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I never had the impression that the Ring was sentient reading the book. It doesn't have a concrete personality, it gives a person immense power, and tempts to indulge in the temptation to use it, which could be argued to come naturally from the wielder. Why wouldn't you do something about the world if you had the capability to? Most of us would do it, right? Hobbits are just too lazy and dumb!
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Aug 3, 2017 00:48
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:All the stuff a page or two ago about Aragorn being a canny politician ignores the way he sets things up at the end. He gives Faramir Ithilien and command of an elite group of troops but he also says that Faramir and his descendants will continue to hold the office of Steward of Gondor. That's loving stupid. Aragorn has magic blood and super powers and outlives everyone so it's kind of hard to judge him on human standards
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Aug 3, 2017 00:49
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Like people literally fall in love with him. Even Boromir did at the end . Faramir was completely head over heels. Aragorn is just better than every one else. He has the racial right to lead as does his son probably .
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Aug 3, 2017 00:51
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:All the stuff a page or two ago about Aragorn being a canny politician ignores the way he sets things up at the end. He gives Faramir Ithilien and command of an elite group of troops but he also says that Faramir and his descendants will continue to hold the office of Steward of Gondor. That's loving stupid. I'd posit that you aren't thinking like a feudal monarch with a vast empire and slooooow lines of communication. If Aragorn wants to repopulate and rule Arnor, he needs someone loyal running Byzantium, I mean Gondor. euphronius posted:Like people literally fall in love with him. Even Boromir did at the end . Faramir was completely head over heels. Aragorn is just better than every one else. He has the racial right to lead as does his son probably . Technically his son should be even more kawaii, he's half-elven, not just Numenorean. Hieronymous Alloy fucked around with this message at 00:56 on Aug 3, 2017 |
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Aug 3, 2017 00:54
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But Eldarion isn't really half Elvish, is he? After Elros chose to be a Man instead of an Elf, his children were not given the ability to choose their doom (unlike Elrond's kids). Eldarion wouldn't really be any more Elvish than Aragorn or even Imrahil, I think.
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Aug 3, 2017 01:28
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You're not going to ruin the gritty fanfiction novel I write set decades after the main LOTR books where a hard-drinking private detective on the streets of Minas Tirith is asked to investigate a strange murder and he slowly finds all these mysterious ties between the murdered man and shadowy figures/organizations based in Ithilien and it turns out there's this huge conspiracy to bring Faramir's son back to the city and crown him King of Gondor.
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Aug 3, 2017 01:30
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Radio! posted:But Eldarion isn't really half Elvish, is he? After Elros chose to be a Man instead of an Elf, his children were not given the ability to choose their doom (unlike Elrond's kids). Eldarion wouldn't really be any more Elvish than Aragorn or even Imrahil, I think. But Elros married a human woman I believe, while Elrond married an elf woman. Elrond's kids were therefore also elven.
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Aug 3, 2017 01:32
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:You're not going to ruin the gritty fanfiction novel I write set decades after the main LOTR books where a hard-drinking private detective on the streets of Minas Tirith is asked to investigate a strange murder and he slowly finds all these mysterious ties between the murdered man and shadowy figures/organizations based in Ithilien and it turns out there's this huge conspiracy to bring Faramir's son back to the city and crown him King of Gondor. This is probably exactly where The New Shadow was going before Tolkien decided it was so stupid he would rather rejigger the entire mythology, gutting material he hadn't touched for over thirty years, to render elven cosmology non-geocentric.
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Aug 3, 2017 01:33
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:But Elros married a human woman I believe, while Elrond married an elf woman. Elrond's kids were therefore also elven. Half elven They all got to choose Eladarion is also half elven and also the direct heir of the kings of westernesse so he's more magical then Aragorn even
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Aug 3, 2017 01:35
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euphronius posted:Half elven I know that's the theory but I think that's a matter of interpretation, not "Fact." The problem is that ELdarion and at minimum hung around for a couple thousand years (and, I believe, then went over-sea). I guess you could argue that Arwen at least eventually Chose the Doom of Man, and thus also chose for her kids. But she just made that choice by marrying, just like Luthien, and must have been elven before that just because she lived for at least a couple thousand years, since Elrond's wife departed for the havens like a thousand years before the start of the events of the Hobbit.
