|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
noWizardme
Half-elven
Dec 3 2016, 9:30pm
Post #26 of 48
(4633 views)
Shortcut
|
|
I think he really tried to write the Silmarillion, but couldn't get it finished. (But others can probably answer this better)
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
I'd like to read more knowledgeable answers. On the face of it, its odd why he couldn't get it done, when a lot of stars had at last aligned (academic duties receding, royalties coming in, Unwins and a readership eager for further books if he could produce them...)
PS: refer back to the 'entitlement issues' post. I don't mean that us readers deserved the next book and Tolkien was at fault for failing to get it done.
~~~~~~
The Sixth read-through of LOTR continues until Christmas. All chapters now have volunteer leaders. Schedule here; http://newboards.theonering.net/...i?post=916172#916172
A wonderful list of links to previous chapters in the LOTR read-through (and to previous read-throughs) is curated by our very own 'squire' here http://users.bestweb.net/...-SixthDiscussion.htm
|
|
|
noWizardme
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 10:39am
Post #27 of 48
(4611 views)
Shortcut
|
|
It nearly wasn't- Arwen was added late in the writing
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
First Aragorn emerged from Trotter, a Hobbit who was an adventurer and traveller, and who wore wooden prosthetic shoes because his feet had been maimed by torture in Mordor. (Aragorn sometimes seems to have an odd memory of being Trotter: at the Prancing Pony he clearly has some very bad memory of the Black Riders; and it's been speculated that Aragorn's memory of Moria is "very evil" because Trotter was captured there).
Having created Aragorn and the plot about him being the heir to Gondor, Tolkien first intended to marry Aragorn and Eowyn. He decided against this, and at one point Eowyn and Aragorn were still to be lovers, but she was to die on the battlefield. Heartbroken Aragorn never remarries. Among the problems that causes are that the Gondorian restoration would only last for one generation.
Only then did Tolkien think up Arwen, and edit the Rivendell section of FOTR to include her. Separately (I'm not sure in what order these changes happened) Tolkien decided that Eowyn would live, Faramir turned up a bit unexpectedly, and Tolkien had two lovely characters and realised he could pair them off.
So there were lots of other ways Aragorn's love life could have worked out!
~~~~~~
The Sixth read-through of LOTR continues until Christmas. All chapters now have volunteer leaders. Schedule here; http://newboards.theonering.net/...i?post=916172#916172
A wonderful list of links to previous chapters in the LOTR read-through (and to previous read-throughs) is curated by our very own 'squire' here http://users.bestweb.net/...-SixthDiscussion.htm
|
|
|
squire
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 2:06pm
Post #28 of 48
(4613 views)
Shortcut
|
|
'Bookend the Beren and Luthien story'
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
What an excellent phrase.
And I think that's the final answer, although as NoWiz has just shown, Tolkien went down all the more conventional paths before he realized he had a real zinger of an ending for his emerging First Age to Third Age cycle of Elf-Man relations.
And that also tends to explain the paradox we've been exploring, of why this appendix, which seems like such a good story it ought to be in the LotR main text, isn't. Arwen isn't "Miss Lord of the Rings"; she's "Miss Silmarillion". And Tolkien, as much as he loved her discovery and placement as a neo-Luthien (nee Edith), realized simultaneously that he really couldn't focus on her too much in a story that would, ultimately, still be read by a bunch of 'Hobbit' fans.
Despite his best efforts in the late 1940s to finish the Sil for publication in a paired set with LotR, he couldn't do it, and so his readers had to cope with Arwen almost entirely in the context of Aragorn's brief song at Weathertop and Sam's little speech on the Stairs.
Note that both episodes are merely framing devices for the hobbits' budding heroism. That's what he meant in that letter, when he said that too much of Arwen would threaten the hobbit-centric theme of the new story. She has to stay hidden in Rivendell, in Tolkien's (and Aragorn's) heart, and in The Silmarillion.
Arwen, in other words, is the original Easter Egg!
squire online:
RR Discussions: The Valaquenta, A Shortcut to Mushrooms, and Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit
Lights! Action! Discuss on the Movie board!: 'A Journey in the Dark'. and 'Designing The Two Towers'.
Archive: All the TORn Reading Room Book Discussions (including the 1st BotR Discussion!) and Footerama: "Tolkien would have LOVED it!"
Dr. Squire introduces the J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia: A Reader's Diary
 = Forum has no new posts. Forum needs no new posts.
|
|
|
No One in Particular
Lorien
Dec 4 2016, 3:48pm
Post #29 of 48
(4594 views)
Shortcut
|
|
And continuing in that chain of thought...
