Girl that when all this is over, she’ll still have a roof over her head and enough money to buy us pumpernickel bagels.  She is extremely allergic to large checks.  In fact, she insists that I write all of them because that way it’s my fault.  In some sense I guess she’s right.  If it had been up to her, we’d still be living in an apartment in Brooklyn.  I guess in that sense she is the true conservative in the family.

When the dumpster arrived, Camera Girl was hopeful that the builder would allow her to use the dumpster to get rid of some of her least favorite debris.  We have a collection of yard junk that she hates with a passion; garden hoses, wire fencing, a couple of old garden swings and a large pool warming cover that is flaking apart.  I opined that the dumpster would be completely filled and probably filled again before the builder was finished but hope springs eternal.  But then I told her that she could get her own dumpster for less than what a contractor would charge her for interfering in his operation and that seemed to work.  She hates being charged more for anything.  She is a very frugal woman (thank heaven).

I wonder who got the contract to remediate the site of the Barad-dûr collapse.  After all that had to be some serious toxic waste.  I’m guessing it would have been dwarves that took the work.  They worked in metal and stone.  Surely, they could salvage something from the rubble pile.  Maybe they could turn it into Section 8 housing for unemployed orcs.  I mean live and let live, right?

Those who call houses money pits are completely justified.  Unless you yourself are a jack of all trades, the liabilities of owning a home are staggering.  But the alternative of renting is even worse.  I completely sympathize with the Millennials and Zoomers who are confronting the herculean task of trying to buy a home in Joe Biden’s America.  But without home ownership how can you truly know the joy of having someone knock your house down just to rebuild it at great expense.  God bless America.

Putting Up a Fight

photog Book Reviews, Reviews, Science Fiction / Fantasy, SF&F Book Reviews , , ,

I am a Tolkien fan and have been one since I was probably eleven.  The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, his lesser works, even his biography.  And I greatly respect the world-building he did in creating Middle Earth; the history, geography, the various non-human races and the tribes of men, even the religious underpinnings of his world.  I love his characters and their interplay with each other and the plot.

But I must be honest.  I find Frodo thoroughly annoying.  Sure, sure.  He carried the One Ring for the better part of a year and didn’t fail until at the very edge of the abyss.  And this after being poisoned by Shelob and frog-marched by orcs across the plains of Mordor.  Maybe that effort was heroic to an extent that we are supposed to revere it as an herculean effort for making it 99.9% of the way.  Maybe.

But that hobbit annoys the hell out of me.  Surely, I’m not the only one who has wondered, what if Frodo had been left behind and the ring had been given to Samwise Gamgee?  Maybe the whole thing could have been done in half the time.  Maybe on Sam’s less refined but sturdier shoulders there wouldn’t have been as much angst about the burden of the ring.  And one thing’s for sure.  Gollum would have been toast.  Sam would have put Sting through that homicidal proto-hobbit without further ado.  And that alone would have made the story shorter and less annoying.  Now you might say that without Gollum they wouldn’t have found their way in.  Well, in that case they hadn’t provided Frodo with enough information to get in.  So, put Aragorn and Sam together as the team.  Or Legolas and Sam together as the team.  Basically, anyone but Frodo.  I’ve heard that the dream team is Gandalf and an eagle but if we’re afraid that Gandalf would be too tempted by the Ring then just go with Sam and an eagle.

And if Sam had succeeded in destroying the ring he wouldn’t have needed to go across the sea to heal.  He would’ve gone right back to work clipping hedges at Bag End.  No fuss, no muss.  Sure, if Frodo had been left behind, Sam wouldn’t be inheriting Bag End because Frodo wouldn’t have to go to the Grey Havens.  Sam and Rosie would need to buy a starter-hole somewhere on Bagshot Row.  But the Gaffer surely had something socked away for Sam and the Cotton clan look like they take care of their own.

Now of course Tolkien had in mind that Frodo was the suffering servant of the Lord and Sam was sort of the batman or orderly for the more aristocratic Frodo.  This sort of synchs with Tolkien’s service in the First World War where an upper-class officer had a commoner for a batman.  And all of that is fine but I just wish Frodo had displayed a lot more pluck and grit than he did.

Would it have killed him to take down Shelob?  At least go down swinging.  Okay rant over.

Fifty Years in the Blink of an Eye

photog Current Events ,

Fifty years ago today J.R.R. Tolkien died.  Here’s a link to the article that doesn’t have a paywall around it (to hell with the Murdochs).

