Renown and Responsibility: Tolkien and the Heroic Ideal

This week in Thinklings we thought about the question ‘Did Aragorn “die at the Somme”?’ in a response to an article about the heroic ideal by Steven Brett Carter.[1]

 In his article, Carter argues:

Through  the  character  of  Faramir,  as  well  as  the  implementation  of other,  more  subtle  elements,  Tolkien  shows  the  impossibility  of  the  ancient heroic  model  in  twentieth-century  warfare.  Faramir  embodies a  redefined  form of  the  heroic  model  that  is  more  representative  of  the  modern  warrior  by accepting  war  as  a  necessary  part  of  western  civilization,  but preferring  peace. Instead of longing for combat and the possibility of gaining honor and glory like his  brother  and  others,  Faramir  does  his  duty  to  his  state  without  becoming absorbed  by  these  ancient  ideals.  Though  characters  such  as  Aragorn  and Boromir  are  not  necessarily  as  glory-driven  as  their  classical  counterparts, Aragorn’s  eagerness  to  reclaim  the  throne  of  Gondor  and  Boromir’s  desire  to take the fight to the enemy set their heroic figures apart from the distinctly more reserved Faramir.[2]

We thought about World War One and how attitudes towards honour and battle have changed since Anglo-Saxon times. We discussed how ancient heroes were ‘inadequate representations of the hardships faced by the modern solider’.[3] We tended to agree with Carter that Faramir did seem to be a way for Tolkien to represent the modern soldier, especially in the way he put the safety of his men, or the success of an attack, above the opportunity for glory.

Carter also argues that the colours worn by Faramir’s rangers ‘align them with more modern military forces’, being similar to khaki.[4] Some members were less certain of this idea, suggesting that Tolkien might not have been necessarily drawing a direct parallel between Faramir’s soldiers and WW1 soldiers through clothing. We discussed how camouflage is used elsewhere in the novels, such as in the cloaks provided by Galadriel to the fellowship. Some members did agree though that camouflage would certainly make Faramir appear more interested in stealth than in hand-to-hand combat.

One of the main aspects of Carter’s article that we questioned was whether you could say that Aragorn ‘died at the Somme’. We questioned whether Tolkien’s interest in modern attitudes to warfare made him reject the old attitudes of honour and glory in battle. We wondered whether Tolkien was accommodating both types of warfare in his novels. As in Tolkien’s ‘homecoming’, we get two sides to the debate.  When discussing this, we also considered the following suggestion by Roger Sale:

[The hobbits’ journey] forces one to ask why the heroism of Frodo and Sam should strike such resonant chords in Tolkien while that of the others, gravely and firmly though Tolkien believes in it, should remain so unable to stir his genius...Frodo Baggins, the real hero in this book where all must be heroic, is Tolkien’s affirmation of possibility in a world where all old and other heroic types are by themselves inadequate. [...] It turns out that Tolkien is no more interested in the old heroism than we are.[5]

We questioned whether it was a fair comment to say that the old heroism did not ‘stir [Tolkien’s] genius’. Some members seemed to be of the opinion that Sale was mistaken in saying that Tolkien was ‘no more interested in the old heroism than we are’. Tolkien is interested in the old heroism; he may seem to be the old, disenchanted retainer Tidwald of ‘Homecoming’, but this does not necessarily mean that he depicts glory in battle wholly negatively. The Ride of the Rohirrim, with its depiction of the ‘joy of battle’, still allows readers to revel in the ancient ideals. This takes us back to what we discussed in the first week: The Lord of the Rings is a ‘chameleon’ that can be interpreted in many different ways, thus ‘If you want an epic; it is an epic, with battles galore, banners flying and swords flashing’.[6]

 

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[1], Steven Brett Carter, ‘Faramir and the Heroic Ideal of the Twentieth Century; or, How Aragorn died at the Somme’, Mythlore, 30 (2012), 89-103.

[2] Ibid., p. 101.

[3] Ibid., p. 101.

[4] Ibid., p. 93.

[5] Roger Sale, ‘Tolkien and Frodo Baggins’, in Tolkien and the Critics: Essays on J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, ed. Neil D. Isaacs & Rose A. Zimbardo (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1976), pp. 247-288 (p. 288).

[6] Verlyn Flieger, 'A Postmodern Medievalist?', in Tolkien's Modern Middle Ages, ed. by Jane Chance and Alfred K. Siewers (Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), pp. 17-28 (pp.17-18).