What if Faramir had gone instead of Boromir?

[BalrogRingDestroyer]

I'm not sure we can say for certain that he'd have not caved like his brother (Boromir held out a long time against the temptation of the Ring before trying to seize it. He was with Frodo for a month or so (maybe more, cannot recall how much time passed, but they left sometime in winter from Rivendale and arrived at the Falls of Rauros sometime in Spring. And I think the Fellowship stayed some time in Rivendale after the Council and before they left, so he had the temptation there too. He also saw the seeming death of Gandalf in Moria and the fair land of Lothlorien and knew what, along with Gondor, would be lost if the Ring would fall into the hand of Sauron (which seemed all too likely as they were going into Mordor itself.) Also, it may have occurred to him as well that even if the quest succeeded, that Lothlorien would fade away as the power of the Three Rings might be broken as well. Also, he was facing the end of his family's control of Gondor once Aragorn took over. (In this, I think Faramir was proven to take it better than he would have as was proven in Return of the King.)

Faramir, by contrast, was only with Frodo a few days and only knew that the Ring was there for a fraction of that time. Also, by this point, he'd already learned how the lust for the Ring had brought his brother to ruin. Also, he'd seen Gollum and learned that Gollum had borne the Ring for a long time, thus could perhaps see that Gollum's long ownership of the Ring had contributed to his wretchedness. As far as I know, Boromir never saw Gollum.


Also, would Faramir have gone with Frodo and Sam, meaning that Rohan wouldn't have been saved from Saruman or at least prevented Merry and Pippin from being taken, also leading to Rohan falling to Saruman? Would Frodo and Sam have also been captured by the orcs thus sending them through Rohan and Gondor (and likely leading to lots of trouble by bringing the Ring there)? Would Faramir have fallen to the lust of the Ring like his brother had and the end result been the same?

 

[Olorgando]

Externally, Faramir was a later addition, "appearing" in Ithilien when Frodo, Sam (and Gollum, but he was away looking for food) were there (so after deciding to try Cirith Ungol and give the Black Gate a pass), as JRRT mentioned in a letter to his son Christopher, who must have been in South Africa for RAF training at the time (so perhaps 1944). JRRT already "knew" that he was Boromir's younger brother, but still had to "discover" much about him. So substituting Faramir for Boromir at Rivendell would have entailed massive re-writing.

And I also think that the breaking of the Fellowship was too established by then. Faramir going with Frodo and Sam would not have worked, as the whole point is that three Hobbits, Frodo, Sam, and the ruined Gollum were what caused Sauron's downfall. No matter how good a ranger, Faramir could never have matched the Hobbits for stealth. I mean, he would never have been able to navigate parts of the Dead Marshes that the much smaller and lighter Hobbits barely made it through. And once again, Henneth Annûn is a kind of "Homely House", a refuge along the way like Rivendell and Lothlórien, to give the Fellowship, here the Ring-relevant remnant, a breather. (In a perverse way, the same could almost be said of the Tower of Cirith Ungol). Boromir at Henneth Annûn would have made no sense, as he was supreme field commander of Gondor, so would have stayed close to Minas Tirith (in that sense one could wonder why Denethor ever let him go the Rivendell, except that he could not deny his older and much the favorite son a wish, however tactically senseless it might be (and never mind that the dream had come to Faramir far more often and earlier)).

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Yes to much of this. I believe Faramir would not have succumbed to the Ring; he was a "wizard's pupil", as Denethor sneeringly put it, and would not have doubted the wisdom of Gandalf and Elrond. I can't imagine him making a speech like Boromir's: 'These elves and half-elves and wizard's, they would come to grief perhaps. . .True-hearted Men, they will not be corrupted'. Faramir was all too aware of Man's fallibility.

The point, or one of them, of Faramir's character is to draw a contrast -- a "contrasted parallel", to use Shippey's term -- with that of Boromir. I mentioned Paradise Lost on another thread as an example of a similar situation; Boromir is, from one point of view, the ideal hero-leader: fearless, commanding, capable of great feats, drawing the admiration of many, including the Rohirrim, as Eomer's dismay shows. I wonder if many of them even knew who Faramir was.

But from the point of view of what we might call the "order of nature" -- the unspoken "Rules" of Arda, he is a mock-hero, in the same way as Milton's Satan. Faramir fought when he had to, but not for the love of fighting itself. It was, at least in part, Boromir's very obsession with martial prowess, with seizing the main chance, using any weapon, with "great alliances and glorious victories", that led to his downfall.