A very old friend of mine sent this to me.  Tolkien’s creation of Middle Earth has turned out to be a reflection of the story of western civilization.  Because at its root it directs us to observe the choice between the sacredness of normal human life; existence under the biblical precepts; under God, as one choice.  And the other choice is nihilism and the lust for power and control; the collectivist model; life under the god-emperor.

Of course in our real world we’re not doing as well as Frodo and company.  Saruman and the orcs are firmly in control of what’s left of western civilization.  I suppose you could say it’s not over yet but to analogize our situation in tolkienian terms, Sauron’s wearing the one ring, Minas Tirith, Rivendell, Lothlorien and Edoras have been burned to the ground, the heads of all nine members of the fellowship of the ring are displayed on spikes over the gate of the Barad-dûr and the last hope for the West depends on the work ethic and attention to detail of Tom Bombadil.

In the essay the author seizes on the religious basis of Tolkien’s creation.  And that is something that many people today miss or ignore.  Middle Earth is a reflection of the Christian medieval model of the universe with Sauron and his minions as the fallen angels and Gandalf as an archangel sent to stave off the end of the world.  But consciously or not, Tolkien was reflecting the crisis of faith in the West.  He had fought in the trenches of the Great War and he saw that his civilization was committing suicide.  And he longed for a time before the machines had overpowered us.  Things of course have only gotten worse since his time.  And the analogies have only become more apt in our time.

But Tolkien has provided a beautiful tale that can inspire and cheer our hearts when we have the time to read it (or now watch it on the screen).  Fifty years!  Where did the time go?

Enough of Gloom and Doom for the Last Week of the Year

photog Current Events, Life in Dunwich, Literature, OCF, photog's Corner, Reclaiming the Family , , ,

 

So that post I had up for yesterday was certainly depressing.  Well, I had an antidote for that today.  After getting home from an errand this afternoon, I had all four grandsons over for a viewing of the extended version of the “Return of the King.”  This includes my personal favorite scene from the motion picture series, “The Ride of the Rohirrim.”

There’s nothing like hanging out with my young descendants to cheer me up.  This was the first viewing of this decisive completion to the trilogy for the two younger fellows.  And there was much excitement over the visually impressive Battle of Minas Tirth.  We cheered on the good guys and laughed when the various orcs and trolls were splatted by projectiles hurled from the battlements.

Camera Girl, always the gracious hostess, provided grilled cheeses sandwiches, mac and cheese and desserts.  There were several pies, various flavors of ice cream, cheesecake and cookies available.  And this being a vacation week we all ate way too much.

After the movie ended, we debated many important points of Tolkeiniana.  I expressed my opinion that regardless of the violence done to the plot Sam should have been allowed to liquidate Gollum.  In all honesty, in the movie version, I despise both Gollum and Frodo almost equally.  Frodo is such a hopeless basket case that it defies imagination that Sam was able to finally carry him over the finish line to Mount Doom at all.  If they had taken along a ten-year-old girl instead it couldn’t have been any more pathetic.  I think if Elrond had given the ring to Sam, he would have chucked it in Mount Doom a couple of months early and been back in the Shire in time for potato planting.

My younger relatives seemed to enjoy most the scenes where Gimli and Legolas compete to kill the most orcs.  I have to confess the liberties that the movie makers took with the dialog around Gimli borders on the farcical but I will admit that sometimes the lightheartedness is a welcome addition.  Although I do draw the line at the dwarf tossing and elf snowboarding scenes in “The Two Towers.”

Eventually some of the discussions spilled over into arguments about the actual text in Tolkien’s books.  I had to bring out my copy of the trilogy in order to provide authoritative answers to questions like which were older, the Oathbreakers on the Paths of the Dead or the dead soldiers in the Dead Marshes?  As it turned out they were both from the same time period, the Last Alliance of Men and Elves against Sauron at the end of the Second Age.

And so, we ended the get together and I brought them home in time to finish their chores and prepare for the next day of their Christmas vacation.  But if life in this confused world still includes time with such admirable characters as my grandsons, then it can’t be all bad.  We’ll have many good things to do in the days and weeks ahead.  And I’ll get to see them grow up to be fine young men.  As for problems, well, helping family with their problems is what family is all about.

