Want to forget about terrorism and all those distracting rumors of war? Need to ignore the economy for a while? Got the holiday blues? Our culture has a sure-fire cure — the traditional spate of post-Thanksgiving movies.
This year, despite a clamor over the latest Harry Potter film, much of the attention is going to another fantasy called “The Two Towers” — Part 2 in the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy. Will it succeed in distracting us for a while, conveying audiences to a world more beautiful and stirring than humdrum modern life?
Naturally, I enjoyed the “Lord of the Rings” (LOTR) trilogy as a kid, during its first big boom in the 1960s. I mean, what was there not to like? As William Goldman said about another great fantasy, “The Princess Bride,” it has “Fencing. Fighting. Torture. Poison. True Love. Hate. Revenge. Giants. Hunters. Bad Men. Good Men. Beautifulest Ladies. Spiders. Dragons. Eagles. Beasts of all natures and descriptions. Pain. Death. Magic. Chases. Escapes. Miracles.”
In 1997, voters in a BBC poll named “The Lord of the Rings” the greatest book of the 20th century. In 1999, Amazon.com customers chose it as the greatest book of the millennium.
Of course there is much more to this work than mere fantasy escapism. J.R.R. Tolkien wrote his epic — including its prequel, “The Hobbit” — during the dark middle decades of the 20th century, a time when modernity appeared to have failed in one spectacle of technologically amplified bloodshed after another.
LOTR clearly reflected this era. Only, in contrast to the real world, Tolkien’s portrayal of “good” resisting a darkly threatening “evil” offered something sadly lacking in the real struggles against Nazi or Communist tyrannies — a role for individual champions. His elves and hobbits and über-human warriors performed the same role that Lancelot and Merlin and Odysseus did in older fables, and that superheroes still do in comic books. Through doughty Frodo, noble Aragorn and the ethereal Galadriel, he proclaimed the paramount importance — above nations and civilizations — of the indomitable Romantic hero.
All right, I read Tolkien’s epic trilogy a bit unconventionally, starting with “The Two Towers” and backfilling as I went along. Likewise, I may be a bit off-kilter in liking, best of all, the unofficial companion volume to LOTR — perhaps the funniest work penned in English — the Harvard Lampoon’s 1968 parody, titled “Bored of the Rings.”
Nonetheless, I deem Tolkien’s trilogy to be one of the finest works of literary universe-building ever, with a lovingly textured internal consistency that’s excelled only by J.R.R.T.’s penchant for crafting “lost” dialects. Long before there was a Klingon Language Institute, expert aficionados — amateurs in the classic sense of the word — were busy translating Shakespeare and the Bible into High Elvish, Dwarvish and other Tolkien-generated tongues.
And yes, LOTR opened the door to a vast popular eruption of heroic fantasy. With exacting devotion to Tolkien’s masterly architecture, his followers scrupulously copied the rhythms, ambience and formulas that worked so well.
Indeed, the popularity of this formula is deeply thought-provoking. Millions of people who live in a time of genuine miracles — in which the great-grandchildren of illiterate peasants may routinely fly through the sky, roam the Internet, view far-off worlds and elect their own leaders — slip into delighted wonder at the notion of a wizard hitchhiking a ride from an eagle. Many even find themselves yearning for a society of towering lords and loyal, kowtowing vassals.
Wouldn’t life seem richer, finer if we still had kings? If the guardians of wisdom kept their wonders locked up in high wizard towers, instead of rushing onto PBS the way our unseemly “scientists” do today? Weren’t miracles more exciting when they were doled out by a precious few, instead of being commercialized, bottled and marketed to the masses for $1.95?
Didn’t we stop going to the moon because it had become boring?
Just look at how people felt about Princess Diana. No democratically elected public servant was ever so adored. Democracy doesn’t have the pomp, the majesty, the sense of being above accountability. One of the paramount promoters of the fantasy-mythic tradition, George Lucas, expressed it this way:
“There’s a reason why kings built large palaces, sat on thrones and wore rubies all over. There’s a whole social need for that, not to oppress the masses, but to impress the masses and make them proud and allow them to feel good about their culture, their government and their ruler so that they are left feeling that a ruler has the right to rule over them, so that they feel good rather than disgusted about being ruled.”
This yearning makes sense if you remember that arbitrary lords and chiefs did rule us for 99.44 percent of human existence. It’s only been 200 years or so — an eye blink — that “scientific enlightenment” began waging its rebellion against the nearly universal pattern called feudalism, a hierarchic system that ruled our ancestors in every culture that developed both metallurgy and agriculture. Wherever human beings acquired both plows and swords, gangs of large men picked up the latter and took other men’s women and wheat. (Sexist language is meaningfully accurate here; those cultures had no word for “sexism,” it was simply assumed.)
