A Hero Remade – Isildur in Tolkien’s Later Life (Part 1)

Over the past week, we’ve taken a look at the accounts of Isildur – his life, his death and the different ways in which Tolkien retold the story. Today we’ll look at “The Disaster of the Gladden Fields,” an essay/short story written sometime during or after 1969, at least fifteen years after Lord of the Rings was published. It appears in Unfinished Tales.

This work picks up the story after the fall of Sauron and contrasts the accounts appearing in both the Lord of the Rings and the Silmarillion. In some cases, it paints an entirely different picture of Isildur.

While in the Lord of the Rings we are told very little about the early life of Isildur, the Silmarillion fills in some of the blanks. There, we learn that he is your basic hero – honorable, rash, daring, rebellious, and willing to sacrifice everything for Good. But then his death via possession by the Ring, as portrayed in the same book, reduces Isildur to little more than a prideful, cowardly man willing to let his people die so he can escape.

In “The Disaster of the Gladden Fields,” Tolkien remakes Isildur completely. Prior accounts, in which the hero might have been painted in a less-than-kingly light, are altered just enough so that a different point of view can be reached. There are, of course, various other details added seemingly at whim, but then, that’s how Tolkien wrote (and rewrote).

In the Silmarillion, we’re told that Isildur returned to Gondor after the battle, put his nephew in charge, took the Ring and then left for Rivendell. In the Unfinished Tales version, he is in Gondor for a year “restoring its order and defining its bounds.” It was only after “he felt free” that he left for Rivendell, where his wife and youngest son were waiting for him. We’re also told that he needed to talk to Elrond. None of this was mentioned in the Silmarillion. There, he wanted only to “to take up his father’s realm in Eriador, far from the shadow of the Black Land.”

As far as the Ring went, in the earlier versions, it was to be an heirloom of his house, but in this late writing, it is not mentioned during this segment. In fact, the Ring was not yet mentioned thus far in the story, and wouldn’t be for quite a few paragraphs (the whole thing is only five pages long).

This in itself is telling. In previous versions, the Ring was the reason that Isildur did anything. Now, however, it’s hardly brought up.

Isildur set off from Gondor with his three eldest sons and 200 knights and soldiers, expecting to reach Rivendell in forty days. Tolkien explains the journey and his path. On the thirtieth day, they passed just north of the Gladden Fields, and were marching toward Thranduil’s realm in Greenwood (later called Mirkwood).

The troops were singing as they marched, and the day was ending. “Suddenly as the sun plunged into cloud they heard the hideous cries of Orcs, and saw them issuing from the Forest and moving down the slopes, yelling their war-cries.” Since it was getting dark, nobody could see how many Orcs there were, but it was estimated that as many as 2,000 were before them. Isildur ordered his men into a defensive position.

Remember, in the Silmarillion the Orcs were merely lying in wait, expecting Isildur’s party, which was caught completely unawares. But in this version, Isildur’s forces had time to prepare. After forming their defenses, they waited. Isildur had enough time to have a full conversation with his son, Elendur.

Isildur saw “vengeance” in the Orcs. “There is cunning and design here! We have no hope of help: Moria and Lorien are now far behind and Thranduil four days’ march ahead.” In response, Elendur reminded him that “we bear burdens of worth beyond all reckoning.” This was the first mention of the Ring.

As the Orcs drew closer, Isildur turned to his esquire Ohtar, who was mentioned in both previous books. He is the one who brought the shards of Elendil’s sword to Rivendell. But before we were not given the chance to hear the conversation of how this went down.

After handing Ohtar the shards, he ordered him to “save it from capture by all means that you can find, and at all costs; even at the cost of being held a coward who deserted me.” This just makes sense, but it’s also a bit suspicious. Isildur is telling Ohtar that running away to save something precious is honorable. Might he be thinking that he’ll have to do the same thing?

If so, this might remind you of Frodo’s Ring-inspired plan in the Barrow. There, he thought that everyone would understand that he had to leave his friends behind to die. What choice did he have? Was Isildur faced with the same choice? Tolkien seems to now tell us as much.

The Orcs halted their advance to dress their lines. Then after a volley of arrows, they charged. The arrows were useless against Numenorean armor. The tall Men easily threw back the assault, and the Orcs seemed to retreat back into the forest. Isildur ordered the march to resume, figuring that the Orcs had had enough. But this wasn’t being heedless, as in the Silmarillion. We are told that this was how the Orcs usually operated, and Isildur apparently had no reason to think they would behave any differently.

