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Sidecast - LOTR: An Author's Journey, Book 1 Chapter 3 · Mythmakers

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  Welcome to Lord of the Rings, a writer's journey, where we take a look at our favorite
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  book from perspective of a writer. My name is Julia Golding and I spend most of my time
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  as an author but I'm also an unashamed Tolkien enthusiast. We have now reached chapter
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  3. 3 is company. So picking up from the end of the last chapter, we're given this mission
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  that the ring must be destroyed and the dark lord mustn't get hold of it. And then what happens?
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  There's a definite setback in the pace. The chapter unusually actually starts with a direct
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  speech act by Gandalf. You ought to go quietly and you ought to go soon. But neither of those
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  things really happen because this is a chapter which really is about delays and it definitely
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  goes at a leisurely pace. So looking at it structurally, we begin with Frodo and Gandalf in conversation.
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  This conversation does achieve two things. It's the first mention that it might be Frodo's fate
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  to go to the cracks of doom. So laying that thought in our heads at this point very early on.
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  And we also have the actual destination of the first part of the story decided which is
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  Gandalf's suggestion that Frodo goes to Rivendell. And the way it's written, it does seem at this
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  point that maybe that's as far as Tolkien has got in his planning of the story. He can foresee
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  that there is going to be some showdown at the cracks of doom. But as far as Frodo's journey is
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  concerned, he has a vague sense that it's going at this stage as far as Rivendell. We also get the
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  first mention here of the important character of Elron half Elven who readers the Hobbit will know
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  from that book. But that title half Elven which Frodo understands is perhaps not immediately
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  apparent to the reader. That is because Elron's parents are Erendell and Elwing who are
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  characters from back in the much earlier period. But they are themselves both of them half Elven
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  and in their marriage they combine the lines of Idril and Tuor and Berrin and Lothian who were the
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  two marriages between men and elves prior to the Aragon and Arwen that is the culmination of this
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  story. Anyway, so that's why he's called half Elven. And as a sort of side note, in case you
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  haven't picked it up, his brother Elros goes on to found the Numenor or the Men of Westoness,
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  Liniacchi chooses mortality. So he is an ancestor of Aragon making Elron in a sense at many removes
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  a kind of uncle figure. So after the Frodo and Gandalf conversation, we then go back to the Hobbit
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  perspective that's become quite familiar to us from the earlier chapters. And note that by now
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  where is the first chapter had the Ivy Bush conversation and the second chapter the green dragon
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  conversation with the younger generation, we actually get them both combined because the news that
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  Frodo is selling back end, he's doing this as a cover for leaving the Shire, is so shocking to
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  the people in the Shire that giants and other portents on the borders were forgotten for more
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  important matters. We're always going back to this frame of reference of how the Shire
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  folks see the events of history. And of course we get this right at the end of the story with
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  how people are not so much interested in what's happened to the four travelers.
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  They see everything through the lens of the Shire which is both comic but also part of their
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  rootedness. And part of the news is that Frodo has sold his lovely hole to Lavelia,
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  Sackfield Baggins and her son, Lotho. Because it's a little note here that Otho has died,
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  that's Lavelia's husband. That reminded me to mention that there was actually some working names
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  in earlier drafts of this part of the book in those years when Tolkien was fretting over exactly
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  what was going to happen. When some of the names of the Hobbits or it's a chief Hobbit was Bingo,
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  Odo and Frodo. And he did for a while consider having Bingo as the main name of the character
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  all the way through. Fortunately he changed his mind. But these names Lotho and Otho, for example,
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  seem to be part of that time when he was playing with those particular sounds for suitable Hobbit
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  names. We also get here the theme of layers of substitution. So Frodo sells his house giving
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  one reason why he's doing it. Gets Mary to buy him a house but doesn't tell Mary that he's not
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  going to settle there and pretends to everybody he hasn't yet bought a house. So there's this confusion
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  that he's he's sowing and his attempt to leave quietly. And then in the last conversation with
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  Gandalf before he leaves, we get the handover. It's the handover from Gandalf who's going to be
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  absent from the narrative for quite some time now to the Hobbits themselves. And this is where
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  the narrative rests most of the time from now onwards. And it's also a sense we're finally
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  getting going. I also just wanted to make a little shout out to Folko Boffin who I have missed
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  until this read through. He is mentioned as a friend of Frodo. I had clopped that fatty
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  Bolger was there. But Folko who disappears from the narrative really on presumed he takes part
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  in the scaring of the shire and so on. But he is mentioned as a friend and then completely forgotten.
