Latest / Mythmakers / Sidecast - LOTR: An Author's Journey, Book 2 Chapter 1

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Sidecast - LOTR: An Author's Journey, Book 2 Chapter 1 · Mythmakers

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  Hello and welcome to Midmakers. Midmakers is the podcast for fantasy fans and fantasy
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  creatives brought to you by the Oxford Centre for Fantasy and this is one of our sidecasts
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  where we take a author's look as we travel through Lord of the Rings together and we have
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  reached the midpoint of the Fellowship of the Ring. He reads book two, chapter one which
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  is called many meetings. This is what happens immediately after the confrontation between
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  Frodo and the Ring Race at the Fords of Bruinen and it starts with him waking up.
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  Now I was looking at the shape of this chapter. It's a long book. How do you structure a
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  long book so that your reader is able to follow you as you go along and this chapter is
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  one of those which is mainly about recap and gathering together threads that you want the
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  reader to notice as well as advance us advancing us into the next stage and it's basically
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  in four parts if you recall. It begins with Frodo waking up and we'll look at that section.
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  Then it goes to the reunion with his friends who survived the journey with him and then
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  it moves on to the feast and then there's a section at the end with the reunion with
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  Bilbo. So the first thing I remember being told when I was writing by a friend who another
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  author John Dickinson is when you have a waking up scene you're going to have quite a lot
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  of the minute story. In this one they'll be waking up in when you're seeping outside or when
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  you're waking up in Lothloria and so on. Each one has to have its own flavour so that it's not
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  repetitive or feels dead as a passage and this is a particularly good example of a waking up which
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  is a slow gathering of the threads and there's lingering as we the passage follows the slowly
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  coming to awareness of where they are, what he's doing. So I suppose it would say the flavour of
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  this is take your time and appreciate safety and then we find the first sort of thing that is
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  spoken as Frodo comes to back to awareness is fair enough it's where am I and what is the time
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  and we get one of these wonderful Frodo and Gandalf conversations. We had one right at the beginning
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  just after about the second or third chapter where you get the long chapter where Frodo and
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  Gandalf decide what to do with the ring and here it's like a reprise it's just the two of them
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  and you see their relationship very very clearly here and it's picking up that conversation in many
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  sense and what you get here in terms of character development is you get a really strong sense of how
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  much Gandalf enjoys the hobbits. I think it's also notable that we get the difference here between
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  what Gandalf is like as a wizard and imagine Saruman the other wizard we see though he obviously
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  read a gas briefly but what we get here is something Gandalf says about Frodo it's his admiration
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  for Frodo's courage and you can't imagine Saruman saying this this is why Gandalf is the best
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  wizard it's because of his love for others so after he they talk about the their conversation
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  provides the recap to book one and Gandalf has this he says though I said observe just now I did not
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  mean it I think well of you and of the others it is no small feat to have come so far and through such
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  dangers still bearing the ring his generosity and his love and appreciation makes him the wizard who's
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  on the side of the good people as opposed to the one who's after power and only sees things
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  of being about himself Gandalf sees it about being about other people and of course Frodo is saying
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  well why weren't you there and this is where we get Gandalf gesturing to the bigger things
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  going on outside of the adventure of the hobbits he's he's sort of almost talking to himself he says
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  I was delayed that's the answer to Frodo and then he goes on and says this very interesting
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  and that nearly proved our ruin and yet I'm not sure it may have been better so
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  so Gandalf is the one who is aware of the hand of fate or fortune on this and not the rings is
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  famously a story that doesn't have the presence of the valar or gods or sort of divine will as you
