What are some things that J.R.R Tolkien did wrong in his writings?

TrackerOrc said:

They say history is written by the winners; no wonder poor old Gollum gets such a bad press! I can just see Gamgee crossing out all the good stuff he did...

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And thus it shall ever be.
As pertains to Gollum, I can't say I'm sorry and I certainly don't miss him. He played his role. Eru foreordained his doom.
Btw, Sam is my favorite human character. I always cheered him on, waving the pom-poms...GIVE ME AN "S"!...🤸‍♂️🎉😁

Deimos said:

And thus it shall ever be.
As pertains to Gollum, I can't say I'm sorry and I certainly don't miss him. He played his role. Eru foreordained his doom.
Btw, Sam is my favorite human character. I always cheered him on, waving the pom-poms...GIVE ME AN "S"!...🤸‍♂️🎉😁

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Once poor old Gollum is gone I basically skip through the remainder of the story before diving joyously into the Appendices, so I guess it's safe to say we have quite the oppsing views!

I don't really have favourite human characters, but if I did, the homicidal Mr Gamgee would be at the very, very bottom of the list. No pom-pom waving whatsoever, I'm afraid.

TrackerOrc said:

Once poor old Gollum is gone I basically skip through the remainder of the story before diving joyously into the Appendices, so I guess it's safe to say we have quite the oppsing views!

I don't really have favourite human characters, but if I did, the homicidal Mr Gamgee would be at the very, very bottom of the list. No pom-pom waving whatsoever, I'm afraid.

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As someone whose favorite characters are both Gollum and Sam, I am quite split between these two opinions.

Elwing the White said:

As someone whose favorite characters are both Gollum and Sam, I am quite split between these two opinions.

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I'm sorry but you cannot be both Team Samwise and Team Gollum

Deimos said:

I'm sorry but you cannot be both Team Sam and Team Gollum


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Maybe not within the conflict between the characters, but I like both of them for different reasons.

TrackerOrc said:

As I think I've posted elsewhere, you could have had Strider defeat the Wight - what an entrance this would be!

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It would also stretch credibility for Aragorn to appear out of nowhere to defeat an undead creature (and with a broken sword). Also, it would be depriving the book of a classic tavern scene. I can't imagine why anyone would want to change that.

Deimos said:

The Red Book was in another language? You are talking about The Red Book of Westmarch, right?
I thought Bilbo authored the first part of the Red Book, Frodo wrote about the War of Ring, and then Sam added some supplemental info.
And I thought it was written in Common Speech (Westron).

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Westron comes from Adunaic and isn't English, as far as I know. I'm not sure if this offers any help or not.

Deimos said:

And thus it shall ever be.
As pertains to Gollum, I can't say I'm sorry and I certainly don't miss him. He played his role. Eru foreordained his doom.
Btw, Sam is my favorite human character. I always cheered him on, waving the pom-poms...GIVE ME AN "S"!...🤸‍♂️🎉😁

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Sam is the man for me after Faramir.

Tyelkormo the Fair said:

Westron comes from Adunaic and isn't English, as far as I know. I'm not sure if this offers any help or not.

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That’s what I meant. I was being not so serious obviously since Tolkien didn’t actually translate a book he found. But in-universe, he did and it was in an ancient language 🙂.

Erestor Arcamen said:

That’s what I meant. I was being not so serious obviously since Tolkien didn’t actually translate a book he found. But in-universe, he did and it was in an ancient language 🙂.

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I still don't follow you.
Are you saying the book was, in universe, in a different language?... Different from what language?
My line of reasoning (you may jump in and correct where needed) ...
The Hobbits spoke The Common Speech which, I thought, was also called Westron.
Bilbo, sitting at his desk, wrote the first part of the Red Book (There and Back a Again) in his native language: Common Speech [Westron].
If he's writing his memoirs for posterity it makes sense that he would write it in a language that his heirs and others in the Shire could understand.
If you mean that the Red Book discovered decades or centuries later would be "In different language" than spoken by the discoverer, well, OK. but who is it that discovered it? If you are saying Tolkien is taking that part of the finder, well, again OK (I guess... I'm soooo confused...😬.)

Tyelkormo the Fair said:

Sam is the man for me after Faramir.

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I like Faramir... he ranks pretty high with me.... higher than Aragorn.

Deimos said:

I still don't follow you.
Are you saying the book was, in universe, in a different language?... Different from what language?
My line of reasoning (you may jump in and correct where needed) ...
The Hobbits spoke The Common Speech which, I thought, was also called Westron.
Bilbo, sitting at his desk, wrote the first part of the Red Book (There and Back a Again) in his native language: Common Speech [Westron].
If he's writing his memoirs for posterity it makes sense that he would write it in a language that his heirs and others in the Shire could understand.
If you mean that the Red Book discovered decades or centuries later would be "In different language" than spoken by the discoverer, well, OK. but who is it that discovered it? If you are saying Tolkien is taking that part of the finder, well, again OK (I guess... I'm soooo confused...😬.)

