Creative and Critical Studies, Faculty of (Okanagan)
DSpace
UBCO
Mirzabayati, Ali
Master of Arts - MA
University of British Columbia
This thesis explores contrasting perceptions of death among Men in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, focusing on the characters Théoden and Denethor in The Lord of the Rings. Central to this study is Ilúvatar’s Gift of mortality, which paradoxically shortens human life while inspiring a yearning for transcendence beyond the physical world. This research examines how Men’s understanding of their free will and connection to larger cosmic forces influence their views of death as either a gift or a curse. Although scholars, including Tom Shippey, Amy Amendt-Raduege, and Majorie Burns, have examined Théoden’s and Denethor’s differing attitudes, this thesis offers a more comprehensive view by analyzing The Silmarillion, The Fall of Númenor, and Morgoth’s Ring alongside Tolkien’s letters. This approach reveals new insights into Tolkien's portrayal of mortality, addressing gaps in existing scholarship. The second chapter reviews death narratives in Arda, showing how Men’s interactions with Elves and divine entities shape their cultural attitudes toward mortality. Building on Anna Vaninskaya’s discussion in Fantasies of Time and Death, this chapter refines overlooked elements of death as a gift. The third chapter delves into Denethor’s despair, framing his fear of death within the context of melancholy as explored in Beowulf and analyzed by F. Anne Payne and Ruth Wehlau. The fourth chapter traces Théoden’s transformation from despair to hope, framing his acceptance of mortality as a source of fulfillment. Comparing Théoden’s journey to Niggle’s in “Leaf by Niggle,” the study explores how embracing mortality offers a path to heroic glory. The fifth chapter contrasts Théoden’s and Denethor’s responses to the loss of their sons, using Freud’s “Mourning and Melancholia” to examine their grief as healthy mourning versus pathological melancholia. Ultimately, this thesis argues that Men’s contrasting attitudes toward Ilúvatar’s Gift—acceptance exemplified by Théoden's heroic death and rejection by Denethor's despair—result in divergent outcomes of glory versus disgrace. Through comparative and psychological analysis, the study provides a fresh understanding of death as a transformative gift in Tolkien's works, emphasizing how accepting mortality celebrates life heroically.
Death as a Gift: A Heroic Celebration of Life in The Lord of the Rings by Ali Mirzabayati A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in The College of Graduate Studies (English) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Okanagan) December 2024 © Ali Mirzabayati, 2024 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the College of Graduate Studies for acceptance, the thesis entitled: Death as a Gift: A Heroic Celebration of Life in The Lord of the Rings submitted by Ali Mirzabayati in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. Dr. Michael Treschow, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisor Dr. Jon Vickery, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Sean Lawrence, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Geoffrey Sigalet, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences University Examiner iii Abstract This thesis explores contrasting perceptions of death among Men in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, focusing on the characters Théoden and Denethor in The Lord of the Rings. Central to this study is Ilúvatar’s Gift of mortality, which paradoxically shortens human life while inspiring a yearning for transcendence beyond the physical world. This research examines how Men’s understanding of their free will and connection to larger cosmic forces influence their views of death as either a gift or a curse. Although scholars, including Tom Shippey, Amy Amendt-Raduege, and Majorie Burns, have examined Théoden’s and Denethor’s differing attitudes, this thesis offers a more comprehensive view by analyzing The Silmarillion, The Fall of Númenor, and Morgoth’s Ring alongside Tolkien’s letters. This approach reveals new insights into Tolkien's portrayal of mortality, addressing gaps in existing scholarship. The second chapter reviews death narratives in Arda, showing how Men’s interactions with Elves and divine entities shape their cultural attitudes toward mortality. Building on Anna Vaninskaya’s discussion in Fantasies of Time and Death, this chapter refines overlooked elements of death as a gift. The third chapter delves into Denethor’s despair, framing his fear of death within the context of melancholy as explored in Beowulf and analyzed by F. Anne Payne and Ruth Wehlau. The fourth chapter traces Théoden’s transformation from despair to hope, framing his acceptance of mortality as a source of fulfillment. Comparing Théoden’s journey to Niggle’s in “Leaf by Niggle,” the study explores how embracing mortality offers a path to heroic glory. The fifth chapter contrasts Théoden’s and Denethor’s iv responses to the loss of their sons, using Freud’s “Mourning and Melancholia” to examine their grief as healthy mourning versus pathological melancholia. Ultimately, this thesis argues that Men’s contrasting attitudes toward Ilúvatar’s Gift—acceptance exemplified by Théoden's heroic death and rejection by Denethor's despair—result in divergent outcomes of glory versus disgrace. Through comparative and psychological analysis, the study provides a fresh understanding of death as a transformative gift in Tolkien's works, emphasizing how accepting mortality celebrates life heroically. v Lay Summary This thesis explores whether death for humans in J.R.R. Tolkien’s stories is truly a gift, as proclaimed by Eru Ilúvatar. It compares different perspectives from Elves and Men found in The Silmarillion, Morgoth’s Ring, and The Fall of Númenor. Focusing on The Lord of the Rings, the study examines how two characters, Théoden and Denethor, view death differently—Théoden embraces mortality with hope and heroism, while Denethor fears death, leading to despair and suicide. Additionally, the thesis uses Freudian psychoanalysis to investigate their mourning processes for their sons, showing how their beliefs about death influence their grief. This research provides new insights into the debate on death as a gift or curse in Tolkien’s legendarium and introduces a psychological perspective on grief and mourning in his works, highlighting how cultural and personal attitudes towards death shape heroic potential. vi Preface The research and writing presented in this thesis were conducted solely by the author under the supervision of Dr. Michael Treschow at the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies, University of British Columbia. No generative artificial intelligence tools were utilized in this work's research, drafting, or preparation. The findings of this thesis have resulted in a submitted journal article, as well as three conference papers and presentations, detailed below: Submitted Journal Article 1. Mirzabayati, Ali. (2024) “Mourning and Melancholia in The Lord of the Rings” submitted to the Journal of Tolkien Research (JTR) Conferences and Presentations 1. Mirzabayati, Ali. (2024) “Death as a Gift in Theoden and Niggle” , A Flame Imperishable: The Christian Legacy of J. R. R. Tolkien, Redeemer University, September 27-28, 2024, Hamilton, Canada. 2. Mirzabayati, Ali. (2024) “Mourning and Melancholia and Gift of Death” , 20th Annual UVM Tolkien Conference, April 13, 2024, Burlington, the U.S. 3. Mirzabayati, Ali. (2023) “Death as a Gift in The Lord of the Rings” , Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA), October 12-14, 2023, Denver, the U.S. vii Table of Contents Abstract ................................................................................................................................................. iii Lay Summary ......................................................................................................................................... v Preface ................................................................................................................................................... vi Table of Contents .................................................................................................................................. vii List of Abbreviations ........................................................................................................................... viii Acknowledgments ................................................................................................................................. ix Dedication ............................................................................................................................................. xi 1 Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 1 2 “All that Is Gold Does Not Glitter”: Tragic Misconceptions of Death and Immortality ..................... 4 3 “Pride and Despair”: Denethor’s Struggles Against His Self-woven Death ..................................... 23 4 Hope He Rekindled and In Hope Ended”: Théoden’s Heroic Death as a Gift .................................. 34 5 “Not So Dark Here”: Mourning and Melancholia in The Lord of the Rings .................................... 63 6 Conclusion and Future Work ............................................................................................................. 78 Bibliography ......................................................................................................................................... 82 viii List of Abbreviations LR The Lord of the Rings FN The Fall of Numenor Sil The Silmarillion TH The Hobbit MR Morgoth’s Ring WoR The War of the Ring MC “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics” UT Unfinished Tales OFS “On Fairy-stories” ix Acknowledgments I want to thank Dr. Michael Treschow, my supervisor, whose support and care have exceeded my expectations. His dedication and attention to my work, even before I arrived in Canada, have been invaluable and have greatly motivated me throughout this research and thesis. I am indebted to his wisdom and knowledge, which have guided my academic endeavors. I greatly appreciate our numerous conversations and the opportunities he provided me to present my work to scholarly audiences. His meticulous attention to every word and detail has significantly influenced my work, and his extraordinary commitment to time has been remarkable. Additionally, his advice and support beyond academic and research matters reflect his unparalleled generosity, for which I am truly thankful. I would also like to extend my heartfelt thanks to Dr. Jon Vickery, whose expertise and support as a committee member have been invaluable in helping me view my research from new perspectives. I have gained significant insights from our conversations, and his thoughtful comments have greatly enhanced the quality and credibility of my work. Beyond his official role, Dr. Vickery has shared essential life lessons that have profoundly impacted me. I am deeply grateful for his unwavering help and support. I would also like to sincerely thank Dr. Sean Lawrence for his invaluable insights and support throughout my research. He has always been welcoming to my questions and provided thorough and thoughtful answers. I immensely enjoyed our conversations about my thesis; his x perspectives added significant depth to my work. Additionally, his comments enhanced the stylistic quality of this thesis. I am deeply grateful for his guidance and contributions. I want to express my sincere appreciation to my parents, whose unwavering support has allowed me to pursue this program and complete this thesis. Their generosity and kindness go beyond words; I am forever indebted to them. Their trust in my journey and decisions has given me the courage and peace of mind to achieve my academic goals. Lastly, I would like to thank Maryam, my wife and best friend. She was the first to encourage me to pursue the study of literature. Her constant presence has never left me alone, and without her unflinching support, dedication, and sacrifice, I could not have taken even the first step. Her love has been the guiding light on my path, and I find it difficult to adequately express the depth of my gratitude and admiration for her. xi Dedication I dedicate this thesis to the eternal soul and memory of Samuel Sholto Willum Treschow. Born in September 1990, Sam was diagnosed with Duchenne muscular dystrophy when he was four years old. In July 2009, Sam died at Canuck Place after a long hard fight with both muscular dystrophy and cancer. I never had the chance to meet or speak with Sam. Michael, his father, spoke with me about Sam only very recently. But his few brief mentions of Sam over the past two years were enough to inspire me throughout the writing of this thesis. Speaking further about Sam with Michael has deepened my understanding of Sam’s immense love and devotion. I do not doubt that Sam's great love has enabled Michael to be such a supportive presence. While this thesis is a small tribute, I hope it honors Sam’s enduring story. He will always be like a brother to me, and I will remember him in my thoughts and prayers. His enduring spirit has profoundly impacted me, and I will always cherish his memory. 