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  get in the Silmarillion but these little hints that somehow it was better so suggest that there is
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  a bigger pattern behind the works of evil in this story and actually this as I was making notes
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  on this chapter I almost kind of wanted to write everything Gandalf said down it's full of wonderful
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  stuff Gandalf at his best he says you know he was delayed and held captive and Frodo shocked
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  by this because he feels that Gandalf is somehow you know superhuman super super powerful
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  and Gandalf responses yes I Gandalf the Grey there are many powers in the world for good or for
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  evil some are greater than I am against some I have not yet been measured but my time is coming
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  the moral lord and his black riders have come forth war is preparing so as well as giving us a
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  sense of Gandalf's place in events with the oversight where he fits in the power structure it's
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  very economic this passage it also gives us a foretaste of where we are going Frodo may think okay
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  I'm stopping here the my job dust off my feet you know shake the dust off my feet go back to the
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  shower already there are hints from Gandalf that actually there is a much bigger struggle that is
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  not just about taking ring to Rivendell and then we have the passage where with Gandalf Frodo
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  is thinking back over what has happened and he's sort of reviewing how he feels about his companions
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  particularly strider I love the way here Frodo is only just coming to terms with it because he
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  self corrects he first all says oh I'm fond of him and then he says hmm fond is not the right
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  word I mean he is dear to me though he is strange and grim at times and one of the things that is
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  a theme through this chapter and through the whole book is this perspective of here is what the
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  Hobbits feel about things and here is the wider world and coming back to this Hobbit perspective is
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  the strength of this story it's why we feel much more affectionately about this book than say a
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  story in the Silmarillion when we don't come back to the Hobbit level Frodo looking at Aragon and
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  saying well I'm fond of him he's dear to me but he's also someone I don't understand because he's
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  grim and strange at times is the position the Hobbits are in all through this story there people
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  and places that they grow fond of but they're also beyond them and that is also the position
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  the reader we feel like Hobbits in this world not like elves and not like men of great renown
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  so it goes from strength to strength this conversation they then have a little chat about men
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  and again we've got this difference between what a Hobbit understands and how things might
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  actually be in the wider perspective because they go on to talk about barley man and Frodo sort of
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  was a bit dismissive says oh his you know his kind and stupid and Gandalf says well actually his
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  wise enough on his own ground you don't understand men if you think that's what men are about
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  and he goes on to talk about there's a different kind of man in Aragon that Frodo is only just
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  meeting and you cannot dismiss someone as only a ranger so in a way Frodo's Hobbit understanding is
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  being pushed up and elevated in this chapter quite deliberately and we also here have more trailing
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  of what is to come and heightening of our anticipation in what Gandalf is saying he says that
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  Aragon is from the race of the kings from over the sea and that race is nearly at an end
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  and it may be that this war of the ring will be their last adventure you don't want
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  to have a expectation at this point even though the last part is called return of the king
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  we don't want to know that the king is going to return we think they're going to we want to believe
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  that they might lose it all that it may not be a happily ever after ending and so we need
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  characters like Gandalf to put in seeds of doubt these are great people strong and powerful but
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  yet this may be last time we see them in history they may it's mainly to failure so this is all
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  I suppose in a sense what Tolkien is doing here is he's running up a series of
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  future promises it's going to be a war it's going to be about the race of kings from over the sea
