The Invisible Counterpoint

Fellowship of the Ring Frodo had been living amongst the inhabitants of the Shire for at least fifty years since he went off with the wizard Gandalf to retrieve a Dwarven homeland and rescue onto them, a treasure-hold of gold. He came back to the Shire possessed not just of gold but of reputation — here was one who had had actual contact with things others in the Shire could only count as imaginings, and been sufficiently up to the experience he hadn’t come back blemished. This prowess was useful for Bilbo, for it served as a protective ward over his quiet, comfortable living space: what other would ever dare venture upon his space other than timorously, when, after all, he could quickly transplant into any unforeseen entangling situation the Bilbo that kept wit and self-possession, with and before a dragon! All magic, all charms, run out eventually — if this isn’t truth, it’s nevertheless how all the simple view those of prepossession built in part out of magic. And since som...

Concerning "Lord of the Rings": If you doubt Galadriel, Queen of Elves, then it reflects only your own evil, so says Aragorn. How quickly did we pass this one over when we first read it... this homage to keeping someone immune to critical scrutiny, this making of her into Kim Jong-on? - - - - - Saruman has always been jealous of Gandalf. Really? Saruman is the head of the council, the innovator, the only one in Middle-earth who doesn't not want the old ways to always dwarf the efforts of the new, and he's the one who's jealous? Gandalf IS favoured by Galadriel, and always has been, and though this surely means a lot to Gandalf, it may not actually mean much to Saruman if he's passed on from finding much pleasure in being so obedient of old rules principally because it makes you mom's favourite, towards finding pleasure in accomplishing his own goals. When Gandalf lists all the ways in which Saruman has not ACTUALLY accomplished all that he...

We all know how Frodo would have trusted Boromir "but for the warning of his heart." But did you know that the elf-king Elrond was against sending Merry and Pippen along as members of the Fellowship, owing to the warnings of HIS heart? It's true... and Gandalf essentially told him HIS heart, the great elf-king's heart, spoke falsely, arguing for their inclusion with the weak argument that since you can't send a battalion into Mordor for it being sure to be noticed, you shouldn't think of military might at all when forming the Fellowship, and instead count on already established friendship. Yeah, 'cause it is SO apparent that not having another elf who can shoot down dragons or another human warrior who can take down dozens of orcs before going down, is but nothing if you've got a bit more of the accustomed and the familiar within your party -- 'cause who are kidding? friendship is born out of nothing again and again through their jo...

And Saruman spoke: "So Gandalf was just about to enter the fray of the most important and dangerous battle of Third Age of Middle Earth, the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, and suddenly was challenged with a choice -- should I stay or should I go? He had been sent back after death, ostensibly by heaven, and endowed with powers that made him now second only to Sauron. Here before him was the battle that would determine whether Gondor fell, and with it, as he had said repeatedly, absolutely the rest of Middle Earth." "But before all this, one of the little hobbits -- you, Pippen -- told him that Faramir was about to be burned alive in some old barbaric pagan ritual and no one was around other than the warrior Berragond, who, as it turns out, was in process of killing all the guards... and thereby maybe rescuing Faramir himself if maybe he had a little extra help --  like, perhaps, yours , Pippen? to prevent this from happening. Faramir's importance was pre...

We remember in Lord of the Rings, Boromir's failing, and how Galandriel sort of called it. But (the elf-queen) Galandriel knew too that she could have been one who could fail her test -- that is, to deny the Ring if within her power to take it -- and yet allowed herself to be alone with Frodo where her soothing sense of being able to take all travails away from the suffering, would very likely draw him to offer for her to take it from him -- that is, what in point of fact happened. When Frodo offers her the Ring, she gets excited about the possibilities that would be afforded her if she took it, and in her excitement grows into the stature of the dark, terrible queen who'd rule the world... but fortunately in the end she wills herself to withdraw, and even as it means she must herself withdraw into the West, she pleases in knowing she passed the test she evidently feared there was a decent chance she could fail. I would myself call this a pretty previous failing on her par...

