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"I put the fear of fire on him..."

Squint-eyed Southerner said:
Yes, it's certainly one of the sources Tolkien drew upon.
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Oh, yes, I knew that he did ... drew on the Biblical Lucifer and Milton's Lucifer.
I would surmise that Tolkien's Melkor/Lucifer is more similar to Milton's than any other literary depiction.
Re the quoted passage.... It was just that this particular quotation reads like the first couple pages of the Silmarillion , wherein Melkor is described, so coincidentally similar.
 
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No Deimos, we are actually very close to agreement here.
I've been away from the forums for far too long and have become rather sloppy and vague with my wording.
I think the vast, vast majority of people are innately good; it's just part of being a human that most people do good most of the time. Of course good people can do things which aren't good, but I don't think of that as evil, I think of that as part of the human condition in all its frustrating complexity.

What I had in mind about the laws being different in 50 years was something along the lines of people looking back and wondering how on earth we could have killed animals for protein, or allowed some individuals to have vast amounts of wealth while others had nothing; something we may take for granted now might strike someone in the future as bizarre as slavery strikes us today.

The point I was making about democracy is simply that it seems about the best system we have to run a fair (or fairly) just system with a framework of laws that the majority of people would never dream of breaking.

I totally agree that Melkor and then Sauron consciously chose evil, and therefore are evil; but doesn't this grant them a strange measure of honesty?

My point about Gandalf and Galadriel is that, if they did use the ring, knowing full well how evil it is and how it would corrupt them, then no amount of justification could suffice to not make their actions evil in the end.
 
Working backwards:
I'll have to think about that last statement (And it may take me quite a while to think about it...just so you don't hold your breath waiting for an answer)

The other statement I highlighted...whence comes that "human condition" you mention that brings about the constant, continual occurrences of good people doing bad things? That is, why don't people always do what is good?
By way of example: It's obviously to a person's benefit to not drive drunk, in fact not to get drunk.
Why does he go ahead and do it? More broadly....most people know what is good and what is bad; why do they so often choose the bad?

And we are (not infrequently ) talking about intelligent people deliberately choosing "the bad", so it can't be from stupidity.
It may possibly be from ignorance (which then may limit or mitigate culpability).
But to use the "drunk" example, I'm pretty certain that people who deliberately get drunk are not ignorant of the fact that imbibing excessive amounts of alcohol will result in mental and physical impairment.
So why do they do it anyway?
 
Ah, but now we come to a couple of points where I would probably be out of kilter with the general feeling of most of the members.

I really give a lot of positive weight to the stuff Tolkien published in his lifetime, by which I mean TH and, of course, LOTR. SIL is a bit of an odd one for me because I know it was actually edited by Christopher Tolkien, but I've always thought that most of the material was pretty much worked out already and CT just did various amounts of tidying up, as opposed to the more comprehensive work of the HoME series. I could be completely wrong about this of course, and feel sure that I'll soon be corrected!

Am I right in thinking that the Letters were compiled after Tolkien's death, and comprised a number of letters to different colleagues and friends of his? If this is correct, then I wouldn't say they hold the same weight as the finished books that Tolkien published in his own lifetime. A private letter to a colleague, friend, or fan can't be held in the same light as something which Tolkien himself put out to the general public?

All that being said, it's fascinating to read these letters in the light of the finished product of LOTR, so to speak.

In the letter quoted, Gollum doesn't come across all that badly, in the way I'm looking at things (which is to say that I always have a soft spot for the baddies in general, so there could be a bit of not-so-unintentional bias here).

I mean, his marvellous courage and endurance, being possibly greater than that of the Hobbits' is a bit of a gold star isn't it?

Gollum is pitiable, yes; persistently wicked, but this worked good - so can we see an echo here of what Gandalf or Galadriel would have done with the ring?

The marvellous and occasionally infuriating complexity of Tolkien's work is here for all to see - his mean soul, his marvellous courage and endurance being devoted to evil - I'm almost tempted to believe that a wordsmith as talented as Tolkien wants us to consider Gollum in many different ways and not just as simply (or wholly) evil at all.

But I do give a lot of leeway to the villains of the piece!
 
I'd say that people don't always do what's good because not everyone is the same as everyone else; being human is to be complicated.
I also think that people don't always deliberately set out to do something wrong, and even if they do they may think it not too serious a problem anyway.

To take your drunk example. I originally come from Liverpool in the UK, and now live in Sydney Australia. Both Liverpool and Sydney, and indeed the UK and Australia are places where an awful lot of heavy drinking goes on. The culture, the media, the advertising - it's all saturated with alcohol (pun intended).

Now everyone who goes out to the pub and gets drunk wouldn't think of it as wrong in any meaningful sense of the word; it's what you do for a good time.

Only a tiny majority of all the people in the pub would ever dream of driving drunk; some drunk drivers make a mistake and don't think they are drunk, but there would be some people who deliberately drive drunk (through laziness or simply not caring).