Part of the sense of loss we feel from the downfall of a tragic hero is due to a vision of what might have been, and Faramir gives us the counter-example: "if only. . ." is part of the tragic arc. Despite the author's struggle to finish the book, "here he came, walking out of the woods of Ithilien"; that is, even though Tolkien "didn’t want him", he was structurally necessary to the story, so the story itself created him. Boromir already had a "contrasted parallel" in Aragorn, but he is a Romance-hero; to put the difference in Northrop Frye's terms, he is "superior in degree, both to other men, and to his environment". Boromir is a hero of the High Mimetic mode, "superior in degree to other men, but not to his environment", making him "subject to both moral and social judgement", that is, a classic tragic hero. As such, he needed a High Mimetic character as a contrast.

I find it interesting that, as Aragorn completes his transition from Romance hero to High Mimetic King, so Faramir seems to change to something like a Romance character: certainly there's a fairytale-like quality to the suddenly blossoming love with a "princess", and the withdrawal to the Eden-like land of Ithilien gives the same sort of feeling. Other elements come to mind, but I'll leave it there, except to note that the Romance image of an "Eden restored" has its Low Mimetic counterpart in the Shire, the geographic opposite, and the restorations are presumed to be happening simultaneously, after the end of the Quest.

JRRT already "knew" that he was Boromir's younger brother

I wonder about this; how soon did the author "know" Faramir's identity? My impression, both from text and letter, is that he appeared, and "revealed himself" as Boromir's brother in the course of writing, for the reasons I outlined above. I don't suppose we'll ever know.

 

[Rivendell_librarian]

If Faramir had been in the Fellowship instead of Boromir would they still have gone through Moria and suffered the orc attack near the Falls of Rauros.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

With both the pass and the south closed to them, Moria was the only option open. About all the difference in the story I can imagine would be less grumbling from Boromir.

The attack on Parth Galen is another matter. That would have happened in any case, but the outcome could have been different: remember that the reason Frodo didn’t return was Boromir's assault on the Ring; that caused the panicked scattering of the company, and especially, Aragorn's absence when the attack came. Whether they could have fought off the orcs when gathered together is another question, but the presence of Anduril in the hands of the rightful king would be a weighty factor. At least they would have been in a better position to escape via the boats.

In fact, it's possible that, had Frodo returned in time, the company might have left the area before the orcs arrived.

 

[Olorgando]

This is getting deep into speculative territory ...

Faramir might have, instead of scaring Frodo up Amon Hen as Boromir did with his assault on the Ring, encouraged him to go up there. The only difference I can really see is that instead of "only" Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli chasing after the Uruks who had captured Merry and Pippin, Faramir would have been added to that company. And again, as I mentioned above, who would have commanded the troops stationed at Henneth Annûn, the sanctuary that Frodo and Sam (and indirectly Gollum) reached just before they entered Mordor? That's where, or just before, by JRRT's own account, Faramir "appeared" to him.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Good point. Had the positions been reversed, and Boromir been in charge in Ithilien, he would, at the very least, probably have acted as did "Movie Faramir"; at worst, he would have carried out Denethor's orders (much harsher than the contrasted parallel example of the concurrent "absurd law" issued by Theoden):

For I am commanded to slay all whom I find in this land without the leave of the Lord of Gondor.

(my emphasis)

And the result would have been as Gandalf said:

He would have stretched out his hand to this thing, and taking it he would have fallen. He would have kept it for his own, and when he returned you would not have known your son.

 

[Sartr]

I'm more curious about about why Faramir was 'chosen' in the first place. He received the prophetic dream first and often, while Boromir did only once (after it was described to him no less). And in Middle Earth, prophecy like that is seldom wrong and never just coincidence. He was specifically recruited with actionable commands (seek for the sword that was broken, in Imladris it dwells) Which is curious, because Boromir in his place was useful but never outright essential throughout FOTR. It was his failure and breakdown that got all the significant events in place: Frodo joining up with Gollum, Merry & Pippin meeting the Ents, and Aragorn in the right place to help Rohan and take the Paths of the Dead. With Faramir there instead, you can speculate any number of ways the party could have split up or moved on together, but none of them seem to make the quest any more likely to succeed.

 

[Olorgando]

From letter 66 in Humphrey Carpenter's 1981 "The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien", written 06 May 1944 to his son Christopher, who was in South Africa at the time in training with the RAF:
"A new character has come on the scene (I am sure I did not invent him, I did not even want him, but I like him, but there he comes walking into the woods of Ithilien): Faramir, the brother of Boromir - and he is holding up the 'catastrophe' by a lot of stuff about the history of Gondor and Rohan (with some very sound reflections on martial glory and true glory): but if he goes on much more a lot of him will have to be removed to the appendices. …"

At this time the breaking of the Fellowship has happened, Boromir is dead, Frodo and Sam have met Gollum, passed the Black Gate with him and are on the way to Cirith Ungol (still spelled "Kirith" in the letter). Faramir was a late addition, and all of his having been "chosen" but Boromir going instead is back writing.