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  So we're left with Mary and Fatty going off with the carts. Folko going home. And the three
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  companions mentioned in the chapter title are Frodo Sam and Pippin. Now there's a little note
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  here. Liberia comes to try and claim the house a little bit early. I heard someone say somewhere
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  that's not offering Liberia tea was the worst insult. Somebody, an English person could
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  pay someone. I don't think that's true. I think it's just a sense that he doesn't want her to stay.
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  You don't offer to tea to people. You don't want to stay and talk to. Anyway, I also don't think
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  it's very admirable that they leave her the washing up. It is a little bit of a sexist world. The
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  world of these Bachelor Hobbits. Now the main thing I want to talk about in the writer's journey
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  in this particular chapter is some wonderful evocations of place but absolutely charged with
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  emotion. And here we get a very good example just as they're about to leave. The sun went down.
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  Baghen seemed sad and gloomy and disheveled. Frodo wandered around the familiar rooms and saw
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  the light of the sunset fade on the walls and the shadows creep out of the corners. So that's a
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  sort of darkening of the mood but that word disheveled. That's a very talking word. It comes up
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  again in relation to a description of a woodland being or a forest being disheveled. It's normally
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  used of a person. Someone is, you know, like you go through a hedge, you come out disheveled.
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  So therefore it means that Baghen is given a sort of personality. It's disheveled, it's neglected,
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  it's empty. It's a very good choice of word. And without any fanfare we get introduction to
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  one of the most scary of our bad guys which is the introduction of a Black Rider. It's muted
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  though because Frodo is overhearing a conversation where he can really only hear Gaffa Gamji's part
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  of that and Gaffa Gamji is not cowed by the Black Rider. They, Black Rider's themselves,
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  they gain in power as this book goes on. They gain in power as their numbers increase. But at this
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  point Tolkien is still playing his cards close to his chest. On a second reading you know what's
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  going on but the first time you read this you're unaware just how important this conversation is
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  and how much of a, how much in danger Gaffa Gamji is and Frodo himself. But it reminds us that Frodo
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  is hunted and people are looking for him. So thankfully finally he actually gets going. Still there's
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  no particular hurry. They're walking at night through landscape that they've walked many times
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  before that they know like the back of their hands. And what I want to highlight here which is a
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  huge strength of Tolkien's writing which is that everything is very specific. You feel as though
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  you could actually pick up this book and if this place existed you could use it as a guide to
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  how to go on this walk. But his descriptions are always loaded with a certain kind of mood and
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  atmosphere. And in this first one as they leave bag end there's this subtle poetry of thinness.
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  It starts with Frodo joking that if he carries on walking he'll burn off some of his fat and he'll
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  end up like a willow wand. But that then that idea of thinness then seems to be folded into the
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  landscape. It's full of spindly images. You've got the black ribbon of the stream. The smoke like
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  wisps of mist. The thin cloud birches. These are all in the next paragraph or two. It's reminder
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  that Tolkien is also a poet. His use of the language when it comes to the landscape is particularly
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  subtle, powerful and really well imagined. This isn't a vague fantasy world somewhere other.
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  This is a landscape that he makes you believe in 100%. And as they settle down for the night
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  in the roots of a big pine tree making a fire of the pine cones and dry wood. You almost most feel as
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  you're getting a guide to camping in the English countryside. Tolkien and his friends love their
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  walking holidays. So they probably actually themselves did something very much like this.