1 Chapter 1 Introduction In J. R. R. Tolkien’s legendarium, Men’s different responses to the prospect of death originate from Ilúvatar’s enigmatic Gift, which paradoxically shortens their lives while fostering discontent with earthly existence and a yearning for what lies beyond. Whether Men perceive their mortality as a gift or a curse depends on their understanding and belief in their free will to shape their destinies. As Eru promises, these destinies will be the foundation for the subsequent creation, transcending all earthly fates. Another significant factor influencing Men’s perceptions of death is their understanding of larger forces at work or the relationship of the self to broader realities. Two characters, Théoden and Denethor, embody these contrasting views and attitudes toward death in The Lord of the Rings. Despite the lack of any direct reference to the gift of death in their narratives, their attitudes and actions, Théoden’s hope and Denethor’s despair illustrate the dichotomy of death as either a gift or a curse. Théoden’s heroic death, driven by hope and acceptance of death, exemplifies how embracing mortality can lead to a life of glory and fulfillment. In contrast, Denethor’s suicide, resulting from his despair and despising of death, underscores the dire consequences of fearing and misunderstanding death. While Tolkien scholars Tom Shippey, Amy Amendt-Raduege, and Majorie Burns have delved into the differing attitudes and deaths of Théoden and Denethor, their studies do not sufficiently explore The Silmarillion, The Fall of Númenor and Morgoth’s Rings—three works 2 that are foundational to the concept of the gift of death. Other researchers have often explored the gift of death, particularly in the context of death in Elves and Men. Their studies have not provided a detailed comparison of Théoden and Denethor. Gaelle Abalea’s 2020 study, “Death as a Gift in J.R.R Tolkien’s Work and Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” visits Morgoth’s Ring, uncovering the historical and originary aspects of death in Tolkien’s legendarium. She also briefly comments on Nienna’s power of mourning, a goddess in both Tolkien’s The Book of Lost Tales and The Silmarillion. Magne Bergland’s 2021 article, “‘This Gift of Freedom’”: The Gift of Ilúvatar, from Mythological Solution to Theological Problem,” only explores Tolkien’s theological and sub-creative engagements with death in his legendarium. Martin Lockered’s recent study, “The Stolen Gift: Tolkien and the Problem of Suicide,” primarily concentrates on the motif of suicide, especially in the cases of Túrin Turambar in The Silmarillion and Denethor in The Lord of the Rings. Jon Mentxakatorre Odriozola’s “The Theological Meaning of Tolkien’s Death as a Gift” studies death in Arda as a transcendence in beauty and existence; however, it barely deals with the related material in Morgoth’s Ring. My study draws on Tolkien’s personal views from his letters and examines The Fall of Númenor and Morgoth’s Ring to discuss death and mortality in Tolkien’s legendarium thoroughly. Additionally, by analyzing Théoden and Denethor in light of heroic Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian sources and a psychological study of their mourning and grief, this research aims to offer a unique understanding of the concept of death as a gift in Tolkien’s works. My second chapter reviews and discusses the various narratives regarding death and the afterlife in Arda to observe the attitudes that shape Men’s differing cultures. To arrive at the fact that Men’s mortality is a gift, I will discuss Men’s questions and doubts with the frequent answers and warnings of the Elves in The Fall of Númenor and Morgoth’s Ring. I will 3 build on Anna Vaninskaya’s discussion of death and immortality in Arda in her Fantasies of Time and Death, but at the same time, I address the points she misinterprets or glosses over. Following Shippey and Amendt-Raduege, the subsequent chapters deal with the contrast between Denethor and Théoden and their Númenórean and northern backgrounds. My third chapter discusses the tribulations of old age associated with melancholy and despair. My discussion centers on Denethor’s fear of death and despair, comparing it to F. Anne Payne and Ruth Wehlau’s studies of despair and grief in the heroic context of Beowulf. The Old English poem is the work that inspired Tolkien’s academic and fictional career to such degree that Shippey calls Middle-earth “a Beowulfian creation” (“J. R. R. Tolkien’s Beowulf” 00:49:23 - 00:49:27). In the fourth chapter, I examine Théoden’s heroic journey and mental development from despair to hope. Comparing Théoden’s narrative to Niggle’s in “Leaf by Niggle,” I explore in these characters the enlargement and fulfillment promised through the gift of death. My fifth chapter contrasts Théoden and Denethor’s responses to the loss of a son: vengeance versus despair, responsibility versus expectation, and mourning versus melancholia. I use Freud’s “Mourning and Melancholia” and Amy Hollywood’s “Acute Melancholia” to examine the griefs of Théoden and Denethor for their sons as a healthy and creative process of mourning and a pathological and destructive stage of melancholia, respectively. Ultimately, this thesis posits that Men’s contrasting attitudes toward the gift of death—acceptance or rejection as epitomized by Théoden’s heroic death and Denethor’s suicide— result in contrasting outcomes of glory and fulfillment versus disgrace and failure. 4 Chapter 2 “All That Is Gold Does Not Glitter”: Tragic Misconceptions of Death and Immortality In J. R. R. Tolkien’s legendarium, the concept of death as a gift from Ilúvatar to Men is central to understanding their behaviour and attitudes within Middle-earth. This divine gift signifies freedom from the circles of the world and an escape from its inherent weariness, promising a more significant existence where their deeds and thoughts are enlarged and fulfilled. However, throughout the history of Arda, Men’s failure to understand this gift has led to catastrophic outcomes. Despite consistent warnings from the Elves, Men often succumb to the deceptive promises of immortality, driven by their fear of death and failure to recognize that Middle-earth is not the place to fulfill their ultimate desires. Men’s envy of the Elves’ immortality prevents them from appreciating the true nature of the gift of death, fueling their misguided attempts to achieve what they perceive as the Elves’ blessed state. This chapter explains how Men’s ignorance of their history and lore and their persistent attachment to life repeatedly lead them to fall into the same traps. By emphasizing the shortness of Men’s lives and promoting the notion that no afterlife awaits them, Evil has successfully instilled a fear of death among Men. This fear, in turn, generates possessiveness, hopelessness, and bitterness, detracting from their ability to live in harmony with their inherent gifts, as predicted by Eru. This eventually deprives them of joy and fulfillment in life. However, 5 regardless of any belief in an afterlife, death itself can be considered a gift in Arda, providing relief from the world’s weariness and the burdens of responsibility. A comprehensive analysis of Tolkien’s treatment of death and immortality in his legendarium requires examining his writings on Arda, but also his personal experiences of loss and bereavement. In 1896, Tolkien was only four when his father died and almost twelve when he lost his mother in 1904, whom he revered as a martyr and to whom, above all else, he owed “a Faith that has nourished me and taught me all the little that I know” (Letters 258). Once again, the shadow of death loomed, this time during his service in WWI, with the loss of two dear friends, Rob Gilson and Geoffrey Smith, in the Battle of the Somme (Carpenter 92-3). Adding to his grief and loss was the death of his legal guardian and teacher, Francis Xavier Morgan, whom he calls “my second father” and whose departure in 1935 Tolkien describes as leaving him feeling “like a lost survivor into a new alien world after the real world has passed away” (Letters 584). In a 1963 letter to his daughter Priscilla concerning the death of C. S. Lewis, a friend and colleague, Tolkien expresses, “So far I have felt the normal feelings of a man of my age – like an old tree that is losing all its leaves one by one” (478). He likens the enormity of such a loss, a friend whose intimacy and influence cannot be overstated, to “an axe blow near the roots” (478). The last trial for Tolkien came in 1971 with the death of his wife, Edith Mary, whom he treasured as brought by “only the rarest good fortune” (71). Although he never called her Lúthien in her lifetime, Tolkien admits that “she was the source of the story that in time became the chief part of the Silmarillion” (590). Her departure made life “crooked” for Tolkien as he laments being left “one-handed” like Beren and powerless “to move the inexorable Mandos” (590). 6 Beyond recounting Tolkien’s losses, it is crucial to understand that these experiences informed his sub-creative work, merging elements from his life with those of his legendarium and vice versa. An exploration of Tolkien’s letters and literary output reveals moments where personal and creative elements mirror and inform each other. This aspect will be discussed later in this chapter. Thus, it is essential to look at death and immortality in Arda not just as a literary theme but as an expression of his grief and loss within his broader sub-creative endeavour. In his legendarium, Men tend to question the gift of Ilúvatar since the whole idea of death as a gift comes enshrouded in mystery, mostly from far-off legends. Without necessarily seeking to excuse Men, Tolkien highlights their propensity toward confusion and misjudgment, given that the tales and legends surrounding death are predominantly “mythically Elf-centered,” and the concept of death as a gift is, fundamentally, “an Elvish perception” (Letters 407). Men complain about the chasm separating the divine from mortals, and they perceive Elves as an unreliable bridge and, therefore, a source of contention. Anna Vaninskaya, in her Fantasies of Time and Death, argues that the narrative tension in the legendarium is because “the immortals (elves) never do succeed in persuading Men to view existence through their eyes” (171). This divergence is further compounded since the Elves have immortality, and although they can “be slain or waste in grief,” they often will be reborn and return to Arda (Morgoth’s Ring 26). However, as Grant Sterling explains, their existence is dependent on the fate of Arda as they are “beings of the world, constrained within the limits of the world” (“The Gift of Death” 16), and the end of Arda means their ultimate demise. Therefore, from the beginning to the end, “the immortal Elves envy Men’s gift of death and Men envy the Elves’ 7 longevity” (Vaninskaya 103), and thus the earth is plowed for “The Power of Terror and of Hate… a seed that does not die and cannot be destroyed” (174). Two important moments in the history of Arda that bring the discussion of death into clarity are “The Debate of Finrod and Andreth” and “The Downfall of Númenor”. With these two events as the structural frame, I attempt to form, in effect, a dialogue between the mortals and immortals: first, to articulate the questions, doubts, and objections posed by Men regarding death and subsequently provide answers and rationale for the perspective of the immortals. The conversation between Finrod and Andreth in F.A. 490 during the Long Peace marks the earliest exploration of mortality from a mortal’s perspective, challenging the Elvish perception of death as a gift. For the intellectual depth and significance of its discussion, Tolkien presents the debate in the form of a Socratic dialogue between Finrod as “the wisest of the exiled Noldor” and Andreth as a woman “wise in thought and learned in the lore of Men and their histories” (MR 305). The dialogue begins with Finrod pitying the death of Andreth’s grandfather: “Sad to me, Andreth, is the swift passing of your people” (307), followed by Andreth’s lament over the inherent discontent of Man’s heart with fleeting life: “all passing and dying is a grief” (307). However, Andreth finds “some amendment, a little lifting of the Shadow” in that their life has become longer since coming to Beleriand. Andreth explains that the Shadow is the cause of Men’s mortality, and Finrod becomes astonished at hearing this. Andreth takes Finrod’s astonishment as his indifference and carelessness, retorting with sarcasm, “Surely you know well! [a darkness that] once lay upon all Middle-earth, while ye dwelt in your bliss” (308). Having been instructed by the Valar, Finrod believes that Men also are the Children of Eru and their fate and nature are from Him (308). At this moment, the 8 conversation escalates as Andreth bitterly accuses Finrod and the Elves of being proud and condescending: All ye Elves deem that we die swiftly by our true kind. That we are brittle and brief, and ye are strong and lasting. We may be ‘Children of Eru,’…but we are children to you also: to be loved a little maybe, and yet creatures of less worth, upon whom ye may look down from the height of your power and your knowledge, with a smile, or with pity, or with a shaking of heads (308). Andreth’s bitter remarks convey a deep grievance regarding mortality and a sense of subordination to the Elves. Finrod tries to elucidate how the malice of Melkor afflicts both Men and the Elves. However, this comparison only deepens Andreth’s resentment until she reveals that, according to the Wise among Men, “We were not made for death, nor born ever to die. Death was imposed on us” (MR 309). This assertion, never heard before by the Eldar, leaves Finrod momentarily silent and disconcerted, stressing the profound gap in mutual understanding between the two races. When Finrod fully grasps what Andreth meant by the Shadow that Men had fled from to the last shores of Middle-earth (310), he distinguishes between death and the Shadow. He clarifies that Men have been wrong to think that “to escape from the Shadow was to escape also from Death” (227), and Morgoth has only tainted death and cast it in an evil and fearful light. However, Andreth disputes Finrod’s perspective on death: “What do ye know of death, ye do not fear it, because ye do not know it” (277). Her logic stems from another fundamental misunderstanding. She finds it unfair that the Elves “in dying do not leave the world and that [they] may return to life” and her race, “dying we die, and we go out to no return. Death is an uttermost end, a loss irremediable. And it is abominable; for it is also a wrong that is done to us” (277). So far, this debate has unveiled three principal 9 objections of Men regarding death: firstly, grieving their lost immortality; secondly, feeling subordinated and neglected by Eru in favour of the Elves; and thirdly, considering death as an ultimate termination. The narrative of the downfall of Númenor begins with the Valar bestowing a reward upon the Edain, three houses of Men who “had become friends and noble allies of the Elves, fighting alongside them in the struggles against Morgoth” (FN 7). The reward is the island of Númenor, a realm not of Middle-earth nor Valinor, yet geographically closer to the latter (8). Endowed with divine blessing and craftsmanship, the island emerges as a utopia or Paradise on earth where Men find ample beauty, grow wise and glorious, and see their wish for long life and peace granted (31). Accordingly, the Númenóreans become “engrossed in lore, and crafts, and various intellectual or artistic pursuits, to a far greater degree than normal” (32), and with that, their love grows in excess and “turn inevitably into possessiveness” (Vaninskaya 185). In exchange for all these blessings, Númenóreans should honour only one command, the Ban of the Valar, which prohibits them from “sail[ing] west out of sight of their own shores or to attempt to set foot on the Undying Lands” (FN 43). For many years, Númenóreans adhere to monotheism, worshipping Eru Ilúvatar (60) and respecting the Ban (42). In those times, their kings, after a long and fulfilled life, eschewing the decline into decay and decrepitude (65), choose to die “of free will while yet in the vigor of mind” (79). Tolkien