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Doesn’t specifically mention Westron but in-universe, Tolkien translated the Red Book to English

“This account of the end of the Third Age is drawn mainly from the Red Book of Westmarch. That most important source, a collection of writings in which the traditions of the Shire were gathered, first by Bilbo and then by Frodo and others, was preserved by the descendants of Samwise the Hobbit, who enlarged it with accounts of later events. The original Red Book has not been preserved, but many copies were made, especially in Gondor. … It is here translated in full, and so presented, according to its traditional order, with only such omissions as seemed necessary for reasons of narrative continuity.”

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Erestor Arcamen said:

Doesn’t specifically mention Westron but in-universe, Tolkien translated the Red Book to English

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Ah...OK. I see now. Gratias 🙂

See also Appendix F On Translation. For example of a name: back in "Sam's" day there was no one actually called "Sam/Samwise" of the "Shire" -- there was rather a Hobbit called Ban, short for Banazîr, who lived in a place called Sûza "Shire".

Not all names in The Lord of the Rings have been translated of course (not Elvish names for example, except in the sense when a meaning is also given, like Legolas "Green-leaves"), but generally speaking. . .

. . . in Ban's time, English had yet to be "invented" (yet to evolve into a branch or branches growing out from the Great Tree of Primary World Languages), so Tolkien-as-translator is part of the internal conceit. Before "the Bilbo Transmission" idea, an earlier mode of transmission had Tolkien translating "Silmarillion related" tales from Old English -- these Old English texts being written by a man named Ælfwine, who had himself visited Tol Eressea and learned stories directly from the Elves there.

To put things very briefly!

Radaghast said:

It would also stretch credibility for Aragorn to appear out of nowhere to defeat an undead creature (and with a broken sword). Also, it would be depriving the book of a classic tavern scene. I can't imagine why anyone would want to change that.

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I think Tolkien would be perfectly capable of writing Aragorn as the saviour of the hobbits without stretching credibility; as for the tavern scene, I'm not sure why it is anything like a classic?

TrackerOrc said:

I think Tolkien would be perfectly capable of writing Aragorn as the saviour of the hobbits without stretching credibility; as for the tavern scene, I'm not sure why it is anything like a classic?

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I can see why someone might consider it a classic in the films (because of the moment when Frodo first puts the Ring on is pretty much known to everyone) but since he's talking about the books I'm not sure. Maybe also the Ring scene? I don't know.

TrackerOrc said:

I think Tolkien would be perfectly capable of writing Aragorn as the saviour of the hobbits without stretching credibility; as for the tavern scene, I'm not sure why it is anything like a classic?

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The Prancing Pony a perfect introduction for Aragorn. Readers don't know who he is so they're on their guard as much as Frodo is. It contributes to the tension.

I don't know how even Tolkien could have Aragorn just show up at the Barrow-downs to save the day, like Mighty Mouse.

Elwing the White said:

I can see why someone might consider it a classic in the films (because of the moment when Frodo first puts the Ring on is pretty much known to everyone) but since he's talking about the books I'm not sure. Maybe also the Ring scene? I don't know.

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It serves as a template for other such scenes by other authors. It's like the granddaddy of tavern scenes in the genre.

Taverns and inns featured in earlier stories, but like so many memorable things in Tolkien, it became a favorite trope for fantasy writers:

As for Aragorn being at the Barrow-downs, he didn't exist at that point:

Strider sitting in the corner at the inn was a shock, and I had no more idea who he was than had Frodo.

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Letter 163, 7 June1955, to W.H. Auden

Retrofitting him into the earlier scene would have required some major rewriting.

Perhaps the most questionable thing about the book is the conversation about what to do with the Ring at the Council of Elrond. Glorfindel states that there are only two options: to send it over the Sea or to destroy it. Elrond says "they who dwell beyond the Sea will not take it" and they don't have the means to destroy it themselves. Glorfindel then proposes a third option (despite a moment before saying there were only two): that it be thrown into the Sea, never to be found by Sauron. Gandalf says it won't be hidden forever. It will eventually be found by someone or something:

Not safe for ever,’ said Gandalf. ‘There are many things in the deep waters; and seas and lands may change. And it is not our part here to take thought only for a season, or for a few lives of Men, or for a passing age of the world. We should seek a final end of this menace, even if we do not hope to make one.’

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But what Gandalf curiously fails to mention is that throwing the Ring into the sea will not defeat Sauron. They had only a few moments earlier said that none there had the strength to defy Sauron, that even Tom Bombadil would fall after everyone else fell. This would be Sauron without the Ring. So, why then would throwing the Ring into the sea even be considered as an option? If they throw it into the sea, they're all still well and truly done for. In fact, short of handing it over to Sauron or using it themselves, losing the Ring would be the most foolish thing they could possibly do.

It should be noted that at this point it is not stated outright that destroying the Ring will destroy Sauron. Gandalf doesn't make this plain until the chapter "The Last Debate" in Book V. It is only hinted at before this in the most oblique way. This makes this whole exchange even more curious to me. For all anyone can tell at this point, unless they are especially astute, destroying the Ring would not destroy Sauron, and he would still be able to destroy them all. I'm of course open to correction on any of this.