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  And then there's an odd note. A fox enters the story and it's given a moment when we hear the
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  thoughts of this fox thinking how strange it is to see the hobbits broad at night. Now this is
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  possibly one of the last echoes of a book meant for children, the idea of an animal with sort of
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  human-like thoughts. But it also is in step with the idea of the shy being friendly. It's foxes
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  they have in the shy, not the wolves and the wags that they will later meet. I can't think of
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  another occasion when the narrator actually goes into the head of an animal. Obviously there are
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  speaking animals like the eagles, but this little passage is an oddity and carrying on with
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  this theme of the brilliance of the nature writing you get in Tolkien. And why I would personally
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  choose it as my desert island book because I feel transported back to some of the most beautiful parts
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  of the English countryside when I'm reading this. You get that delightful detail familiar to
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  anyone who's been camping of waking up after the first night, finding lying on the ground is
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  actually quite tough on the old bones. And Frodo leaping up he plays a game on his companions,
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  but then he has this moment where he goes off on his own and there's a moment of sublimity which
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  is absolutely beautiful. He's watching the sunrise. Away eastward the sun was rising,
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  red out of the mist that lay thick on the world. Touch with gold and red the autumn trees
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  seem to be sailing rootless in a shadowy sea. So the thin wisps of mist that we met the night
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  before, where everything was spindly impale, have ripened overnight into this almost lush harvest
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  of reds and golds. It's wonderfully done. When Frodo returns to his companions and is told off
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  for not getting the water, there's a little conversation about the road itself and how it goes
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  ever on and on. And we get the reprise of the poem that Bilbo recited as he started his journey.
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  But now we get Bilbo as like the presiding spirit, the presiding genius of this story. He's often
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  mentioned as the travel who went before. So his poetry goes with them and also his thoughts and his
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  thoughts also act as telling us how serious this adventure will become. He's quoted as saying,
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  you step into the road and if you don't keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might
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  be swept off to. And going back to the applicability, this is one of those little sayings in the book
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  which I found really thought provoking. The Lord of the Rings is a book full of worldly wisdom as well
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  as other worldly magic. And you can count on Pippin to break the mood by his rather more practical
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  demand to have a rest. This is a point worth making here that Tolkien is differentiating the
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  characters of these three hobbits and later Mary right from early on. So Pippin is often the one
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  who says, right, let's eat. Let's go to this pub. Let's have a rest. He's very much on a holiday
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  mood when he's out for this journey. Sam is minding his position, I suppose you'd call it. He knows
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  how serious this journey really is. He's aware that he is there as the servant to Frodo. So he tends
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  not to speak until he gets really excited. He tends to agree with Frodo more, for example. And Frodo
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  is the one who perceives the sublime in the landscape, the one who we spend most time really in his
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  head of all the hobbits at this stage. That will change. And now we come to their first close brush
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  with the Black Rider, if you don't count the one with Gaffer Gamji. In an early draft of this novel,
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  this was a bit where Tolkien came unstuck really. He actually had Gandalf arriving at this point.
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  Think how that would work in terms of a plot. It immediately destroys any form of tension. Where's
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  the Jeopardy? Keeping Gandalf away so that they have to be on their own for the adventure is a much
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  more exciting direction to take. And it wasn't till he realized that it shouldn't be Gandalf arriving,
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  it should be a Black Rider that he got going again with this plot. Another thing that you can
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  notice here is that there is a sense of, well, what you tend to call a rule of three, there are going
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  to be three encounters with this Black Rider, two in this chapter. And our story listening training
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  means that somewhere in the back of our mind, we're thinking, oh, the third one's going to be
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  the most serious. So the first time we get Frodo having a gut feeling that things aren't right,
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  but also notice the way he asked them to hide. It's the most British way of possibly asking
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  somebody to get off the road. It takes him quite a few sentences.