himself asserts that “reward on earth is more dangerous for men than punishment!” therefore, a taste or glimpse of the divine glory ultimately becomes, for Númenóreans, “their undoing – or the means of their temptation” (Letters 215). Once short-lived, the Númenóreans wished for a long lifespan, and when so granted, they become “enamoured of the immortality of the Valar and the Eldar and the lands where all things endure” 10 (FN 86). Therefore, the Númenóreans change their ways as Erendis, a wise Númenorean, once foresaw: “Númenor was to be a rest after war. But if they weary of rest and the plays of peace, soon they will go back to their great play, manslaying and war” (108). The theme of death and mortality resurfaces as “the more capable they become of enjoying this world, the more they wax in wealth and power, the more do they desire to postpone the end” (Vaninskaya 167). Similarly, Tar-Atanamir, for the first time in Númenor, “spoke openly against the Ban and declared that the life of the Eldar was his by right” (FN 148). Eventually, the Shadow, long kept at bay, once again “deepened, and the thought of death darkened the hearts” (148), and it prepares “the ground for the lies of the Enemy to sprout again” (Vaninskaya 167). Upon receiving the news of Men’s rebellious sentiments, Manwë “grieved, seeing a cloud gather on the noon-tide of Númenor,” (FN 149) and to avert the impending disaster “sent messengers who spoke earnestly” (149) with Númenóreans about “the fate and fashion of the world” (149). The messengers’ exhortations, explaining death as a divine gift and postulating the existence of a realm beyond Arda, provoke responses from the Númenóreans that echo Andreth’s earlier complaints. Númenóreans accentuate their love and attachment to their land: “Why we must die, leaving our home and all that we have made?” (148). At the same time, they express a longing for the forbidden lands: “Why should we not go even to Aman, and taste there, were it but for a day, the bliss of the Powers?” (149) which rekindles the same old dispute: “Why do the Lords of the West sit there in peace unending… and the Eldar die not, even those that rebelled against the Lords” (149). They justify their envy as a rightful response against the requirement of “a blind trust, and a hope without assurance” (149). The last blow of the Shadow falls upon Númenor during the reign of Ar-Pharazôn as he captures Sauron, who is wise and knowledgeable enough to “find words of seeming reason 11 for persuasion” (FN 176) and embolden the king’s pride, urging him to act according to his will: “Great kings must have their will” (176). This time, it is not merely through the Shadow but also his chief agent, Sauron, that Morgoth’s will subjugates Men, pushing them to make a temple dedicated to his worship (214). Sauron’s strategy and advice mainly prey upon Men’s misunderstanding of their free will. As a master of confusion, Sauron inflames the king’s pride and provokes the fear of death, counselling the king, “One thing only now you lack to make you the greatest King in the world, the undying life that is withheld from you in fear and jealousy by the lying Powers in the West” (181). He ultimately incites the king’s sense of freedom and pride: “But great kings take what is their right” (181). As a result, Ar-Pharazôn launches an assault upon the Undying lands, resulting in the wrath of the Valar and the drowning of Númenor (190). This disastrous end underlines the tragic consequences of pride and distrust in divine providence. The answer to the questions and complaints of Men lies in what this chapter has yet to say from Athrabeth and Akallabêth. Prior to explaining how death is a gift, it is vital to first probe the premise: Was death imposed on Men? Tolkien’s Manuscript A of Athrabeth has a decisive dialogue as Finrod asks Andreth, “What did ye do, ye Men, long ago in the dark? How did ye anger Eru?” (MR 313). Although she keeps the answer a secret, Tolkien’s supplementary notes on Athrabeth uncover an alternate narrative, wherein Andreth, urged by Finrod, explains how the disaster or death upon Men happened at the beginning of their history. In this version, Eru came to Men as a voice declaring, “Ye are my children. I have sent you to dwell here” (345) and gave them both a promise and duty that “in time ye will inherit all this Earth, but first ye must be children and learn. Call on me and I shall hear; for I am watching over you” (345). At this juncture, Men were slow to learn and make words, often calling upon the Voice 12 and asking questions, only to be advised, “First seek to find the answer for yourselves. For ye will have joy in the finding, and so grow from childhood and become wise. Do not seek to leave childhood before your time” (307). Vaninskaya interprets this stage as an “existential uncertainty” (163). The newborn Men receiving no concrete guidance nor intelligent answers from the Voice are likened to inquisitive and vulnerable infants (164). Amid their desperation and confusion, Morgoth appeared before Men, adorned in shining raiment, introducing himself as the giver of gifts (MR 307). He feigned compassion for Men: “Ye should not have been left alone and uninstructed,” (307) and promised them that “the world is full of marvellous riches which knowledge can unlock. Ye could have food more abundant and more delicious than the poor things that ye now eat. Ye could have dwellings of ease, in which ye could keep light and shut out the night. Ye could be clad even as I” (307). Thus, Men fell into the worship of Melkor, defying the words of the Voice, and soon after, they heard it for the last time: “Ye have abjured Me, but ye remain Mine. I gave you life. Now it shall be shortened, and each of you in a little while shall come to Me, to learn who is your Lord: the one ye worship, or I who made him” (308). Vaninskaya’s treatment of Men’s helpless situation as “existential uncertainty” (163) and her analogy to an infant, while empathetic, does not take into account a crucial moment in the narrative. Adhering to Eru’s advice to “first seek to find the answer for yourselves. For ye will have joy in finding” (MR 346). Men admit, “but we were in haste, and we desired to order things to our will, and the shapes of many things that we wished to make awoke in our minds. Therefore we spoke less and less to the Voice” (346). This confession highlights Men’s hasty and self-determined disposition, often culminating in their estrangement from the divine. The evil nature of haste is first hinted at in Melkor’s impatience with Eru's designs (Sil 27). In the 13 case of Númenor, Men followed the same pattern, only through excess instead of haste, as their love for lore, crafts, and intellectual or artistic pursuits grew to a “far greater degree than normal” (FN 32). Regarding Men’s assertion that they were immortal before their Fall (MR 345), the story offers no proof of Men’s immortality shifted to mortality; instead, it suggests that Eru only shortened their lives: “I gave you life. Now it shall be shortened” (347). These words indicate that in Eru’s original design before the Fall, Men had longer lifespans. Given their initial longevity and the Fall happening at the beginning of their history, Andreth’s claim that no Man had died before could be only because none among Men had yet been old enough to die. Nevertheless, even at the beginning of their history, death had been present for Men even though it took longer to come. The discussion of death imposed on Men, more than anything, attests to their fallibility in understanding the truth in the divine plans or, as Tolkien tentatively noted before striking out the comment, the Elves believe “[Men] are blind, and their joy is small, which should be great” (36). In Tolkien's works, striking out a line does not invariably signify a rejection; instead, it often reflects a deliberate choice to leave certain matters unspoken. This inclination to withhold information is evident in a letter addressing whether Shadowfax accompanied Gandalf in leaving Middle-earth. Tolkien writes, "I feel it is better not to state everything (and indeed it is more realistic, since in chronicles and accounts of 'real' history, many facts that some enquirer would like to know are omitted, and the truth has to be discovered or guessed from such evidence as there is)" (Letters 495). The following treatment of the gift of death builds upon Men’s fallibility by proving that the perennial questions posed by Men regarding death have always been met with cogent answers, though often overlooked or disregarded. In Tolkien’s legendarium, Men’s wishes are 14 endless living, exploring, and creating. They envy the Elves for having such qualities and consider them the favourite children of Eru. The divine warnings to Men have frequently underscored that Arda is ill-suited to fulfill such aspirations since it is marred, limited in space, and impermanent. It is marred because, in the beginning, Morgoth “let most of his being pass into the physical constituents of the Earth” (MR 348) and made Arda incapable of purity as “all things that were born on Earth and lived on and by it, beasts or plants or incarnate spirits, were liable to be ‘stained’” (348). Regarding space, Arda’s boundaries limit Men’s expansive ambitions, as their hearts, by Eru’s will, “should seek beyond the world and should find no rest therein” (36). Jon Mentxakatorre Odriozola, in his theological study of death as a gift in Tolkien’s works, notes that humans are aware that their desired plenitude is only achievable beyond earthly existence (“The Theological Meaning” 50). Similarly, the Númenóreans, having already conquered Middle-earth, aspired to “conquer new realms…and ease the pressure of this peopled island, where every road is trodden hard, and every tree and grass-blade counted” (FN 276). However, the Númenóreans mistakenly perceive the Undying Lands as their destined existence. Tolkien indicates at various points an eventual conclusion, where Arda, as Elves assume, “will be destroyed by wicked Men (or the wickedness in Men)” (MR 304) since the evil seed of Morgoth “cannot be destroyed; and ever and anon it sprouts anew, and will bear dark fruit even unto the latest days” (Sil 323). Therefore, everlasting life on Arda promises nothing but weariness and loss, a bitter finale that only the Eldar remain to grieve, a sorrow that “fills all the Earth with tears” (MR 43). Conversely, for Men, Eru the Designer envisages an untainted, unlimited, and permanent world where they transcend their current role and status as guests and strangers to become agents and inheritors (MR 296). The Eldar believe that at Arda’s end, Men will join in 15 the Second Music of the Ainur (MR 37), that is, in Vaninskaya’s words: “share in God’s authorship of the world” (170). Finrod’s vision in Athrabeth emphasizes that Men will share not only in undoing the marring and desolation of Melkor but also creatively produce “a third thing, Arda Re-made—for Eru never merely undoes the past, but brings into being something new, richer than the ‘first design’” (MR 296). This purpose of Men seems to have existed from the beginning but was only postponed. One of the speculations on Eru’s design states that Men “were destined (after tutelage) to take on the governance of all the Earth, and ultimately to become Valar” (316), but Eru’s plan adjusted as they fell into Melkor’s evil. However, one might ask what makes Men able to create “something new” and “richer than the first design.” Men are distinguished from the Elves by a different kind of freedom, a trait intricately tied to their bestowed gift of death. Eru grants them “a virtue to shape their life, amid the powers and chances of the world” (Sil 51) and “a strange power for good or ill, and for turning things aside from the purpose of Valar or Elves” (MR 21). Had Eru and the Valar directly meddled in their affairs, Men’s free will, akin to that of the Elves, could have bent toward obedience. Men perceive this physical absence of the divine as indicative of disinterest in them. When Andreth complains to Finrod that “Your Valar do not trouble us either with care or with instruction” (279), he clarifies that Men are too great to be governed by the Valar and are the sole masters of themselves (280). Men’s free will generates distinctive deeds and thoughts, all of which, according to Eru, “redounds at the end only to the glory of my work” (21) and, in Finrod’s vision, serves to “enlarge the Music and surpass the Vision of the World!” (284). The paradox between Men’s love for Arda and their death, therefore, makes sense as the messengers to Númenor emphasize that Ilúvatar “does not plant to no purpose,” and Tolkien, in a letter, admits that for an Elf, “a mortal Man has probably a higher if unrevealed destiny” (Letters 16 407). Grant Sterling explains this paradox thus: “although God intends that we love the world […] yet He also intends that we see death, in its appropriate time, as a blessing, for through it we may escape the world and serve Him in other ways, and receive from Him a greater reward” (18). Tolkien’s conception of an afterlife for Arda aligns with his Christian faith, as expressed in a letter to encourage his son, Michael, during the Second World War: Death: by the divine paradox, that which ends life and demands the surrender of all, and yet by the taste (or foretaste) of which alone can what you seek in your earthly relationships (love, faithfulness, joy) be maintained, or take on that complexion of reality, of eternal endurance, which every man’s heart desires. (Letters 74) In a subsequent letter in June 1941, Tolkien follows up with more spiritual counsel on death: “there is a place called ‘heaven’ where the good here unfinished is completed; and where the stories unwritten, and the hopes unfulfilled, are continued” (76). This perspective finds a parallel in Tolkien’s short story “Leaf by Niggle,” where “a little man called Niggle” (285) struggles as he cannot paint more than a solitary leaf of his imagined tree. However, upon his death, to his immense astonishment, he discovers that “before him stood the Tree, his tree, finished” (“Leaf By Niggle” 302). Vaninskaya comments that finishing the tree was “not something he can achieve in life” and, therefore, “He must die first, and only beyond the mortal world and its Time can he assist in the enrichment of God’s creation” (170). She associates this story with the Elven conception in Arda as Niggle’s “vision during his lifetime is gifted after death with that vision fulfilled, become now a reality that is incorporated into God’s wider reality” (170). As Niggle’s singular tree grows into a forest, providing other people with respite as “a holiday, and a refreshment” (“Leaf by Niggle” 311), Vaninskaya finds it analogous to Men’s agency in the Second Music of Ainur as the Tree “serves