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
And maybe that's why Arwen had a tragic ending. Most of the major characters in the Silmarilion came to bad ends of different sorts, and, as Aragorn was the latest of the Kings of Numenor, Arwen was the latest of the elves to suffer the curse of the Noldor (to lose all that she had gained). 
While you live, shine
Have no grief at all
Life exists only for a short while
And time demands an end.
Seikilos Epitaph
|
|
|
noWizardme
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 3:55pm
Post #30 of 48
(4594 views)
Shortcut
|
|
I wonder whether it also explains Tolkien's disposal of Arwen after Aragorn's death?
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
Arwen, as we glimpse her in the main text, hardly has space to become a rounded character. Seen in Rivendell, she's as much a stunning work of art as a living human character. Encountered briefly in Minas Tirith in Many Partings she sings to the White Tree (which seems a pretty generic elven thing to do), and barely has time to have some kind comments for Frodo before she's (slightly strangely) left behind once more in Rohan for Aragorn to escort our other heroes homeward as far as Isengard.
Maybe she didn't really bed in as a character Tolkien could see and empathise with, and that's why he slightly does not seem to know what to do with her once she has been the foil to Aragorn's quiet acceptance of his death?
It's hard to say, because Tolkien gets a lot of really good effects in LOTR by hinting, and by letting readers imagine for themselves: I can also see the argument that our perception of Aragorn and Arwen's relationship is all the stronger because we gradually see that he is driven on by love as well as duty.
~~~~~~
The Sixth read-through of LOTR continues until Christmas. All chapters now have volunteer leaders. Schedule here; http://newboards.theonering.net/...i?post=916172#916172
A wonderful list of links to previous chapters in the LOTR read-through (and to previous read-throughs) is curated by our very own 'squire' here http://users.bestweb.net/...-SixthDiscussion.htm
|
|
|
noWizardme
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 4:19pm
Post #32 of 48
(4595 views)
Shortcut
|
|
could we have a story (less awesome of course) that had some kind of female Heir of Isildur that Aragorn marries?
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
Sure - If you like I'll quickly invent a twin sister for Faramir. Matching her father in pure-blooded Numenroeanism and also in stubbornness, father-daughter relations have been difficult since her evident mutual attraction to the now vanished Thorongil. I'm beginning to like her already. Perhaps, being of the famously long-lived Numenorean bloodlines, she's 'old and grim' enough to match Aragorn ('he's too old and grim' was Tolkien's margin note about why Aagorn wouldn't do as a husband for Eowyn.)
Had Tolkien remained content to have Aragorn marry a Man-woman (if you see what I mean) then a High-Numenorean Princess of Gondor would be an eminently suitable match politically.
Or there's probably another solution for every taste, including the suggestions you already made..
But I think that,once Tolkien had hit upon the idea of a third elf-Man union, he wasn't ever going to give that up, even if the symmetry and neatness of it all was largely going to remain a private pleasure, largely unexplained to his LOTR readers.
~~~~~~
The Sixth read-through of LOTR continues until Christmas. All chapters now have volunteer leaders. Schedule here; http://newboards.theonering.net/...i?post=916172#916172
A wonderful list of links to previous chapters in the LOTR read-through (and to previous read-throughs) is curated by our very own 'squire' here http://users.bestweb.net/...-SixthDiscussion.htm
|
|
|
InTheChair
Rohan
Dec 4 2016, 5:34pm
Post #33 of 48
(4583 views)
Shortcut
|
|
Maybe the sources of the Red book would have been as interesting as the Red book itself.
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
(another of Galadriel's grand-daughters)?
I didn't know there were any. Even if there was one, another man-elf pairing wouldn't seem all that different from Aragorn-Arwen.
I agree that Arwen is not that necessary from the hobbit-centric point of view. If the story had been told form an Elvish or even just a Numenorean point of view it would have gotten a different focus.
|
|
|
CuriousG
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 9:36pm
Post #34 of 48
(4564 views)
Shortcut
|
|
Arwen as the final victim of the Curse of Mandos? It does make some sense. //
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
|
|
|
CuriousG
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 9:53pm
Post #35 of 48
(4569 views)
Shortcut
|
|
Was Arwen not a person at all, but just a thematic device?