I guarantee you if you ask anyone in a crowded pub if they know they are impairing themselves they would simply say they are having a good time.

So to me, doing bad things can actually be quite a grey area, and in other circumstances (say telling a little white lie perhaps) perfectly understandable.

Or, to put it in not so long-winded a way, 'bad' things can be really trivial when compared to the overwhelmingly awful things one does if you are totally evil.
 
Not quite sure if you answered my question.
I used the "drunk driver" example because it was the first thing that came to mind; I may have to come up with a better , more comprehensive one.
However, your explanation that "human nature is complicated" is (pace) evasive , even if you didn't intend it to be.
What makes human beings "complicated?" Competing interests (as in "desires")?
Why should we act against our own good? We make jokes about people who win the "Darwin award" because they do a stupid thing that kills them , thus removing them from the gene pool, hopefully before they've had any kids.
But why do we do that? (And we have all done stupid things that might have earned a Darwin Award. )
 
Definitely wasn't trying to be evasive, just too vague, which I'm working on!

I think I haven't made myself clear as to what bad vs evil means; bad to me can be completely trivial, almost unthinking, whereas evil has to be deliberate and conscious. Doing a bad thing can be almost meaningless, and maybe even should be called not doing the good thing. Perhaps we should take it even further and say that most people can go for days and days at a time without thinking whether what they are doing is good or bad? Just going about your daily routine - going to work, coming home and spending time with your family, going out to a restaurant or pub - how much of this involves consciously thinking about good or evil?

I think the Darwin example shows the difference between our thinking: to me the Darwin 'winners' have done something really extreme (bad for themselves, but surely not deliberately evil?), whereas most people would never do anything remotely worthy of a Darwin award.

Another way of looking at things: I went to my local cinema today and watched Alien: Romulus (really good little movie, definitely belongs in the Alien universe with a couple of nice twists). Now in the half-full audience there were two or three people who would open their phones now and again, maybe to check the time? Now this was irritating to the rest of the audience and therefore, to my mind, bad. But in the grand scheme of things it's quite a trivial thing. I think the triviality is the salient point to me.
 
TrackerOrc said:
Am I right in thinking that the Letters were compiled after Tolkien's death, and comprised a number of letters to different colleagues and friends of his?
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Yes, they were compiled by Humphrey Carpenter and published in 1981. An updated edition was released last year that I haven't read yet.


Why not? Surely the author's word should carry some weight, whether or not it's published in his lifetime? That should not ever be a consideration. And he is merely describing and expounding on his own work, which the letter does not contradict. Gollum tries to get Frodo killed and then tries to kill Sam himself. After a certain point, none of Gollum's actions can be seen or justified as noble or heroic.


Really? His actions were "devoted to evil", "not honourable", a "mean sort of thief"; an example of someone who appears to be "damnable". These don't come off as ringing endorsements for 'Hero of the Day' to me 🫤

I mean, his marvellous courage and endurance, being possibly greater than that of the Hobbits' is a bit of a gold star isn't it?
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No, for the reasons stated. Tolkien actually seems to award this "gold star" to Frodo, or perhaps more specifically, to the quality of mercy.
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  • Letters, #192
Gollum is pitiable, yes; persistently wicked, but this worked good - so can we see an echo here of what Gandalf or Galadriel would have done with the ring?
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No, I'm afraid I don't see the analogy and I'm still confused about what you mean by the two Gs being hypocritical or dishonest. They both outright admit that the Ring would be a bad thing for them to have and use. That's hardly being dishonest. Also, neither would be willfully persisting in wickedness. They would persist in doing what they thought was right and it ending up something warped and horrible. Gollum persists in wickedness with or without the Ring for selfish reasons. Most of his life he doesn't give a ring-toss about anyone but himself. You may call Gollum an unsung hero but I would, at best, add 'anti' to that phrase.


Again, I don't see how you can spin Gollum's motives into something noble. Here is more of Letter #181:
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I think Tolkien is obliquely comparing (or contrasting) Gollum with Bilbo, Frodo and Sam, especially with those first few sentences and also plainly saying that Gollum is who he is not because of the Ring, buy because that's who he always was. Sam's reaction to him when he awoke and saw Gollum "pawing" at Frodo was nothing more than a gut reaction and not enough justification to go over to the dark side, or reason to believe that "good is dumb". Tolkien actually envisioned an alternate scenario where Gollum doesn't betray the hobbits and chooses the light side, ultimately sacrificing himself for the cause of good.
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  • Letters, #246
But he chose evil because of hurt "fee-fees".
 
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A lot of really good points here Radaghast, let me try to offer my responses as succintly.