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  this mysterious people we don't yet understand certainly when I first read this I had no idea he
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  was talking about Numenor it was just a mysterious phrase but gave them a sort of royalty and mystery
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  and awe and wonder about them you run up all these expectations so that you can start to pay them
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  off later in well by book three in this case okay so I mentioned that this chapter is
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  allows us to connect to the previous book it's full of recaps as well as
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  drawing up an account for going forward so in that way it's one of those pivotal chapters this
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  plus the council of Elron that comes next is it's quite static and it stays in one place but there
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  is it is the one where the adventure heads in a new direction and at this side it's still on the
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  what's just happened side of things and we get a recap of what Frodo missed because he passed out
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  first of all before they had the sort of narrative about the physical events they discuss the
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  nature of the ring race and Frodo is rightly saying that if he had known exactly what was happening
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  he he may not have had the courage to you know what it was too terrifying to take any action
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  and Gandalf's answer is an interesting one because it sort of sums up
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  how things work in this novel Frodo is helped by fortune or fate there we are that's the hidden
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  hand the wider pattern behind this but he's also only done it because of his courage
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  you need both of that you have to have the the characters adding their own
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  input into the fortune and fate pattern so I suppose we're beginning to sense behind Tolkien's world
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  what he feels is the I suppose it is the religious dimension of it it's not a world of randomness
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  it's a world that has a pattern but it's also a world where individual actors in it have
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  their own free will to add to the good side or to the bad one of the things that they discuss
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  here is about how the raves are half in the unseen world and this is something in Tolkien which
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  is mentioned a number of times but I've never actually really quite understood
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  how it fits in that we know the elves stay in this world when they die they go to the halls of
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  Vandos and eventually some of them can come back but they don't go beyond the confines of this world
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  so this unseen world I think perhaps I I understand it best as a world of pure power it's like as if
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  you looked at the world and were able to see the physical forces behind it the atoms and the
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  forces binding atoms as opposed to the solid matter maybe that's one way of understanding it
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  because the people who can see that are the elves people like Gandalf presumably but also the
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  raves and Frodo when he puts on the ring that's why I was thinking it might be about power that
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  these beings all have a form of power which isn't available to ordinary men ordinary hoppits
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  and he talks about he being Gandalf in that case the power that is in Rivendell he says
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  one they live here the elder now the elder are the name for those who have dwelt in the blessed realm
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  so that's people like Glough Indell but it would also be coming later Galadriel they live at once
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  in both worlds this is the world of the scene and unseen and against both the scene and the
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  unseen they have great power maybe the fact that it's not entirely possible to pin it down
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  is part of what it's point is that it's gesturing to something glorious something bigger something
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  greater and that in Tolkien's letters is described as the vistas that disappear off into the horizon
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  it's one of those vistas and there's quite a lot of time spent on Glough Indell's power here
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  but Gandalf also chips in that there's power of another kind in the shire so he's saying it's not
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  all about the as was the glamour and that's using that word intentionally not the glamour of the elves
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  because in the shire there is a rootedness of the earth of the hoppits have been close to nature
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  I guess that's more akin to the power of bombardal now looking at this from a writer's point of view
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  have you noticed there is something odd that happens here in this conversation where we have a
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  changed point of view we start very clear clearly in Frodo's point of view with his slow awakening