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
Maybe she didn't really bed in as a character Tolkien could see and empathise with, and that's why he slightly does not seem to know what to do with her once she has been the foil to Aragorn's quiet acceptance of his death? I agree she seems to have little personality in the LOTR proper: stunning work of art, as you say, and otherwise the devoted lover far away from the action, not the kind of girl to send Aragorn a "Dear John" letter at the Mordor front, saying she was lonely and found another Dunadan in Rivendell to comfort her, sorry...
But I wonder if I sometimes give JRR too much credit as a writer, and maybe Arwen was his clumsy attempt to once again glorify Aragorn, who accepted death as a gift the way he was supposed to, while she is the embodiment of all that's wrong with people who don't accept death as a divine grace. We may be seeing her as too much of a character and not enough as a setup for a contrast, sort of like the Baggins (good hobbits) vs Lotho and the Sandyman millers (bad hobbits).
Otherwise, I keep contrasting her with the heroic and wise Luthien, and she comes up short, except for being equally beautiful. Luthien somehow managed to die of a broken heart when Beren was killed, and once again she took the leadership role, persuading Mandos to let them both out of his purgatory and even get Iluvatar to give the gift of death to her AND give Beren a second life too. Yet Arwen shows none of that leadership or power or resourcefulness and just falls apart. From an uncharitable view, one could say she slowly dies from self-pity. The key point is that Arwen's fate isn't satisfying from any point of view, no matter how much we try to justify it.
|
|
|
noWizardme
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 10:21pm
Post #36 of 48
(4567 views)
Shortcut
|
|
More like Melian than Luthien, then?
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
In the last Silmarillion read-through someone noted that Melian is more like a plot device than a person. Apart from the need for someone to be Luthien's mother, the plot would be undisturbed if Thingol had, say, a magic mirror instead:
Melian, Melian on the wall,
How do I protect my eleven hall?
And then he'd do the opposite of what was advised, the fool, and be proved to be wrong, yet again.
~~~~~~
The Sixth read-through of LOTR continues until Christmas. All chapters now have volunteer leaders. Schedule here; http://newboards.theonering.net/...i?post=916172#916172
A wonderful list of links to previous chapters in the LOTR read-through (and to previous read-throughs) is curated by our very own 'squire' here http://users.bestweb.net/...-SixthDiscussion.htm
|
|
|
CuriousG
Half-elven
Dec 4 2016, 10:43pm
Post #37 of 48
(4564 views)
Shortcut
|
|
That's how I'm starting to re-think her
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
All these years of reading, and I took Arwen for granted. But really digging into her in this read-through with the rest of you, like Melian, she is falling apart as a character for me and appearing more as a plot device. Aragorn is the great hero who is rewarded with a pretty bride. Check. He needs a female to continue the dynasty. Check. Oh, she even reinjects some Elven blood plus a little dose of Maia blood back into the Dunedain bloodline. So far, she's pretty, and she's a petri dish.
But as I write this, it occurs to me that Tolkien might have thought the same thing--did he think Arwen was too much of a trophy bride, rather belatedly, and give her that complex, unhappy ending to try to round out her character? Possibly.
|
|
|
FarFromHome
Valinor
Dec 5 2016, 11:07am
Post #38 of 48
(4526 views)
Shortcut
|
Otherwise, I keep contrasting her with the heroic and wise Luthien, and she comes up short, except for being equally beautiful. Luthien somehow managed to die of a broken heart when Beren was killed, and once again she took the leadership role, persuading Mandos to let them both out of his purgatory and even get Iluvatar to give the gift of death to her AND give Beren a second life too. Yet Arwen shows none of that leadership or power or resourcefulness and just falls apart. I think she shows a bit more backbone that you're giving her credit for, despite the fact that her story (such as it is) has to be told through cryptic hints in LotR since it's essentially unknown to the hobbits. There are two places where Aragorn receives help that is actually from her, but it's so subtle that it's easy to just read right on and miss it. The first is the cryptic conversation between Galadriel and Aragorn where Galadriel gives him the Elfstone. What isn't so evident at first sight is that it's Arwen who has sent the Elfstone to Lórien for him: “This stone I gave to Celebrían my daughter, and she to hers [i.e. it belonged to Arwen]; and now it comes to you as a token of hope.” The second is when she sends her banner - "she wrought it in secret, and long was the making". Secret from whom? I suspect it was secret from Elrond. Okay, it's true she doesn't defy her father as Lúthien does, and go off to fight with her lover, but while remaining dutiful to Elrond she still sends her help and hope to Aragorn through her grandmother and brothers. I suspect that Elrond wouldn't have approved of her two gifts since Aragorn is supposed to pass his test alone, yet it's her constancy that gives him the determination and strength to go on, symbolized by these two gifts.