They then proceeded to announce rules and “traditions” ensuring that their sons would inherit everything.
Putting aside cultural superficialities, on every continent society quickly shaped itself into a pyramid with a few well-armed bullies at the top — accompanied by some fast-talking guys with painted faces or spangled cloaks, who curried favor by weaving stories to explain why the bullies should remain on top.
Only something exceptional started happening. Bit by bit, the elements began taking shape for a new social and intellectual movement, one finally capable of challenging the alliance of warrior lords, priests, bards and secretive magicians.
Timidly at first, guilds and townsfolk rallied together and lent their support to kings, thereby easing oppression by local lords. Long before Aristotle became a tool of the establishment, his rediscovery during the High Middle Ages offered some relief from dour anti-intellectualism. Then Renaissance humanism offered a philosophical basis for valuing the individual human being as worthy in its own right. The Reformation freed sanctity and morality from control by a narrow, self-chosen club; it also legitimized self-betterment through hard work in this world, not the next. Then Galileo and Newton showed that creation’s clockwork can be understood, even appreciated in its elegance, not just endured.
Still, the entire notion of progress remained nebulous and ill-formed. Society’s essential pyramidal shape remained intact till a full suite of elements and tools were finally in place for a true revolution — one so fundamental, coming with such heady, empowering suddenness, that participants gave it a name filled with hubristic portent: Enlightenment.
The word wasn’t ill-chosen, for it bespoke illuminating a path ahead — which, in turn, implied the unprecedented notion that “forward” is a direction worth taking, instead of lamenting over a preferred past. Progress — and boy, did we take to it. In two or three centuries our levels of education, health, liberation, tolerance and confident diversity have been momentously, utterly transformed.
The very shape of society changed from the once-universal pyramid toward a diamond configuration, wherein a comfortable and well-educated middle class actually outnumbers the poor. For the very first time. Anywhere.
We can argue endlessly about the accuracy and implications of this “diamond” analogy — and its vast remaining imperfections — but not over the fact that a profound shift has occurred, driven by a genuine scientific-technical-educational revolution.
And yet, almost from its birth, the Enlightenment Movement was confronted by an ironic counterrevolution, rejecting the very notion of progress. The Romantic Movement erupted as a rebellion against the rebellion.
In fairness, it didn’t start out that way. The first Romantics stood with their Enlightenment predecessors against feudalism and clericalism and welcomed the French Revolution as a step toward a kind of utopian universal brotherhood. Even today, men like Thomas Jefferson stand as icons of both Enlightenment and Romanticism.
But this changed when the industrial revolution hit full stride. Suddenly, where once gentry and clergy ruled, there were arrogant new powers striding about. An entrepreneurial bourgeoisie. A new intellectual elite of science. And a clanking, noisome ruction of impudent machinery.
Even democracy began to seem less classically pure when it was taken off a pedestal to be practiced for real by farmers, shopkeepers and a rising middle class, all of them arguing, wheedling and conniving amid an incredible din.
Temblors began splitting a chasm between Romantics and Enlightenment pragmatists. The alliance that had been so formidable against feudalism began turning against itself. Trenches soon aligned along the most obvious fault line, down the middle — between future and past.
In this conflict, J.R.R. Tolkien stood firmly for the past.
Calling the scientific worldview “soul-less,” he joined Keats and Shelley, Sir Walter Scott, Henry James and many European-trained philosophers in spurning the modern emphasis on pragmatic experimentation, production, universal literacy, progress, cooperative enterprise, democracy, city life and flattened social orders.
In contrast to these “sterile” pursuits, Romantics extolled the traditional, the personal, the particular, the subjective, the rural, the hierarchical and the metaphorical.
By the turn of the century, Romanticism was fast losing all vestige of its initial empathy for the concerns of common folk. One solitary artist — or entertainer or lost prince or angry poet — loomed larger in importance, by far, than a thousand craft workers, teachers or engineers (a value system shared today by the mythic engine of Hollywood). Just as in Homer’s time, 10,000 foot soldiers mattered less than Achilles’ heel.
This fits the very plot of “Lord of the Rings,” in which the good guys strive to preserve and restore as much as they can of an older, graceful and “natural” hierarchy, against the disturbing, quasi-industrial and vaguely technological ambience of Mordor, with its smokestack imagery and manufactured power rings that can be used by anybody, not just an elite few. (Recall the scene where Saruman turns away from the “good” side and immediately starts ripping up trees, replacing them with mining pits and smoky forges. The anti-industrial imagery could not be more explicit.)