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  but then we get Gandalf looking at Frodo and this is something which I feel only Gandalf knows
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  and I'm not convinced he would have told Frodo that he thought this about him and it comes in my
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  addition on page 235 where Gandalf takes a good look at Frodo and he says that he he's sort of
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  internal thoughts that he noticed a hint of transparency about him and he wonders what will happen
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  to Frodo and he posits in his mind that maybe he won't go evil but he'll become like a glass filled
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  with clear light and we start pointing this out is very early on when I was learning to you know
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  do the job of writer remember having a note from an American editor about don't jump heads
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  so if you're in the point of view of somebody don't jump into somebody else's head
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  here Tolkien is jumping heads now you could say this is something because it's the idea this is
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  an account written by the Hobbits afterwards and maybe Gandalf said oh yes I was really worried about
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  you when you woke up in Rivendell or it may be a bit like the funny moment with the fox in the
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  shire that it's just Tolkien breaking the rules I guess I lean more to that but he wants us to
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  know this Tolkien that is wants us to know what Frodo looks like what state is in at the moment
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  and what his possible future is one wonders if for example when he does go to the blessed realms if
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  that's what he becomes like a glass filled with clear light it there is a sense of the ethereal
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  about Frodo breaking the rules but possibly with an intent there you can decide for yourself if you
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  think it is I think perhaps you gain the information you gain necessary information so you just
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  blink or don't notice at the broken rule right now we get the proper recap where we get
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  Gandalf telling Frodo what he missed when he swooned and this is where we get the
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  glimpse of the mischievous firework Gandalf because he wasn't content just to send a load of
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  water down the river with Elrond and grinding boulders but he wanted to have white horses versus
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  the black horses and you get a sense of his kind of almost like an academic pride he says
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  you may not have noticed but some of the waves took the form of great white horses with shining white
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  riders and there were many rolling and grinding boulders you know he wants he wants Frodo to know
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  because he he feigned it before it happened look at my wonderful touches and I love this it's a
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  slight hint of vanity about his art about Gandalf which I always love he's not a perfect mentor he has
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  his lovable side which also produces dragon fireworks and this is where we see it here and fitting
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  with this sort of account the conversation ends with Frodo lapsing back into a sort of a little
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  sleepy comedy sill in this mode of recap where he says I wish I could tell Bilbo the cow jumped over
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  the moon and the poor old troll that's referring to the songs of course which Bilbo would particularly
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  appreciate and again that's a paying forward to what's going to happen in the rest of the chapter
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  now we then move into the getting up phase and we've got Sam running in after Frodo is sort of
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  feeling a bit more himself he looks in the mirror and he looks younger that would be nice
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  but the journey has toughened up Frodo in many ways fling him down and we get this moment which
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  reminds us we're talking about hobbits not people because Sam comes in he ran to Frodo and took his
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  left hand awkwardly and shyly he stroked it gently and then he blushed and turned hastily away
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  that's not the behavior of an English gentleman of the time of when Tolkien is writing it feels
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  almost like it's something a child might do it's like childish something feminine you know the
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  softer skills the brushing of the hand and I choose to look at it not as a servile thing
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  it's there is a bond of affection the hobbits are there's an element of them which is a little
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  bit more like a preacher in a borrow and this is where we get that sort of hint that their behaviors
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  are not our behaviors at least that's how I choose to understand it and it's described as a
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  slightly awkward moment but we get them the sense that they are not stiff up a lip edwardian