To my way of thinking a private letter written to a colleague cannot be held in the same light as a work of literature polished and presented to the general public after years or decades of work having gone into it. In the first place, can we say that Tolkien ever meant the letters to be published at all? We can certainly say this about TH and LoTR; both works which were meant to be published to the widest possible audience. Could we see the letters as 'works in progress' or, to give a more modern example, deleted scenes from a movie which for whatever reason didn't make it to the final theatrical cut? It's telling that Tolkien seems almost to be discussing the work of a third party in these letters - he's asking if the ring needed to ever cross Gollum's path, he posits a completely different ending to the story as if he were discussing someone else's work, or at least almost taking a step back from the work to critique it.

It seems obvious to me that the finished work - where Gollum doesn't choose the light side, is the one Tolkien decided on; he actually published this scenario and no other, so to me this gives LoTR much more weight than anything he talks about in a private letter. These are the words he chose to send out to the millions of people who read his books, not to an individual he was corresponding with.

There is also another point about these letters being a compilation produced by an external party (though I've no doubt that Humphrey Carpenter meant to do a really good job and no doubt succeeded). What letters were not used? What letters have never been found? Did HC have a perhaps unconscious bias towards a particular view which colours the selection?

Was there a letter where Tolkien said: 'I've had a good hard think about things and I was completely wrong about old Gollum; I reckon he's the best thing since sliced bread'? Obviously extremely doubtful, but you get my point!

My reasoning about G and G being hypocritical was probably poorly put. I meant that they both know exactly what the ring would do to them if they used it: 'I do not wish to become like the Dark Lord himself' as Gandalf says in 'The Shadow of the Past'. They both know exactly what the ring would do, so we can't say that they would be doing what they thought was right, only for their actions to turn out to be evil - they simply have too much knowledge of the dreadful power of the ring in the first place.

And they actually aren't hypocrites as they don't give in to temptation and use the ring - they pass the test, as Galadriel has it.

Now as to poor old Gollum, you're absolutely correct, there should definitely be an anti- before his name. Is he even an anti-hero? To my mind he's probably the most fascinating character Tolkien ever came up with; Tolkien couldn't create a dull character if he tried (though he comes perilously close with that capering dunce Bombadil), but I think Gollum is just endlessly interesting.

I think almost any question you ask about him could produce equal and opposite answers. Is he evil or does the ring twist his innate characteristics to produce a creature who does evil things? (crucially not the same thing). Look at how he is introduced to Frodo by Gandalf in 'The Shadow of the Past':

'The most inquisitive and curious-minded of that family was called Smeagol. He was interested in roots and beginnings; he dived into deep pools; he burrowed under trees and growing plants; he tunnelled into green mounds; and he ceased to look up at the hill-tops, or the leaves on trees, or the flowers opening in the air; his head and his eyes were downward' Not anything evil here at all, yet is there something slightly sinister about him not looking up, but always down? Straight away we have a character who is most definitely not going to be a one-dimensional villain (or hero).

And then, hundreds of years later, Gollum comes across the two sleeping Hobbits in 'The Stairs of Cirith Ungol':

'Could one of the sleeprs have seen him, they would have thought that they beheld an old weary hobbit, shrunken by the years that had carried him far beyond his time, beyond friends and kin, and the fields and streams of youth, an old starved pitiable thing'. Good lord this is heart-breaking; how could anyone think ill of such a poor down-trodden little fellow? Yet he is leading the Hobbits into the path of a gigantic spider in the hopes that they will be eaten and the ring tossed away with their clothes...

So from the beginning to the end (and it's probably something we forget - just how long the little guy has been around compared to the Hobbit ringbearers) Tolkien has written a character which I believe will be the source of constant delight/debate/fist shaking at the Sun...
 
I don't understand. A comment made is not valid unless it's meant to be published? Anyway, I'm not quite sure what point is being debated or made here. The alternate scenario I mentioned is an ancillary point. But the main point I'm highlighting is that Gollum is inherently bad and he throws away his chance for redemption with the weakest provocation. Sam's saying a "rough word" is not justification for doing the wrong thing (attempted double homicide, for starters), which Gollum unequivocally does, even if it turns out to the good (and this harks back to what Eru says in The Silmarillion*). Tolkien's statement about how this is no credit to Gollum is an explanation of this.


Well, they would be corrupted so would no longer be operating rationally. The difference between them and Gollum is that Gollum does what he does before he even gets acquainted with the Ring. I'm still utterly lost on this point about hypocrisy.


We are in complete agreement about Gollum (though not Tom).


Well, to be fair, as Tolkien himself said, through LoR, "nothing is evil in the beginning. Even Sauron was not so." Curiously (and perhaps a bit disappointingly as well), he wrote precious little about pre-evil anybody: Melkor, Sauron (and his Nazgûl), Saruman or Gollum. What you quoted is part of that precious little. But when we come to his encounter with Déagol we find that he resorts to murder to get the Ring way too quickly (at least as far as we are told; also, to be clear, I would not endorse murder to be resorted to at any speed). Did the Ring have that strong of a pull on him? Or was he just inclined to be homicidal? Also, cue Tolkien's statement about Gollum being a "mean sort of thief" before he ever saw the Ring. Gollum was not been born evil but something logically must have turned him on that path before he ever laid his peepers on that gold trinket.