not merely as an instance of 17 individual redemption, but as a benefit to all humanity to help them on their way to Heaven” (170). Despite the Elvish assurances on the gift of death and Eru’s overarching design that there is something greater beyond death, Men tend to question the truth and reliability of these prophetic visions, dismissed as “a hope without assurance” (FN 149). Addressing this skepticism requires drawing parallels between Men’s First and Second Fall to uncover the cautionary events and clues overlooked by Númenóreans. In “The Tale of Adanel”, Morgoth ensnares the ambitious hearts of Men with a promise of “marvellous riches…abundant food… and comfort” (MR 307). In his turn, Sauron plays the same trick on Númenóreans by promising, “In the east and even in the west, there lay yet many seas and many lands for their winning, wherein was wealth uncounted” (FN 177). He gives the order for a temple to be built where Men would make sacrifices to be released from Death (179), mirroring Morgoth’s preaching about the Dark in The Tale of Adanel and the temple made for him where those escaping from his darkness were sacrificed through death by fire (MR 348). The shadow that Morgoth casts upon Men, which is not death but only the fear of it, works as a catalyst for their death as Finrod explains: “The shadow may have darkened your unrest, bringing swifter weariness and soon turning it to disdain” (282). Likewise, Sauron’s false promise of escape from death only intensifies its presence and accelerates its coming: “Death did not depart from the land, rather it came sooner and more often, and in many dreadful guises” (FN 180). Tolkien’s dramatic irony in Akallabêth stresses the Númenóreans’ failure to discern these forewarnings because of their obliviousness to their ancestral lore, culminating in their downfall—a second tragedy. Nevertheless, not all Men in Númenor were blind and oblivious to divine signs and clues; some had repented their mistakes and escaped the fall. In Morgoth’s Ring, Andreth refers 18 to another group of Men as “those of the Old Hope,” believing in an ultimate divine intervention as “the One will himself enter into Arda, and heal Men and all the Marring from the beginning to the end” (MR 286). Although Andreth dismisses this belief as mere rumour, Finrod values it as “strange news that comes from afar,” admitting that “no such hope was ever spoken to the Quendi” (287). As for Númenóreans, Manwë, before giving them longevity, warned them of its dangers and reminded them that they had not become the Eldar; thus, their fate was still tied to mortality (FN 31). Additionally, when Númenóreans craved to sail to the Undying Lands, the messengers of the Valar alerted them that “it is not the land of Manwë that makes its people deathless,” but that the Valar themselves have hallowed the land and if Númenóreans set foot on it, they would “but wither and grow weary sooner, as moths in a light too strong and steadfast” (FN 149, italics mine). While the majority of Númenóreans reject these divine admonitions, a small group called the Faithful—with Elendil as their most prominent figure—“kept Ilúvatar in their hearts” (215) and resisted the descent into the darkness of Morgoth. A significant moment of realization in Athrabeth, overlooked by Vaninskaya, arises when Finrod differentiates Men and Elves in their love for Arda as “between one who visits a strange country, and abides there a while (but need not), and one who has lived in that land always (and must)” (MR 281). He reveals a belief by the Eldar that Men’s love for and engagement with Arda often seems predicated on a longing for something beyond immediate reality: “They look at no thing for itself; that if they study it, it is to discover something else; that if they love it, it is only (so it seems) because it reminds them of some other dearer thing” (281). However, this dearer thing refers to what neither the Elf-king nor the wise woman can guess until it unfolds in Finrod’s vision of Arda unmarred and re-made (296). Amy Amendt-19 Raudege, in her study of dream visions in The Lord of the Rings, explains that in the medieval framework, dream visions are the means by which the dreamer gains a sort of knowledge, which they would otherwise lack (“Dream Visions" 45). Within Tolkien’s fictional world with blurry lines between sleeping and waking, Amendt-Raduege emphasizes that dream visions might occur even when the dreamer is not asleep (49). She appeals to Constance B. Hieatt that prophetic dreams and visions are, if true, sent by God and, if false, sent by the devil (47; Hieatt 24). Amendt-Raduege points out Frodo’s dream in the house of Bombadil as an example of prophetic vision: But either in his dreams or out of them, he could not tell, Frodo heard a sweet singing running in his mind: a song that seemed to come like a pale light behind a grey rain- curtain and growing stronger to turn the veil all to glass and silver, until at last it was rolled back, and a far green country opened before him under a swift sunrise. (LR 158) Comparing this vision to Frodo’s experience on the ship to the Undying Lands, Amendt-Raduege displays how Tolkien “weaves together dream and reality” (“Dream Visions”) and in a medieval style, dreams and visions offered Frodo “an eternal reality above and beyond the realm of mortals” (53). Finrod’s vision in Athrabeth anticipates a reality that is to come at the end of Arda. Importantly, this vision affects not only Finrod but also Andreth. Prior to his vision, Finrod associates, in a platonic sense of memory, Men’s love for Arda with a memory of a greater thing or ideal future, which he believes to be Arda unmarred. Andreth’s wonder at his words, “You speak strange words, Finrod, which I have not heard before,” is followed by a confession: “Yet my heart is stirred as if by some truth that it recognizes even if it does not understand it” (MR 282). In his notes on Athrabeth, Tolkien states an Elven belief that the “lightening of the heart or stirring of joy” after hearing a proposition or argument is a sign 20 of recognizing truth by the fëa or soul (343). However, even if Andreth experiences a moment of epiphany, it is undoubtedly incomplete, which prompts the question: What makes her fail to recognize the truth fully? As mentioned earlier in this chapter, Andreth’s sarcasm toward the Eldar and Valar indicates an underlying resentment. She feels a sense of humiliation and neglect from the divine, delineating a hierarchical gap between Elves and Men: “the lords and the humble, the firstcomers high and enduring, the followers lowly and of brief service” (MR 276). As her repudiation of death ends in defying the Valar, Finrod warns Andreth, “If ye will not speak to others of your wound or how ye came by it, take heed lest (as unskilled leeches) ye misjudge the hurt, or in pride misplace the blame” (280). This interaction is reminiscent of the moment Húrin in The Silmarillion, engulfed in wrath and grief, blames Thingol for the death of his wife and children, only to be cautioned by Melian that “with the voice of Morgoth thou dost now upbraid thy friends” (293). As Finrod suggests, the envy and hostility occasionally arising between Men and Elves stem from the lies of the Enemy that breed hate (MR 277). However, Andreth’s resentment seems connected to a personal trauma: a rejected love and unsuccessful relationship with Aegnor, Finrod’s brother. Grieving her mortality as something tragic, Andreth laments: “I was young and I looked on his flame, and now I am old and lost” (288). She juxtaposes her aging with Aegnor’s enduring youthfulness (288). Finrod assures her that Aegnor still loves her and will never marry a woman. When asked why Aegnor left while she still had some years to spend, Finrod explains that even if Aegnor survived the battle and rejoined her, the passage of time would inevitably inflict them with the disparity of their nature: “He would not have run before thee. He would have stayed at thy side to uphold thee. Then pity thou wouldst have had in every hour, pity inescapable. He would not have thee so shamed” 21 (289). Vaninskaya’s concluding point on Athrabeth merely accentuates the gloomy side of Finrod’s parting words to Andreth: “But you are not for Arda. Whither you go, may you find light” (MR 290), as she argues, “Finrod’s wish, his hope on behalf of the human race, is all he has to give” (171), adding to her overall view of the futility of Elven counsel and sympathy for Men. Therefore, Vaninskaya dismisses Finrod’s impact on Andreth by omitting the second half of his last words: “But you are not for Arda. Whither you go may you find light. Await us there, my brother - and me” (MR 293, italics mine). Against Vaninskaya’s skeptical interpretation, Finrod’s last words can offer Andreth hope for life beyond Arda and a solemn promise of an eventual reunion. To recognize the gift of death, Men do not necessarily need to be well-versed in ancient lore, engage in dialogue with the messengers of the Valar, or partake in debates with Finrod. Men’s fleeting nature often makes their responsibilities toward Arda less burdensome than those of the immortals. As a result, even those who do not explicitly acknowledge death as a gift can still perceive and appreciate its consoling attributes. Beren of the House of Bëor exemplifies this perspective as he refuses to fight against Melkor’s forces with the rationale, “Let the Eldar look to it! Our lives are short enough” (Sil 181). Tolkien writes in a note later struck through that at the end of Arda, the sorrow of the Elves fills the world with tears, which Men do not hear since they have left what they had made or marred (MR 43). In the Battle of the Black Gate, Pippin, confronting the imminence of death, embraces his fate with a liberating spirit: “So it ends as I guessed it would,” and his thought laughs and “almost gay it seemed to be casting off at last all doubt and care and fear” (LR 893). Elendil, in the shadow of Numenor’s demise, walks in his garden and reflects, “The shadow of fear is between us and the sun, and all things look as if they were already lost” and then discovers a unique beauty only revealed 22 in the hour of doom: “Yet they are strangely beautiful, thus seen” (FN 274). Not all inhabitants of Arda may be aware of Eru and the envisaged Second Music of Ainur, yet hope for an existence beyond death shapes and directs some cultures in Middle-earth. Thorin Oakenshield, a Dwarf-king, dies with a yearning “to sit beside my fathers, until the world is renewed” (The Hobbit 287), and Théoden, King of Rohan, finds solace and delight in the prospect of joining his fathers as a reward for his heroic death (LR 866). Such expectations of an afterlife, not exclusive to the Dúnedain and Eldar, develop a core tenet of hope across Eru’s creation. Interestingly, Celeborn the Elf-king, Arwen, the half-elven queen, and Théoden, both immortal and mortal, allude to death or the afterlife as a “long home” (LR 1061, 367, 513). Therefore, a fulfilled life in Arda does not depend on the specifics of the envisioned afterlife; it suffices to embrace the hope that death is not the ultimate end. Therefore, Tolkien’s concept of the gift of death illuminates life as much as it does death. In Arda, only those genuinely understand and treasure the gift that are like those in the Sayings of the High One, “Do not cling to the cup but drink [their] share” (Poetic Edda 13). 23 Chapter 3 “Pride and Despair”: Denethor’s Struggles Against His Self-woven Death One way to explore death as a gift in The Lord of the Rings is through the contrasting attitudes of Denethor and Théoden toward death. These two elderly lords, with their physical weaknesses and melancholy, are deeply concerned with their impending deaths. Having tasted the limitations of old age, Tolkien draws on his inspirations from Northern literary works to contrast the paths of these characters based on their attitudes toward death. This chapter focuses on Denethor, whose profound fear of mortality, inherited from his Númenórean ancestors, starkly contrasts with the idea of death as a gift. His reluctance to risk his life in battle, coupled with pride and self-righteousness, prevents him from envisioning a greater design by Providence for the outcome of the war with Sauron. Denethor’s refusal to heed Gandalf’s advice reflects his mistrust of the divine and inability to see beyond his immediate fear. Trapped in his despair and fear, he remains passive and makes unheroic and disastrous decisions. A comparison of Denethor’s case with F. Anne Payne’s interpretation of the Danes praying to the Gastbona during Grendel’s attacks in Beowulf and Ruth Wehlau’s study of grief and despair in Boethius’s allegorical writings reveals how Denethor’s fear of death and failure to embrace mortality as a gift lead to his tragic downfall. 