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  into war period gentlemen but these are hobbits and we get to see Rivendell first of all here
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  from Sam's point of view Sam's motivation for leaving the shire as well as serving Mr Frodo of course
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  is to see elves and so we get to see the elves through Sam's eyes and what we get is the sense of his
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  pure joy he is just loving it elves elves here elves there some like kings terrible and splendid
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  and some as merry as children and the music and the singing not that I have had the time or the
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  heart for much listening since we got here but I'm getting to know some of the ways of the place
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  so Sam is in heaven really he is living out his dream of seeing the elves and I think it's important
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  for people who are coming at this from having read the hobbit to get their expectations reset
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  by Sam first because the hobbit elves are the fallar lally down in the valley singing
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  laughing in the trees type people and they're there aren't they in the elves like children
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  merry as children but he starts with elves like kings so I think this is the gentle reset
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  for the Rivendell of Lord of the Rings as opposed to Rivendell of the hobbit then we get to go
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  outside if you read the John Garth book about the locations that inspired talking to
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  write the various places in his book his trip to the Alps as a young man is definitely behind
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  Rivendell and I was remembering this I think the moment when the shadows leave a valley in the
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  evening or arrive at dawn is very outpying anybody who has been to places with high mountains knows
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  that feeling that down in the valley it gets dark very quickly and you can still see the light
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  up on the cliff side it's not something that there are many places in the UK that you get because
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  we don't have that dramatic mountain landscape except in sort of like Northern Scotland and places
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  and Wales majority of us like where I live on the downs it's all very gentle and you don't get
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  that sudden contrast as the sun goes down and that's how he chooses first to describe Rivendell
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  so Frodo goes out with Sam and he finds his friend sitting on the porch looking east the shadows
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  had fallen in the valley below but there was still a light on the faces of the mountain far above
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  the air was warm the sound of running and falling water was loud and the evening was filled with
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  a faint scent of trees and flowers as if summer still lingered in Elrond's gardens this is a hint
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  of a quality of the elves which they always have a bit of summer or spring or autumn about them
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  not so much winter and then we get a classic a classic pipin and Gandalf moment here where pipin puts
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  his foot in it by declaring make way for Frodo lord of the ring hint of the books tight also of
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  course we all sit up and pay attention and immediately Gandalf comes out of the shadows and says oh no
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  we don't name evil things here the lord of the ring is not Frodo but the master of the dark tower
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  of Mordor whose power is again stretching out over the world we are sitting in a fortress outside
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  it is getting dark a lesser writer would have stopped there and everyone would say yes Gandalf
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  you're exactly right but no pipin undercuts it by saying Gandalf has been saying many cheer for
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  things like that he thinks i need keeping in order but it seems impossible somehow to feel gloomy
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  or depressed in this place so the irrepressible spirits of the hobbit bubble up partly encouraged by
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  the place but also because this is pipin and i think this is why the hobbits are such fantastic
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  central characters to focus on because they they have this resilience in them which makes them
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  find people to spend a long journey with so let's move on to the section about the feast i'd say
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  the theme of this section if we had the theme of we cap in the first part the theme of this section
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  is look again and we immediately enter into this when Frodo looks up at the high table and sees Gandalf
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  Glorfindel and Elrond and he looks again at his familiar friend Gandalf and sees a version of him
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  that in a way he hasn't encountered before he sees him like some wise king of ancient legend
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  in his aged face under great snowy brows his dark eyes were set like coals that could leap suddenly