As far as the death scene goes, I have to think that Arwen (like Lúthien, as you mention above) is dying of a broken heart. But she can't go and "rescue" Aragorn from death, since he has chosen it himself and he has gone beyond the Elvish halls into the unknown. All she can do is go back to the place where they made their first promise to each other, and die there alone. It's certainly a tragic end, and maybe it could have been more satisfyingly romantic if, for example, Aragorn when he had felt the end of his life approaching had left Minas Tirith with Arwen, so that they could make a last journey to the northern realm where they had met, and died together there. But Aragorn can't really leave his kingdom - he is bound by his kingly duty. I think that he must be the only member of the Fellowship to have died at home. And the price of that is paid by Arwen. (But I do sometimes wonder if we should read something into the throwaway line in the Lothlórien chapter: “he left the hill of Cerin Amroth and came there never again as living man.” Did the chronicler at least imagine that his spirit may have visited his beloved there, on her last journey?
They went in, and Sam shut the door.
But even as he did so, he heard suddenly,
deep and unstilled,
the sigh and murmur of the Sea upon the shores of Middle-earth.
From the unpublished Epilogue to the Lord of the Rings
|
|
|
noWizardme
Half-elven
Dec 5 2016, 12:37pm
Post #39 of 48
(4523 views)
Shortcut
|
|
Is part of the problem a stylistic one?
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
Tolkien tells LOTR in a style that is mostly novel-like (or, perhaps better, it is 'a romance for an audience brought up on novels'). In Barahir's telling on this Appendix, we're using a different, older storytelling style (I'm not quite sure what to call it, but it resembles folk tales or legends in a traditional telling to me).
So not only is Arwen "Miss Silmarillion" as squire put it - a character more from that story world than from the Hobbity LOTR - she's being written in a Silmarillion style rather than a LOTR style. Perhaps those two things are connected.
The choice might be deliberate - when 'novelized' characters seem to come across as much more human. I think we see this in the members of the Fellowship in LOTR. We get to know them well and they learn to work as a team. But the familiarity means that you could easily read them as a party of Men, with Tolkien sometimes remembering to throw in some item highlighting racial differences, such as Legolas not needing to sleep, or being able to run across snow. Legolas and Gimli can't both be stalwarts of the fellowship and remain mysterious alien races, perhaps. Maybe Tolkien wanted a more remote and mysterious feel to Arwen, and is trying to preserve a strangeness by means of style.
But if so the strangeness can become unsatisfying, as at the end of this tale when the focus is on Arwen and I am trying to assess her state of mind and wishes, and can't really do that from the writing.
Another difference that may be relevant is that I think novels tend to be about becoming - characters grow and change. I think that is less so in older forms: characters are pretty fixed at an early stage, and events reveal that character rather than challenging and moulding it. So maybe my lack of satisfaction with this tale is because I'm expecting Aragorn and Arwen to have changed from 120 years of married life, whereas they are characters in a form where that doesn't happen.
~~~~~~
The Sixth read-through of LOTR continues until Christmas. All chapters now have volunteer leaders. Schedule here; http://newboards.theonering.net/...i?post=916172#916172
A wonderful list of links to previous chapters in the LOTR read-through (and to previous read-throughs) is curated by our very own 'squire' here http://users.bestweb.net/...-SixthDiscussion.htm
|
|
|
InTheChair
Rohan
Dec 5 2016, 8:08pm
Post #41 of 48
(4500 views)
Shortcut
|
|
Maybe one can't understand it until ones own time approaches.
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
I think that he must be the only member of the Fellowship to have died at home.
I can see your observation, though didn't Aragorn say something like, what home I have is in the North?
He was apparently the only one of the fellowship (Not counting Bill the pony) who didn't go for a trip shortly before they died. (Or in Legolas and Gandalfs cases went to the west.)
Strange that both Legolas, Gimli, and Merry, Pippin and Sam all wen't away to die somewhere else.
Tolkien also didn't die at his home btw, but that is surely incidental?
(This post was edited by InTheChair on Dec 5 2016, 8:11pm)
|
|
|
Hamfast Gamgee
Tol Eressea
Dec 7 2016, 12:20pm
Post #42 of 48
(4416 views)
Shortcut
|
|
Does Arwen really regret her choice?