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Aug 3, 2017 01:38
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You are right It looks like they were mortal. Mea culpa
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Aug 3, 2017 01:41
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Being descended from an ex-Elf does appear to give Men a touch of the ol' greatness, which is diminished by the passage of time.
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Aug 3, 2017 02:14
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:You're not going to ruin the gritty fanfiction novel I write set decades after the main LOTR books where a hard-drinking private detective on the streets of Minas Tirith is asked to investigate a strange murder and he slowly finds all these mysterious ties between the murdered man and shadowy figures/organizations based in Ithilien and it turns out there's this huge conspiracy to bring Faramir's son back to the city and crown him King of Gondor. I.... would unironically read this
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Aug 3, 2017 02:17
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The lifespan seems to diminish over time but I'm not sure about the intangible "greatness", as evidenced by the fact that Faramir is apparently a true throwback to Numenor while Boromir is not.
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Aug 3, 2017 02:18
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Monglo posted:I never had the impression that the Ring was sentient reading the book. It doesn't have a concrete personality, it gives a person immense power, and tempts to indulge in the temptation to use it, which could be argued to come naturally from the wielder. Why wouldn't you do something about the world if you had the capability to? Most of us would do it, right? Hobbits are just too lazy and dumb! I don't think "sentience" is a reasonable term to use of the Ring but we are told outright it has agency, it tries to do things, it looks after itself, and it is totally capable of acting without its bearer's consent, even directly against its will. You don't need any knowledge of the immense power of the ring for it to work upon you; indeed, you don't need to know that it has any power at all. Smeagol wanted the ring for its beauty, enough that he was willing to murder his kin for it, even though he didn't have the slightest idea that it was anything other than a pretty trinket. Bilbo is made invisible by the ring without even realizing it! So clearly it isn't just the bearer projecting their own feelings into the Ring. I don't even think there's an ambiguity like how you could interpret Gurthang's speech to Turin as the crazed Turin projecting a personality onto his sword because he can't stand the responsibility for what he has done. The Ring has a will and can take independent action; whether it has an internal monologue or knows what it is, or that it is, is not ultimately relevant because we can see its behavior. At the same time, bearers don't always seem to perceive its influence on them directly: rather they experience a sense that part of them wants to use and keep the Ring, and with long use of the Ring that part of them begins to completely dominate their personalities.
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Aug 3, 2017 02:58
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elise the great posted:I.... would unironically read this It's a ripoff of several very good books.
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Aug 3, 2017 03:11
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elise the great posted:I.... would unironically read this quote:I did begin a story placed about 100 years after the Downfall [of Mordor], but it proved both sinister and depressing. Since we are dealing with Men it is inevitable that we should be concerned with the most regrettable feature of their nature: their quick satiety with good. So that the people of Gondor in times of peace, justice and prosperity, would become discontented and restless–while the dynasts descended from Aragorn would become just kings and governors–like Denethor or worse. I found that even so early there was an outcrop of revolutionary plots, about a centre of secret Satanistic religion; while Gondorian boys were playing at being Orcs and going round doing damage. I could have written a ‘thriller’ about the blog and its discovery and overthrow–but it would be just that. Not worth doing. (Letters, 344 edit that was a misquote unsurprisingly quote:256 From a letter to Colin Bailey 13 May 1964 Hieronymous Alloy fucked around with this message at 03:53 on Aug 3, 2017 |
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Aug 3, 2017 03:24
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The Ring is a severed and still-active component of the mind of Sauron. You know the experiments they've done on people whose corpus callosum was severed, separating the two hemispheres of the cerebrum from each other? Things like - cover one eye at a time and have them read different things, and then determine that the left and right hemisphere then know different information and make different decisions. In some cases they even had noticeably different personalities. You would still call such a case one person instead of two, in spite of that - even though it's clear that their personhood resides in neither hemisphere exclusively. In some even more severe cases, a person who had an entire hemisphere rendered basically dead managed to regain their faculties, and are regarded as having continuity with their pre-injury self, regardless of which