Worthless and Weak

So it looks like I can read stuff faster than I can blog about stuff, so i've gotten a little further behind...

So, I've read from the Ring Going South to Leaving Lothlorien. Again, its very interesting what is highlighted in the book, there are two chapters devoted to Moria, full of orcs and cave trolls and balrogs, and then three chapters devoted to Lothlorien, with nothing but elves, and no real danger or "excitement". The most important character from this part is Galadriel, the elf queen. She has one of the three elven rings, and it is revealed that all of Lothlorien's beauty, and indeed the elves themselves, is dependent upon her ring (and the other two), and that destroying the one ring would cause all less rings to slowly die. Faced with this problem, she still urges Frodo on, saying that she would rather see this magnificent beauty fade from the world than have it overcome by Sauron.

This is one of Tolkien's major themes, perhaps the major theme: that beauty is slowly disappearing from middle-earth, and that what is is never as impressive as was, for there are no more mithril mines, no more silmarils, Numenor fell into the sea, and very soon there will be no more rings of power. Yet this is as it should be, that to attempt to turn back time, to use the ring to attempt to regain these treasures would be to invite Sauron's corruption into whatever it touched. This I think, is most clearly illustrated in the character of Saruman, in his attempts to control the power of the world, he can only use it for evil ends.

I'm not sure what (if anything) this decline is a metaphor of, but one very stark similarity is to aging. As we age, all the "wonderful" things in our lives begin t disappear, and that while preserving youth as long as possible is a good thing, it can never be stopped, and attempting to recreate your youth ends only in folly. Indeed, most of the periphery of the book deals with elves, who are eternally youthful, and yet must deal with the truth that they shall soon perish, as they are forced to leave the world for the undying lands.

Labels: LOTR