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Riven Delve
Tol Eressea
Mar 5 2015, 2:57pm
Post #1 of 13
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"Fate is with you, Thorin Oakenshield"
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So says Elrond to Thorin in Rivendell in AUJ:
These runes were written on a mid-summer's eve by the light of a crescent moon nearly two hundred years ago. It would seem you were meant to come to Rivendell. Fate is with you, Thorin Oakenshield. The same moon shines upon us tonight.
Keeping in mind Thorin's end...at what point, then, did Fate leave Thorin? Or did it?
Or was Elrond wrong in the first place?
“Tollers,” Lewis said to Tolkien, “there is too little of what we really like in stories. I am afraid we shall have to try and write some ourselves.”
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dormouse
Half-elven
Mar 5 2015, 3:18pm
Post #2 of 13
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I'd say no, but perhaps he left it....
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Something like this:
Thorin was meant to arrive on the Mountain at just the right time to open the secret door. He did - Fate was with him.
Thorin's company were meant to remove the danger of Smaug - and they did. Maybe there were other ways it might have happened, but thanks to them it did happen.
Then comes the dragon sickness. In talking to Gandalf Elrond saw that as a kind of fate as well. Maybe it was. Or maybe if Thorin had taken notice of the warnings and acted differently at the Gate - if he had gone out to parley with Bard and Thranduil before the orcs appeared, maybe then his personal fate would have been different.
Complicated business, Fate!
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nusilver
Rohan
Mar 5 2015, 4:03pm
Post #3 of 13
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Something like this:
Thorin was meant to arrive on the Mountain at just the right time to open the secret door. He did - Fate was with him.
Thorin's company were meant to remove the danger of Smaug - and they did. Maybe there were other ways it might have happened, but thanks to them it did happen.
Then comes the dragon sickness. In talking to Gandalf Elrond saw that as a kind of fate as well. Maybe it was. Or maybe if Thorin had taken notice of the warnings and acted differently at the Gate - if he had gone out to parley with Bard and Thranduil before the orcs appeared, maybe then his personal fate would have been different.
Complicated business, Fate!
Around the same time in AUJ, Gandalf told Thorin that his pride would be his downfall.
Fate doesn't mean "winning the day." It means "thing that is meant to be."
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Voronwë_the_Faithful
Valinor
Mar 5 2015, 4:04pm
Post #4 of 13
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He correctly noted that Thorin's grandfather had been overcome by the dragon sickness, but he also said that Thorin's father had been as well, and there doesn't seem to be any evidence of that, is there? Is there a reason for this, or is it just a mistake?
'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'
The Hall of Fire
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Riven Delve
Tol Eressea
Mar 5 2015, 4:05pm
Post #5 of 13
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Another question this brings up is
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Is "fate" the same thing as "providence"?
Just to make it more complicated. 
“Tollers,” Lewis said to Tolkien, “there is too little of what we really like in stories. I am afraid we shall have to try and write some ourselves.”
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dormouse
Half-elven
Mar 5 2015, 4:27pm
Post #6 of 13
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Oh, sorry, I wasn't implying that Fate was the same as winning....
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Just that in that case the downfall of Smaug was 'meant'.
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nusilver
Rohan
Mar 5 2015, 4:31pm
Post #7 of 13
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Just that in that case the downfall of Smaug was 'meant'.
Whoops. Didn't mean to imply that you were. I was actually just continuing what you were saying as response to the original post. :)
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dormouse
Half-elven
Mar 5 2015, 4:44pm
Post #8 of 13
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I'm not sure that we ever saw Thrain respond to the treasure hoard at all. He didn't show any reaction when Thrain withheld the necklace from Thranduil - we saw Thorin look surprised.
In the EE scene when Thrain is adamant that Thorin must stay away from the Mountain I took it that he was thinking only of what he had learned in Dol Guldur about Sauron's plans. But could it also be that there is some other piece of Thrain's story that we haven't seen yet, to explain what Elrond said? That's the only way I can imagine it not being a mistake.
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arithmancer
Grey Havens
Mar 5 2015, 5:36pm
Post #9 of 13
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...Balin states that "Thrain was driven mad with grief" at the Battle of Moria. Presumably, his account matches Middle-Earth "common knowledge" of the House of Durin and these events. So Elrond's comment about "a strain of madness" would apply to Thrain, so far as Elrond knows.
(This post was edited by arithmancer on Mar 5 2015, 5:36pm)
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Voronwë_the_Faithful
Valinor
Mar 5 2015, 6:11pm
Post #10 of 13
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Wasn't Elrond specifically referring to the dragon sickness?
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My recollection is that Elrond was specifically warning against Thorin entering the mountain because the "strain of madness" that afflicted his family was the dragon sickness and being driven mad by greed. I wouldn't think that Balin's comment about Thrain being driven mad by grief would qualify (or for that matter, Thrain being driven mad by torture in Dol Guldur). But perhaps I am misremembering.
'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'
The Hall of Fire
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Otaku-sempai
Immortal
Mar 5 2015, 9:24pm
Post #11 of 13
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So says Elrond to Thorin in Rivendell in AUJ:
These runes were written on a mid-summer's eve by the light of a crescent moon nearly two hundred years ago. It would seem you were meant to come to Rivendell. Fate is with you, Thorin Oakenshield. The same moon shines upon us tonight. Keeping in mind Thorin's end...at what point, then, did Fate leave Thorin? Or did it? Or was Elrond wrong in the first place?
I think that all Elrond meant here was that fate was with Thorin on that particular night. It wasn't meant as a prediction of success.
"At the end of the journey, all men think that their youth was Arcadia..." - Phantom F. Harlock
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arithmancer
Grey Havens
Mar 6 2015, 2:39am
Post #12 of 13
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He does not reference dragon sickness. Just that a strain of madness runs in that family, that Thror went mad, and that Thrain succumbed to "the same sickness" (which could be any form of "madness").
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lionoferebor
Rohan
Mar 6 2015, 8:03am
Post #13 of 13
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So says Elrond to Thorin in Rivendell in AUJ:
These runes were written on a mid-summer's eve by the light of a crescent moon nearly two hundred years ago. It would seem you were meant to come to Rivendell. Fate is with you, Thorin Oakenshield. The same moon shines upon us tonight. Keeping in mind Thorin's end...at what point, then, did Fate leave Thorin? Or did it? Or was Elrond wrong in the first place? I think that all Elrond meant here was that fate was with Thorin on that particular night. It wasn't meant as a prediction of success. |
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