hemisphere was the one damaged. Their personhood could never truly be destroyed as long as one or the other remained. But a person who loses both hemispheres, leaving only the cerebellum, brainstem, etc., is basically a vegetable. That's the Ring and Sauron. He inflicted a form of brain damage on himself, in a way that left his two parts susceptible to traumatic separation, and then they were separated, so that each part could observe and know things the other could not. The part left in the body, let's call it the Eye, was clearly still fully autonomous and intelligent, carrying on his agenda under such guises as the Necromancer, whereas it's very difficult to estimate the full extent of the Ring's awareness and independence, on account of its lack of physical capabilities except for changing its radius. On the other hand, killing the Ring also killed the Eye, whereas killing the Eye repeatedly failed to kill the Ring. The Ring could communicate by an apparent form of telepathy, but was generally not cooperative. However, we are aware of some other instances where the Eye also communicated psychically, and made a much more forceful and nuanced conversation. This might be a matter of what each part thought was most prudent under those circumstances, or it might also reflect the respective reasoning ability of each part. Was the Ring's failure to tempt Sam and difficulty in tempting Frodo, in comparison with the Eye's success at tempting Saruman and Denethor, and apparently successful provocation of Aragorn, entirely explained by Sauron's moral inability to understand the perspective of the humble? Or was it also the case that the Ring was not as intelligent as the Eye, less able to communicate or even think of comparably complex ideas?
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Aug 3, 2017 03:25
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I ... would unironically read a thriller about the discovery and overthrow of the blog
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Aug 3, 2017 03:40
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euphronius posted:You are right oh i think you might be right according to, like, the online consensus, I'm just making an argument based on contradictions in the text, which isn't necessarily determinative for Tolkien
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Aug 3, 2017 03:51
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Data Graham posted:I ... would unironically read a thriller about the discovery and overthrow of the blog That whole palantir network thing: overrated and, ultimately, not a good idea
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Aug 3, 2017 03:54
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If nothing else, the presence of big empty lands to expand into and reclaim would absorb political unrest for a while. Eventually Aragorn's grandson or great-grandson would start running out of Mordor-fiefs to hand out, obviously.
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Aug 3, 2017 04:00
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:oh i think you might be right according to, like, the online consensus, I'm just making an argument based on contradictions in the text, which isn't necessarily determinative for Tolkien My understanding about mortality, having read way too much of the History of Middle-earth when I was younger, is that under normal circumstances even one drop of mortal blood rendered one mortal. The sole exception was for Eärendil and Elwing and any of thier Elvish heirs; that is, Eärendil and Elwing, who were both moral, were granted a special doom by Ilúvatar due to the special circumstances of their coming to Valinor. They could choose to reject the Gift of Death, and in doing so this choice would then fall to all of their descendants, until one of them chose to accept the Gift, rendering them perfectly Mortal again, at which point all of the normal rules applied. Elros accepted the Gift, and this is why Vardamir and his descendants had no choice in the matter. Elrond rejected the Gift, and this is why Arwen and her brothers had the choice that their cousin Vardamir did not. When Arwen married Aragorn, she implicitly accepted the Gift, and so Eldarion had no choice in the matter either.
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Aug 3, 2017 04:24
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:All the stuff a page or two ago about Aragorn being a canny politician ignores the way he sets things up at the end. He gives Faramir Ithilien and command of an elite group of troops but he also says that Faramir and his descendants will continue to hold the office of Steward of Gondor. That's loving stupid. Aragorn's rise to the throne is orchestrated by Gandalf and Elrond. He is a puppet. A figurehead. He's very good at fighting wars and learns to be good at acting Kingly (eg. the insane speech he makes from the battlements at Helm's Deep).
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Aug 3, 2017 12:25
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Listening to wise advisors is an incredibly canny political move.
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Aug 3, 2017 17:58
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Gandalf isn't a person though he's a magical spirit who exists only to manipulate people into fighting Sauron and he doesn't give a poo poo about you or your family or anything except in how they can help him get that done.
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Aug 3, 2017 18:09
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I don't think the text supports that reading.