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
On the one hand she did find love and was also able to have off-spring that did exist in the real world, so to speak unlike nearly all of the rest of her kin. But on the other hand the number of years must have seemed brief to her at the end, even if possibly time in a relative sense slowed down when she became mortal as it where which might have done. But it does seem odd that in his tales where 'hope' is such a strong theme, it ends in a kind of despair. At least for one character. I wonder if Tolkien did this deliberately or maybe it was just someone's poor editing!
|
|
|
Hamfast Gamgee
Tol Eressea
Dec 7 2016, 12:23pm
Post #43 of 48
(4421 views)
Shortcut
|
|
You did forget one part of Gilreans farewell speech
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
'I have hope for the Dunedain, but none for myself,' another case of where despair comes into these tales. Despite the hope that many commentators talk about in them.
|
|
|
Hamfast Gamgee
Tol Eressea
Dec 7 2016, 12:26pm
Post #44 of 48
(4414 views)
Shortcut
|
That Tolkien chooses to end the tales on a relatively minor character in terms of the bulk of the tales.
|
|
|
Hamfast Gamgee
Tol Eressea
Dec 7 2016, 12:34pm
Post #45 of 48
(4414 views)
Shortcut
|
|
It probably helped to have been someone Elven
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
And even Elven nobility in order to keep some of the bloodline in Middle-Earth. Possibly so much that if this case if they hadn't had fallen in love, someone could have had an arranged marriage with someone that was willing. Mind of course this is ME fantasy so that type of thing doesn't happen.
|
|
|
elentari3018
Rohan
Aug 15 2023, 12:18am
Post #46 of 48
(3119 views)
Shortcut
|
|
didn't Tolkien write that originally he had Aragorn consider Eowyn?
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
"By Elbereth and Luthien the fair, you shall have neither the Ring nor me!" ~Frodo
"And then Gandalf arose and bid all men rise, and they rose, and he said: 'Here is a last hail ere the feast endeth. Last but not least. For I name now those who shall not be forgotten and without whose valour nought else that was done would have availed; and I name before you all Frodo of the Shire and Samwise his servant. And the bards and the minstrels should give them new names: Bronwe athan Harthad and Harthad Uluithiad , Endurance beyond Hope and Hope Unquenchable.." ~Gandalf, The End of the Third Age , from The History of Middle Earth series
|
|
|
elentari3018
Rohan
Aug 15 2023, 12:21am
Post #47 of 48
(3118 views)
Shortcut
|
|
I love this post and like the comparison between all the moms who passed young
[In reply to]
|
Can't Post
|
|
It does sound like Tolkien wrote it like how his own mother died.
But i do think Celebrian didn't die but passed west to heal.
"By Elbereth and Luthien the fair, you shall have neither the Ring nor me!" ~Frodo
"And then Gandalf arose and bid all men rise, and they rose, and he said: 'Here is a last hail ere the feast endeth. Last but not least. For I name now those who shall not be forgotten and without whose valour nought else that was done would have availed; and I name before you all Frodo of the Shire and Samwise his servant. And the bards and the minstrels should give them new names: Bronwe athan Harthad and Harthad Uluithiad , Endurance beyond Hope and Hope Unquenchable.." ~Gandalf, The End of the Third Age , from The History of Middle Earth series
|
|
|
Silvered-glass
Lorien
Aug 15 2023, 2:58pm
Post #48 of 48
(3102 views)
Shortcut
|
I can think of multiple possible reasons for Arwen's behavior, but the common thread is that they all make someone look bad.
Some possibilities:
#1: Arwen was in love with Aragorn to an unhealthy degree, as if enchanted. (And maybe she was...) She didn't want to live without him even though realistically she could have found plenty of new reasons to live.
#2: Arwen soon started to hate living in Minas Tirith and wanted in vain to reclaim her past happiness in Lórien away from Men. The tale using the word the very strong word "bliss" to describe her married life is going beyond exaggeration to outright falsification of facts for the sake of glorifying Aragorn and his dynasty.
#3: Arwen was extremely proud of her looks and hated the idea of others taking pity on her old age. The mirror was already showing her proof that she was - or soon would be - no longer the most beautiful of women. Her Elvish upbringing left her completely unable to deal with that idea and embrace the position of a grandmother.
#4: Arwen was unable to have a friendly relationship with King Eldarion even though he was her son. It was so bad that she couldn't even live in the same city.
I can think of other possibilities too, but the list might be getting a little too unusual with far-reaching plot implications.
Also, Arwen's starless departure reminds me of Smith of Wootton Major and how Smith gave up his star, but at least Smith got to keep his home and family.
|
|
|
|
|