24 In Letter 156, Tolkien explains that death is not a punishment for Men within his legendarium. Instead, their changed attitude toward it—characterized by fear and reluctance— can be viewed in a penal sense (Letters 302). For those inhabitants of Arda who view immortality as the quintessential and most desired attribute of life, their sense of place in Time is informed by their attitude toward death. Númenóreans, though to a limited point, have a similar “life-mode to that of the Eldar” (FN 31). At the end of the First Age, the Valar counselled the Elves to leave Beleriand and return to the West; however, some of the Elves disregard the Valar’s call and remain in Middle-earth, “lingering and unwilling to forsake where they had fought and labored long” (FN 2). Tolkien refers to this moment as “a sort of second fall or at least ‘error’ of the Elves” (Letters 211) due to a sense of possessiveness and attachment that later appears in the Númenórean objections that “we must die and go we know not whither, leaving our home and all that we have made” (FN 185). This fallacy, observable in both Elves and Men, emanates from the Enemy's malevolent work, which leads them into a confusion between freedom from Time and clinging to Time (Letters 386). This temptation anchors the Elves to Middle-earth, fueling their endeavour to halt Time (386), and incites Númenóreans to disdain their mortality and rebel against the Valar (FN 181). Consequently, they find death as an ultimate loss and will choose temporal attachment over transcendence from Arda’s confines. Apart from Tolkien’s comparison of death in a Ringwraith and Aragorn, one clinging to it and the other embracing it (Letters 386), an exploration of the contrasting deaths of Denethor and Théoden in light of their cultural and personal dichotomies further underscores the link between their positions and identities in terms of time and death. In a letter to his son Michael in June 1941, Tolkien metaphorically expresses a poignant sense of diminished capacity and confinement as “a lame canary in a cage” (Letters 76). His 25 inability to manage even being a home guardian or having a conversation with his friends has left him feeling permanently reserved. Regarding the ongoing war, he says wistfully, “If only I could do something active” (76), but expresses his hopes resting on his son’s shoulders, “Still you are my flesh and blood, and carry on the name” (76). Tolkien’s engagement with the melancholic dimensions of growing old is also informed by his acquaintance with and inspirations from earlier English and Scandinavian literary works. Within the narrative of Beowulf, following the protagonist’s slaying of Grendel’s mother, King Hrothgar, himself advanced in years, counsels the young warrior about the inevitability and hurts of old age: “Soon sickness or blade will steal your strength…or terrible old age, or the light of your eyes will fail and grow dark” (Shippey lines 1762-1767). Later in his report to Hygelac, Beowulf describes Hrothgar as “sunk in age” whose “heart grieved him when old in winters, he [Hrothgar] thought of many things” (lines 2110-2114). Similarly, Hrethel, Beowulf’s grandfather, is portrayed as powerless in the face of his son’s tragic death, epitomizing the helplessness associated with old age in a world bereft of his contemporaries and comrades (Beowulf 197). Saxo Grammaticus, whose works Tolkien studied and took inspiration from (Shippey, The Road 480; Brecq 4; Tolkien, Beowulf 245), presents in his Gesta Danorum the famous warrior Starkather, now, “worn out from an already prolonged life,” asking a young man to give him a proper death blow (248). Starkather explains the dichotomy of strength in youth versus the afflictions of old age, confessing, “I too have learnt the hurts of pernicious age/diseased eyes, hoarseness in chest and larynx/all a man’s advantages working adversely” (248). In Njals Saga, before Flosi sets Njal’s house on fire, he permits him to come out: “You do not deserve to be burned inside” (268). However, Njal rejects the offer, admitting that “I am an old man and little fit to avenge my sons, and I do not want to live in shame” (265). 26 However, in Denethor’s case, experiencing old age does not justify his despair and passivity as Gandalf, in an unpublished draft of The Lord of the Rings post-humously published by Christopher Tolkien, urges him to act as a leader: “You must go out to the battle of your City putting away despair and risking death in the field” (WoR 376). Denethor, with a Númenórean descent, continues the fear of death and thus final dotage exemplified by Tar-Atanamir, who “lived to a great age, clinging to his life beyond the end of all joy and refusing to depart until he was witless and unmanned” (FN 187). Denethor’s fear and passivity despite Boromir’s death and his mistreatment of Faramir, both of whom risk their life to fulfill the will of the father, resemble the Númenórean king, Tar-Atanamir, who clung so much to life and kingship to deny his son the right to rule (187). Denethor’s selfishness echoes with Joseph Harris’s interpretation of King Aud’s sacrificing his sons to Odin for a longer life in Ynglinga Saga (“Sacrifice” 93). Harris finds in this story the motifs of “weak old age (anasott), clinging to life (pralifr), and sacrifice of kin (ottunga rjodr)” (93). Although Denethor does not sacrifice his sons for long life, he is partly responsible for their deaths, especially as he orders a pyre so that Faramir burns with him “only to ease his death” (LR 853)—a practice that Gandalf rebukes as a heathen tradition of kings under the influence of evil (853). This way, Denethor the Númenórean displays the fear of death and the inevitable weariness and dotage of old age previously suffered by his ancestors. Denethor’s case, besides the loss of a son discussed in the fifth chapter, is also complicated by the problem with his faith in a greater design, his self-assuredness and pride, and lastly, his complex of power and stewardship, which are further explored in the subsequent analysis. In her 1979 article, F. Anne Payne offers a new reading of the word “hæþen,” previously taken as “non-Christian” in Beowulf scholarship. Payne critiques the traditional analysis of 27 lines 175-183—where the poet disapproves of the Danes praying to Gastbona or the soul-slayer during the attacks of Grendel—considered as a Christian addition and the poet’s contempt for the non-Christian Danes (“The Danes’ Prayers” 308). She argues that the passage concurrently affords “invaluable insight into the poet’s vision of the heroic imagination and of its negations,” suggesting that hæþen metaphorically signifies the “dead,” “confined,” “uncreative” spiritual and mental states (308). Shippey’s discussion of “heathen,”—a term that only surfaces twice in The Lord of the Rings, both instances about Denethor’s suicide—overlooks the heroic imagination Payne explores in her study of Beowulf (The Road 223). Denethor’s refusal to go to battle is rooted in his pride and self-assurance, rejecting anything other than his own counsel. Denethor boasts his superior knowledge of lore over Gandalf and Saruman (LR 252), overestimates his power against the Palantir and Sauron (Amendt-Raduege 37), and ultimately usurps the authority to dictate not only his death but also that of his son (LR 853). Despite Denethor’s pretense of superior knowledge, especially his ability to read Gandalf’s schemes, he has been, like the Danes in Beowulf, blinded to “the dimensions of possibility” (Payne 309) and a greater power at work, which is divine Providence as “the ultimate projection of the unopposed imagination” (311). Payne remarks that the heroic imagination in times of crisis necessitates the mental capacity to envisage “the freedom to live, exert power, hear music, taste wine, fight for joy” (309). In contrast, Denethor’s choice to end life and forsake power (LR 825) or, as he metaphorically puts it, to taste “the bitterness in the cup that I mixed for myself” (813) leaves no space for heroism. Payne elaborates on another sense of hæþen as “confined” in the example of dragon’s gold (309). This conceptualization extends to the Danes’ decision to confine their bodies to a heathen temple and thus “destroy in themselves any vestige of remaining awareness of the spatial and temporal dimensions of the universe” (310). Denethor’s 28 self-imposed isolation within his hall and chamber, with his sole departure being his descent to his pyre in Rath Dinen—a place of darkness, emptiness, and death—embodies the same confinement (LR 826). Ruth Wehlau’s “Beowulf’s Dark Thoughts” contributes an essential discussion on despair in times of crisis or the struggles that Tolkien views as a battle between “the soul and its adversaries” (MC 9). Her argument focuses on lines 2327-52, revealing Beowulf’s thoughts before his fight with the dragon. Wehlau examines Beowulf’s assumption that the disaster of the dragon might emanate from wrongdoing or breaking a divine command, followed by his “vacillation between despair and overconfidence,” as indicating a mind “ill-equipped to deal with disaster” (“Beowulf’s Dark Thoughts” 135). She highlights Beowulf’s initial failure to recollect and put into practice the lessons of Hrothgar following the defeat of Grendel (137), wherein the king counsels the young hero on the divine omnipotence: “The lord ruled all mankind, as he does now. Therefore, discernment is best everywhere, forethought of mind” and the ephemeral nature of earthly joy and sorrows “Much of joy and of loathing he will experience, who long makes use of this world here in these days of strife” (1057-1062, Wehlau’s translation). Wehlau draws a parallel between Beowulf’s wavering faith and Boethius’s philosophical allegories, where Wisdom cautions Mod or the mind against the threats of pride and despair to the mind (137)—vices that Gandalf attributes to Denethor’s suicide (LR 853). Beowulf would not have fallen into momentary despair and pride had he remembered the words of Hrothgar (Wehlau 139), a lapse similarly manifested in Denethor’s disregard for Gandalf’s counsel. Denethor trusts the visions in the Palantir, which Shippey argues to be self-directed and self-deluding (“Curious Case” 8), and as Gandalf explains, the Palantir shows “only those things which that Power permitted him [Denethor] to see” (LR 856). 29 Grief, as Wehlau suggests, impairs the memory (138), and Denethor loses caution in using the Palantir as a result of his grief at the death of his wife (LR 1056) and later, the departure of Boromir and Faramir’s dying wounds (856). In Metre 5 of The Old English Boethius, the metaphorical work of pride and despair is to “cloud the mind so that the light of the sun cannot penetrate” (38b– 45) and make the mind struggle with despair and foolish pride (Wehlau 138). This method is analogous to Sauron’s heaping shadows and clouds upon Minas Tirith to “darken hearts and counsel” (LR 808). Gandalf attests to Sauron’s capacity to manipulate knowledge and fill Denethor “with despair, mistrust and unwisdom” (WoR 375). To escape from such darkness of mind, one must believe that fortunes change quickly and unexpectedly (Wehlau 138), and these changes are only by God’s design. Denethor’s resignation to defeat, dismissing Frodo’s quest as “a fool’s hope” (LR 813), echoes Andreth’s pessimism against Finrod’s counsels as she claims Morgoth is the lord of Arda and, therefore, the valour of Elves and Men are “a folly and or at least it is fruitless” (MR 279). Influenced by the same evil and fears, Denethor displays envy and resentment in his dispute with Gandalf, which echoes that which Andreth and Númenóreans previously had for the Elves. Denethor also fails to envision a reality governed by wisdom and design greater than his own. Denethor’s case responds to Tolkien’s notion of Recovery, which he defines as: “regaining of a clear view” (373). He further explains that the way to Recovery is by “clean[ing] our windows; so that things seen clearly may be freed from the drab blur of triteness or familiarity–from possessiveness” (373, italics mine). Denethor’s trust in his knowledge or, in Tolkien’s words, “seeing things as they are” (373) deprives him of seeing the possibility of a greater design or “seeing things as we are (were) meant to see them” (373). Ironically, in the dark hours of the war, “where hope and despair are akin” (LR 880), had Denethor chosen life over death and 30 only briefly postponed his suicide, he could have tasted victory and witnessed the falsity of his premonitions (“Curious Case” 9). In other words, Denethor’s refusal of Recovery makes him fail to experience Consolation or “the joy of happy ending, the sudden joyous ‘turn’” (384) that Tolkien calls “eucatastrophe” (384). Matthew Dickerson and Jonathan Evans explain Denethor’s flawed understanding of stewardship as merely concerned with ruling and authority (Ents, Elves, and Eriador 38). Despite Gandalf’s example of proper stewardship, Denethor praises and identifies with Sauron’s use of others as an instrument for his ends (38). Denethor acknowledges the tenure over Gondor only “until the king should come again” (LR 818); however, he repudiates Aragorn’s coming to the throne as the heir of Isildur: “I will not step down to be the dotard chamberlain of an upstart… I will not bow to such a one, last of a ragged house long bereft of lordship and dignity” (854). Denethor’s possessive attitude and obsession with ruling lead to envy and mistrust toward Gandalf: “Thy hope is to rule in my stead, to stand behind every throne” (853). He also jealously accuses him of disintegrating familial and knightly loyalties: “Thou hadst already stolen half my son’s love. Now thou stealest the hearts of my knights also” (854). The question then arises, what makes Denethor mistrust and envy Gandalf and Aragorn who, similar to the messengers of the Valar to Númenóreans, offer knowledge and assistance? Shippey observes that the first image of Denethor in The Lord of the Rings portrays humility, with his seat placed on a simple chair beneath the throne of Gondor (The Author of the Century 120). Faramir’s memory of a dialogue between his father and brother further reveals Denethor’s consciousness of his inferior status. Unhappy that his father was not a king, Boromir asks Denethor the duration required for a steward to ascend to kingship, to which Denethor replies, “Few years, maybe, in other places of less royalty… In Gondor, ten thousand 31 years would not suffice” (LR 670). Thus, Denethor’s enduring sense of humiliation and the prices he has paid in stewardship—his advancing old age and the loss of his wife and offspring— makes him acutely intolerant of any threat to his authority, whether Gandalf or Aragorn. Denethor’s decision to die in a fire is reminiscent of Men’s use of fire in the dark days of Middle-earth under the dominion of Evil (LR 825, 853), and his boast of unequaled lore mastery (252) suggests an intentional dismissal of his ancestral tales. His pride and dispute with Gandalf, sacrificing a son, chiding the divine, and self-immolation ironically echo the missteps of his forebears discussed in the previous chapter. After Denethor’s death, Tolkien describes the destruction of Rath Dinen: “the dome of the house cracks and smokes issue forth; and then with a rush and rumble of stone it fell in a flurry of fire, but still unabated the flames danced and flickered among the ruins” (855). It bears a striking resemblance to Melkor’s temple in The Tale of Adanel: “he went up in a great flame and smoke, and we were scorched by the heat” (MR 347). It also resembles the evil practice of Men burning those among them who fled from the Dark Lord’s worship, “taken to the House and there done to death by fire” (348). Additionally, in the destruction of Numenore, a great reeking smoke issues from the temple of Melkor, where Men made sacrifices to escape death (216), and even after the engulfment of the city, the temple still stood with smoke rising from it. In an earlier draft of “The Pyre of Denethor,” Gandalf tells the citadel’s guards not to mourn Denethor overmuch (WoR 377). Amendt-Raduege emphasizes that Faramir, the only remnant of Denethor, not even once mentions his father (The Sweet and the Bitter 39), paralleling Wehlau’s interpretation of the death of a proud man in lines 1725-1758 of Beowulf. Wehlau argues that compared to the mourning and funerary rituals for Beowulf, this man 32 receives no such love and reverence, indicating that his death, unlike Beowulf’s heroic one, has been “an ignominious end, a punishment worse than death within the heroic culture that Beowulf depicts” (141). Ironically, after the Battle of Pelennor Fields, when the Prince of Imrahil and Éomer seek Denethor in the citadel, they find instead his chair empty and Théoden resting in a splendid bed: …before the dais lay Théoden King of the Mark upon a bed of state; and twelve torches stood about it, and twelve guards, knights both of Rohan and Gondor. And the hangings of the bed were of green and white, but upon the king was laid the great cloth of gold up to his breast, and upon that his unsheathed sword, and at his feet his shield. The light of the torches shimmered in his white hair like sun in the spray of a fountain, but his face was fair and young, save that a peace lay on it beyond the reach of youth; and it seemed that he slept. (LR 861) Had he chosen a heroic death like Théoden, Denethor would have been sleeping with such reverence and splendour in the hall of which he had spent many years as the steward. The contrast between Denethor’s empty chair and Théoden’s kingly bed symbolizes their deaths and foreshadows how others will remember them. Théoden receives a grand funeral, frequent praises, and affectionate remembrances, while Denethor is no longer remembered in affection nor glory save only by Pippin (LR 892). The portrayal of Denethor with his complex death indicates the ironic susceptibility of Men, regardless of their lore mastery or intellectual prowess, to succumb to the follies of pride and power. Denethor’s suicide, positioned in stark contrast to the concept of death as a gift, emerges as a refusal to acknowledge the possibility of a greater force capable of altering fortunes. One might argue that Denethor’s self-immolation contradicts his fear of death. 