But he was wrong. These were Orcs made of different stuff. And it wasn’t just vengeance and hatred that spurred them on. “…and though it was unknown to them the Ring, cut from his black hand two years before, was still laden with Sauron’s evil will and called to all his servants for their aid.” The Orcs were unknowingly drawn to the Ring.

The Orcs attacked again, this time with all of their forces. They did so quietly and quickly surrounded Isildur’s party, though they were out of range of the archers. It was dark now.

While waiting for the Orcs to attack a second time. Elendur, Isildur’s son, spoke to his father again about the Ring. “What of the power that would cow these foul creatures and command them to obey you? Is it then of no avail?”

Isildur’s reply changed everything we know about Isildur’s character. It might as well have been a completely different person. But since I’ve gone on for some time now, we’ll hit that up tomorrow.

A Few Notes
What? A cliffhanger? Dig me!

Fun “fact” – Ohtar’s name was not Ohtar. In an author’s note, Tolkien wrote: “it is probably only the title of address that Isildur used at this tragic moment, hiding his feelings under formality. Ohtah ‘warrior, soldier’ was the title of all who, though fully trained adn experienced, had not yet been admitted to the rank of roquen, ‘night’. But Ohtar was dear to Isildur and of his own kin.”

Ohtar escaped with one other. In the original tellings, only three people escaped the ordeal. Who will be the third? Find out tomorrow!

Camera: Polaroid Automatic 250
Film: Fuji FP-100C (reclaimed negative)

About the Photo
Careful! There’s Orcs in them thar forests! Nahh, this is an old concrete section of Route 66 in Illinois.

• Day 127
• Miles today: 5
• Miles thus far: 636 (182 from Rivendell)

• 285 miles to Lothlórien
• 1,143 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place in the narrative: Book II, Chapter 3. Marching south along the western foothills of the Misty Mountains. Seventh night out from Rivendell. January 4 – 5, 3019 TA. (map)

Don’t Know Much About Isildur

Elrond was pretty chatty during the Council of Him, but Frodo had some questions, most of which were about how old Elves were. Turns out, they’re pretty ancient. Without getting too lost in reverie, Elrond told about the Elder Days and spoke a bit about his lineage before returning to the tale of the Last Alliance of Elves and Men (and Dwarves, okay?).

Near the end of the Second Age, this huge army gathered in Rivendell. Elrond then gives an incredibly brief overview of what happened on the slopes of Orodruin [Mount Doom], “where Gil-galad died, and Elendil fell, and Narsil broke beneath him; but Sauron himself was overthrown, and Isildur cut the Ring from his hand with the hilt-shard of his father’s sword, and took it for his own.”

But Boromir also had something to say – “So that is what became of the Ring!” Apparently in Gondor, they had a different take on things, which mostly went: “The Ring was lost, okay?” And that’s it.

Isildur took the Ring, and Elrond lamented that it should have been cast into the fires of Mount Doom where it was made. Gathered at the fires were Isildur, Cirdan (the shipwright) and Elrond. The latter two begged Isildur to throw the Ring into the cracks of doom. But he refused.

“‘This I will have as weregild for my father, and my brother,’ he said; and therefore whether we would or no, he took it to treasure it. But soon he was betrayed by it to his death; and so it is named in the North Isildur’s Bane. Yet death maybe was better than what else might have befallen him.'”

There was clearly more to the story, though only a few in the North had heard it. This explains why Gondor in the South was unfamiliar with the Isildur factor. Isildur, told Elrond, died in the Gladden Fields and only three men from his party survived. One was an esquire named Ohtar, and it was he who carried the broken bits of Elendil’s sword, named Narsil. He brought them back to Rivendell where the pieces remained and the sword had not been reforged.

Earlier in the book, in “The Shadow of the Past” chapter, Gandalf tells his own version of this. All he says is that Isildur took the Ring for his own. He makes no mention of Elrond or weregild or anything like that. The only part he adds (or that Elrond subtracts) is that Isildur “was waylaid by the Orcs of the Mountains, and almost all his folk were slain. He leaped into the waters, but the Ring slipped from his finger as he swam, and then the Orcs saw him and killed him with arrows.”

This was, for the longest time, all that any reader if Tolkien knew of this tale. Isildur took the Ring and refused to destroy it. In turn, it betrayed him and he died. Even The Tale of Years (Appendix B) doesn’t give us too much more to go on, saying only: “Disaster of the Gladden Fields; Isildur and his three elder sons are slain.”

Tolkien might have had a larger story to tell, but as far as can be seen in the drafts written during the Lord of the Rings construction, he never wrote it down (if he even had it at all).