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  It may not matter much, he said apologetically, but I would rather not be seen on the road by
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  anyone. I am sick of my doings being noticed and discussed. And if it is Gandalf, he added as an
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  afterthought, we can give him a little surprise to pay him out for being so late. Let's get out of
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  sight. And this is the first of our near misses. When the Black Rider arrives, it's Frodo who's
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  able to see him most clearly because he doesn't hide as far off the road as the others. He's the one
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  who notices the looking or smelling. And he also gets the feeling that he should put on the ring.
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  It's not his willpower that saves him here. It's the Black Rider deciding to move on.
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  So that's a near miss where Frodo does nothing to escape it. It's the Black Rider's impatience
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  that saves him. Once the Black Rider goes on, Sam then recalls what his father told him about
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  his visitor. So we get a second look at that conversation that Frodo part overheard.
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  And then the next section is really about the hobbits coming down from their fear.
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  They come back to thinking, well, you know, we're still in the shower, but what really bad
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  things can happen in the shower. They're still in the world of the fox rather than the wolves.
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  To highlight this, they find a really safe place to have another of their little rests,
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  which is this tree stump that they can get right inside. There's a feeling of nesting.
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  Makes us feel that hobbits are actually quite like little wild animals in a way.
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  They're cocooned there for a while, safe and away from the Black Riders.
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  And because they've had a moment of relaxation from the tension,
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  their high spirits return and we get another poem about walking. And this one has the theme of
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  returning home after a long walk. Upon the half the fire is red that one. What's really interesting
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  about this? If you're the kind of person who skips over the poems, actually have another look
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  at this because it's a bit like Tolkien's laying down clues for us. Many of the things they say they
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  will see actually come to be. Of course, there's the Sudden Tree. Well, that's Old Man Willow,
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  the standing stone. That's the Barrow Rites. The new road. Well, that's their path they have to find.
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  And a secret gate, of course, is Moria. And finally, there's a mention of hidden paths that run
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  towards the Moon or to the Sun. That's not unlike the very last journey Frodo takes with Bilbo
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  in the Elven boat because that journey defies the normal rules of geography. And this happy song
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  is then interrupted by the second time the Black Rider becomes a threat. And again,
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  remembering that we're doing this from the author's point of view, what's happened here is he's
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  lightened the tone in order that he can darken it again. And because we're in this rule of three,
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  the second time Frodo fills the urge to put on the ring, he experience it as much stronger than before.
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  He's not saved by his own willpower. He's saved by the arrival of the elves who are singing a song
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  as they approach through the woodlands. And this scares off the Black Rider. This is the first time
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  we get to Elven Poem. It's called a hymn. And it's to one of the Valar. It's to Elbereth,
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  who is known over in the Undying Lands as Vada. She is the
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  the demigods, the Valar, who put the stars in the sky. And Gilthoniel means star kindler,
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  which of course is what she did. Some people say that this song, this hymn draws on Tolkien's
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  experience of hymns to Mary in his Roman Catholic life. You might find that a helpful idea,
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  but certainly Elbereth Gilthoniel is the Valar that Frodo invoke at very key moments during
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  the course of this story. And the whole idea is Starlight. Starlight above Starlight trapped in
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  Galadriel's file and the star that Sam sees in Mordor much later. These are moments when
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  Elbereth's presence is felt in the novel. We don't get the Elvish here. We get a kind of translation
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  of it as Frodo understands it. And there's some things here which are worth mentioning because
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  there is this weaving that goes on in Lord of the Rings that I've mentioned already. There are
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  images here that appear much later. So for example, the one about woven trees, with stars behind
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  them. This imagery is very similar to what Sam thinks at one of the darkest moments in Mordor
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  when he's separated from Frodo. It starts in Western lands beneath the sun. It's got some of
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  the same imagery picked up from this Elven song. This song also marks it elves out as high elves.
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  Now, if you want the full history of the elves, you have to go and read the Silmarillion.