33 However, the way Denethor clings to life—“I would have things as they were in all the days of my life” (854)—and loathes the changes of fortune brought by Time—I will have naught: neither life diminished, nor love halved, nor honour abated”— is aligned with his possessiveness, obsession for authority, and pride. Denethor’s choice of suicide is driven by a profound fear of death and humiliation at the hands of Sauron (813). Therefore, he prefers death, seeing it as an escape from the Dark Lord’s ultimate victory (818). This attitude is similar to the Danes’ prayers to the Gastbona or the soul-slayer amid Grendel’s onslaughts, which is ironic as Payne remarks, “They pray to death for release from death” (311). Having lost all his power and possessions, Denethor’s defiant words before his suicide, “But in this at least thou shalt not defy my will: to rule my own end” (LR 854), and his complaints against the Valar that “the West has failed” (853), are a desperate assertion of autonomy against Gandalf and the Valar. Denethor’s narrative arc, marred by fear, despair, and suicide, depicts the failure to understand the gift of death, resulting in his inability to choose “life over death, hope over despair, humility over pride” (Lockered 18). His misunderstanding of mortality not only leads to a death repudiated both morally and heroically but also deprives him of a satisfying and fulfilled life as he mourns his sons, becomes old before his time, and, in his final despair and dotage, burns in fire. 34 Chapter 4 “Hope He Rekindled and In Hope Ended”: Théoden’s Heroic Death as a Gift Regarding the heroic spirit and death in The Lord of the Rings, King Théoden displays courage, hope, and a readiness to embrace death. Above all else, the Rohirrim, as a constructed people from the cultures of Goths, Anglo-Saxons, and Scandinavians, highlight what Tolkien refers to as “the creed of unyielding will” (MC 8). Their readiness to die and glorification of heroic death contrast with the Númenórean fear of death and clinging to life. While Denethor falls into despair and commits suicide, Théoden chooses hope and life until he dies heroically, tasting the gift of death as he achieves fulfillment in both life and death. By exploring Théoden’s heroic decisions and mental development culminating in a glorious death, this chapter highlights the significance of hope and heroic imagination in achieving the enlargement and redemption inherent in the gift of Iluvatar. Despite Tolkien’s dismissal of close parallels between the Rohirrim and the early English (or Anglo-Saxons; LR 1136), many studies have found resemblances between the two cultures, and some, for good reasons, have argued for Gothic influences as well (Roots and Branches 118; Libran-Moreno 91; Honneger 7). Despite his appreciation for the Northern fearless and heroic spirit (MC 11), Tolkien critically viewed the fascination with death as glory-seeking (The Battle of Maldon 28). Shippey argues that the Rohirrim culture presents Tolkien’s model of virtuous pagans (The Road 223), and Honnegar sees them as a distillation of northern 35 courage (10). However, for reasons beyond the scope of this study, scholars have often dismissed the influence of Scandinavian cultures and works of literature on the Rohirrim. Therefore, this study of Théoden’s narrative of hope and heroic death employs Scandinavian sources alongside the Gothic and Anglo-Saxon. Germanic cultural motifs in the Rohirrim surface early as Aragorn, prior to arriving at Edoras, sings a poem, The Lament for the Rohirrim, beginning with “Where now the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?” (LR 508). These lines and the rest of the Rohirrim song resemble the Old English poem “The Wanderer,” which deals with themes of loss, exile, and nostalgia. Although the Old English narrator laments a nostalgic, heroic past with no hope of revival in this life, Théoden’s narrative culminates in a revival and exaltation of Rohan’s glorious past. Despite its tone of northern melancholy, Aragorn’s lamentation of the loss of heroism anticipates its restoration. A Beowulfian episode where Théoden’s guards inspect Gandalf’s company with mistrust (The Author 116; Kightley 120) underscores Théoden’s confined and hostile condition. The company finds Théoden as an old man sitting in his gloomy hall with a withered stature and a mind fallen into despair (LR 512) by the sinister influence of his counsellor, Gríma Wormtongue (UT 355). Gandalf, now the chief of his order and empowered by the Valar, uses his staff and Narya, the ring of fire, to dispel the darkness from the king (LR 514). Remarkably, Gandalf does not force Théoden into the light but instead provides him with autonomy, giving him a choice: “‘Do you ask for help? No counsel have I to give to those that despair. Yet counsel I could give, and words I could speak to you. Will you hear them? They are not for all ears” (514). Théoden soon leaves his hall, looks upon his land, and breathes fresh air (515). This immediate act of coming out from his darkened hall underscores a departure from confinement. He moves into not only spatial but mental freedom 36 that contrasts the heathen temple passage in Beowulf, where the Danes pray to the Gastbona (Heaney lines 175-188) in a hopeless and passive attitude, which F. Anne Payne interprets as the most destructive human experience (“Danes’ Prayers” 311). Théoden finds a heroic and spiritual space as Gandalf gives him hope, and Éomer offers his sword (LR 516, 517). Unlike Denethor’s descent into despair, Théoden welcomes the heroic path and re-engages with life and leadership, soon inspiring and mustering an army to defend his people (517). Tolkien leaves certain aspects of Théoden’s transformation enigmatic, hinting at his renewal’s divine quality. Following his heroic sacrifice in Moria and slaying the Balrog, Gandalf is enhanced and sent back by a “prudent plan of the angelic Valar” (Letters 299). Only through this improvement can Gandalf renew Théoden (299). Following Gandalf’s intervention, who is figuratively a messenger of Providence to Middle-earth (Lasseter 122), Théoden sees his first vision from his terrace: “Suddenly through a rent in the clouds behind them a shaft of sun stabbed down. The falling showers gleamed like silver, and far away the river glittered like a shimmering glass” (LR 515). This image is in kinship to Frodo’s recurring vision of “the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise” earlier in the house of Tom Bombadil, another enigmatic figure in Middle-earth, and later in his voyage to the Undying Lands (LR 135, 1030). Although Théoden and Frodo’s visions are not the same, they are epiphanic and indicate the possibility of something beyond, as if a gift of possibility of hope. In addition, part of Gandalf’s later words to Théoden, rekindling hope in the king, remains a secret: “his voice was low and secret, and none save the king heard what he said” (515). What Gandalf told Théoden, besides the hope for the destruction of the Ring and Frodo’s quest, remains unanswered. 37 Gandalf sees Théoden’s choice as life over the shadows of death: “You dream no longer. You live” (LR 516). His renunciation of despair and readiness to act—“What is to be done?” (516)— his generously forgiving Éomer (521), and gifting Shadowfax to Gandalf (522) portray Théoden in a stage of freedom (The Author 117), contrasting with Denethor’s attaching and possessive attitude. Théoden is eager for life and ready to die in battle. Following the Northern heroic virtues of oath-keeping and his veneration for his ancestors, Théoden finds the war with Saruman and Sauron as an opportunity to honour his fathers and their oaths. Théoden characterizes himself as “a lesser son of great sires” (LR 580); he develops a heroic space despite his sense of guilt and remorse over the deaths of his people, his son Théodred, and his captain Hama. Théoden and the Rohirrim are not ideal people from early on due to their fascination with the glory of death, which might lead to despair in times of crisis. Théoden’s renunciation of darkness and despair shifts merely into a longing for death in battle. This is evident from his frequent remarks about his impending demise in the Battle of Helm’s Deep—“I myself will go to war, to fall in the front of the battle, if it must be. Thus shall I sleep better” (LR 518)—alongside his lamentation of old age and weariness—“If I could have set a spear in rest, riding before my men upon the field, maybe I could have felt again the joy of battle, and so ended” (539). This implies that he desires death in battle merely for personal glory and escape. In the episode of Helm’s Deep, Théoden loses hope in victory and Gandalf’s promised aid in facing Saruman’s vast forces. In his despair and concern for his future reputation, Théoden chooses a heroic death over the safety of his tower: “But I will not end here, taken like an old badger in a trap” (539). His following charge responds to what Shippey examines as an Old English antithesis: a sudden onset as a boar versus a cautious defence as a badger (“Boar and Badger” 3). The boar attitude has brought some Anglo-Saxon heroes disastrous 38 ends, such as Byrhtnoth in “The Battle of Maldon” and Cynewulf in annal 755 of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and, as Shippey argues, it is “traditionally regarded with massive suspicion by English generals” (The Road 143). Given Tolkien’s criticism of Byrhtnoth’s treatment of battle as a “sporting match” (The Battle of Maldon 30), Théoden’s charge, primarily motivated by the joy of battle rather than hope, implies a character flaw in the Rohirrim king that reflects a “northern heroic spirit” that is not entirely pure. Although Thomas Honneggar argues that Théoden’s charge represents the Rohirrim spirit in “an unprecedentedly pure and unalloyed degree” (“Anglo-Saxons on Horseback” 12), it still lacks the hope for a greater possibility of victory through Providence—traceable in various moments of the narrative, but in this episode, particularly in Gandalf’s coming in the dawn (LR 541). Théoden’s hopelessness in Helm’s Deep aligns with Wehlau’s discussion of the dark sentiments that clouded Beowulf’s judgment in the dragon episode (“Beowulf’s Dark Thoughts” 145). Both characters fail to imagine a greater design behind the events: Théoden keeps no hope for Gandalf’s aid and finds himself alone in facing the enemy. Beowulf thinks the dragon’s destruction of his hall results from his actions and falls into a momentary despair. As Gandalf puts it in the Council of Elrond, such despair comes “only for those who see the end beyond all doubt” (LR 269). Even deeper despair unfolds in Éomer and Éowyn’s attitudes in times of crisis: Éomer desperately cries for death at his misconception of Aragorn’s ships as the enemy (LR 844), and Éowyn rides to battle with “the face of one without hope who goes in search of death” (803). Their absence of hope for a possible victory beyond their imagination reflects a criticism sometimes directed at the Northern ethos in Tolkien’s narratives and Old English literature, which scholars like Payne interpret as lacking belief in Providence or “a dimension of possibility and uncontaminated space, of all that allows a sense of well-being in the cosmos” (311). Théoden initially regrets 39 his decision to encounter the Uruk-hai in Helm’s Deep, and he blames Gandalf: “His counsel seems not now so good as it did under the morning sun” (LR 539); however, at the coming of Gandalf and victory (541) he acknowledges his mistake and learns his lesson: “In the dark hour before dawn I doubted, but we will not part now. I will come with you, if that is your counsel” (544). Théoden begins to understand the inadequacy of his imagination and thus opens his mind to hope, setting the ground for his character development in the narrative. Apart from the episode at Helm’s Deep, Théoden’s worldview develops beyond his expectations in various moments of the story. Shippey observes that the Rohirrim’s fear and distrust of the Elves stem from their ignorance (Roots and Branches 171). This is evident in Éomer’s remarks about Galadriel as a perilous net-weaver (LR 432), Háma’s fear of a sword forged by the Elves (511), and even in their general unfamiliarity with ancient legends (434, 511). This cultural insularity, deepened by Gríma’s manipulations, hampers Théoden’s imagination for the possibility of hope and the existence of other influential forces. However, as Nicholas Birns examines, Théoden shows “a sense of cultural possibility and negotiation” in his interactions with Gandalf, Aragorn, Saruman, and Ghân-buri-Ghân (The Literary Role of History 134). This elevates Théoden’s worldview above that of his folk as he acknowledges the Rohirrim’s neglect of the old legends and ignorance toward the other races and forces in Middle-earth (LR 550). His wonder at such encounters is always followed by Gandalf’s sharing of his wisdom, turning every new experience into a lesson of hope: “You should be glad, Théoden King. […]You are not without allies, even if you know them not” (550). In other words, Théoden’s gaining of a new perspective responds to the notion of Recovery or seeing things gra (“OFS” 373). Théoden’s growth is also evident in his social interactions, where he jokes with Pippin and Merry (558-9) and gradually develops an intimate father-son relationship 40 with the latter (777). His forgiveness of