In the Silmarillion, we’re given a much longer telling in “The Rings of Power and the Third Age,” which was started in 1948. It was to be, as Tolkien wrote that same year, “a link between the Silmarillion and the Hobbit world.” Much of that was to appear in Appendix A, but was cut for space.

And then, sometime in 1969, Tolkien wrote the short story “The Disaster of the Gladden Fields,” which took the tale even farther. This story was never finished, and appears in Unfinished Tales.

I’ll be covering both of those soon enough, but wanted to give you the basic story as Elrond, Gandalf, and Tolkien told it to the readers of Lord of the Rings. For all but a select few, this was everything known about the Disaster in the Gladden Fields until 1977 when the Silmarillion was published.

A Few Notes
Another short post. But it makes things flow a bit more.

I used a slew of books for this, but was most helped by The Peoples of Middle-Earth as well as The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide by Scull and Hammond. I was really hesitant to pick this up, but got a good deal on both volumes used. It’s wonderfully thorough.

Camera: Imperial Savoy || Film: Kodak Ektachrome 160 Tungsten (expired 12/1994)

About the Photo
Throw the Ring in the volcano, please! This is the Amboy Crater in the Mojave Desert, California. It’s about 79,000 years old, and was rumored to have last erupted 500 years ago, though more recent information makes that doubtful. At any rate, it’s a wonderful little volcano that you should visit sometime.

• Day 123
• Miles today: 5
• Miles thus far: 616 (162 from Rivendell)

• 305 miles to Lothlórien
• 1,163 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place in the narrative: Book II, Chapter 3. Encamped south along the western foothills of the Misty Mountains. Seventh night out from Rivendell. January 2, 3019 TA. (map)

Here You Will Hear Many Songs and Tales

The point of this project is to follow Frodo’s journey mile-by-mile (also, exercising). This is fairly easy to do since Tolkien tracked everyone’s movements with minute detail. However, in some cases, he enters a montage where a portion of the Fellowship’s journey is covered in a sentence or two.

After leaving Rivendell, he almost immediately enters into such a passage where 200 miles are covered in a sentence. Since that gap must be filled with something, I’ve been taking a look back at their time in Rivendell, which, due to the nature of the project, I had to skip.

And so we have just covered the dinner and a star-struck Frodo’s meeting with Gloin. Now, for a bit of dessert, Elrond and Arwen lead their guests into the Hall of Fire.

“Here you will hear many songs and tales – if you can keep awake. But except on high days it usually stands empty and quiet, and people come here who wish for peace, and thought. There is always a fire here, all the year round, but there is little other light.”

This was not the first time Tolkien used such a place in his writings, and harkens back to the Cottage of Lost Play from The Book of Lost Tales. Written in 1916 and 1917, it tells part of the story of Eriol, a mariner who travels to Tol Eressea.

The Cottage itself was inhabited by Lindo and his wife, Vaire, both Elves (or as Tolkien originally called them, Gnomes). They welcome Eriol into their cottage and gave him a quick tour (sort of). One of the rooms was called The Room of Log Fire. It was for the telling of tales.

Lindo, Vaire, a bunch of happy children, and Eriol sit down to eat a meal and Eriol tells the Elves a long tale of his journey so far. But then it was time to retire for some more storytelling.

The way Tolkien writes about this is pretty nutty. I’ll give a couple of passages. Before they sat down for dinner, Eriol heard a gong and his face was “filled with happy wonderment.” Seeing that, Vaire explained:

“That is the voice of Tombo, the Gong of the Children, which stands outside the Hall of Play Regained, and it rings once to summon them to this hall at the times for eating and drinking, and three times to summon them to the Room of the Log Fire for the telling of tales.”

But the nuttiness is just getting started. Lindo added:

“If at this ringing once there be laughter in the corridors and a sound of feet, then do the walls shake with mirth and stamping at the three strokes in an evening. And the sounding of the three strokes is the happiest moment in the day of Littleheart the Gong-warden, as he himself declares who has known happiness enough of old; and ancient indeed is he beyond count in spite of his merriness of soul. He sailed in Wingilot with Earendel in that last voyage wherein they sought for Kor. It was the ringing of this Gong on the Shadowy Seas that awoke the Sleeper in the Tower of Pearl that stands far out to west in the Twilit Isles.”

Anyway, they all enter the room at the three gongs. They were surrounded by many differently sized children holding many differently sized candles. At one end of the room was the “red glow as of a big fire.” Vaire explained that it was “tale-fire blazing in the Room of Logs; there does it burn all through the year, for ’tis a magic fire, and greatly aids the teller in his tale.”