At the risk of coming off as pedantic, only Frodo would be consumed by Shelob, who would suck out the hobbit's life fluids leaving a desiccated corpse with the Ring still on his finger. Gollum himself attempts to take out Sam, maybe even with the intent of devouring him later. As for thinking ill of him, it's for those very reasons of leading Frodo into a would-be deathtrap and stopping Sam from helping him, and attempting to murder him in the process. Again, he destroys the notion that anyone could think anything else from that point.

 
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Well the comments in the letters are completely valid, but to my mind they are secondary to what Tolkien deliberately chose to put in LoTR - it's the finished product that he worked on for decades; anything he wanted us to know about any of the characters is there to read in the work he wanted published: a private letter (which has been chosen by a third party at that) to me cannot have the same weight.

Saying that Gollum is inherently bad makes him a rather one-dimensional character which, to my mind, he isn't. It's shocking that he murders Deagol for the ring, which to me shows the horrible power of the ring, not that Smeagol was always going to be a murderer. Look how Tolkien describes Deagol as 'gloating' over the ring as soon as he holds it - that's a powerful description right there. Look how difficult it is for Frodo to even think of damaging the ring( in 'The Shadow of the Past'); this thing is horribly potent, and affects people straight away: I think if we say that Gollum was always going to kill Deagol then it takes away this aspect of the tale.

I know that I'm probably in the minority about Bombadil; it's a complete blind spot for me which I doubt I'll ever get over, even though I'm being unfair to the character.

I think I sympathise with Gollum (possibly a little too much!) because I generally think that the villains in any story are usually the most interesting characters. I tend to rate the Bond movies as to how good the baddies are (apart from the last one where that bad guy didn't look like he could knock the skin off a rice pudding). So to me it's the Orcs over the Elves say, the bad guys over the good guys generally. It's entirely possible that I let this bias colour my thinking too much.

Excellent description of what Shelob would do to Frodo! And at the risk of annoying people after saying how much I cheer for the baddies, Shelob is the exception. As a life-long arachnaphobe, I can still hardly bear to read the descriptions of her, and I still jump out of my skin when she stabs Frodo in the film, even though I've seen it countless times!
 
You seem to suggest one contradicts the other. But they don't. I'm not using the letter over the text. I'm using the letter to support the text, which it does. Tolkien said he persisted in wickedness, which the book shows he does. He had a chance to be good and even shows signs of goodness, but it all "withers" away too quickly. And, as Tolkien said, that this ultimately worked to the good is no credit to him; it does not excuse his wickedness and it does not award him a gold star. For an analogy, if I'm a vicious serial criminal and I get caught, and I testify against other serial criminals that leads to them being caught, should I get a parade?

A bad person need not be one-dimensional. Also, I never said Sméagol always had it in for Déagol, only that murder is the first thing he thinks to do when he wants to take the Ring, which wasn't even his by rights. So he is also a thief, which is not as bad as being a murderer but it does add to his badness.

Fair enough. At least you're not suggesting Gandalf extracted (through torture) a false confession from Gollum about killing Déagol, as a certain poster here once seemed to do (before I joined the forum).

As a non-arachnophobe (although she is not an actual spider but a monster in spider form) I'm actually a bit sympathetic towards Shelob. I see her as little more than an (un)glorified apex predator. She does what any predator does, i.e. kill things to live. And she is not a danger to the world at large. Also, just like Gollum, she is essential to the success of the Quest. Without her, I don't know how the hobbits would avoid capture by orcs (and this is part of Gollum's wicked acts turning out to be a boon).
 
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No I don't think the text and the letters are contradictory, only that, for me at least, the text is all-important. If you never read anything but TH and LoTR then you have everything that Tolkien wanted to publish about the whole story. The letters may give more evidence and may contain some of the idea included in the text, but they were not published by Tolkien and not included in the text. As I think I said before, they may be looked at as Tolkien discussing things with his colleagues, as a kind of work in progress.

Plus, again as I stated before, I think there could be an issue with the selection/omission of letters by Carpenter, and the possibility that there are letters which have never been discovered.

One thing that has struck me about Gollum killing Deagol (or perhaps that should be Smeagol killing Deagol) is that, as far as I can remember, this is the only time where a character doesn't already have the ring in their possession; how do we know that the lust for the ring would not have affected other characters in the same way that it did do to poor Smeagol?