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  But just in brief, there were some elves who always remained in Middle-Earth. Those were
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  often referred to as the Woodland elves. And they speak a different form of Elvish. They speak
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  Sindarin. High elves speak Quenia and that's the language that Frodo is going to use a little bit
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  later on. But we know that they are these high elves, the ones who didn't stay in Middle-Earth,
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  but went over to the undying lands. They were, they accepted the invitation of the Valar to go
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  and live with them. And the break came when the Silmarils entered the story. And many of them,
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  at that point, came over to Middle-Earth on a quest to regain those jewels, which was led by a
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  particular elf called Fianno. Anyway, that story is very well told in the Silmarillion,
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  so just going to have a look at that if you want to find the full story.
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  Which means that Gildor, in Glorion, the elf who introduces himself, is part of that exile.
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  The elves who exiled Galadriel is also part of that. This means he's incredibly old.
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  He isn't an elf who is much named in the Silmarillion, so his backstory is a little bit opaque.
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  But we do get a sense here that he has been in Middle-Earth for a very long time,
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  and that he, like Galadriel, is part of the elf community who knows what it's like
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  on the other side of the sea, his scene, the starlight, on the western seas. For someone who is
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  so old, I think it is worth mentioning that these elves are pretty rude. They call the Hobbits
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  Dull. One gathers because Frodo doesn't seem that upset. This is done as a teasing.
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  But there doesn't seem as to be much suggestion that they're going to invite the Hobbits to join
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  them, until Pippin mentions the Black Riders. And that's when they get serious.
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  When the elves issue their invitation for the Hobbits to go with them, this is the moment
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  when Frodo first shows just how deep his learning is, because he thanks them in Quenia,
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  which is the language of the High Elves. It's a bit like what would an equivalent be? Be
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  something like finding an ordinary person able to thank a scholar in ancient Greek. It's
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  elegant, beautiful, and a surprise, because the Hobbits are not known for their fluency in the
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  Elven tongues. The elves now walk the Hobbits to their favorite camping spot. And there is so
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  many wonderful passages in Tolkien describing the nature of the countryside they're passing through.
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  But I just want to point out one particular little phrase here. They go through breaks of Hazel.
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  Now breaks are a kind of thicket. He uses the word thicket a bit in the next sentence.
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  But breaks of Hazel. It's got that quality about the words, like twigs snapping.
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  I think this adds to the power of these little descriptions. We're right with them.
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  Pushing our way through the undergrowth. The elves stop above Wuddle. And I love this description
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  because you've got them in this opening in the trees, looking down on the lights of the Hobbit
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  village in the distance and above them the stars. This is how the elves are in middle earth.
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  They're all the Hobbits and are the folk down in the valley. The elves are in this sort of
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  midpoint between ordinary folk and the skies. There's something a little bit elevated about them.
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  In the first chapter we had the excitement of Gandalf's fireworks. Here we've got the excitement,
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  the elves feel, and that's passed on to the Hobbits for the rising of the constellation
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  of Menelvago, which equates to Orion. Here's a nice link back to Elbarez, where we started with
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  their song because she is the one who put Menelvago in the skies, the swordmen of the sky.
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  And let's note here too the first of these woodland palaces that the Hobbits get to visit natural
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  halls. Got a feeling that Tolkien went through the woodlands of England looking for these places
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  because of course trees do naturally form these clearings. The next time we see something like
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  this is when Mary and Pippin are staying with Tree Bird. Tolkien isn't ashamed to repeat some,
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  well repeat with variation, shall we say, some ideas that he likes, such as being safe by eagles.
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  He's not afraid to bring them back in and these natural halls made of trees and one of those
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  places that he likes to take us. We now get the feast though it's interesting that Frodo compares it
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  to good enough for a birthday party. We're still a little bit in the world of the children's tale,
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  aren't we? And also note that elves don't travel light. They bring dishes and bowls and all sorts
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  of things, large amounts of food, not sure where they kept it but suddenly they're serving a feast
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  in the middle of this natural feasting hall. I want to draw your attention to a technique that
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  Tolkien introduces here and he does it several times, well many times and that is when there's
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  something that happens like this, he then reports on the reactions of the Hobbits individually.