While in Lord of the Rings, the Elves break into song in the Hall of Fire, at least on this night in the Room of Log Fire, the Elves tell stories of the old days and of the island they now live upon. On other nights, of course, there is song. For example, on the fourth night of Eriol’s visit, “Meril fared there amid her company of maiedens, and a full of light and mirth was that place; but after the evening meat a great host sat before Ton a Gwedrein, and the maidens of Meril sang the most beautiful songs that island knew.”

The Room of Log Fire was known by a few names (of course), just as the Cottage of Lost Play was also known as Mar Vanwa Tyalieva. It was also the Room of the Tale-fire, the Room of Logs, and Ton a Gwedrin (How much Gwedrin do we got in here? A ton a Gwedrin!). It was in this room that Eriol learned what would later be known as the Quenta Silmarillion. Most commonly, it’s just called “the Tale-fire,” and though Vaire claims it’s some sort of magic fire, it really just seems like a place to kick back, relax and listen to some Tolkien.

The Room of the Tale-fire was abandoned when Tolkien ditched the framing of the story telling, deciding instead to just tell the tales himself, rather than through the various Gnomes like Littleheart. But, as with many things he abandoned, bits are found throughout the legendarium.

A Few Notes

• Nutty? Yes. But if not for Tolkien, we would not have: “Gozer the Traveller – he will come in one of the pre-chosen forms. During the rectification of the Vuldronaii, the Traveller came as a large and moving Torb! Then, during the third reconciliation of the last of the Meketrex supplicants, they chose a new form for him – that of a giant Sloar! Many Shubs and Zuuls knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of the Sloar that day, I can tell you!”
• This past Saturday, I took a 10 mile hike to visit a single 15.5 million year old petrified tree. I took mostly film photos of it, which will be posted at some point on my Flickr account, but here’s one from my phone:

• I am counting the 10 miles hiked toward this project, which basically means that I didn’t have to use the elliptical machine Saturday or Sunday – a boon since on Sunday, I could barely move. The hike was about four miles longer than we thought it would be, and I clearly need better hiking boots. Or just hiking boots.

Camera: Imperial Savoy || Film: Kodak Ektachrome 160 Tungsten (expired 12/1994)

About the Photo
Cottage of Lost Play? Who knows.

The photo was taken along Route 66 in Dagget, California. I’ve been by this place a few times and just love the roof. It’s absolutely pointless and perfect.

• Day 110
• Miles today: 5
• Miles thus far: 550 (97 from Rivendell)

• 370 miles to Lothlórien
• 1,228 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: Book II, Chapter 3. Encamped along the western foothills of the Misty Mountains. Sixth night out from Rivendell. December 30 – Yule 1, 3018TA. (map)

Catching Up with Gloin the Dwarf

Frodo had come out of his mini-coma after being rescued and taken to Rivendell and was hungry. He was led downstairs after a chat with Gandalf and was seated at a large table. At its head was Elrond, who was flanked by Gandalf and Glorfindel. In the middle of the table was Arwen, Elrond’s daughter, and next to Frodo was a dwarf named Gloin.

“Am I right in guessing that you are the Gloin, one of the twelve companions of the great Thorin Oakenshield?”

Of course, he was, and both had questions for each other. Gloin wondered what was so important that four hobbits would come out of the Shire on such a mysterious journey. Frodo wondered why such an important dwarf as Gloin would come to Rivendell, “so far from the Lonely Mountain.”

Neither thought it proper to give any answers. However, Gloin was more than willing to recount the long tale of what he had been up to since the Battle of Five Armies, as told in The Hobbit. Frodo, well versed in Bilbo’s story of the battle, was interested in everything Gloin had to say, but was bewildered by all of the names.

This sounds strikingly like many feel about reading Tolkien, especially the Silmarillion.

Many of the dwarves in The Hobbit aren’t fully developed as far as their characters are concerned. Gloin was one of the most, however. In the story, he was the dwarf to note that Bilbo was “more like a grocer than a burglar.” He, perhaps apart from Thorin, was the least optimistic about Bilbo.

Tolkien uses this passage to catch the reader up with what’s been going on in the non-Shire parts of The Hobbit since the Lonely Mountain was retaken. Following Beorn’s death, his son, Grimbeorn the Old was the leader of the Beornings. It was this family that kept the High Pass open and free of Orcs. This allowed free travel to and from Rivendell and Dale. Speaking of Dale, Bard the Bowman had died, but his grandson, Brand, was now the king.

As far as the dwarves were concerned, Dain was still King under the Mountain, and only seven of the original twelve members of Thorin’s company were alive. “Bombur was now so far that he could not move himself from his couch to his chair at table, and it took six young dwarves to lift him.”