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  into fire he's realized this majesty this history to the wizard and then we get Glorfindel
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  little sidebar on Glorfindel we get a lot of time spent on Glorfindel in this book
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  this central section of the book but then he doesn't appear again except in briefly mentioned
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  and it's one of the embellishments excesses in a sense redundancies to spend a lot of time
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  or a character who doesn't then carry forward that is one of the underlying strengths of Tolkien's
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  world building thematically here we're going from Maya like the demigods of this world to the
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  Eldar the people from the the elves from the blessed realm which is Glorfindel who are like
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  ageless voice like music browse at wisdom and so on and in his time strength so he represents
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  the elves who came from the blessed realms and then we move to Elrond Elrond is half Elven
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  he is a blend of human and elf from both sides in his family and in a way he is both so he's
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  venerable as a king like Gandalf and yet hairless warrior like Glorfindel so he he in a way
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  brings the two together he's a third way for middle earth and then we get of course the first
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  mention of Arwen now it can sometimes be a bit annoying that all of the notable female characters
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  in Tolkien are always ineffably beautiful I guess it's because they're elves mind you
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  even Erwin is beautiful but anyway that's just allow the I suppose it's a chivalric
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  sense here of the the fine lady that people serve maybe that's what's going on but we get here
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  the family sketch so we've gone from Elrond and we now go to Arwen and it's nice to know that she's
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  not just a pretty face beautiful face it's also mentioned that thought and knowledge were in her
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  one of the disservices I think about the way the film portrayed Arwen and Elrond is that because
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  they were featuring the relationship of them as father and daughter and that sacrifice it was hard
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  to also add in and hard to have the script convey that oh yes by the way she's also an elf of
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  learning in her own right that is the problem of the fact that you're a mortal family but I
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  just wanted to highlight here that Arwen is no no fool she knows what her role in middle earth is
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  and she is wise and queenly in her own right and in a sense Frodo falls enough with her or in that
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  sense of chivalric code he sees the person that is on the most beautiful sites that he will ever see
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  and we also get mentioned here of the wider family Ella Dan and Elro here and the fact that they
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  are often out on errant tree to avenge their mother's death now just to for those of you who are
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  listening to this who haven't read all the way through I can't imagine as many of you but these
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  characters do turn up again because one of the cuts made in the film version was of the grey company
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  which will be a thing we can enjoy later on in the story when the sons of Elrond white ride to war
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  so from the elves we move to the dwarves and Frodo after filling his stomach because it's a hobbit
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  get your priorities right nice character note if he looks around and sees his sitting next to
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  dwarf who is beautifully described he's all in silver and white just let's have a little
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  look at how to describe a dwarf his beard very long and fault was white nearly as white as a
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  snow white cloth of his garments he wore a silver belt around his neck hung a chain of silver
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  and diamonds looking very magnificent and they have a lovely exchange of greetings as befits a
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  someone who knows dwarven manners which Frodo as a well bought up hobbit does and here we get a
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  reprise of the connections to the previous story of the hobbit and this is a very economic or
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  snap snapshot way of telling us where Bilbo's journey went the politics of it and what's happened
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  in the interim so these moments where you have encounters and you can recap information is a great
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  way of without burdening your reader with masses of flashbacks is a great way of saying this is what's
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  been happening so we get a sense of what's happened over at the lonely mountain in indale and so on
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  there's no time to go there in this tale but for those of us who have read the hobbit we want to know
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  this but it's not pointless so it's not just to satisfy the hobbit readers because it winds up to