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 3 – The Various Races or Peoples of Middle Earth

photog Book Reviews, Reviews, Science Fiction / Fantasy, SF&F Book Reviews , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 1

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 2 – Tolkien’s Creation Story

In the Lord of the Rings and his other writings Tolkien speaks of races and peoples to mean what we would call different species.  The major division between the Children of Illuvatar was between the Elves and Men (the Eldar and the Edain).  Within these two groups there were further subgroupings that I guess could best be described as tribes or nations.  But the differences between Elves and Men are profound.  The Elves do not grow old.  Therefore, unless they are killed by accident or illness they can live indefinitely.  And even when they die their spirit is constrained to remain within the Realm of Arda which is under the control of the angelic powers, the Valar.  In fact, it is hinted at by Tolkien that eventually the spirits of Elves that have died will be returned to life in Arda after some very long time.  Men are mortal just as humans are on Earth.  In Tolkien’s theology men do not remain in Arda after they die.  Their spirits leave Arda altogether and return to Illuvatar outside of the jurisdiction of the Valar.

What Tolkien seemed to be mirroring with the Elves and Men was the distinction between men who lived before the Christian era who had no chance of redemption from the Christian perspective and those who lived after.  The Elves would be like the Valar in a way.  They could serve Illuvatar and share in the smaller creation that was Arda but within Arda they were not in direct contact with Illuvatar.  Men were meant to escape Arda after their lives and then return to Illuvatar.  Despite the profound differences between Men and Elves Tolkien allowed for the possibility of love and even children between Men and Elves.  But what would the children be, deathless Elves or mortal Men?  Tolkien decided that they would be permitted a choice.  If they chose to be Men then that was a final choice for them and their children.  But if they chose to be of Elven-kind then their children also had the choice to make and in the same way.  Now what this means to me is that any child of a Man would always have the choice to choose to be Human.  And I think this is because the Fate of Man is the higher fate.  The Elves are halfway between Valar and Men.  And despite the tremendous power of the angelic Valar their fate is less than that of Men.

Then there are the Dwarves.  According to the Silmarillion the Dwarves were not created by Illuvatar but instead were the unsanctioned creation of Aulë, one of the Valar.  When Illuvatar spoke to Aulë about what he had done Aulë realized that what he had created weren’t independent beings but only shadows of himself, puppets.  Aulë was about to smash them when he saw that Illuvatar had turned them into living beings with souls of their own.  This makes the Dwarves sort of adoptive children of Illuvatar.  I believe they are like the Elves in being bound to Arda and under the authority of the Valar.  And they are odd in other ways and always seem to be at odds with the natural children of Illuvatar.  They are not naturally evil but the properties that Aulë endowed them with put them at odds with Men and Elves.

The Hobbits are sort of like nature spirits that inhabit English folklore like Puck or Robin Goodfellow but based on Tolkien’s characterization in his books I have to say I believe the Hobbits are human.  They are mortal and beside their stature they are in all ways human.  Maybe Tolkien intended to make them bound to Arda like the Elves and Dwarves but based on the Hobbits we meet I wouldn’t think they should be left out of human heaven.  They’re just too human.

In the Silmarillion Tolkien tells us that the Orcs were made by Morgoth by capturing Elves and corrupting them through his evil influence.  This always made me wonder then if Orcs also did not die of old age.  We are never shown any female Orcs which is probably a blessing but I assume they must exist.  The idea of a corrupted race is a little hard to understand theologically.  For instance, it seems possible that just by chance, an Orc might be born that wasn’t particularly evil.  And if he managed to escape the evil influence of his tribe might live a virtuous life.  I’ve heard people talk along these lines and mock the idea of “good Orcs” and based on what we see in the Lord of the Rings it does seem patently ridiculous but since Tolkien was a Christian writer, I’m sure he thought about that possibility.  Suffice it to say that no “good Orcs” ever show up anywhere in the Tolkien tests.

Dwarves and Elves are pretty standard creatures of Northern European folklore and Tolkien adapted as needed for his use but one of the most original characters that Tolkien place in his Middle Earth was the Ent.  They are the “Shepherds of the Trees.”  They resemble trees.  They are gigantic in size and have great physical strength.  Their ability to rend stone is compared to a much-accelerated version of the action that roots have for infiltrating and cracking stone that they come in contact with.  Ents also appear to live indefinitely unless killed by violence.  But they can become senescent and become completely tree-like.  It seems that the Ents must be another race of creatures like the Elves that are restricted to Arda forever.  But from their description in the Silmarillion, they are never described as Children of Illuvatar.  Possibly Tolkien never left any notes about the status of the Ents because he invented them later on than the Elves and Dwarves.  Whatever their place in the theology of Middle Earth Tolkien designed them with a distinctive and entertaining character.  They are extremely slow and methodical in their actions and extremely long winded in their method of speech.  They think of normal action by any other race as extremely hasty.  This must be to mimic the immobility and permanence of trees in the landscape.