That seven were still alive was a bit of dwarf-realism. The truth was that the ten who survived the Battle of Five Armies would, by most peoples, be considered alive – or at least not dead. There were three, Balin, Ori and Oin (Gloin’s brother), who were missing. This was the real reason why Gloin was in Rivendell, and he didn’t want to say anything more.

For both Frodo, who did not wish to talk about The Ring, and Gloin, who did not wish to talk about the probable death of his three dearest friends, these were dark times. Even in Rivendell they felt that perhaps some things were best left unmentioned – at least for the present. The dinner was to be a happy time (though we’re not told what Gandalf was talking about, and it was probably gloomy).

And so Gloin filled the rest of the conversation with explanations of the halls inside the Lonely Mountain and the lands around Dale. There were many changes to the Desolation of Smaug, and all for the better!

A Few Notes

• I think it’s awesome that Sam, Merry and Pippin were put at the kids’ table. I remember quite a few Thanksgivings like that.
• If your copy of Fellowship of the Ring reads: “You should see the waterways of Dale, Frodo, and the mountains and the pools!” it’s an error. In the original published edition, it read: “and the fountains and the pools!” But it was mistakenly changed in 1954 (almost immediately after it was published). The 50th Anniversary edition corrected this.
• And that’s that – a pretty simple post today. Nothing too striking.

Camera: Polaroid Automatic 100
Film: Fuji FP-100C (reclaimed negative)

About the Photo
Well, maybe Dale and the Lonely Mountain weren’t doing as well as Gloin insisted. It’s all a matter of perspective, I suppose!

This photo was taken on Route 66 on the Continental Divide. Strange place.

• Day 109
• Miles today: 5
• Miles thus far: 545 (92 from Rivendell)

• 375 miles to Lothlórien
• 1,233 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: Book II, Chapter 3. Walking south along the western foothills of the Misty Mountains. Sixth night out from Rivendell. December 30 – Yule 1, 3018TA. (map)

Too Comfortable and Peaceful to Argue

Since Tolkien has entered full montage mode while the Fellowship makes its way south along the western slopes of the Misty Mountains, let’s take a look back to Frodo’s time in Rivendell starting with his awakening at the beginning of “Many Meetings,” Chapter 1, Book Two.

How Frodo comes to consciousness of the world around him tells us a lot about our hobbit. First, it’s the practical – he thinks “that he had slept late, after a long unpleasant dream that still hovered on the edge of memory.” Disregarding that, he wondered if he might have been sick.

Opening his eyes for the first time, he sees that the ceiling wasn’t very hobbit-like. Nevertheless, he found himself lying there listening to, of all things, a waterfall. He then questions where he is, out loud and apparently to the ceiling.

But it is Gandalf who replies. The last Frodo heard Gandalf was still missing. Of course, the first thing Gandalf does is chastise Frodo. But the hobbit “felt too comfortable and peaceful to argue.”

Before Gandalf spoke again, he remembered most of his journey (except how he got to Rivendell). But he then asked for Sam and his other friends, of course.

The whole time that Frodo was fading from the effects of the Morgul-wound, Tolkien measured his far-goneness by how well Frodo could see his friends. Now that he was apparently cured, he needed to see them. Gandalf puts it off, but assures Frodo that they’re perfectly fine.

I’ve talked about the effects of the Morgul-wound before, so I won’t go into too much detail here. This is where Gandalf explains just what happened on Weathertop and why he was so ill.

But here it’s revealed that Frodo had not only been asleep for three nights and four days, but that he talked about his journey. Specifically, he told the story of the Barrow-wights, which Gandalf overheard.

Gandalf’s chastisement was that Frodo had done some “absurd things” since leaving Hobbiton. He soon apologized for it, allowing that it had been “no small feat to have come so far” still holding the Ring.

“‘We should never have done it without Strider,’ said Frodo, ‘But we needed you. I did not know what to do without you.'” This is a fairly good point. Gandalf was supposed to meet them along the way. Of course, the Hobbits were supposed to leave much earlier. If Frodo had left when Gandalf wanted him to leave, “soon” after Midyear’s Day (which was the second of three days between the months of June and July), Gandalf would have been imprisoned during the whole of Frodo’s journey. Not only that, but Gildor would likely not have run into the hobbits and word would never have gotten back to Rivendell. Things worked out pretty much as they should have.

Still, Frodo had to ask. And all Gandalf could say in reply was “I was delayed.” He also delayed telling Frodo exactly how and why he was delayed. But he did say that he was captured. Do not meddle in the affairs of Wizards, okay?