Deagol has the ring for a very short time but is already 'gloating' over it. Bilbo finds the ring by accident; there is no real recognition of what this thing is: 'he put the ring in his pocket almost without thinking' ('Riddles in the Dark' TH - which is a much lighter tale anyway) but he ends up not wanting to part with it at all (although, to his great credit, he does; perhaps this is for another discussion)

Would Boromir have killed Frodo for the ring? He is certainly very badly affected by his lust for it: 'he sprang over the stone and leaped at Frodo. His fair and pleasant face was hideously changed; a raging fire was in his eyes'...'curse you and all halflings to death and darkness!' (The Breaking of the Fellowship) Now he immediately regrets what has happened, but would he have killed Frodo in his moment of madness? Frodo certainly thinks so, which is why he runs like the clappers.

And when Sam saves Frodo in the Tower of Cirith Ungol (again not having to have taken the ring from anyone) look how Frodo reacts - actually calling Sam a thief (which he regrets as well, but the damage has been done)

And obviously, and very understandably, Frodo can't destroy the ring at the end.

All of which, to me, shows just how malignantly powerful this thing is. When it is destroyed the world actually changes; 'the Realm of Sauron has ended' says Gandalf (The Field of Cormallen). Given the monstrous power of this thing I'm actually wondering whether anyone would have behaved differently from Smeagol.

'Shelob the Great, last child of Ungoliant to trouble the unhappy world' is beautifully put, but I can never get past the giant-spider thing!
 
The letter we're discussing was written shortly after the book was published.

Plus, again as I stated before, I think there could be an issue with the selection/omission of letters by Carpenter, and the possibility that there are letters which have never been discovered.
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If you agree that the letters don't contradict the text then I'm afraid I don't get your point. Tolkien is expounding on his own work and characters he created. You seem to want to disallow this because it was only in a letter. You also seem to be holding out hope that there is a letter where Tolkien, absolves, I guess, Gollum of responsibility? You cannot seem to accept what Tolkien said, outside the book, of his own characters and work. If so, that's just very odd to me. Because the book does not justify what Gollum does either. He ends up a full-on villain.

For the record, here is the note by Carpenter before the letter (#181), published in 1956:

I believe I've already mentioned these but here goes again: Frodo offers the Ring to Gandalf, Aragorn and Galadriel. None of them have any compunction to strike Frodo dead. Sam gives Frodo the Ring back after he rescues him but first suggests he might carry it a bit longer. Frodo doesn't try to throttle Sam for even saying such a thing, though he does get angry. Sam doesn't try to kill Frodo for wanting the Ring back. Also, Frodo shows mercy towards Gollum while he has the Ring. Back in The Hobbit, Bilbo doesn't run Gollum through, even when he has a legitimate reason for doing so. If the Ring were so pernicious, why didn't it influence Bilbo to do just that, especially when one might normally see the need to anyway? If Bilbo were so inclined and where he might see a need, the Ring might incline him even further, by your argument. But he chooses instead to leap over Gollum, a move that very well might not succeed, instead of running Gollum through. So, I continue to wonder, how can you argue that the Ring turns people into homicidal maniacs when this is demonstrably not true?

Well, it's a nice find for him, as he sees it. And 'gloating' is not some unpardonable find. I'm not sure how Bilbo finding the Ring applies. It certainly doesn't make Bilbo into a murderer.

It's possible Boromir would have killed Frodo. It's also possible he would have just relieved him of the burden; there's certainly no reason Boromir would need to kill Frodo to get the Ring. But, in any case, rather than for selfish reasons, Boromir is desperate to save his homeland and momentarily loses his faculties. But he is shortly thereafter very rueful of his behavior. The Ring is definitely a very dangerous thing around certain personality types. I'm not excusing Boromir for his behavior, by the way, I'm simply saying his motives were different from Gollum's (also, incidentally, this encounter proves necessary for the Quest).

I'm responding to this post as I go through it rather than read it first, so I'm coming across incidents I've already mentioned. Anyway, you're listing points that seem to argue against your point. Frodo gets angry, yes, but he doesn't so much as raise a hand towards Sam. Gollum strangles his cousin without even trying to wrest it from him first. This is noteworthy, because Tolkien could have written it that Gollum accidentally killed his cousin, thereby widening the possibility of redemption. But he chose to go with what he did, probably based on how he'd already written the character.

And obviously, and very understandably, Frodo can't destroy the ring at the end.
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Frodo is at the very end of his endurance, underfed and under-watered. If he were to have any chance to throw the Ring into the fire it would, very understandably (by any rational person) ,have been gone by then. This does not justify Gollum's murder and attempted murders (nor any of the other things he did in the past, including very likely taking babies from their cribs).

As demonstrated, they do.
 
May I quickly say, Radaghast, how much I'm enjoying these discussions (and indeed the various discussions about other matters with the other members of the forum); I've been away for a long time and can only say what an extremely enjoyable place you have all created.

My general point about the letters, or indeed about any material outside of the published texts of TH, LoTR (and SIL, which I still believe was basically a finished work which Christopher Tolkien more or less put in order) is that the text takes precedence simply because it's the finished work which Tolkien himself published for as wide a reading public as possible. A private letter to a friend or colleague discussing the finished work can be a source of endless fascination but it can't carry the same weight as the finalised work of the text.