Certainly, being an "Aragorn junior" (book Aragorn, obviously) as I have once called him, he would have been much better able to understand the message than Boromir - or even his father Denethor, being a "student" of Gandalf's in some way, also much to his father's displeasure. But I probably should take back "or even his father Denethor". Or at least assume they were equally able to understand "the sword that was broken", but they certainly would have reacted pretty much diametrically opposite to it. Faramir as a sign of hope for some kind of meaningful assistance from the secret remnants of the northern Kingdom of Arnor. Denethor, having become arrogant in the rule of his family as Stewards, the "Return of The King" part of their oath having become mere lip service formality no longer believed in, as a threat to his own rulership if threatening to actually become reality again. Whatever one envisions for what might have taken place at the falls of Rauros with Faramir being there instead of Boromir (quite a few possibilities), Boromir at Henneth Annûn would definitely have been a very bad idea. Squint-eyed Southerner basically made that point above. PJ, utterly unable to comprehend book Faramir, gave him a "Boromir moment" until that totally ridiculous encounter with a Ring-wraith mounted on a fell beast at Osgiliath (blithely ignoring that his idiocies had piled up a mound of problems between the three Hobbits at Osgiliath and Cirith Ungol that makes JRRT's look like a molehill).

 

[Aramarien]

As Olorgando said:

"PJ, utterly unable to comprehend book Faramir, gave him a "Boromir moment" until that totally ridiculous encounter with a Ring-wraith mounted on a fell beast at Osgiliath (blithely ignoring that his idiocies had piled up a mound of problems between the three Hobbits at Osgiliath and Cirith Ungol that makes JRRT's look like a molehill). "

Later in that scene when Sam says, "By rights we shouldn't be here!" I almost yelled out in the movie theater.
You're darn right you should not be in Osgiliath at all!!! Later, when Frodo tells Sam to go home on the stairs of Cirith Ungol, I almost walked out of the movie theater, I was so upset and angry!

But, I digress from the topic! I apologize.

The dream was "sent" to Faramir. He was called. But, I always felt that one of Tolkien's biggest messages in LOTR was about "free will" and "choice". Faramir could have chosen to argue his position to go to Rivendell instead of Boromir or even defy his father and go, but he chose not to. Of course, Boromir insisted, Faramir would not choose to defy his father, but the choice was there.

This is very speculative, and based on a belief system, but although Eru gives free will and choice, he may know what the choice is going to be. Eru may have sent the dream to Faramir, giving him the choice, but knew what Faramir's choice would be. Faramir had plenty of time to further ponder the dream and try to decipher it. When Faramir met the Hobbits, he was " warned" with the knowledge. He had seen Boromir's body. Because of this, it helped him to decide more clearly to help Frodo and Sam.

If Faramir had gone instead of Boromir, we can only speculate what would have happened based on what we know of Faramir's character. I feel Faramir would NOT have gone after Frodo like Boromir did at Parth Galen. He would have stayed with the rest of the group and leave Frodo alone. Would Frodo still have climbed Ammon Hen with the Ring on and have the visions he had if he wasn't trying to escape Boromir? I don't think so. He would not have had a reason to put on the ring in the first place. Sam knew what Frodo was going to decide: to go to Mordor, but would Frodo have come back to the group with that decision and would the group split?
Faramir would not have felt the necessity to go back to Minas Tirith that Boromir felt. Faramir would feel responsible for Minas Tirith, but being a pupil of Gandalf, he would understand the importance of going to Mordor to destroy the ring. Aragorn felt the responsibility of the Fellowship had fallen to him upon Gandalf's demise. Although Aragorn might try to persuade some of them to go to Minas Tirith, the Fellowship would probably not be broken and they would all go. Merry and Pippin would not want to be parted from Frodo.
Legolas and Gimli would go too.

I agree with the idea, that the group might have avoided the orcs and just had taken the boats.
Of course, all this is speculation and based on the conversations that the remaining Fellowship had while waiting for Frodo to return.

There is even the possibility that the Orcs would have captured Frodo when he was out alone. He may have taken longer to decide how he was going to tell them. If that was the case, then instead of the three hunters, we would have them all trying to track down Frodo. The ring would not have been destroyed.

 

[Hisoka Morrow]

Apart from all discussion, I wonder if the Fellowship would got lost in Mordor or not, seriously.
After all, without being tempted by the Ring screwing the whole original plan leading to the skirmish of Amon-Hen, 4 bad ass(Gandalf already done in Moria) would be well-prepared to end Glooum's show in the whole story like a piece of cake when he started stealing back the Ring, and Gollum might be far more familiar with Mordor than any member of the Fellowship for he's the only one tracked into Mordor during the recently latest decades when the environment of Mordor might be the most similar with the time of the Fellowship's operation, unless Faramir's military operation had infiltrated the heartlands of Mordor at the same period.