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Aug 3, 2017 18:11
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:Gandalf isn't a person though he's a magical spirit who exists only to manipulate people into fighting Sauron and he doesn't give a poo poo about you or your family or anything except in how they can help him get that done. He feels real bad about using Frodo as the ring bearer.
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Aug 3, 2017 18:45
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SHISHKABOB posted:He feels real bad about using Frodo as the ring bearer. He should feel bad, he ditched the ring on Frodo for the better part of twenty years while he knew that it was a ring of power at the very least. He stopped in a couple times to make sure that Frodo hadn't spontaneously degenerated into a light-fearing ghoul, which was nice of him I guess, but even Frodo gives him a little poo poo about it when he finally fesses up.
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Aug 3, 2017 19:08
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He didn't ditch it on Frodo. He never possessed it so he couldn't ditch it. He did feel bad tho and was extremely worried .
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Aug 3, 2017 19:51
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I think I've just been reading too much Sarumax.com on my palantir.
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Aug 3, 2017 21:44
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Gandalf doesn't want to take the ring himself because he is aware of its extreme danger that poses to himself and to the world at large. While he did 'ditch' it with Frodo, it's pretty much explicitly because he is trying to work out what can be done with it. He can't take it, nor should it be taken by someone like Elrond or another elf lord. Frodo having it is bad for Frodo, but seems less damaging to him (and to everyone else) than almost anyone else. I suppose that Gandalf could have tried to get him to bury it in the back yard or something instead of holding on to it.
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Aug 3, 2017 22:02
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Gandalf knows Hobbits. Even if he begins to suspect what ring it is, he knows it'll remain inert there unless acted upon by an outside force.
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Aug 3, 2017 22:22
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Bilbo also kept the Ring around for 60ish years and ended up giving it away freely to Frodo. Yeah, Gandalf left it with Frodo but Bilbo showed the Hobbits seem to be incredibly resistant to the Ring's power.
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Aug 4, 2017 00:02
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:Gandalf isn't a person though he's a magical spirit who exists only to manipulate people into fighting Sauron and he doesn't give a poo poo about you or your family or anything except in how they can help him get that done. Gandalf is a person whose life's purpose is either a) to safeguard all that is objectively Good and Pure in middle earth or b) to war with the other maiar on middle earth by raising armies and hatching cunning schemes. Depending on how you choose to read it. He's objectively an rear end in a top hat to people he doesn't find personally useful (specifically see how his attitude towards Pippin changes over the course of the books), and he does a lot of dickish stuff for "the greater good". He's not really much different from Sauron and Saruman in how he operates, only in his choice of allies. Posh hobbits, elvish nobility and horselords vs. history's downtrodden underclasses.
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Aug 4, 2017 00:34
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Gandalf was a diplomat given wide latitude in his mission to ensure no power in Middle-Earth could oppose the hegemony of Valinor. Bringing down the second-world nation of Mordor was part of purging the last survivor of the faction of Melkor. He made sure that Gondor prosecuted the war in order to keep them occupied with their, well, occupation, and to ensure that Men had to deplete their resources in order to do it, rather than fill a postbellum power vacuum so profitably that they come to see themselves as rivals of the West. It's "let's you and him fight" backed up by three thousand years of religious dogma. The descendants of the kings of Numenor always seem to be susceptible to foreign prophets.
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Aug 4, 2017 06:59
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And I, personally, want to see what Annatar has in the way of "Gifts" for me and my family. Don't you?
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Aug 4, 2017 07:13
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Bongo Bill posted:It's "let's you and him fight" backed up by three thousand years of religious dogma. The descendants of the kings of Numenor always seem to be susceptible to foreign prophets. It's a cultural trait, they're descended from primitives whose reaction to meeting loving immortal warlords fighting an suicidal war against a god was "sweet, what can these guys teach us? Also, can we have sex with their women?"
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Aug 4, 2017 12:28
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skasion posted:It's a cultural trait, they're descended from primitives whose reaction to meeting loving immortal warlords fighting an suicidal war against a god was "sweet, what can these guys teach us? Also, can we have sex with their women?" I mean, wouldn't you?
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Aug 4, 2017 13:22
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Well, if I'd never read that elise the great post
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Aug 4, 2017 13:36
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