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  mentioning that Barlin, Ori and Owen have gone missing and this will of course become an important
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  fact later in this book now the oddity though I just wanted to point out him here which slightly
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  I don't know I'm not sure about it when they're discussing Bilbo there's an odd past tense
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  from blowing he says you were you were very fond of Bilbo where you're not now it may be in there
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  to keep the reader on tender hooks that maybe Bilbo has you know he's died because he was an old hobbit
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  possibly but Bilbo is only in the next room so I often have wondered why he's blowing a past
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  tensor not sure I like it but anyway it's there after the meal we move into the Bilbo section so if
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  the feast section was about look again the next section is about the relationship between Frodo,
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  Bilbo and poetry they go into the hall and we hear that Bilbo didn't attend the feast because
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  he's too old and this is when Frodo gets to reunite with him and there's a lot of good hobbit
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  sense here because Frodo says oh why didn't anyone tell me you were here and he said well I knew you
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  were fine because I've been sitting with your bedside so that's why there's the delay and then
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  and Frodo is finally told it's a bit cruel someone should have said by the way Bilbo is fine Frodo
• 32:56
  but a bit more suspense if you do it this way possibly and then we get to see Bilbo
• 33:03
  in a bigger world than we knew him before so we saw him in the shower amongst the boffins and the
• 33:09
  bulges and the proud feet and so on and proud foot and now we get to see him amongst the elves
• 33:17
  and with the dunadan and we get here a sense of the relationship that pre-exists between Bilbo
• 33:28
  and Strider also known as Aragon also known as the dunadan and so we get to see Bilbo in a bigger
• 33:36
  world as we also heard about Bilbo in a bigger world from the reverence paid to him by the dwarves
• 33:42
  there's a a key moment here where the two ring bearers hold up the ring between them
• 33:50
  in the film you may remember this was done as a jump scare and I do remember that when my children
• 34:00
  were younger and they came to this bit they couldn't bear it this bit and the bit when Boramir
• 34:07
  turns on Frodo with the two bits they would often ask me to fast forward or they would hide behind
• 34:13
  the sofa because the familiar person becoming the unfamiliar or the enemy is worse than ring race
• 34:23
  it's not presented like this in the book have a look at how it's done here it's actually done
• 34:28
  as a moment of realization particularly for Bilbo he's asking to see it because he's curious
• 34:36
  he's probably still feeling the pull of the ring he knows that he's been told
• 34:41
  it's no longer your business but he can't it's temptation isn't it the ring is temptation
• 34:49
  but Frodo Frodo is reluctant but trusts Bilbo enough to show him so there's a strong
• 34:55
  familial love there which means he does something for Bilbo he doesn't want to do for somebody else
• 35:02
  but there's also in the other way the fact that Bilbo gave it up freely means that he doesn't
• 35:09
  try and take it back in fact he's grown in stature to realise that he doesn't spell it out but he
• 35:18
  says I'm sorry that this burden came to you I understand now and then he gives his very wise
• 35:26
  reflection he says don't adventures ever have an end I suppose not someone else always has to
• 35:33
  carry on the story and as this was being written during the Second World War I sometimes wonder
• 35:42
  here if there is a reflection on the fact that one generation fought in the First World War
• 35:49
  another generation is now having to carry on the adventure and fight in the second much to
• 35:55
  everybody's regret so if there's an application here that seems to me one that lends itself to this
• 36:02
  moment and there's another nice moment here and when you are writing you have an instinctive
• 36:09
  story sense of course and everything should have a purpose and there's a lovely moment here that
• 36:16
  fits that which is we find out that Strider is watching the two hobbits fondly enjoying the fact
• 36:27
  that they're having this catch up conversation and I think as well as the ring is a test of the
• 36:34
  goodness of people's souls how they respond to the hobbits is also like that because the way the
• 36:41
  hobbits behave is relished by the best-hearted characters it's the kind of generosity of spirit
• 36:50
  that they're able to relish the small and this is a moment when we just briefly glimpse
• 36:58
  why Aragon is going to be a great king is because he cares for the hobbits
• 37:05
  and of course he finds time to help them with their poem so the next section in the Bilbo section
• 37:13
  is about poetry and if you're wondering how to convey something which is so sublime that
• 37:23
  you lack words to do so Tolkien is brilliant at doing this and one of the things he does
• 37:31
  is when something is too much he will describe the feeling of experiencing it
• 37:38
  rather than give us the thing that is being experienced so we have Frodo here listening to the
• 37:44
  Elven poetry of course Tolkien does write also very good beautiful Elvish poetry but the very best
• 37:53
  stuff which he hasn't had a time to write for us we get described and so we get the experience
• 38:00
  of listening to it with Frodo almost it's seen that the words took shape and visions of far
• 38:07
  off lands and bright things that he and Frodo had never yet imagined open out before him
• 38:15
  and the file at hall became like a golden mist above seas of foam that side upon the margins of
• 38:23
  the world so the prose there becomes poetry and we are transported by we know not what to we know
• 38:33