And finally, the last of the other major peoples of Middle Earth are the Trolls.  Trolls are a well-known creature of legend but how Tolkien fits them into his creation is not well defined.  I can remember hearing the explanation that they were Ents that were twisted by Morgoth into evil creatures just as the Elves were turned into Orcs.  Honestly this seems singularly unconvincing.  There doesn’t seem to be much Ent-like character to Trolls.  But I haven’t heard any other explanation so I’ll just leave this as a loose end.  In addition to being evil the main character trait of Trolls seems to be stupidity.  But they are enormously strong and tough so they come in handy for war scenes when something special is needed.

Based on the status of the various races of speaking peoples in Middle Earth what it seems is that Tolkien has Christianized the folklore creatures of Norse mythology by giving them a place in the Genesis story of his world, Middle Earth.  It is not at all clear what the final status is of the Elves, Dwarves, Ents or even the Orcs and Trolls.  They seem to have souls like men and are judged on their deeds, good and evil.  But it is far from clear whether even the Elves can gain Paradise in this theology.  Instead, they seem to be permanently attached to sub-creation of the Valar, the Kingdom of Arda.  And that may be Tolkien’s intention.

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 2 – Tolkien’s Creation Story

photog Book Reviews, Reviews, Science Fiction / Fantasy, SF&F Book Reviews , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 1

 

J. R. R. Tolkien was a devout Christian. He was a member of an informal Christian writer’s society called The Inklings that also included the likes of his old friend C. S. Lewis. In fact, Lewis and Tolkien had planned to divide between them a project to write fantasy and science fiction stories with a Christian world view.  Tolkien decided his story would go back to an earlier time and Lewis decided to go into outer space.

Getting back to Tolkien, when he started writing the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings, he was able to set it in a world for which he had long ago written the Genesis story.  All of this background was finally published after his death by his son Christopher as the Silmarillion.  In this pre-history we are told that God (or as Tolkien called him Eru (The One) or Illuvatar (Father of All)) created the angels (the Ainur which are divided between the archangels (Valar) and the lesser angels (Maiar)).  Then He created the Universe (Ea) and particularly our world (Arda) and allowed the Ainur to build out the place where His children, the Elves and Men, would live.  Some of those Ainur were loyal to Illuvatar and some were corrupted with the idea of power over lesser beings.  The chief of these renegades was Melkor, originally the most powerful Valar, the equivalent of Lucifer.  He leads the fallen Ainur against the Valar and is defeated.  Later on, he is thought rehabilitated and brought back into the fold by the leader of the Valar, Manwe.

The Valar are supposed to teach the children of Illuvatar about Him and help them reach their potential in goodness.  And they attempt to do this with the Elves, the firstborn of the two races.  They bring them into the Blessed Realm where the Valar live and teach them the knowledge that they possess.  But even in this Blessed Realm, Melkor plots to destroy the happiness of the Elves and Valar.  He destroys the Trees that give light to Arda and steals the jewels, the Silmarils of Feanor, that contain the light of the trees.  Feanor, who is the most powerful and proudest of the Elves, disobeys the command of Manwe and sails from the Blessed Realm back to Middle Earth to defeat Melkor (or as he now names him Morgoth, Black Enemy of the World) and regain the Silmarils.  For this rebellion all of the Elves and Men in Middle Earth are left to the nonexistent mercy of Morgoth.  Essentially, they fight without the help of the Valar.

And in this rebellion of the Elves against the Valar is the start of the downfall of the world of Elves and Men.  For when Men appear, they too are drawn into wars against Morgoth and in these wars they all are thoroughly defeated and immiserated by the powers of evil beings.  Finally, a representative of Elves and Men, Earendil sails back to the Blessed Realm and successfully begs the Valar to defeat Morgoth and allow the peoples of Middle Earth to reclaim their lives.  And this is done.  Morgoth is defeated and cast out of Arda forever.