If you re-read the part where Elrond agrees to let Merry and Pippen into the Fellowship rather than the two elf-lords he was considering, it's really rather amusing. What he actually does is relent, to Pippen's badgering -- pick me! pick me!-- and to Gandalf arguing for the importance of friendship over sheer might... as if friendship isn't something that is quickly forged when on travels, as it was between Gandalf himself and Shadowfax just before he got to Rivendale, and it will soon be between the elf, Legolas, and dwarf, Gimli, on their way to Mordor. Elrond the great leader more or less goes, "fine, it's only the end of the world if you fail... take your two munchkins over my elf-lords, even as even if two elf-lords can't "storm the Dark Tower, nor open the road to the Fire by the power that is in [them]," they could at least come closer to that pippenmerry possibly could. It's irritating that pippenmerry weren...

So at the Council of Elrond, there is an elf-lord, Glorfindel, who argues that the One Ring be deposited in the middle of the ocean. Gandalf acknowledges that if might well be safe there for "a passing of a world," but because the threat -- even if incredibly long delayed -- would still however exist, it must instead be dealt with for good immediately. To me this sounds a bit like someone arguing that, yes, the sun is in no soon danger of burning out, but a number of billions of years from now it nevertheless will do so, and so it is our greatest concern to do something about this fact -- NOW. Fortunately Elrond immediately steps up to argue that the way east to the sea will be under most watch -- it's likely what Sauron's expecting -- so it's not really an option, anyway, because otherwise Gandalf would seem a bit ripe for mocking; especially considering that the alternative he favours involves bringing it closer and closer to him, where the o...

I was thinking of writing a short essay on Lord of the Rings -- the book. Not sure, but probably. I'll mention now though that comparing the book with the film, one notes how much more democratic Jackson is compared to Tolkien. Jackson's impetus with the hobbits is to make each one of them leaders in the sense that with their decisions, abide the fate of the world... so leaders in the most flattering and worthy sense. Frodo decides to set off alone into Gondor, and the future King -- Aragorn -- has to react to this decision, and decides in fact to change course, which is what happens in the film. So all good both ways there: Frodo sheds himself the impetus of the great council of Elrond, which willed they go as much as possible as a team. But in the film it is Merry and Pippen who are responsible for destroying Saruman, they sway the ent-leader to his decision to participate and fight, when he had at first decided to play it the Tom Bombadil way and let the whole ranc...

If I could ever write my perfect response to this film, it would effectively sort through what I think is brilliant and empowering about the emotion in it, and what is foul about it. These were fleshed-out, passionate, brave, good people -- delightful to know, and worth our caring about. Out there, in a way we all need to come -- to allow ourselves -- to be. It's just a pity that Jackson seemed to use this beautiful miracle as a kind of bait to move us this way and that, which can make us feel a bit dependent and used -- in retrospect, fools, for having allowed ourselves to be drawn in -- which, in the end, has served to draw some of those reluctant to allow emotion into the circuitry of their reason, ready reason to retreat back to intelligent but affectless cognizizing. They took him in, are now feeling a bit taken for it, and in recovery, in pay back -- subsequent years of the kind of removed consideration, in film, in art, in mind, of the like we know or at least suspect would ...

Exeunt Peter Jackson, chased by our inner Anthony Lane The more we talk "longish orcish life [. . .] hinted at during the closing of TTT, when Shagrat and Gorbag are . . ." the further confident the Andrew O'Hehir in most of us will be in its inclination to have little to nothing to do with this film, for rather the longish while. Our decade-end sum: For a moment, we kept fellowship with the geeks -- and it speaks well of our humanity for doing so -- but, alas, they are very clearly a breed apart: fiddling with their forever toys, are these lot of unredeemable, squalor boys. One wonders if in fact this article wasn't bait to coat the film-memory well enough in sludge, so that it could be left behind for good, so much more the cleanly. When you want to dump someone, you are inclined to focus on the bad, and conclude that's more of what it...

We know these myths, we encounter them every day embedded in in our language, our culture and our psyches. No matter how beautiful and heartfelt the LOTR trilogy was, nothing new is revealed by them. (ThisMorningofJune, response to post, Dude, where’s my LOTR?,” Salon, 6 January 2010) Exposure to the truly beautiful and heartfelt can very much mean being exposed to something new, something we haven't really known before. There is a lot of heart in LOTR -- a lot of impetus to imagine the preferred psychological state as open, accepting, giving. I think the goodness in this is why we must try for a decade-end push to ensure the memory of this movie isn't stamped over by those who HAD been shut-down but have re-emerged -- now that the film's protectors have flown -- who complain of plot deviations from the book. The feeling now is of the scurried, pissing on the fallen giant. Ever see "Can't buy me love"? -- it's the geek gone star, possibly in position to b...