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  A bit like a reporter going around and saying, well what did you think of this? And you've got
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  Pippin's reaction, but then you've got Sam and Sam is said to regard this as one of the
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  chief events of his life. It's not actually mentioned again, well other than hearing that
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  guild or certain messages ahead in the wilderness about them, but Sam's impression of this
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  isn't mentioned again. Maybe it's because it's the first time Sam meets elves and that's a very
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  important part of Sam's experience in this story is why he really wanted to leave the Shire in
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  the first place. He's achieved it without even leaving the Shire. He's also worth noting just how
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  good Tolkien is at making us almost taste the food and smell the smells of something which is not
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  in our experience. We're going to get that much later on when we meet the lebbas bread in
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  lorien, but here the bread that is served, Pippin says it was a bread surpassing the saver of a
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  fair white loaf to one who is starving and the imagery of that and the berries and the water
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  pure clean makes your mouth water just reading those words. This kind of interview technique where
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  the narrator tells us what the hobbits thought of something after it's happened, like when they've
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  had some time to think about the experience, is an example where the narrator seems to have a kind
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  of four knowledge steps ahead of us in the story. It does mean that we know Sam isn't going to
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  die tomorrow for example, because we know he's had time to talk about it later. So at first it does
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  remove some of the jeopardy a bit because we feel he's going to survive. I think it's something
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  that Tolkien doesn't do as often as the peril facing his characters actually increases. He doesn't
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  want us to think that it's don't worry about it. They're going to be okay with this kind of little
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  projection into the future. The last substantial passage in this chapter is of course the conversation
• 29:20
  between Gildor and Frodo, which is a little bit like a memory of the Gandalf Frodo conversation,
• 29:27
  except Gildor is far less informative infuriatingly so. And this prompts Frodo to snap back at him
• 29:35
  with the phrase go not to the elsewhere council for they will say both no and yes, which makes Gildor
• 29:43
  laugh. I think it's very true isn't it? Don't go to the elsewhere council. Galadriel is going to
• 29:48
  demonstrate something of the same qualities later on. The spirit that Frodo shows here does
• 29:53
  actually prompt Gildor to give him a straight answer, which does prove to be good advice. Go at once
• 30:00
  and go don't go alone. And the last note in this chapter is that about courage. We've had
• 30:07
  kindness and generosity. Courage is something which is like the third part of the Hobbit
• 30:14
  character. And Frodo is the one to raise it because he says he doesn't know he's got the courage
• 30:20
  for the test that's ahead of him. Gildor comes back with courage is found in unlikely places,
• 30:26
  which does ring true throughout the story because the four hobbits, the most unlikely heroes,
• 30:33
  turn out to find courage in unlikely places. And it's fitting that he ends by naming Frodo
• 30:41
  Elfriend. Frodo is going to be an Elfriend and friend to all of Middle-earth by what he does.
• 30:47
  And the chapter ends with Frodo announcing this time to go to sleep. So what do we make of this third
• 30:53
  chapter? Well, we finally got going, though of course it's not at a great pace. They're still
• 31:01
  walking in a leisurely fashion. And even when they do meet the Black Rider, which does give this
• 31:08
  sense of danger, they do recover from it or they're saved by the Elves. So it's not the nail
• 31:16
  biting journey it could be. Tolkien is saving that. He's probably aware that he's going to darken it
• 31:24
  and increase the pace and the danger. So he doesn't want to fire all his arrows here in this third
• 31:30
  chapter. But what I relish about this chapter is the feeling like I'm going on a country
• 31:38
  wall. The magic of the Elves and being with the Elves is impressive for Sam and for Pipin and
• 31:44
  for Frodo. But for me, what's most impressive is walking through the countryside with these three
• 31:52
  friends. And that's why it's a chapter that's particularly rewarding to go back to.
• 32:02
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• 32:05
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