Consider the rings. Those man-made wonders are deemed cursed, damning anyone who dares to use them, especially those nine normal humans who tried to rise up, using tools to equalize and then usurp the rightful powers of their betters — the High Elves.
The nine Ringwraiths aren’t just evil henchmen and cardboard monsters. In my opinion, they are among the most important figures of the epic. Tolkien himself calls them tragic figures and dwells on their background. These fallen mortals — men who were hauled into service to the “dark side” — can be looked upon as cautionary figures, conveying the universal lesson that “power corrupts.”
On that much we can all agree. But I think there’s more to the Ringwraiths. To me, they distill the classical Greek notion of hubris — a concept that Romantics often embrace — the idea that pain and damnation await any mortal whose ambition aims too high. Don’t try putting on the trappings or emblems or powers that rightfully belong to your betters. Above all, don’t try to decipher and redistribute mysteries.
In other words, exactly the same morality tale preached in “Star Wars.”[1] Romanticism has come full circle, now unctuously praising the very same lords — the über-men — that it started out bravely opposing.
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I’m not suggesting that Romanticism is never right in its critique of the Enlightenment. Scientific advancement badly needs the constant light of public scrutiny, or else the “advances” can easily go sour. The most blatant example of this is what we’re doing to the environment today.
(An aside, in self-defense. Some readers may assign “left” or “right” political significance to what I say here. But both Romantics and pragmatists can be found in every modern political movement. For example, as a staunch environmentalist, I can still comment on the Romantic elitism of many who share the same cause. Enlightenment’s child — suspicion of authority — often comes paired with the quintessential romantic image: a smug loner who despises the masses. They get mixed together, even though they arise from different traditions. One way to tell them apart is to observe whether a character sneers only at power-abusers — or at everybody: Is his or her ire aimed solely upward, toward some cruel elite, or downward too, despising fellow citizens and neighbors as clueless sheep?)
Moreover, Enlightenment can never completely replace older modes of thinking. The need for stirring, illogical tales and images runs deep within us all. (Some of us earn a good living that way.) Without romance, we’d be sorry creatures, indeed.
Still, scientific/progressive society has been known to listen to its critics, and not just now and then. Name one feudal society whose leaders did that.
Were any orcs or “dark men” offered coalition positions in King Aragorn’s cabinet, at the end of the War of the Ring? Was Mordor given a benign Marshall Plan?
I think not.
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Which brings us to another of the really cool things about fantasy — identifying with a side that’s 100 percent good. You can revel as they utterly annihilate foes who deserve to be exterminated because they are 100 percent distilled evil. This may not be politically correct, but then, political correctness is really a bastard offspring of egalitarian-scientific enlightenment. Witness the sometimes saccharine p.c.-sweetness of “Star Trek.”
Romanticism never made any pretense at equality. It is hyperdiscriminatory, by nature. (Have you ever actually read Byron or Shelley?) Whole classes of people are less worthy, less deserving of life, than other classes. The Nazis were archetypal Romantics.
The urge to crush some demonized enemy resonates deeply within us, dating from ages far earlier than feudalism. Hence, the vicarious thrill we feel over the slaughter of orc foot soldiers at Helm’s Deep. Then again as Ents flatten even more goblin grunts at Saruman’s citadel, taking no prisoners, never sparing a thought for all the orphaned orclings and grieving widorcs. And again at Minas Tirith, and again at the Gondor Docks and again … Well, they’re only orcs, after all.
Lev Grossman made a similar point in a recent Time Magazine article, when he asked, “Where are the women? Peter Jackson filled out Liv Tyler’s role for the movies (it’s much less prominent in Tolkien’s version), but the Fellowship is still as much a boys’ club as Augusta National.”
Let’s not ignore but instead openly acknowledge the underlying racism and belief in aristocracy that J.R.R. Tolkien wove into the books, without even much attempt at subtlety. Nor do I much blame him. He couldn’t help it, coming from the imperialist and class-ridden culture that raised him.
Moreover, the characters whom the reader comes to know best — Frodo, Sam and even the king-in-waiting, Aragorn — are themselves not very snooty or racist. Aragorn has an easygoing, common touch — much like Luke Skywalker, the only unpatronizing Jedi. The snootiest and most relentlessly aristocratic characters in LOTR stand off in the wings — for example, the preachy, secretive and patronizing elf-lords Elrond and Galadriel, coaxing maximum effort from their allies while letting others do the fighting for them.