There’s a phrase that Tolkien uses fairly often and I think it’s pretty important to point it out. Gandalf says: “There are many powers in the world, for good or for evil. Some are greater than I am. Against some I have not yet been measured. But my time is coming.”

Power, in Tolkien’s world, isn’t just a measurement in hit points (if it’s that at all), but a question of timing. The Witch-king’s power works in the same way. His time had not yet come, though it was close at hand. In Return of the King, he tells Gandalf that his hour is at hand. So, soon.

A Few Notes

• I’m still not quite sure what I’ll be covering and when. Maybe I’ll jump around. Maybe I’ll take it page-by-page. Who knows, really. But I’ll do a little and then go back to dig around the earlier manuscripts to see what’s there.
• Where applicable, I’ll take a look at later stories and manuscripts that Tolkien wrote long after publishing LotR that fill in some of he gaps.
• Tomorrow, we’ll take a look at this Strider fellow, and at Elrond.

Camera: Polaroid Automatic 250
Film: Fuji FP-100C (reclaimed negative)

About the Photo
Rivendell is a haven for rest, right? And you know that it’s got some great truck parking. Glorfindel totally moonlights as a trucker.

• Day 97
• Miles today: 6
• Miles thus far: 480

• 440 miles to Lothlórien
• 1,298 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: Book II, Chapter 3. Marching south along the western foothills of the Misty Mountains. (map)

Crossing the Last Bridge – Talk of Trolls, Stones, and that Aragorn Character

Strider leads our hobbits, including the wounded Frodo, across the Last Bridge, where they find an elf-stone. Once across the river, they begin to pick their way through the rocky Trollshaws.

Thoughts on the Passage – Book I, Chapter 12 (p200-2, 50th Anniv. Ed.)
Today’s reading covers a bit of ground – about six miles, but a relatively eventful six miles. When I first read the part about the elf-stone, for some reason, it really bothered me. It took me completely out of the story. I have no idea why, because once you know why it’s there, it all makes some sense.

As they left the East Road and started across the Trollshaws, Frodo could see old forts and embattlements staring down at them, and asked Strider who built them. This land used to be part of Rhudaur, one of the three sub-kingdoms of Arnor. This sub-kingdom was the first to fall under the influence of the Witch-king’s land of Angmar. I wrote about all of that here.

Strider then went on to explain that these evil men were all killed in the war that “brought the North Kingdom to its end.” While the war started in 1409 of the Third Age, this last fight, called the Battle of Fornost, did not happen until 1975, or 1,043 years before our story takes place. These old forts were over a millennium old.

After Strider explained this (in much less detail), Pippin asked where he learned about all this history. “The birds and beasts do not tell tales of that sort,” he concluded. This is incredibly fascinating, I think. Pippin completely took for granted (or simply knew) that the birds and beasts
told some sort of tales – though not of this sort. So, what tales do the birds and beasts tell? We know that some birds, like crows, can be spies and report to the Enemy, but what could he mean here?

Before they make their camp for the night, Strider sort of reveals two things about himself that the hobbits seem to miss completely. In answer to Pippin’s question, Strider replies: “The heirs of Elendil do not forget all things past.” He quickly moves on to talk of Rivendell, which the hobbits key upon, ignoring the whole “heir of Elendil” bit, if they would even have known what it meant.

Second, in talking of Rivendell, he says “there my heart is.” Of course, it could mean that he misses the place because he “dwelt there once,” but that hardly seems reason to leave your heart behind. I mean, Tony Bennett didn’t just pass through San Francisco, right? No, his love waits there, above the blue and windy sea! More than likely, he’s talking about Arwen, who I talked a bit about here.

For the hobbits, this was an incredibly difficult part of the journey. Old tree and roots made the scramble over the rocks an exhausting chore.

A Few Notes

• I listened to Kiss’s Alive II LP today, and now whenever I see the name “Strider,” I sing it to the chorus of “Strutter.” Strider! A million dollars to anyone who makes a decent parody of the entire song, singing all about Aragorn. (not actually a million dollars)
• For nearly a week, the proto-fellowship walked only about six miles a day. I’ll therefore be ellipticaling six miles a day to keep up and keep it clean.
• Tolkien again goes into montage mode, so we’ll have time to explore the Last Bridge and Trollshaws in greater detail. Maybe we’ll even dip back into The Hobbit.

Camera: Imperial Savoy
Film: FujiChrome 400D (RHP) expired in 08/94

About the Photo
When it comes to pictures of bridges, I’ve got you covered. This is the Devil’s Elbow Bridge along Route 66 in Missouri.

