📖👀 Chapter 8 (📔Book VI): The Scouring of the Shire

[Rivendell_librarian]

Do you remember the dark months you held the sector at Mametz—
The nights you watched and wired and dug and piled sandbags on parapets?
Do you remember the rats; and the stench
Of corpses rotting in front of the front-line trench—
And dawn coming, dirty-white, and chill with a hopeless rain?
Do you ever stop and ask, 'Is it all going to happen again?'
Siegfried Sassoon

A hugely significant chapter.

'Yes, this is Mordor,' said Frodo. 'Just one of its works. Saruman was doing its work all the time, even when he thought he was working for himself.'

Ostensibly, in this chapter we read how the magnificent four hobbits deal with the petty dictatorship that Lotho Sackville-Baggins has set up in The Shire under the direction and command of Saruman. It certainly helps to have a map of The Shire handy as our heroes progress past former or closed down inns on the way to Hobbiton, and we then trace the movements of the opposing forces that leads to the climactic battle of Bywater. But there is much more going on.

Everything is on a smaller scale as we read of forces of hundreds, not tens of thousands. The two spiked gates are a much smaller version of the Black Gate of Mordor but are the first sign of the un-Shirelike changes that have happened in the year or so after they left. Bill Ferny is with the hobbit shirriffs but faced with these bigger armed hobbits he soon legs it. Even so, food and hospitality are hard to come by and our heroes soon reject the idea of laying up in Crickhollow, to press on to Hobbiton which is the headquarters of "the Chief" i.e. Lotho.

They are "arrested" at Frogmorton but leave their captors behind to meet the first band of ruffians at Bywater. They see the hobbits' swords and the different tone of our heroes and leg it back to Hobbiton. Frodo has worked out that Lotho is a pawn being used by someone else and we see the first clash between the merciful Frodo and the vengeful Pippin and the more warlike Merry. Sam has a sudden urge to visit Tom Cotton's farm with Tom being the leading citizen of Bywater, but is there another reason?!

Rosie's 'where've you been' welcome may be a sign of things to come for Sam but she did run after him to tell him how fine he looked. Sam's future is well and truly sealed. Farmer Cotton fills in our heroes with more information of the evil goings on, including the arrest of Lobelia Sackville-Baggins. A trap is laid for the Hobbiton ruffians who are summarily dealt with. Frodo delegates this initial skirmish to Merry to organise but again pleads for a minimum of killing and no killing of hobbits by hobbits, something that has never happened in The Shire.

But there are more ruffians in Waymeet. Peregrin Took takes off to Tookland for Tookish reinforcements Sam goes looking for his father and Frodo and Merry go to Tom Cotton's farm to make further plans and hear more about what has been happening, including the export of Shire leaf and the name Sharkey comes up. He seems to be the power behind it all. Pippin arrives back with his reinforcements from Tuckborough and Eowyn's horn proves useful for Merry in summoning local farmers. The battle of Bywater is fought and won but with 19 dead hobbits and 70 dead ruffians.

The chapter ends with our four heroes and two dozen sturdy hobbit led by Farmer Cotton make for Hobbiton and Bag End. A surly Ted Sandyman is dismayed to hear about the defeat of the ruffians. At Bag End, in a weird inversion, the anti-Gandalf, Saruman (Sharkey), greets our heroes at Bag End. We learn that the despoiling of The Shire was simply an act of malice by Saruman. The hobbits call for Saruman to be killed but again Frodo is merciful much to Saruman's bitterness, who fails to stab Frodo who is saved by his mithril coat. Wormtongue ('Worm') is with Saruman and in a twist Wormtongue cuts Saruman's throat and is cut down with hobbit arrows.

A grey mist arises from Saruman's body. It looked to the West but was dispersed by a cold West wind in a pale imitation of Sauron's demise. Saruman's body shrivels up like Haggard's She. Sam focusses on the clearing up that will need to be done whereas a thoughtful Frodo comments on the ugly irony of Saruman being killed at the very door of Bag End.

Discussion to follow.

 

[grendel]

Everyone seems surprised to find that the oft-mentioned-but-never-seen "Sharkey" is actually Saruman. But earlier in the chapter, when the hobbits encounter the small group of ruffians at Bywater, Frodo says this to the leader:
"Yes, I see," said Frodo. "For one thing, I see that you're behind the times and the news here. Much has happened since you left the South... And Isengard has been destroyed, and your precious master is a beggar in the wilderness. I passed him on the road."

He almost certainly seems to be referring to Saruman, and yet they (supposedly) had no inkling that Saruman was the new Chief. Is this one of those foolish inconsistencies that are almost impossible for Tolkien to catch in a work of this size?