Éomer and taking him as his son testifies to his emotional adaptability. Théoden’s intimate relationship with his sister’s son, Éomer, especially as his righthand in battles, resonates with the Germanic tradition of uncles and nephews as comrades in war—recorded in various Old English and Scandinavian works and described by Tolkien as “a position of traditional love and affection” (Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary 191). Théoden displays further humility and care when, in a conversation before the Battle of Pelennor Fields, Wídfara foretells a change in weather as a good omen. Even though he is an ordinary man, Théoden gratefully receives his counsel and gives him his blessing (LR 836). These interactions culminate in a crucial yet implicit change in Théoden as he becomes more outward-looking as his concern for defending his people expands to the survival of beauty in Middle-earth: “Yet also I should be sad…For however the fortune of war shall go, may it not so end that much that was fair and wonderful shall pass for ever out of Middle-earth?” (550). When asked by Éomer to stay away from the war in Gondor, Théoden responds: “If the war is lost, what good will be my hiding in the hills? And if it is won, what grief will it be, even if I fall, spending my last strength?” (792) indicating a shift in his reception of death: from personal glory-seeking to selfless contribution. Thus, when Hirgon brings him the Red Arrow, Théoden shows utmost altruism in his response to Gondor’s call: “Even if Rohan itself felt no peril, still we would come to his aid” (799). Despite all the lessons and developments in his journey from Edoras, Théoden, arriving at the siege of Gondor, gazes upon the suffering city as “A smell of burning was in the air and a very shadow of death” (837). Théoden seems “to shrink down, cowed by age” (837), and Merry thinks the king might change his mind: “Perhaps Théoden would quail, bow his old head, turn, slink away to hide in the hills” (837). Given his determination to fight 41 the armies of Mordor, Théoden’s wavering in the moment of crisis, though unexpected, is not unexampled. At first glance, it seems analogous to Beowulf’s despair at hearing the news of the dragon, which the poet describes as “His mind was in turmoil,/ Unaccustomed anxiety and gloom” (Heaney lines 2331-2). As Wehlau points out, such times of darkness necessitate recollecting and applying lessons learned in the heroic journey to ward off despair (“Beowulf’s Dark Thoughts” 137). In comparison to Beowulf’s ultimate resolution that the Metod, or Lord of men, decides the outcome of his fight with the dragon, Théoden’s sudden change is more challenging to explain as he “sprang suddenly erect. Tall and proud he seemed again” (LR 838) after a flash of lightning rose from beneath Minas Tirith followed by a tremendous boom (838). However, one might ask how only a glimpse of Minas Tirith “dazzling far off in black and white, its topmost tower like a glittering needle” (838) is enough to invigorate Théoden and send off his despair. A plausible interpretation of this moment can be made by comparing the imagery of this scene with Théoden’s renewal by Gandalf in Meduseld: He raised his staff. There was a roll of thunder. The sunlight was blotted out from the eastern windows; the whole hall became suddenly dark as night…Only Gandalf could be seen, standing white and tall before the blackened hearth…He lifted his staff and pointed to a high window. There the darkness seemed to clear, and through the opening could be seen, high and far, a patch of shining sky. (LR 515) The darkness of Théoden’s hall parallels the smoke and darkness of the siege of Minas Tirith. There is thunder in both images, and the White Tower amidst the darkness evokes the image of Gandalf standing white and tall in the hall. As in Wehlau’s reading that Beowulf recollects the lessons of Hrothgar, Théoden remembers Gandalf’s teaching in Meduseld, thus regaining 42 his courage and hope when nearly consumed by despair. Ironically, the incident is a result of Grond breaching the city’s Great Gate (829), which is a realization of Théoden’s earlier prediction that “oft evil will shall evil mar” (595). Théoden’s reaction to the crisis fundamentally differs from Beowulf’s. Unlike the Beowulf-poet, who omnisciently describes Beowulf's thoughts and mental reactions, Tolkien does not reveal what is happening in Théoden’s mind. When faced with the burning of Minas Tirith, Théoden is “as if stricken suddenly by anguish, or by dread” (837). The narrator only guesses at Théoden’s internal struggle, and what the reader sees is through the eyes of a scared Hobbit who has never been in a war, perhaps the most naïve person there to interpret a king’s body language. Beowulf does fall into momentary despair, but for Théoden, there is no such evidence. It is more convincing to propose that Théoden is somewhere between hope and despair. Even if on the edge of despair, he does not fall like Beowulf does. Théoden is not only on a mental but also a spatial threshold: “After a while the king led his men away somewhat eastward, to come between the fires of the siege and the outer fields” (LR 837). Théoden neither escapes nor rashly rides toward the enemy as he does in an earlier draft (WoR 849). Théoden pauses, gazes, and reflects: “And still Théoden gave no signal. At last he halted once again. […] sat upon Snowmane, motionless, gazing upon the agony of Minas Tirith” (LR 837). Although “the horses were uneasy” and the tension high in the moment, Théoden does not give in to his ancestral lust for battle nor the heroic rashness Tolkien criticizes in his essay on ofermod. The concept of threshold is one that Tolkien himself brings up in Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics, where he explains the mediation between the pagan and Christian in Beowulf: “and the great (if lesser) Christian just over the threshold of the great change in 43 his time and place: the backward view: multa putans sortemque animo miseratus iniquam” (10). For Tolkien, Beowulf is a work inspired by the long debate among Christian scholars: “Shall we or shall we not consign the heathen ancestors to perdition?” (10). Tolkien appreciates the Beowulf-poet’s emphasis on the “permanent value of that pietas which treasures the memory of man's struggles in the dark past, man fallen and not yet saved, disgraced but not dethroned” (10). Tolkien champions the fusion of the pagan and Christian in Beowulf over “the harsh and intolerant view that consigned all the heroes to the devil” (12). In his time, in the Second World War, as Adolf Hitler was “Ruining, perverting, misapplying, and making for ever accursed, that noble northern spirit, a supreme contribution to Europe” (Letters 76), Tolkien faced almost the same challenge as the Beowulf-poet, or in Shippey’s words, “The Beowulf-poet’s dilemma was also Tolkien’s” (The Road 220). Therefore, the English scholar of the 20th century attempts to show the Germanic ideal in “its true light” (Letters 76). He sees the work of the Beowulf-poet as building a tower from old stones of an old house, from the top of which “he had been able to look out upon the sea” (MC 2). Thus, in his turn, when provided with old stones of pagan legends, should not Tolkien build something as great as a tower to look upon something as great as the sea? Alternatively, in a far-distant moment from pagan times, this time also with the stones of Beowulf in his hands, Tolkien might have purposed to build something even greater than the tower and the sea. In “Tolkien and The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth,” Shippey explains that Tolkien tried to “create an alternative and Christianized image of a heroic style” in the characters of Aragorn, Samwise Gamgee, and Théoden. The first two have received much scholarly attention, specifically as humble characters who reflect Tolkien’s version of heroism. However, Théoden receives no such attention, even though mentioned alongside the 44 other two Shippey does not elaborate on him. However, in a recent personal correspondence, Shippey and I agreed that Théoden in The Lord of the Rings embodies Tolkien's contribution to the long debate about pagan heroes (Shippey, 2024). In Middle-earth, where the characters are neither pagan nor Christian, the binaries associated with pagan despair and Christian hope give way to an in-between stage, what Shippey calls “limbo” (The Road 224), but might sound more plausible as a threshold. Théoden’s act of restraint and reflection before taking action or making judgment raises him above Beowulf, Beorhtnoth, and other Northern heroes. Théoden “gave no signal” until he got a signal: the wind, morning light, thunder, lightning, and a great boom (LR 837-8 ). Tolkien’s lifelong engagement with finding a refined Northern heroic spirit gives fruit to Théoden’s development in the narrative. From a king who has fallen into despair, Théoden finds courage but, still out of doubt and despair, rashly rides into the enemy at Helm’s Deep (539-40). However, in the end, he neither doubts nor despairs. He no longer expresses any sentiment for death like he did several times earlier in the narrative. Unlike Beowulf, Théoden finds hope in Gandalf’s teaching that this is not his battle only but one for the whole of Middle-earth. Unlike Beohrtnoth, he does not risk the lives of his men for the joy and glory of battle. He rides precisely at the right moment to distract the Witchking from the encounter with Gandalf (829) so that the wizard can save Faramir at the last moment (850). His death prepares the ground so that Éowyn and Merry, out of their love and loyalty, kill the Witchking (842), whose cries distract the other Nazgul patrolling over Mordor so that Frodo and Sam can move forward (919). Emphasizing the significance of Théoden's ride, it is pertinent to note Tolkien's admission that, without Théoden's charge, “the return of the King 45 would have been in vain” (UT 290). All these qualities justify Tolkien giving Théoden such a celestial last ride and glorious reception after death, which the rest of this chapter deals with. Before his charge, Théoden gives a stirring speech echoing the Ragnarök in the Old Norse Völuspá: Arise, arise, Riders of Théoden! Fell deeds awake: fire and slaughter! spear shall be shaken, shield be splintered, a sword-day, a red day, ere the sun rises! Ride now, ride now! Ride to Gondor! (LR 838) Great is my knowledge, I can see the doom that awaits almighty gods. Brothers will die, slain by their brothers, kinsmen betray their close kin; woe to the world then, wedded to whoredom, battle-axe and sword rule, split shields asunder, storm-cleft age of wolves until the world goes down, only hatred in the hearts of men. (Terry 33) However, Théoden speech does not equal Ragnarök's hopelessness and darkness, which is another sign of the king’s hope. Even as an old king, Théoden’s battle cry is “more clear than any there had ever heard a mortal man achieve before,” he blows his horn with such force that it breaks it apart (LR 838). Such a powerful hornblow is reminiscent of the sound of Oromë’s Valaróma . The imagery of the ride of Rohirrim is ancient. Tolkien’s emphasis on Théoden’s unachievable speed—“Behind him his banner blew in the wind, white horse upon a field of green, but he outpaced it…but Théoden could not be overtaken…but he was ever before” (838)—dramatically echoes with the ancient kingly manner of the battle recorded in Tacitus’ Germania “On the field of battle it is a disgrace to the leader to be surpassed in 46 valour by his companions”( 93). His image as bearing the fiery battle-fury of his ancestors and his comparison to a god of old “even as Oromë the Great in the battle of the Valar when the world was young” (LR 838), places Théoden above any mortal warrior, a distinction paralleled only by Fingolfin’s legendary ride to Morgoth’s stronghold (Sil 178). For one reason, Théoden’s similarity to Oromë is because, among all the Valar, the Rohirrim recognize and revere only Oromë or Béma in the Rohirric language (LR 1065). They believe Oromë first brought the mearas, the divine race of horses to the Rohirrim (1065). Tolkien’s reference to Oromë, who is “less strong …but more dreadful in anger,” over Tulkas, who “laughs ever, in sport or in war” (Sil 20), draws a line between fighting for a just cause rather than for sport and joy. It challenges Faramir’s earlier assertion that the Rohirrim pursue war and valour “as things good in themselves, both a sport and an end” (LR 679). Such a profound portrayal of Théoden as a hero and king associated with Oromë, a war deity, is unequalled even by the heroes in Old English and Scandinavian literature. Scholars such as Cristin Ivey and Giuseppe Pezzini examine the presence of divine Providence in The Lord of the Rings (“The Presence of Divine Providence”; “The Lords of the West”); however, they do not deal with moments of divine intervention specifically in Théoden’s case and the Battle of Pelennor Fields. If one argues for the Valar coming to the aid of Middle- earth, Oromë is a likely choice as he “alone of the Valar came often to Middle-earth in the Elder Days” (1039) and loved the lands of Middle-earth” (Sil 20). Oromë’s delight in horses and his horn, Valaróma, are woven into descriptions of Thedeon’s charge in Pelennor Fields (Sil 20; LR 838). In the Old English translations of Eriol, Oromë is referred to as “Wáðfréa or Huntinglord” and “Wealdafréa or Lord of Forests” (The Shaping of Middle-earth). Wídfara is an enigmatic character, coming out of nowhere only to tell 47 Théoden a hopeful and mysteriously accurate prediction: “The morning will bring new things. Above the reek, it will be dawn when you pass the wall” (LR 836). He promises the king a change of wind, which Pezzini argues to be the West Wind from Manwë that “normally blows in concomitance with positive turns in the story” (“The Lords of the West” 9), such as giving speed to Aragorn’s ships (LR 877) and breaking Sauron’s darkness upon Minas Tirith (839). Wídfara’s advice to the king, “Do you remember the Wild Man’s words, lord?” (836), drawing upon the wisdom of the Wild Men of the forest, links his enigmatic character to Oromë, the Lord of the Forests. Wídfara, the Old English for “far, wide traveler,” aligns with Oromë’s habit of returning to the hills and plains of Middle-earth (Sil 21). What adds to the relationship between Oromë and Wídfara is that he foresees the coming of dawn as, “to me also the air brings messages. Already the wind is turning. There comes a breath out of the South; there is a sea-tang in it, faint though it is” (836). Wídfara is the only one who catches the message of wind and sea in the time of crises of Middle-earth, a reminder of Ulmo and Manwe, the lords of seas and winds respectively, who were counselled to join against the efforts of