  not where but we just know it's a kind of middle earth golden state very powerful and that merges
• 38:42
  into the long poem Erendel was a Mariner now this poem in itself is fascinating if you have had a
• 38:53
  chance to look at the new collected poems of Tolkien edited by Christina Skull and Wayne G Hammond
• 39:00
  they have a big section devoted to this in the second volume it's a poem 128
• 39:09
  which shows how this poem went through many versions it appears in the Tom Bombadil poems as
• 39:18
  errant tree it appears here as Erendel was a Mariner and it has two other titles as well the short
• 39:28
  lay of Erendel actually I think it's the Elvish version of that title Erendel Linuy forgive my
• 39:37
  pronunciation what holds these different poems together is the meter it seems as though
• 39:45
  that Tolkien got the meter of this poem from a very unexpected source it was a Jacobite song
• 39:54
  Jacobites were the political force that supported the Catholic King James II of England in the
• 40:03
  Bonnie Prince Charlie era they're the Jacobites King James was his father Bonnie Prince Charlie's
• 40:10
  English politics Scottish politics anyway there was a poem at the time called
• 40:17
  what's the rhyme to Porninger can you the rhyme to Porninger can James VII had a daughter and he
• 40:25
  gave her an orange so that is the rhyme and for some reason this just stuck in Tolkien's mind and
• 40:33
  he turned it into a poem and the poem that's in Tom Bombadil using the same meter is of a kind of
• 40:43
  fairy world it's more like the fairies of a midsummer night stream it's a small world the fairies
• 40:50
  the sort of Tom Thumb world of fairies and then you've got the absolute contrast here where Erendel
• 40:57
  who is Elrond's father who is the one who appeals to the Valar and the world is remade and he
• 41:07
  becomes a star in the sky I mean it's a heroic story key to the sort of foundation of this age of
• 41:14
  middle earth so if you want to look into the background to this poem do have a look at that section
• 41:23
  in the collected poems but I think what's important here in terms of the story is it's a difficult
• 41:30
  meter so Bilbo is trying Bilbo slash Tolkien is trying a difficult poem and he's laying the
• 41:38
  poem before the hardest critics which are the elves and it's a so Tolkien slash Bilbo is offering
• 41:47
  us this ambitious poem hoping for a good reception and we get three verdicts on it one is the banter
• 41:57
  with Lindyir Lindyir saying I can't tell which bits by men which bits by Hobbit because you're both
• 42:03
  the same to me kind of thing so not really passing judgment but having a sort of gentle ribbing
• 42:11
  going on between them it shows how Bilbo exists in Rivendell as a bit of a cherished oddity shall we
• 42:19
  say you also get Bilbo telling us Aragorn's view Aragorn said you must put in the green jewel the
• 42:28
  elf stone which again is important to the sort of lineage of the house but also he says aren't you
• 42:39
  really you know what we would say now doing something above your pay grade you're telling a poem
• 42:46
  about Aragorn's mum and dad in his halls telling the story of telling his story in other words
• 42:55
  which I suppose is the worry that Bilbo has that he is punching above his weight or whatever
• 43:01
  you want to choose as a picture but Frodo dear old Frodo says actually it felt right
• 43:09
  and it feels right at this moment in the story because what we have here is a blend of a Hobbit
• 43:16
  view of an Elven story though also of course involves men elf half Elven story so it is a blend
• 43:28
  of all the traditions coming together to round off our evening of poetry and as we leave the hall
• 43:35
  it's as though we're leaving and stepping away from history as they leave Bilbo and Frodo look back
• 43:44
  and Frodo sees a kind of tablo with the accompaniment of an Elven song our Elboresky Alfoniel
• 43:52
  a short lyric in Elvish and he sees a tablo of Elrond in his chair Arwen but Aragorn and here we see
• 44:03
  Aragorn for the first time in the Washington brushed up Aragorn the kingly Aragorn
• 44:11
  his dark cloak was thrown back and he seemed to be clad in Elven male and a star shone on his breast
• 44:17
  and there's a lovely second moment here where Arwen looks at Frodo and it's as though her eyes fell
• 44:26
  on him from afar and pierced his heart there is a connection between Frodo and Arwen which will come
• 44:31
  to right at the very end of the story about how he goes in her place in a way so their connection
• 44:37
  is forged here very little is said we don't sort of get along discussion with Frodo till way
• 44:43
  after the events are over but this little touch here connects the two almost at the end here
• 44:50
  and we return after the high stuff of the elves the high stuff of the kings from over the sea
• 44:57
  to Bilbo and Frodo just chatting it's about their relationship their love
• 45:04
  it's a bedrock of Frodo's character really and what I like about here is that they've gone
• 45:10
  through the catch-up phase and the Elven phase if you like to put it and it sums up what holds
• 45:16
  them together what their love is based on they spoke no more of the small news of the shy far away
• 45:24
  nor of the dark shadows and perils that encompass them but of the fair things they had seen in the
• 45:30
  world together of the elves of the stars of trees and the gentle fall of the bright year in the woods
• 45:39
  another extremely poetic passage there are these lovely moments in Tolkien he's finest writings
• 45:47
  is when it becomes like a song like a lyric like a poem and just so we don't spend too much time
• 45:53
  up in the starlit trees we get Sam knocking on the door saying remember Frodo's only just got up
• 46:01
  but he doesn't say that he says is there anything else you'll be wanting this is Sam in his valley
• 46:07
  phase this is where he is at the moment his stature he ends the book as the hero of course but here
• 46:15
  he is the valet wingman to Frodo and there's a good bit of Hobbit sense from Bilbo he says you're
• 46:24
  absolutely right to cut us off he's only just got up and I'm going to go out and look at the stars
• 46:32
  of Elbroth and that kind of moment is a very lovely landing point for this chapter which started
• 46:41
  waking up and it ends with bedtime
• 46:51
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