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The Frodo-Gollum dynamic certainly features goodness and heroism, but not in any naïve way, and it ends with divine providence engineering the world’s salvation (though not its full redemption) through and despite their mutual corruption by the ring.
But between the “consistently good” and the “immovably evil” lies the zone in which most of the trilogy’s drama takes place - the corruption of the wizard Saruman, the fatal temptation of Boromir, the despair and subsequent redemption of Théoden, the curdled conservatism of Denethor and above all the complicated and tortured relationship between Frodo and Gollum, and within Gollum’s own divided consciousness. Yes, there is a mostly offstage villain, Sauron, whose evil seems fixed yes, Sauron’s Orcish armies are fairly described as immovably depraved yes, there is a set of characters who are unfailingly heroic despite various doubts and temptations. But the idea that he wasn’t interested in the territory between good and evil is belied by even the most superficial reading of the story. There are various ways in which Tolkien refuses realism, and his books are in no way gritty or sexy in the contemporary style. Martin’s “Game of Thrones” became a dominant cultural influence, and it never ceases to be puzzling. I’ve read many variations on Muir’s claim over the years, especially once George R.R. They were greeted with the sort of enthusiasm one can imagine.Įdmund Wilson called the books “balderdash,” a battle between “Good people and Goblins.” The book’s morality was a sticking point even for the most sympathetic critics, with Edwin Muir lamenting that “his good people are consistently good, his evil figures immovably evil.” Into this context dropped 1,200 pages of Dwarves, Elves and Hobbits in a grand battle of good and evil. Spare, complex prose, focused on the darker side of society, was in vogue. Literary critics of the time were taking up the “New Criticism,” which dispensed not only with the previous generation’s fascination with historical context in favor of close reading, but also with the traditionalist concerns for beauty and moral improvement, which were regarded as subjective and emotionally driven. Modernist writers were obsessed with interiority, broke with prior literary convention, and traded in irony, ambiguity and convoluted psychology. It was published in 1954, at a time when literary modernism was dominant and pervading the academy. The often ferocious response of many critics perhaps stemmed from the apparent anachronism of the book, combined with its massive popularity. Here, from Sebastian Milbank, in an essay making a counterintuitive but compelling case for Tolkien’s place among the literary modernists, is a useful summary of the argument over the portrayal of good and evil in “Lord of the Rings,” which has been ongoing since the saga first appeared: So let’s take on a couple of questions raised by the memorializing essays, starting with the familiar debate about the supposed absence of moral ambiguity in Tolkien’s works, relative both to more realistic novelists and to later fantasists who have adopted a grimmer and less heroic style.
4 - I’m not a true enough Tolkienphile to be automatically aware of such anniversaries in advance.īut I am enough of one to have some observations on other people’s Tolkien arguments. I didn’t write one because although I’m currently reading “The Lord of the Rings” aloud to kids two and three - this is the second time through, with at least one more ahead for kid No. Tolkien, a date which yielded a spate of memorializing essays. Last week marked the 50th anniversary of the death of J.R.R.
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