 

[Inkling]

Good point. Had the positions been reversed, and Boromir been in charge in Ithilien, he would, at the very least, probably have acted as did "Movie Faramir"; at worst, he would have carried out Denethor's orders (much harsher than the contrasted parallel example of the concurrent "absurd law" issued by Theoden):
(my emphasis)

And the result would have been as Gandalf said:

I agree with you, but also, I don’t think Boromir would have ever been content to stay in Ithilien. He would have still been closer to Minas Tirith, probably fighting in Gondor. To me at least, he didn’t seem like a man who appreciated the stealth of a ranger, but would have preferred open combat. Therefore, I don’t think they would have come into contact with Frodo and Sam.

 

[Hisoka Morrow]

aradise Lost on another thread as an example of a similar situation; Boromir is, from one point of view, the ideal hero-leader: fearless, commanding, capable of great feats, drawing the admiration of many, including the Rohirrim, as Eomer's dismay shows. I wonder if many of them even knew who Faramir was.

Faramir had been a big guy, similar to Boromir's deputy in the military already obviously, unless all his merit had been gained by office's job behind the frontal combat.

...who appreciated the stealth of a ranger...

Rangers were obviously closer to SF instead of merely scouts, just take a look at their suicide operation in Osgilithas. As an result, such bad-ass units like Rangers always in charge of hell-level missions might just fit Boromir's favor.

 

[Inkling]

So I know this only opens up more speculation on this topic, but also if Faramir had gone, Denethor would certainly have put a lot of pressure on Faramir to return with the ring. My question is how would that have played into it. (It’s been a while since I read the two towers so I might be missing something) However, in the movies we can see that Faramir is also tempted not only by the promises of the ring but by his father, and if he didn’t hear the story of Boromirs death would he have been more likely to try and take the ring?

 

[Olorgando]

Movie Faramir is by far the worst garbage PJ perpetrated, and we are in "The Works of J.R.R. Tolkien" or books section, anyhow.

 

[Barliman]

Good point. Had the positions been reversed, and Boromir been in charge in Ithilien, he would, at the very least, probably have acted as did "Movie Faramir"

Exactly what I was thinking when I read the question.

 

[Hisoka Morrow]

...However, in the movies we can see that Faramir is also tempted not only by the promises of the ring but by his father, and if he didn’t hear the story of Boromirs death would he have been more likely to try and take the ring?...

...mir is by far the worst garbage PJ perpetrated, and we are in "The Works of J.R.R. Tol...

Not totally, for strictly speaking, Faramir had been getting much higher chance to take away Frodo's Ring directly for too many times just before his witness the Frodo's mind control by the Ring, after all, it's his place, he didn't need to care anyone else would stop him like Boromir about to fear the other Fellowship member from doing so, of course it's another matter if Faramir's order to take the Ring was highly classified able to be known by Denethor and him only.

 

[Barliman]

However, in the movies we can see that Faramir is also tempted not only by the promises of the ring but by his father, and if he didn’t hear the story of Boromirs death would he have been more likely to try and take the ring?

Are you talking movie or book?
Movie - All bets are off and Faramir could have done anything since the movie Faramir bore little resemblance to the actual Faramir.
Book - I think not. I didn't consider he was ever seriously tempted.

 

[Olorgando]

Not totally, for strictly speaking, Faramir had been getting much higher chance to take away Frodo's Ring directly for too many times just before his witness the Frodo's mind control by the Ring, after all, it's his place, he didn't need to care anyone else would stop him like Boromir about to fear the other Fellowship member from doing so, of course it's another matter if Faramir's order to take the Ring was highly classified able to be known by Denethor and him only.

In the book (which is what we're discussing here) Faramir only discovers the secret of the One Ring when Sam blurts it out. And Faramir immediately dismisses any thought of taking it away from Frodo (while realizing what a sore temptation it must have been to his older, if relatively dim-witted brother). "Frodo's mind control by the ring" (with a Nazgûl on a flying Fell Beast in the scene, no less!!!) is among the worst garbage PJ ever perpetrated.

 

[Aramarien]

In the book (which is what we're discussing here) Faramir only discovers the secret of the One Ring when Sam blurts it out. And Faramir immediately dismisses any thought of taking it away from Frodo (while realizing what a sore temptation it must have been to his older, if relatively dim-witted brother). "Frodo's mind control by the ring" (with a Nazgûl on a flying Fell Beast in the scene, no less!!!) is among the worst garbage PJ ever perpetrated.

I agree. That is one of the worst scenes in the movie!! When Sam says, "By rights we shouldn't be here" I had to stop myself from shouting out in the movie theater , "You're darn right!!! You should be in Osgiliath at all!!!"
Faramir in the books confided to Frodo on the way to Henneth Annûn that he often spoke with Gandalf and was aware that Gandalf was studying the ancient scrolls in Minas Tirith. Faramir said that he would not touch anything of the enemy's even if it was lying in his path.