My point about a letter being found stating that Gollum was actually Mr nice guy was my feeble attempt at humour, but it does have a serious couple of points: we can only discuss the letters that HC included in the compilation - what about the letters which he chose not to include? What do they amount to? Does the make-up of the compilation invite a potential bias one way or another about a whole host of things? We'll never know. And for this reason alone, I'd say that the text has to carry an awful lot more weight than any other material
Another point would be this: if a letter was found showing Tolkien did regret the portrait of Gollum (or any other character for that matter), would this alter your perception of the character as presented in the text? With me, it wouldn't. You may not have noticed but I'm quite a fan of old Gollum but I would still argue that the text takes absolute precedence over any other material, precisely because Tolkien sent it out as a finished work.

Now we enter areas where I haven't put things in enough detail. As I've said, I've been away from the forums for far too long and really need to up my game as to the precision of the language I use. What I should have said was that Gollum is the only character who doesn't have the ring, who really wants it, and who succeeds in getting it - through absolutely shocking means. The others who are offered the ring are literally not having it denied to them. Boromir wants the ring, and I have no doubt at all that he would kill Frodo to get it. I feel that you are being remarkably sympathetic to Boromir, but not to Gollum. you allow Boromir selfless reasons for wanting the ring (the defence of Gondor, basically), but this is at best delusional - he has been told time and time again that the ring would utterly corrupt him.

What reason does Tolkien allow Smeagol for killing Deagol? 'Because the gold looked so bright and beautiful' ('The Shadow of the Past'). now this is no reason at all, or something so twisted as to be almost unfathomable - which, to me shows the awful malignancy of the ring, and not the idea that Smeagol was always going to do murder. It's the ring which does this horrendous thing, working on the personality of someone who may not be very nice, but who I just can't see as being inherently evil from the start.

I think 'gloating' is an unattractive word used by Tolkien just for that purpose; Deagol has only had the ring for moments but it's already having a negative effect on him, whereas the point I was making about Bilbo is that he finds the ring in the dark and basically stuffs it into his pocket without a moment's thought - it hasn't had a chance to start affecting him, which it does later. (but to his great credit I believe it affected him probably least of all of anyone).

Well I think I'm still arguing for my points and not against them, as the characters other than Gollum are not denied the ring. You say that Frodo gets angry at Sam in the tower of Cirith Ungol, but let's look a little closer at what happened. Sam tells Frodo that the ring is safe and Frodo begins to change: 'Give it me at once! you can't have it!' Then Sam, still holding the ring, says 'You'll find the Ring very dangerous now, and very hard to bear. If it's too hard a job, I could share it with you maybe?' Frodo snatches the ring from his hand and cries 'No you won't, you thief!' He panted, staring at Sam with eyes wide with fear and enmity'.
This second reaction, which I see as more severe, comes from Frodo believing that he isn't going to get the ring back - as soon as it's in his possession he calms down. What would he have done if Sam continued to hold onto the ring? Again, it's the power of the ring which seems most important here.

I agree that Frodo had almost no chance of destroying the ring; I personally think it wouldn't have worked if that's what he ended up doing. It makes it a much more interesting story that the quest 'failed'.

Now this last point is my vague use of words I'm afraid. I meant to say that in Gollum's unique circumstances - wanting the ring, being denied it, and then successfully getting it (no matter how horribly this was achieved). I firmly believe that the enraged Boromir would have killed Frodo to get the ring, even if he would be regretful later (or would he? Would the ring have taken over him so completely?) Saruman would have laid waste to half of Middle Earth to get hold of it. What would Frodo have done to Sam if Sam withheld the ring?

I basically believe that the ring is the central part of the story as a whole; it's immense power (always for evil) keeps the poor wretched Gollum alive long after he shouldn't be with his hopeless longing for it. I've always thought that the first word you think of with Gollum should be pity - and he's often described in this way by various other characters. Sauron, Melkor, Saruman, all deserving of being called evil (even if they weren't from the beginning). Gollum absolutely does, and wants to do evil thngs, but I don't believe he does this in the same conscious, deliberate way that the last three characters do - the ring utterly enslaves him and he never gets free of it.
 
If Tolkien wrote such a letter that would mean he regretted the way he wrote the book and I find no indication of that in any letter. I continue to be befuddled about your point about the text having precedence over a letter. It has no relevance in this particular discussion. Neither contradicts the other, and one is in support and explanation of the other. The letter basically says Gollum is not a hero, even if they lead to the success of the Quest. Do you disagree? Then please make your argument. If you don't disagree, I don't know what this disagreement is about. Also, I would guess there is no unpublished letter where Tolkien absolves Gollum of his crimes.