 

[Rivendell_librarian]

Ostensibly this chapter is about the changes in The Shire since our four hobbit heroes left, and how they restore the Shire to an even better state of rural idyll. But. I think Tolkien is very much concerned with the changes in Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin. Merry and Pippin are much taller now and, having fought in major battles, they are well capable of meeting the military challenge of defeating Sharkey's ruffians. Sam's overriding concern is the fabric of The Shire e.g. the chestnut trees of Hobbiton. Frodo's concern is to preserve life at all costs and for the soul of The Shire i.e. the hobbits themselves.

Hammond and Scull fall over themselves to say that Tolkien was not a pacifist. After all he fought in World War One and there is nothing specific in his letters. But Siegfried Sassoon also fought in World War One, was awarded the Military Cross and recommended for a VC. He returned to England to recuperate from gastric fever and declined to return to duty, writing this excoriating letter to his commanding officer:

I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military authority because I believe that the war is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it. I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. I believe that the war upon which I entered as a war of defence and liberation has now become a war of aggression and conquest. I believe that the purposes for which I and my fellow soldiers entered upon this war should have been so clearly stated as to have made it impossible to change them and that had this been done the objects which actuated us would now be attainable by negotiation.

I have seen and endured the sufferings of the troops and I can no longer be a party to prolong these sufferings for ends which I believe to be evil and unjust. I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the political errors and insincerities for which the fighting men are being sacrificed.

On behalf of those who are suffering now, I make this protest against the deception which is being practised upon them; also I believe it may help to destroy the callous complacency with which the majority of those at home regard the continuance of agonies which they do not share and which they have not enough imagination to realise.

When Frodo tells one of the ruffians in Bywater that Saruman has been reduced to a beggar, the ruffian snaps his finger in his face. Pippin, Merry and Sam draw their swords and the ruffians head off to Hobbiton. Merry tells Frodo "You won't rescue Lotho, or the Shire, just by being shocked and sad, my dear Frodo". Not Merry's finest hour! Gaffer Gamgee berates Frodo for selling Bag End and his main concern seems to be his 'taters", but Frodo remains polite. Frodo is merciful to Saruman and Saruman has the wit to see that it is Frodo who has "grown very much".

I think Frodo's opposition to violence is really important here. Sauron was defeated not by using his Ring against him, as per Boromir, but by Frodo and others being merciful to Gollum. Frodo is the saviour of the Shire not through his own strength but by being merciful, by being non violent.

To avoid the inevitable ton of bricks, I'm not saying that this means Tolkien became a pacifist because of his WW1 experiences, but there are definite hints that he disapproved of the punitive Treaty of Versailles; and, of course, would honour the way Jesus achieved victory rather than accepting Satan's offer of power. Hmm Satan sounds a bit like Sauron.

 

[Eljorahir]

Investigating other uses of the name Sharkey this morning I found that Saruman isn’t the only fictional Sharkey to be set adrift:

Sharkey of Bag End:
“To the road again Worm! These fine fellows and lordlings are turning us adrift again. Come along!”

Spoken to the despicable pirate Captain Sharkey after his crew had had enough of him:
“…you shall be set adrift in a boat to find such a fate as Fortune may be pleased to send you.”

‘The Blighting of Sharkey’ is a short story written by Arthur Conan Doyle first published in the Pearson's Magazine in April 1911. 4th and last story of the Captain Sharkey saga.

I wonder if Tolkien had Captain Sharkey in mind when he chose Saruman’s nickname. Saruman does have a lot in common with a despicable pirate.

 

[Vardarianna]

When Frodo tells one of the ruffians in Bywater that Saruman has been reduced to a beggar, the ruffian snaps his finger in his face. Pippin, Merry and Sam draw their swords and the ruffians head off to Hobbiton. Merry tells Frodo "You won't rescue Lotho, or the Shire, just by being shocked and sad, my dear Frodo". Not Merry's finest hour!

I'm not sure I agree with you about Merry here. What he says is true for the most part. I get Frodo was spent on war and violence and all, but he (and Sam) really didn't partake in any big battles, whereas Merry rode to battle with Dernhelm (Eowyn) and had a major part in the slaying of the Witch King. In light of that, his saying "You won't rescue Lotho, or the Shire, just by being shocked and sad, my dear Frodo" makes perfect sense.

 

[Eljorahir]

"You won't rescue Lotho, or the Shire, just by being shocked and sad, my dear Frodo". Not Merry's finest hour!

makes perfect sense.

Cotton: "They've shot one or two of our folk."
Merry: "There you are, Frodo! I knew we should have to fight. Well, they started the killing."

I suppose Merry's view can be both: 'makes perfect sense' and 'not his finest hour'.
If triggers had been invented yet, I might say Merry is depicted a little more trigger-happy than I'd like him to be.

The inherent conflict between opposing ideas: "It's wrong to kill." and "Sometimes one must kill for the greater good." It's a very deep subject. Gary Cooper expresses both sides with his uncomfortable anguish in the movie 'Sergeant York'...