• Day 74
• Miles today: 6
• Miles thus far: 362

• 98 miles to Rivendell
• 1,417 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: Book I, Chapter 12. In the Trollshaws, across the River Hoarwell. (map)

How Do You Convince Tolkien to Write Another Book About Hobbits?

On the slower days, as our heroes tramp descriptionless through the empty grounds east of Weathertop, we’ll be taking a look at some of Tolkien’s letters.

Thoughts on the Passage – Book I, Chapter 12 (p200, 50th Anniv. Ed.)
If you’ve not picked up a copy of The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien edited by Humphrey Carpenter, you’re doing yourself a disservice. While I’m not one to care all that much about the life of an author, I’ve found this book to be nearly essential in understanding the legendarium.

The vast majority of these letters explain and detail not only the writing process, but the finished work itself. For today’s plunk into the letters, I wanted to start with something that was written after The Hobbit was published (September 1937), but before he began writing Lord of the Rings (mid-December of that same year).

That led me to a letter written to his publisher, Stanley Unwin, on October 15, 1937. The Hobbit had just been released, and he was just now fielding some of the first reviews of the work. Remember, that this was really the first major work he had published about Middle-earth. Though much of the larger picture in the ledgendarium was already set, this was the world’s first peak into Tolkien’s imagination.

In a review attached to a letter written by Unwin, author Richard Hughes raved about The Hobbit, calling it “one of the best stories for children I have come across for a very long time.” But he saw what he called “a snag.” There were parts of the story that might be “too terrifying for bedside reading.” And that’s hard to deny, at least at the bedsides of the more squeamish youngsters.

But Unwin wrote to Tolkien, exclaiming that “a large public” would be “clamouring next year to hear more from you about Hobbits!” This was good news for the publisher, of course, but what did it mean for Tolkien?

Of course, he was humbled by the praise, but Hobbits weren’t really the focus of the rest of his work. What about the Elves, who played a pivotal (if dickish) roll in the story? And at this time, only a very select few knew anything about the Valar, the West or even Illuvatar.

“All the same,” he wrote, “I am a little perturbed. I cannot think of anything more to say about hobbits.” Bilbo, in Tolkien’s mind, had exhausted everything he had to say about their nature.

The problem it seems, wasn’t with hobbits, but with everything else. “I have only too much to say, and much already written, about the world into which the hobbit intruded.” Here, he was asking Unwin to read the early Silmarillion works. So far, he had gotten the opinions of C.S. Lewis, a close friend, as well as his own children. Now he wanted Unwin to tell him “whether it has any value in itself, or as a marketable commodity, apart from hobbits.”

In the end, Tolkien was a professional author. If the public wanted more Hobbits, he admitted that he would have to comply: “I will start the process of thought, and try to get some idea of a theme drawn from this material for treatment in a similar style and for a similar audience – possibly including actual hobbits.”

Here, we see the first time Tolkien committed himself to writing Lord of the Rings, but we also see an example of how he so thinly trod the blade between fact and fiction, that he might be writing this for “actual hobbits.” His letters are filled with such lines. In another letter that I can’t now locate, he claims to have written something before “discovering” the Redbook of Westmarch, as if it was an actual historical text he uncovered like some vastly more entertaining Joseph Smith.

For the rest of this letter, Tolkien muses on ideas. While his daughter wanted to know more about the Tooks, another had written asking for more information on Gandalf and the Necromancer. “But that is too dark,” he asserted, calling back to the “snag” mentioned by Richard Hughes.

“I am afraid that snag appears in everything,” he continued. No doubt he quickly remembered the Tale of the Children of Hurin. There was nothing but darkness in the story of Turin Turambar. “A safe fairyland is untrue to all worlds.”

Simultaneously, Tolkien was out of ideas, but also filled with a bit of “faint hope” from Unwin’s letter and the encouragement he was receiving from the pubic.

A week later, he reconfirmed his commitment, telling Unwin that he would start something soon. But two more months would slip by before he committed anything to paper.

A Few Notes:

• We should also keep in mind that the public reception of The Hobbit at this point was incredibly small. Thus far, only one bookstore was carrying it. Tolkien was pleased to announce that his own university, Oxford, wanted six copies, “if only in order to find material for teasing me.”
• I’m loving this new Letters idea. I should have started this long ago. What do you think?

Camera: Imperial Savoy
Film: Kodak Portra 400NC (expired 01/2003)

About the Photo
Though Tolkien really wanted to continue with this Silmarillion stuff, he was willing to set it aside to start writing more about hobbits. In this was, hobbits were Tolkien’s load, and he was “humpin’ to please.”