I, on the other hand, am not certain at all certain that Boromir would kill Frodo. And his motives for wanting the Ring are noble and I don't see what's delusional about that. Yes, he has been told the Ring corrupts and he ignores this wisdom. But I never said he was wise. Yes, I do have more sympathy with Boromir's desire for his homeland not to be overwhelmed over Gollum's love of shiny things and his non-existent provocation to commit murder.

I didn't say he was evil from the start (presumably that means birth). I said I think something perhaps turned him on the wrong path before he encountered the Ring. Perhaps he was born a psychopath (which doesn't necessarily result in something bad) who had some malignant influence in his youth.

Frodo is nearing the end of his endurance and in enemy territory where the influence of the Ring is getting stronger and he has had the Ring in his keep for nearly two decades. Despite all this his first instinct isn't to wrap his fingers around Sam's throat and squeeze. Gollum is hundreds of miles away from Mordor when he commits murder against a friend and relative, before even laying a finger on the Ring. Also, you highlight Frodo but don't mention Sam. If the Ring's influence were so pervasive, why doesn't Sam kill Frodo?

I don't know. Perhaps things would then have gotten ugly if Sam was obstinate. But see my previous point.

There's not much to go on as far as pitying Gollum. I don't see him as you do, some innocent victim of the Ring. Also remember that when we first see him he eyes Bilbo as potential dinner and it's only blind luck that Gollum isn't hungry at the time:
​
Gollum is a creep both when he enters the stage and when he exits it. Unfortunately, there is no redemption arc for him, as much as some may wish there was (including, perhaps, even myself) despite the ultimate (and positive) consequence of his pursuit of the Ring; he threw it away all because of a "rough word from Sam".
 
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Same here. It's always fun to discuss the works of Tolkien.

If Tolkien wrote such a letter that would mean he regretted the way he wrote the book and I find no indication of that in any letter. I continue to be consternated about your point about the text having precedence over a letter. It has no relevance in this particular discussion. Neither contradicts they other, and one is in support and explanation of the other. The letter basically says Gollum is not a hero, even if they lead to the success of the Quest. Do you disagree? Then please make your argument. If you don't disagree, I don't know what this disagreement is about.

I, on the other hand, am not certain at all certain that Boromir would kill Frodo. And his motives for wanting the Ring are noble and I don't see what's delusional about that. Yes, he has been told the Ring corrupts and he ignores this wisdom. But I never said he was wise. Yes, I do have more sympathy with Boromir's desire for his homeland not to be swallowed by Darkness over Gollum's non-existent provocation to commit murder.

I didn't say he was evil from the start (presumably birth). I said I think something perhaps turned him on the wrong path before he encountered the Ring. Perhaps he was born a psychopath who had some malign influence in his youth.

Frodo is nearing the end of his endurance and in enemy territory where the influence of the Ring is getting stronger and he has had the Ring in his keep for nearly two decades. Despite all this his first instinct isn't to wrap his fingers around Sam's throat and squeeze. Gollum is hundreds of miles away from Mordor when he commits murder against a friend and relative, before even laying a finger on the Ring. Also, you highlight Frodo but don't mention Sam. If the Ring's influence were so pervasive, why doesn't Sam kill Frodo?

I honestly couldn't say. Perhaps things would then have gotten ugly if Sam was obstinate. But see my previous point.

There's not much to go on as far as pitying Gollum. I don't see him as you do, some innocent victim of the Ring. Also remember that when we first see him he eyes Bilbo as potential dinner and it's only blind luck that Gollum isn't hungry at the time:

Gollum is a creep both when he enters the stage and when he enters it. Unfortunately, there is no redemption arc for him, despite the ultimate (and positive) consequence of his pursuit of the Ring; he threw it away all because of a "rough word from Sam".
 
A bit of a side topic at this point, but. . .

TrackerOrc said:
My general point about the letters, or indeed about any material outside of the published texts of TH, LoTR. . .
Click to expand...

I'd add The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and The Road Goes Ever On to the list, as well.

"Nomenclature" was meant for more than one recipient, but never made it to the general readership while JRRT was alive. Perhaps add the Pauline Baynes map, although we now know Tolkien didn't like some of the illustration on it, anyway.

TrackerOrc said:
(and SIL, which I still believe was basically a finished work which Christopher Tolkien more or less put in order)
Click to expand...

I can't agree with this characterization, but as this is a complicated subject, all I'll say here is that for me, only work published by JRRT is canon.


TrackerOrc said:
is that the text takes precedence simply because it's the finished work which Tolkien himself published for as wide a reading public as possible.
Click to expand...

Indeed a "once and future readership" as I sometimes like to put it.

TrackerOrc said:
A private letter to a friend or colleague discussing the finished work can be a source of endless fascination but it can't carry the same weight as the finalised work of the text..
Click to expand...

