The Lord of the Rings, Return of the King (1955)
416pp, Fiction
Notes
2020-10-25
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I bored everyone by drunkenly talking about Lord of The Rings which I recently finished reading to K. It’s a book about which there’s a lot to say – so much good! so much bad! The thing that intersted me this read through, particularly noticable when reading aloud, is that there seems to me to be two fairly clearly delineated registers in which the story is told. First, the Hobbit register i.e. pretty much all the Frodo and Sam sections, all the Merry and Pippin alone bits. The language is more humane the story more readable – the heroes and vilains more human scale (c.f. the differences in the power of the Nazgul in the Shire vs during the battle on the Pelenor, also Saruman vs Sharkey). Most of The Fellowship if the Ring is told in this mode. The other register is the high-falutin’ conciously mythopoeic bits – bits where they call Gandalf “Mithrandir”, bits with Aragorn in, anytime someone is introduced with the names of one or more forefathers apended. Both these modes are necessary for the book, they function as a secondary alternation, colouring the books heavier primary rhythm, the alternation of light/ dark secitons that Ursula Le Guin notes in her essay “Rhythmic Pattern in Lord of the Rings” (from the collection “A Wave in the Mind” if you want to check it out). Both these structures are much more obvious when you’re reading out loud and the way they interact helps give the book its unique texture – very formal (structurally speaking) without ever being formulaic.
I’m a fan of the Hobbit bits but most adapters have minimised this part of the story in favour of the kings and battles side of things – this makes sense I guess, or at least it’s the obvious route because it fits a very clear dramatic schema which things like the Tom Bombadil section just don’t. But I’d love a LOTR which is 100% Hobbit-mode. Tom Bombadil IN. Scouring of the shire IN. The non Frodo bits of Return of the King OUT! Lord of the Rings pastoral edition 100% more pipeweed and ale.