📖👀 Chapter 8 (📔Book III): The Road to Isengard

[Rivendell_librarian]

After the last action packed chapter (Helm's Deep), this is inevitably a quieter more contemplative chapter. But rather than having the main characters and the Rohirrim merely tidy up the battle field and then ride to Isengard to confront Saruman, Tolkien uses this chapter to explore and explain more of the lore of Middle Earth and to further develop the relationship between Legolas and Gimli..

Through Gimli, we read an extensive description of the caves of Helm's Deep and learn how struck by Fangorn is Legolas. These two friends agree to visit each other's preferred realms if they survive the conflict. Legolas is tempted to return to Fangorn when he sees that some of the "trees" have eyes, but is restrained by Gandalf. In fact, we learn that Gandalf has been giving orders to the surviving Rohirrim of the West March and Westfold, even sending a force back to Edoras to protect it against a possible attack by wolf-riders and plunderers. A funeral mound surrounded by spears has been raised above the fallen at the Fords of Isen; earlier we read about the various funeral mounds before the Hornburg in the Coomb. The philosophic King Theoden understands the deeper significance of what this conflict means: "for however the fortune of war shall go, may it not so end that much that was fair and wonderful shall pass for ever out of Middle-earth". Tom Shippey picks up and expands on this statement in his Road to Middle-earth. Theoden was clearly upset about the death of his door steward, Hama who has his own personal mound marking his burial place.

The Huorns surround and pass the small party riding to Isengard having mopped up the Orcs. The once free flowing River Isen is almost dry and there is a mysterious vapour coming from Isengard. Something strange has been happening at Isengard. During the journey the Isen mysteriously starts to flow freely again. We then read an extensive and beautiful description of Isengard and learn how Saruman has despoiled it with his own version of an industrial revolution.

When the party finally reach Isengard who do they first meet but Pippin and Merry enjoying the fruits of conquest, eating, drinking and smoking - clearly hobbits don't mind smoking during a meal - well they are outdoors. Gimli is annoyed ("hammer and tongs") but also overjoyed to find them alive, as are Legolas and Aragorn, of course. In true Shire fashion Pippin brings it all down to earth by describing King Theoden as a "fine old fellow, Very polite". Isengard is now under the new management of Treebeard whose Ents have overthrown the power of Saruman.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Through Gimli, we read an extensive description of the caves of Helm's Deep

A moving description, as Legolas admits. Tolkien says in Letter 321 that the Caves of Aglarond were inspired by visits to the Cheddar Gorge Caves, including on his and Edith's honeymoon.

These two friends agree to visit each other's preferred realms if they survive the conflict.

Yes, their growing friendship foreshadows the reconciliation of the long rift between Elves and Dwarves -- though Gimli is still reluctant about Fangorn, and may have regrets about telling Legolas "Where you go, I will go" in the White Rider chapter. 😄

I note a couple of other items: when Theoden asks about the wood, Gandalf replies with a poem; we don't know if he improvises it, or if it's proverbial, but the king takes it as a riddle -- a theme that runs throughout both LOTR and The Hobbit.

And previously, when Eomer exclaims "You are mighty in wizardry, Gandalf the White!", he says

'That may be. But if so, I have not shown it yet.'

An enigmatic comment indeed.

 

[Rivendell_librarian]

There may not have been all this coloured illumination in Tolkien's time.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

You may well be right. In the letter he says he " revisited these in 1940 but was still colured by my memory of them much earlier before they became so commercialized."

On the other hand, descriptions of the formations say they're "multi-colored", so it's not all just down to lighting.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Retuning to this because after a reread the other night, I was struck by a certain nightmarish element running through much of this chapter, beginning with the approach to the eerie wood, where

The Riders came to the wood, and they halted; horse and man, they were unwilling to pass in. The trees were grey and menacing, and a shadow or a mist was about them. The ends of their long sweeping boughs hung down like searching fingers, their roots stood up from the ground like the limbs of strange monsters, and dark caverns opened beneath them.

And later, while they are resting at night,

. . . the watchmen cried out, and all awoke. The moon was gone. Stars were shining above; but over the ground there crept a a darkness blacker than night. On both sides of the river it rolled towards them, going northward.

'Stay where you are!'' said Gandalf. 'Draw no weapons! Wait! and it will pass you by!'

A mist gathered about them. Above them a few stars still glimmered faintly; but on either side there arose walls of impenetrable gloom; they were in a narrow lane between moving towers of shadow. Voices they heard, whisperings and groanings and an endless rustling sigh; the earth shook under them. Long it seemed to them that they sat and were afraid; but at last the darkness and the rumor passed, and vanished between the mountain's arms.

Enough to give anyone chills. Of course, the fact that I was reading this at night, sitting on my porch, the only illumination my Itty Bitty Book Light, may have influenced the impression it had on me. 😄

However that may be, the nightmarish tone continues after the sun rises; they don't see it rise, in fact: "The light came grey and pale"; "The air above was heavy with fog, and a reek lay on the land about them"; they see "dimly through the mists". Gandalf "rode on into the mist, and reluctantly they followed him".

There's a sharp contrast between this mist-shrouded sequence and the clarity of the description of Isengard, as it had been, and as it was revealed to the eyes of the Riders. Even more striking is the change in tone toward the end of the chapter, when they meet the hobbits -- a sudden shift from nightmare to levity.

One more small note: on first seeing the ents, to Theoden's query 'What are they?' Gandalf's reply is interesting:

'Is it so long since you listened to tales by the fireside? There are children in your land who, out of the twisted threads of story, could pick the answer to your question.'

Shippey, in his discussion of Tolkien's use of interlace, says that "Tolkien certainly also knew that the Icelandic word for a short story is a "þáttr", literally a thread". So he no doubt used this deliberately. Not only that, but his citing of children as the ones who would recognize them fits with his argument in "On Fairy Stories".