I agree. And I read Letters with care -- two examples of why being:

1) chronology concerns (when did Tolkien think X or Y)
2) arguable contradiction with TPT (Tolkien Published Text)

That said, I absorb posthumously published stuff into my Middle-earth. The way I go about this is basically a mix of:

1) TPT (canon)

(or should I use APW "Author Published Work" or APT "Author Published Text" or something else)

2) Late text/ideas over earlier text/ideas -- if the later one fits (in my opinion) with TPT/APW/APT. . .

Of course, each "case" is different. I could argue, for example, that the Eldar had dark hair save for
the golden house of Finarfin, which leaves the so called "Vanyar" with. . . what colour hair, generally speaking? And I even have a TPB ("Tolkien Published Book") that states it was the golden house of Finrod. . . which leaves me with more than one APN ("Author Published Name") in the same sentence, so I go with. . . the later AP ("Author Published") one.

Maybe a slip of the pen in 1955

Ah Inglor Felagund! Where did you go?

🐾
 
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Well I've been arguing that, generally, I put the finished works (TH, LoTR, SIL - though I know the latter work could be much more complicated as to its provenance) at a much higher level than anything else Tolkien wrote; I use the word wrote deliberately, as Tolkien never published them, and perhaps never intended them to be published. Even if he did, they are an incomplete record as HC hasn't (to my knowledge) published every letter Tolkien wrote about his finished books. So instead of the complete published works of Tolkien himself, we have an incomplete record chosen by a third party; the material isn't contradictory but, to my mind, it has to be secondary.
The material in the letters (and in any specific letter) can be thought-provoking and endlessly debatable, but the actual material that Tolkien gave priority to is in the finished texts. Whether an individual letter states that a character is or isn't a hero is basically irrelevant - I base my thinking about all the characters in LoTR on what is included in the LoTR.
Now the beauty of Tolkien's writing is that there is so much room for interpretation by the reader themselves - my reaction to Gollum is most decidedly not yours (and I'm probably in the minority with my view of him); my view of Boromir (see below) is different from yours, but neither of us is in the 'wrong' as far as I can see - we're discussing interpretation on an individual level.

As to Boromir, I believe he is delusional in the same way that everyone else who thinks they can control the ring is delusional: you can't control it, it will utterly corrupt you. As Frodo asks 'Were you not at the Council? He was. He was told by the wisest and most powerful forces for good left on Middle Earth that this ring cannot be used. You say that he ignores this wisdom, but I see it more as him being rather arrogant and prideful.
'These elves and half-elves and wizards, they would come to grief perhaps. Yet often I doubt if they are wise and not merely timid. But each to his own kind, True-hearted Men, they will not be corrupted.'
He's got a remarkably high opinion of Men (and himself here)!
Are his reasons for wanting the ring noble (or perhaps I should say, completely noble?):
'He drew plans for great alliances and glorious victories to be; and he cast down Mordor, and became himself a mighty king, benevolent and wise'. There is an awful lot of self-worth here isn't there? I just see this as the ring, or the lust for the ring, already working on Boromir; i have every sympathy for him, as I do for Gollum, as the ring, to me at least, is horribly powerful.

'His fair and pleasant face was hideously changed; a raging fire was in his eyes'. Boromir has been almost physically changed by his lust for the ring; I absolutely believe that he will Frodo if he can't get the ring. Now you believe that he won't, and you could probably produce evidence from the text that you believe supports your argument, which is the measure of Tolkien as a writer I would say.

If Gollum was a born psychopath, then how is that different from saying he was born evil? I don't understand the distinction here.

Sam gives the ring back to Frodo quite quickly; when Sam makes the reasonable observation that it was going to be really hard for Frodo, he reacts by snatching the ring from him and calling him a thief. What, and this to me is the crucial point, would Frodo have done if Sam refused to give him the ring? He knows all about the ring, he's talking to a life-long friend (if we put to one side the rather old-fashioned relationship they have) and he reacts like this. Can we honestly say that things wouldn't have taken a darker turn if Sam kept the ring?

Sam doesn't react strongly to the ring, and how lucky he is. Perhaps because he isn't really interested in anything other than the really sinple things in life? Would you call him 'inquisitive' as Gandalf describes Gollum at the beginning?
Bilbo gives the ring up voluntarily, which does him immense credit. He is, as far as I know, the only character who can do this. So can we see Bilbo as the anti-Gollum and vice versa? Gollum is engulfed by the ring; other characters, I believe, would react the same way in his place. But there are characters who can resist the ring, to a greater or lesser degree, but I still think my point holds - Gollum is hit with a thunderbolt of evil and reacts in a terrible, but perhaps understandable way.

I first met Gollum via the Prologue of LoTR, and he is introduced as a 'loathsome little creature', so I agree his entrance is not at all glorious (and neither is his exit). I don't believe he needs a redemption arc as I don't think the power of the ring would allow that; as I said before, I think the finale of the quest would have been hugely diminished if Frodo (or anyone else) was able to destroy the ring - it's simply too powerful.
 
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