Here we are at the last Chapter of Book 3, a Chapter I have called the Book of Stones Flung Outward. It has that shape: It concerns a stone, the Palantir, flung outward from Orthanc by Wormtongue, and also the scattering again of the almost-reunited Fellowship, following different trajectories to Minas Tirith, Edoras, and the Paths of the Dead – reuniting again after the Battle of the Pelennor Fields.
But I believe there’s more going on here. For whatever reason, there are clues laid here to differences in the Books to come. And I think it’s worth it to examine those differences now, well before they arrive.
The first difference concerns the idea of the Palantir itself. There are many generalizations that could be made about these items, and I am not comfortable with most of them. If anything, I view the Palantir as what Alfred Hitchcock called a McGuffin – a piece of technology or a secret that really doesn’t matter that much in itself to the audience, but is there primarily to move the plot along, to give urgency to it. And what I view the Palantir as doing, as we move into Book 5, is signaling that Sauron is going to be from now on a real, immediate person and presence, making moves and counter-moves in real time, not an abstract force occasionally reaching out although always sensed in the background.
Because Sauron is now in some sense reacting to what you do almost immediately, the Palantir is also signaling that things are going to move very fast for this part of the Fellowship from now on. That the theme of Book 5 is going to be: Time is of the Essence. That because Sauron is moving his chess pieces fast, in haste to react at all the alarming news, you have to move much faster to forestall him. And that will always be at the back of your mind in Book 5.
But there’s another, more subtle foreshadowing. At the beginning of the Chapter, this part of the Fellowship had been reunited; and were planning to continue their journey in support of the main Quest of Frodo and Sam, continue together. And then, the stones are flung outwards. And from now on, they are reunited not for a journey in pursuit of a Quest, but rather as more of a class reunion. Yes, I know that nominally they are mostly reunited for the journey to the Last Battle; but this is not the journey of a Fellowship; this is the journey of an army. And you see very little of Gimli, Legolas, and Pippin on that journey.
And given that, the “meeting of old friends” only a day ago takes on a bittersweet air. Although they didn’t know it, this part of the Fellowship was also saying farewell to the tight-knit and purposeful Fellowship of the Road South. Never again will they have same level of complex sharing and support between each other, all for a great purpose, that the Fellowship has given them up to now. It is time, as has happened so often in my work life, to move to a new project, with some people the same and some different.
Finally, and most subtly, I want to call your attention to the last sentence in Book 3: “Pippin had a strange feeling: he and Gandalf were still as stone [!], seated upon the statue of a running horse, while the world rolled away beneath his feet with a great noise of wind.” You know what that reminds me of? A train.
Up to now, for the most part, we have seen Middle-Earth as a hiker or a walker sees it, with careful attention to the scenery all along the way. In Book 5, and in the last part of Book 6, we see it as a traveler on a train sees it: first the scenery rushes by, and we feel as if we were on the back of a mighty animal, snorting and puffing, with the noisy wind rushing by; and then we reach a stop, noting it as we pass at full speed, or descending to look around and maybe stay a while, before you resume your journey. Oh, there may be walking around at your stop, so you see the Nature or the people there, but then you ascend again, and once again the world flashes by. That is Book 5.
And then you undertake the return journey. It may involve walking, or riding slowly, but you skip over that, because you have seen it all before. Again, the journey is as if you ride swiftly, then stop, then ride again, until the final return home. That is the last part of Book 6.
And as a hiker reader, I must admit to being frustrated by this. I want to explore more of the Frodo Trail! I want to see the sights from the Stone of Erech to Pelargir! From Pelargir to the Rammas Echor! I want to see Lossarnach, and maybe even the great Road along the shore to Umbar, and the crossings of Poros, and the cool green Entwash and the waves around Dol Amroth and … well, that would be enough for me.
But it is what it is. In this new train Earth, stones flung outward do not get to choose their direction or speed. And anyway, I’ll always have Frodo and Sam, as the Frodo Trail goes ever on and on. I’ll always have Ithilien.
Speaking of which … Book 4 tomorrow.
Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings Like You’ve Never Heard It:
- The First of a Series of Ramblings About JRR Tolkien
- Part II. Pre-Psychology Writing, Poetry, and a New Hero
- Part III. Torture, Enlightenment
- Part IV. Weather, Mushrooms, Leaders
- Part V. In the Moment, Sam the Obscure
- Part VI. Folk Songs, Master, First, Fair
- Part VII. Hiking, Curses, Noble Language
- Part VIII. The Hiker’s Extrasensory Writing
- Part IX. Torture, Elves, Endings
- Part X. Your Highness
- Part XI. Business Meetings, Dwarves
- Part XII. Horns of Wild Memory
- Part XIII. Ecstasies of the Dwarves
- Part XIV. Valaraukar, the Third Touch of God
- Part XV. Memory, Nature, Passion
- Part XVI. The Gift of Enchantment
- Part XVII. Frontier Maturity
- Part XVIII. Pity, Decisions, Endings
- Part XIX. Into the Shadow, Kings, Names, Winds
- Part XX. People of the Morning, Child Soldiers
- Part XXI. Herdsmen and High Trees
- Part XXII. The Faith of God
- Part XXIII. Theoden’s Law
- Part XXIV. Helm’s Deep, Zangra, and A Life Worthy of Song
- Part XXV. Book of Marvels, Book of Friendship
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