But in time evil reappears in the person of Morgoth’s lieutenant, Sauron.  He pretends to mend his ways but instead corrupts some of the Elves with the lure of knowledge and power and teaches them to forge rings of power.  Then he creates the One Ring to rule all of these lesser rings and makes war on Men and Elves for the mastery of Middle Earth.  But he is defeated by the Numenoreans.  These are the descendants of the Men who fought against Morgoth in that earlier war and were rewarded with a great island home, Numenor, halfway between Middle Earth and the Blessed Realm.  They were also rewarded with a lifespan three times that of mortal men.  They come to Middle Earth with a great army and defeat Sauron and take him captive.  But Sauron corrupts his captors too.  Fear of death was always the weakness of the Numenoreans.  They were friends of the Elves but they envied their virtually endless lifespan.  When the King of Numenor began to feel the end of his life approaching he gave heed to Sauron who told him he could wrest eternal life from the Valar by conquering the Blessed Realm.  When he attempts this war, the Valar, rather than be forced to kill Illuvatar’s children themselves, call on Him to act directly.  Illuvatar alters the world to remove the Blessed Realm from the physical plane of the world.  In fact, instead of a flat plane, the Earth now becomes a spherical globe from which only ships with special dispensation can any longer sail to the blessed Realm.  But this power is still reserved to the Elves in Middle Earth.  When they grow weary of the mortal lands, they can sail off the western shore of Middle Earth and find their way to the Blessed Realm which is now considered the proper home for the Elves.

As part of this reshaping and as a direct punishment for their sin, Numenor sinks below the sea.  Only the Numenoreans that had settled in Middle Earth and a few ships of the faithful who were not party to the King’s blasphemy were able to escape the downfall.  It is this remnant along with the remaining Elves in Middle Earth who now have to deal with Sauron.  Because when Numenor sank he lost his material form but his spirit returned to Middle Earth and joining to the One Ring which he had left in Middle Earth he was able to reform his body and then renew his war against Elves and Men.  And once again Elves and Men were victorious against him, though at a terrible cost.  The Kings of the Elves and Men, Gil-galad and Elendil are slain by Sauron along with the remaining strength of the Elves.  But Elendil’s son Isildur cuts the One Ring from Sauron’s hand, causing him to lose form again.  But Isildur refused to destroy the One Ring and it was lost in the Great River, Anduin.  And because it was not destroyed Sauron retuned and plagued Middle Earth until the time of the War of the Ring which is the subject matter of The Lord of the Rings.  And all down their long history the descendants of Elendil recreated the sins of their ancestors in Numenor and sought power and long life rather than wisdom and happiness.

Wow, that’s a long prologue.

If you look over that history what you’ll notice is that it parallels the Old Testament.  Of course, there are differences.  Fantasy elements like elves, and silmarils don’t occur in the Bible.  But you can find analogs for both types of angels, good and evil.  There is a flood sent to wipe out transgressors.  And the majority of the text describes a chosen people who forget their responsibilities and choose power and lust for earthly possession over wisdom and love.  And behind all of the misery stands Lucifer and his successful temptation of Adam and Eve.  And that is the basis for the story of Morgoth and Feanor and also the story of Sauron and the elven ringsmiths.  They were tempted by the lure of forbidden knowledge to trust the devil.

Tolkien wanted a fantasy history of the world that would allow him to incorporate the elves, goblins, dwarves and other creatures that inhabit European folklore.  But he wanted it to be a Christian universe.  And that is what he built.  In this world men must contend with a world in which evil is always present but can be defeated by the good people if they stand up against it and don’t allow the evil within themselves to corrupt their intentions.

And in the Lord of the Rings this can be seen in the fact that all of the greatest of the leaders of the good are afraid to even touch the Ring lest it corrupt them too.  It is only the simplest and least sophisticated of creatures, the hobbits, that can resist the ring the longest.

Casting this worldview behind the story allowed Tolkien the direction he needed to expand the Lord of the Rings into the epic length story it is.  In each of the chapters it is the challenge to ignite in each of the allies they meet, the determination to fight the evil no matter how impossible the odds may seem.  Often it is the simple hobbits declaring their simple-minded faith in doing the right thing that shames the sophisticated and jaded leaders who up until that point are almost relieved to surrender and allow evil to win the day.

And having the Christian framework behind the story also gives a sense of the familiar world that most of us have grown up with.  And also allows it to act as a contrast to the monstrous evil that Frodo and the other hobbits encounter.  So, although Tolkien’s story may resemble other fantasy worlds with respect to the creatures that inhabit it and the magic that exists, he has added a spiritual dimension that he believed would render the stories valid in a deeper sense.  From his point of view, they were in a sense true stories because they conveyed his understanding of how God interacted with mortals and angels in the actual world.  Interesting idea.