• Day 61
• Miles today: 5
• Miles thus far: 296

• 164 miles to Rivendell
• 1,483 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: Still south of the East Road, southeast of Weathertop. (map)

The Soft Light of Sunset (Day 44)

Camera: Tru-View (vintage Diana clone) || Film: Kodak Ektachrome 64 (EPR) (expired 1989) (xpro)

The day is ending when our hobbits begin to miss the sunsets of the Shire.

Thoughts on the Passage – Book I, Chapter 11 (p184 50th Anniv. Ed.)
Having traveled a great deal on my own I know a bit about the loneliness that takes over come dusk. I though this was something that only I experienced, that it wasn’t a nearly universal thing. Here, Tolkien writes: “The hobbits thought of the soft light of sunset glancing through the cheerful windows of Bag End far away.”

That longing can eat away at you if you’re not careful. You’d think that it would be worse if you stopped before dusk, but it’s not. Maybe it’s the business of setting up camp and fixing your evening meal that keeps away thoughts of home. All I know is that if I’m on the road when the sun dips too close to the western horizon, I feel an aching that can only be relieved by stopping.

I first read about someone else feeling this in Peter Beagle’s I See By My Outfit, a memoir of two friends traveling across the country on scooters. It’s fitting as I felt it more when doing my own cross-country scooter ramble.

‘In the late afternoon the sun comes out long enough to go down, and it begins to et lonesomely cold. We stop for coffee in East Stroudsburg [Pennsylvania] and consider. We have planned to camp out as much of the way as possible, but there is something sad and frightening to both of us in watching the day waitresses at the Dairy Queen going home. We would marry them right now, just to have a place to go. Other people have their own scary times of day and get married them.’

In another passage, Beagle expounds upon this:

‘We always stop driving before sunset, partly in order to set up camp while it is still light, but partly, I think, because the hour before dark is a strangely lonely time to be driving something as small and open as a scooter as far away as we are. The thin orange light is going away so swiftly, and yet our own lights seem so feeble against the thickening air.’

The Lord of the Rings, while being about light and dark, duty, honor, friendship and a slew of other things is, essentially a book about a road trip. In so many ways, it’s no different than any other account of hard and dedicated travel. The hobbits are walking all day, from just after sunrise to just before (or just after in today’s case) sunset. They travel the same way that I travel – with an unstoppable consistency. Also, we both camp. And while I’m on a Vespa (or these days, in a car) much is the same simply because of the very nature of travel.

I See By My Outfit is easily my favorite travel book. It was written by the guy who later wrote The Last Unicorn, which places it in the late 1950s. It was a different country then. And just as I can relate my present travels to their wandering of six decades ago, they related their own travels to Tolkien.

‘”It’s like The Lord of the Rings,” I say. The Lord of the Rings is a fantastic odyssey written by J.R.R. Tolkien, and it forms part of our private Gospels…. “The beginning of the journey,” I say, “the first night on the road to Mordor. This could be Bree, I guess, the edge of the wild country. What could Ann Arbor be?” We are detouring to Ann Arbor to visit friends.

“Rivendell, where the elves live,” Phil says happily, “if I remember what Kisa looks like.”‘

A Few Notes:

• I cannot recommend this book enough. Oddly, it wasn’t this book, but my own whatever, that made me want to travel across the country on a Vespa. Before I even got a scooter, I longed for that journey. I finally did it in 2008, traveling over 10,000 on two 12″ wheels. I covered something like 28 states without a single breakdown (until the night I returned home to Pennsylvania, when my rear tire went flat).
• I’m not sure I could do it again. But I hope someday that I will.
• Usually, I write about Lord of the Rings or Middle-earth, but today I digressed. I like that. I’ll do it more often. Also, tomorrow I’ll talk about Trotter the wooden shoed hobbit. I think he’ll become a man. If you want to refresh yourself on the story thus far, click here, okay?

As an aside, I’ve been trying to think of other social media ways of getting word out about this blog. Mostly, I think it would help me stay on target, but also I think it would help me learn more about Tolkien through even more discussion. My first thought was Facebook, but as I know from personal experience, only about 10% of your followers get to see the stuff you post. There’s also Twitter, but it sort of annoys me. Should I not bother? Should I set aside my cranky misgivings and do one or the other (or both)? Thoughts, please.

About the Photo
Because most of my photos are taken on the Road, and because I stop before sunset, I have very few photos of the westering sun. This is one of the only ones, I think. It was taken in Frenchmen Coulee in central Washington. It was a long day and we were out too late, thus I was cursed by a lens flare

• Miles today: 6
• Miles thus far: 211

• 30 miles to Weathertop Summit
• 249 miles to Rivendell
• 1,568 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: An encampment by a stream.(map)