 

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 3 – The Various Races or Peoples of Middle Earth

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 1

photog Book Reviews, Reviews, Science Fiction / Fantasy, SF&F Book Reviews , , , , , , ,

Tonight, I was looking through my old posts to see if I had any unfinished series that I should continue on.  About three and a half years ago I wrote the first part of a review of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movie series.  I called it “Tolkien: A Very, Very Long Story – Part 1 – On the Screen vs. the Mind’s Eye.”  That’s a good name for a review of the Jackson films.  But going over it, I realized that starting with the films would short circuit an enormous amount of material in the books that I would much rather discuss first.  So that is what I’m going to do.  When I get back to the movies, I’ll reference these posts on the books as a baseline for my opinions on Tolkien and his remarkable creation.

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I read the Lord of the Rings over fifty years ago.  Over time some of my opinions of the work have changed somewhat.  But my enjoyment of the story remains intact.  The world building that Tolkien did provides the reader with depth and scope to enjoy the story on several levels.  There is the quest for the destruction of the Ring.  There is the story of Aragorn.  There is the fading of the elves and the other non-human beings.  There is the mission of the wizards.  There is the Shire.  And most of all there is the War of the Ring.  And under all these themes we have the panorama of Middle Earth.  The quaint Shire, the lonely wilds of Eriador, the harrowing heights and abysmal depths of the Misty Mountains.  The grassland of Rohan, the grandeur of Gondor and the shadowy horror of Mordor.  Tolkien brings all these things alive in our minds.  And he populates this world with a crowd of characters of all manner of creatures.  We have several kinds of men and we have several kinds of elves.  We have dwarves and hobbits.  There are wizards and orcs and trolls and ents.  There are undead creatures and intelligent animals of several types; wargs (a kind of wolf), eagles and even an ancient and giant spider.

All of these creatures, wizards, elves, dwarves and orcs are now common characters in all the fantasy books and movies around.  But people forget that Tolkien was the one who resurrected these creatures from fairy tales and returned them to the level of mythical creatures full of menace and wonder.  The Lord of the Rings was the template for every epic fantasy, both well-written or awful that has emerged in the last half century.  And not taking anything away from some well-crafted creations that some talented writers have produced, none of them has displaced Middle Earth as the touchstone of this particular type of fantasy world.  Because Middle Earth is the creation of a worldview that incorporates the myths of northwest Europe and imbues them with the moral philosophy inherited from medieval Christianity.  The Shire is Britain.  Rohan is the Germanic Tribes.  Gondor is the legendary Roman Empire, once spanning Middle Earth from Britain to the Near East now ceding territory to younger tribes and hedged in by Eastern and Southern foes.  Mordor is the infidel barbarism at the edges of the world.  Tolkien was a gifted philologist and historian of medieval Europe with a deep and wide knowledge of its literature and folklore.  And he was a devout Christian.

This re-imagining of European history with the non-human peoples and the angelic and demonic creatures that are analogs of Christian theology make a very powerful mythic background to fill out the story of Frodo and his friends.  And that is the point I want to make in this introduction.  In future installments I’ll give my thoughts on various aspects of Tolkien’s story.  Since they’re my opinions I won’t apologize if I commit any sins against the Tolkien orthodoxies.  I’ve been thinking about this stuff for a very long time so I feel I have the right to have my say.  But I also welcome comments both agreeing and disagreeing with my opinions.

 

The Lord of the Rings – A Book Review – Part 2 – Tolkien’s Creation Story

When Your Eyes Are Finally Opened

photog Current Events, OCF, Trump , , , , , , ,

‘Now, Théoden son of Thengel, will you hearken to me?’ said Gandalf.  …  ‘I bid you come out before your doors and look abroad.  Too long have you sat in shadows and trusted to twisted tales and crooked promptings.

‘It is not so dark here’ said Théoden. … ‘Dark have been my dreams of late,’ he said, ‘but I feel as one new-awakened.’ … ‘What is to be done?’

― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings; The King of the Golden Hall

 

Lots of friends and relatives on our side of the fence (meaning the non-leftists) criticize me for being too optimistic.  They acknowledge that Donald Trump has altered the landscape in a revolutionary way.  They admit that progress has been made.  But they stress that things are still almost hopeless.  They stress the lopsided progressive advantage among millennials and immigrants.  They remind me just how razor thin were the margins in the 2016 elections and the election fraud that is sure to be unleashed in 2020.  And on and on and on.  And all these things are true.

But there is one change that is not a matter of degrees but rather a binary change from unknown to known.  And that is the knowledge of why we always lost.

I’ve been a fan of the Lord of the Rings for about half a century.  Because of this I often find myself using analogies from that book to explain and illuminate logical points I want to make.  Admittedly, from a strictly logical perspective, it’s an unjustifiable practice.  And when viewed by those unfamiliar with Tolkien’s work it’s a counterproductive practice.  But you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

Thinking about our situation currently I am drawn to the scene in the Lord of the Rings where Gandalf enters Meduseld and is confronted by Théoden, the King of Rohan and Grima Wormtongue.  Grima is the king’s chief counsellor and an agent of Saruman the Evil Wizard.  Grima has poisoned Théoden’s mind against his own family and provides counsel to the king that flatters him but always leads to the worsening of Rohan’s position.  The king is bowed down by despair.  His only son has recently been killed in battle and the enemies of his people are attacking his country at will from all sides.  His own kinsman is disobeying his orders and his chief counsellor, Grima advises him to accept the diminution of his power and the necessity of capitulating to his foes in order to survive.

Through the counsel of this traitor Théoden has mistaken his friends for foes and enemies for allies.  And in such a state he is constantly dismayed to see all his efforts fail.  Trusting Grima implicitly, he doesn’t realize that all his plans are known to his enemies and all the actions he is told to follow always make his enemies stronger and him weaker.

Then Gandalf comes along and reveals the truth to Théoden.  And once he understands Grima’s status his own situation and the experiences of the past make sense.  Now, that is not to say that Théoden isn’t indeed in an almost hopeless position.  He is.  But at least now it all makes sense and he can choose how he wants to make a stand without his enemy knowing his plans in advance.  Once the confusion of the false assumption about Grima is eliminated Théoden can see clearly where he is and which way he should head.  Without the misinformation being fed to him he has a better chance of correctly choosing a path forward.  And to complete the metaphor Gandalf leads Théoden out of the dark hall of Meduseld into the bright light of day.

So, that’s the analogy.  We handed the Republican Establishment victory after victory.  We gave them what they said they needed in money, votes and loyalty and in return they sold us out time after time.  They accomplished nothing and conserved nothing.  Their slow-motion capitulation to every Leftist demand has finally left us virtually strangers in our own land.

But that day, at least for me, is over.  Anyone who tells me that the only way to survive is through capitulation is working for the enemy.  Anyone who supports leftist social policies is by definition a Leftist.  Wall Street needs cheap labor so their Republican Establishment puppets tell us that even trying to enforce immigration laws will make us a minority party that will never win another election.  Then Donald Trump wins on that very platform.  We may be defeated in the future because of demographic change but allowing the fear of it to prevent us from pursuing our own interests is rank stupidity.  Cowardice and stupidity are not the qualities needed when you are in a tight spot.  Intelligence and courage are.  And with the world as degraded as it has become it will not be a short or easy job to return life to a normal state.  It will take years and it will involve hard work and even then, we may be beaten in the end.  So be it.  At least you go down to defeat swinging not just walking passively to the slaughter house.

So, my point is it is time to stop listening to the defeatists.  Even the ones who truly are on our side.  When some well-meaning Republican tells me that the only way to win the woman vote is to nominate Nikki Haley for vice president, I politely say that is a terrible idea.  Haley is a RINO who will fold under any pressure from the left.  She would be just as bad as a Bush.  The idea that we should nominate someone just because she’s a woman is the same bad thinking that has gotten us in trouble time after time.  Find someone who knows how to make the system work for us and back him.

Allow yourself to dream big and then try to do something positive yourself.  Red-pill a friend or a family member or an acquaintance.  Back a candidate that you think is good.  Build a platform where people on our side can share ideas and encouragement.

For those who don’t know the Lord of the Rings I can give a different pop culture reference.

 

“Well I won’t back down

No I won’t back down

You can stand me up at the gates of Hell

But I won’t back down

…

Hey baby

There ain’t no easy way out (I won’t back down)

Hey I, will stand my ground

And I won’t back down”

 I Won’t Back Down by Tom Petty