evil (Sil 30). In addition, the fact that the Valar can appear in different shapes according to their own thoughts (32) allows us to suspect traces of Oromë’s presence in the character of Wídfara. Another way to explore the divine influence on Théoden is to look at his diminishing health in the narrative. Although revitalized by Gandalf’s intervention, Théoden’s health is declining permanently: first, before the ride to Isengard he claims his body’s natural weakening “My old age is not feigned nor due only to the whisperings of Wormtongue. It is an ill that no leech can wholly cure, not even Gandalf” (LR 544), Second, he asks for help to climb the stairs of Orthanc: “Éomer shall come with me, and see that my aged feet do not 48 falter” (577). He feels remarkably weary despite being on a journey merely for days: “Long years in the space of days it seems since I rode west” (792). However, with the thundering sound of the breaching of the gates of Minas Tirith, Théoden finds a new strength, uttering a battle cry “more clear than any there had ever heard a mortal man achieve before” (838). This juxtaposition suggests that Théoden possibly receives a divine blessing, a temporary augmentation that overcomes his natural physical weakness. Théoden’s ride in the Battle of Pelennor fields is described as: “Fey he seemed, or the battle-fury of his fathers ran like new fire in his veins, and he was borne up on Snowmane like a god of old, even as Oromë the Great in the battle of the Valar when the world was young” (838). The narrator’s struggle to pin down the source of Théoden’s power and glory, whether Théoden is merely filled with ancestral fury or if other forces are at work, opens up a discussion on the inspiring powers of the king. In his introduction to Beowulf, Bruce Mitchell shares a private letter from Tolkien discussing the fury of pre-Christian kings and warriors mingled with Christian ethics: “I think we fail to grasp imaginatively the pagan ‘heroic’ temper, the almost animal pride and ferocity of ‘nobles’ and champions on the one hand; or on the other the immense relief and hope of Christian ethical teaching amidst a world with savage values” (13). It is no secret that Tolkien, though critical of the northern fury, was not entirely against it. Therefore, he attempted to mediate between pagan and Christian heroism and “grasp imaginatively” this synthesis in The Lord of the Rings. In his charge, Théoden seems fey, “fǣge” in Old English, which is primarily used to mean marked for death. In Tolkien’s legendarium, in most cases, a fey mood has a negative connotation and is associated with death and disaster. In The Silmarillion, it is used four times: twice for Feanor (113, 136), once for Hurin (285) and once for Morwen (278), all 49 leading to disaster and death. In The Lord of the Rings, Éowyn and Éomer use the term negatively for Aragorn’s mood before he visits the Paths of the Dead (LR 797-8). After Denethor decides to burn himself and Faramir, Pippin describes him as “fey and dangerous” (827). However, the victorious conclusion of Aragorn’s visit to the Dead Men of Dunharrow indicates that being fey does not always culminate in a deadly fate. While the fey mood in other characters results from greed, pride, or despair, in the cases of Aragorn and Théoden, it is associated with sacrifice, justice, and hope. To further distinguish Théoden from the flaw of ofermod, Tolkien carefully contrasts the old king’s wrathful charge, which is inspired by hope for the survival of Middle-earth, with Éomer’s hopeless sudden onset, crying death in despair. (844). There is even a sharp distinction between hope and despair in the poems associated with these two kings of Rohan: Théoden’s Song Out of doubt, out of dark, to the day’s rising he rode singing in the sun, sword unsheathing. Hope he rekindled, and in hope ended; over death, over dread, over doom lifted out of loss, out of life, unto long glory. (LR 976) Éomer’s Song Out of doubt, out of dark to the day’s rising I came singing in the sun, sword unsheathing. To hope’s end I rode and to heart’s breaking: Now for wrath, now for ruin and a red nightfall! (LR 847) 50 While the desperate last stand of Éomer with his vision of ruin bears a resemblance to the pagan Ragnarok, Théoden’s ride, both inspired by and inspiring hope, culminating in transcendence over life and death, inclines more toward the Christian ethical teachings and views that Tolkien meant in his letter to Bruce Mitchell. Owing his newly-found hope and wisdom to Gandalf’s teachings, who, more than any other character in the narrative, symbolically reflects Christianity, Théoden is the first and only king of Rohan that corresponds to Tolkien’s imagination of pagan heroic temper refined by lessons of hope and relief. Moreover, the concept of battle-fury, though mostly found in stories of the Berserkers and Odin’s shaman-warriors, is not exclusively a pagan attribute. Gregory Mobley, in his chapter, “Glimpses of the Heroic Saul,” elaborates on how King Saul, invigorated with “the breath of YHWH/Elohim,” becomes filled with “battle-fury” or “divine madness” and rides to victory (Saul in Story and Tradition 82). He also explains that such martial rage in a great warrior, is also found in the biblical stories of Othniel, Gideon, Jephthah, Samson, and David (82). Jason Fisher, in his chapter, “Horns of Dawn,” draws attention to the association of Oromë with Théoden’s ride, arguing that the Rohirrim’s battle music, with its horns and drums, resembles Oromë’s. Fisher also proposes that Oromë’s part in Ainulindalë, the Music of the Ainur, “inspired the martial music and verse of Middle-earth” (Middle-earth Minstrel 17). The Rohirrim’s music of battle is terrible, like Tacitus’s description of the Germanic warriors’ singing: they not only kindle their courage, but, merely by listening to the sound, they can forecast the issue of an approaching engagement. For they terrify their foes or themselves become frightened, according to the character of the noise they make 51 upon the battlefield; and they regard it not merely as so many voices chanting together but as a unison of valor. What they particularly aim at is a harsh, intermittent roar; and they hold their shields in front of their mouths, so that the sound is amplified into a deeper crescendo by the reverberation. (Germania, 3) However, like the forms of the Valar in War of Wrath, the song of the Rohirrim is fair at the same time, a feature primarily associated with the Valar and the Eldar in the legendarium. Moreover, the celestial reflection of the Sun in Théoden’s golden shield is unexampled in the heroic literature of the North. The image of the Sun in the Old English poems has divine associations: in the poem, Battle of Brunanburh, the Sun is described as “the bright candle of God, the Eternal Lord (line 16), and in Tolkien’s translation of Exodus “The torch of Heaven” (22). Given the significance of dawn and sunrise in Théoden's ride, it is noteworthy that, in the Quenya Lexicon, Oromë's name is associated with “the dawn, Sunrise, East” (Book of Lost Tales 304), providing yet another hint at the possibility of Oromë's involvment in the Battle of Pelennor Fields. In addition, the charge of the Valar in the War of Wrath (Sil 320) and Théoden’s charge (LR 838) share similar wording and imagery, both containing horn and trumpets, young and fair and terrible, the imagery of fire and golden colour, and metaphors such as “like straws in great fire…like leaves before a burning wind” (Sil 320) and “grass flamed into green…. eored roared like a breaker foaming to the shore” (LR 838). Also, Théoden’s hunt of the orcs as they “wailed, and terror took them, and they fled, and died, and the hoofs of wrath rode over them” (838) is another similarity to Oromë, who is “a hunter of monsters and fell beasts” (Sil 40) and in the woods of Valinor, “would train his folk and his beasts for the pursuit of the evil creatures of Melkor” (40). Ultimately, given Eru’s assertion that whatever Men do will add to His glory and 52 Finrod’s claim that the Valar have long foreseen that Men will join Eru in the Second Music of the Ainur (MR 21), the Rohirrim’s song of battle, with Théoden leading in the image of Oromë, undoubtedly has divine urgency in this world and contribution in the other. Regarding the critical stakes of this battle for the fate of Middle-earth, it is worth considering the potential spiritual support of Oromë for Théoden and the broader cosmological dynamics involving the Valar’s influence on the world’s weather patterns. There are analogues for the hidden work of divine power in other sources Tolkien was well-acquainted with. In The Aeneid, during the Trojan War, Venus grants her son the sight of giant shapes of gods at work (Krisak 49). In the Old Testament, when Elisha’s servant falls into despair at the sight of a great army surrounding the city, the prophet assures him, “Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them” (2 Kings 6:17). God grants the servant the sight of horses and chariots in a fire around Elisha and miraculously blinds the army to follow the prophet’s words (6: 17-20). Tolkien’s portrayal of gods at work is not as explicit as in The Aeneid; as Ivey points out, Gandalf, Galadriel, and Elrond indicate that greater forces are at work even though unseen (194). Gandalf’s encouraging words to Théoden, “You are not without allies, even if you know them not,” mirror the words of Elisha to his servant (LR 550). Théoden’s unexpected and fiery charge with horses to the aid of the besieged Minas Tirith (838), similar to the great host of chariots in Elisha’s story, becomes an instrument of divine intervention in the Battle of Pelennor Fields. Besides the celestial qualities of his charge, Théoden’s death aligns with glorious historical figures. Dying under his horse, Snowmane, he ends up in a similar fate to that of three Gothic kings chronicled by Jordanes: Thorismud, Valamir, and Theodorid I (The Gothic History 122, 131, 109). However, his triumph over the King of Haradrim and the subsequent 53 retreat of the enemies lends further heroic dimension to his death as a redemptive closure to his earlier feelings of shame and guilt for his days of despair and dotage before the coming of Gandalf. In his final half-conscious moments, Théoden thinks the battle won and draws his last breaths imbued with hope and joy, telling Merry: “Live now in blessedness; and when you sit in peace with your pipe, think of me!” (LR 843). His unawareness of Éowyn lying half-dead near him and the threatening approach of Black Ships that later put Éomer in despair juxtaposes his prophetic and comforting vision of “a grim morn, and a glad day, and a golden sunset” (842). In Théoden’s final moments, such serenity comes as a culmination of grace, a divine gift, allowing him to end in peace rather than anguish. It is by “the consolation of fairy-stories” (“FOS” 384) that despite his death, Théoden finds a joy that “denies universal defeat” (384) and serves as “a fleeting glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the walls of the world” (384). Théoden’s final words contain a sense of heroic fulfillment: “I felled the black serpent” (LR 842) that serves to atone for his past mistakes, bringing the reward of hope even in death: “I go to my fathers. And even in their mighty company I shall not now be ashamed” (842). Shippey believes Théoden’s words mean “only that he will be buried alongside his predecessors in the row of barrows by Edoras” (The Author 190); however, examples from Scandinavian sources suggest another possibility of Théoden’s afterlife. In Eyrbyggja Saga, Thorstein Cold-Biter and his fellows are received by Thorstein’s father into their familial mountain after their deaths (Sanmark 172). The mountain opens with “great fires burning inside it and the noise of feasting and clamour over the ale horns,” and Thorstein sits in the place of honour opposite his father (Palsson 38). Njals Saga recounts that after Gunnar’s heroic death, his cairn opens with a burning light, wherein he looks at the moon with a 54 cheerful expression and sings praises of courage and death in battle (F. Bayerschmidt and M. Hollander 163). In her notes on the Waking of Angantyr, Patricia Terry observes that the mounds of Angantyr and his brothers are a place between life and death. Terry finds their existence as “a state of grace, a gift of the gods” as their bodies are still intact in the grave, and they can come out at night with burning fires around them (Elder Edda 253). In an unpublished draft of The Lord of the Rings, Théoden’s body remains unchanged in his mound, and his hair grows and turns into silver, sometimes turning into a silver river out of his grave. Also, in times of peril, his voice would cry to inspire the Rohirrim to defend their land (WoR 389). Although Tolkien refuses to keep such overtly Icelandic qualities of Théoden’s afterlife in the published version of the story, the enduring influence of Northern cultures is undeniable. Amendt-Raduege examines the mounds in Rohan as a funerary custom similar to the Anglo-Saxons; however, the Rohirrim mounds are “not only a memorial but also an instrument” (The Sweet and the Bitter 73) where the dead kings and warriors of Rohan “retain their ability to serve their country” (73). Théodred speaks his last words, “Let me lie here and keep the fords until Éomer comes” (UT 359). Also, upon coming to the mounds of the fallen Rohirrim, Éomer confidently says, “And when their spears have rotted and rusted, long still may their mound stand and guard the Fords of Isen” (LR 551). This concept also appears in the Battle of Helm’s Deep, when hearing Helm’s horn at Théoden’s charge, the Rohirrim believe their ancient father has come to their aid: “Helm is arisen and comes back to war. Helm for Théoden King” (540). Thus, death for the Rohirrim allows the hero to have an enduring spiritual presence where his valour continues to resonate. In the analysis of Tolkien’s concept of death as a gift, Théoden’s death is comparable to Niggle’s in “Leaf by Niggle”. This story is regularly considered an autobiographical work 55 woven with Tolkien’s Catholicism. Tolkien describes The Lord of the Rings as “a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision” (Letters 257), indicating that the religious elements are woven into the narrative and symbolism (257). Therefore, Tolkien’s religious concerns might explain why Théoden does not get a pagan afterlife in the published version. Both Théoden and Niggle are elderly men with little time to finish their tasks: Théoden has a war to fight, and Niggle has a painting to complete. Théoden first appears in The Lord of the Rings as an old man sitting in his gloomy hall, his stature withered and his mind fallen into despair (LR 512), grieving the death of his son, Théodred. Under the evil influence of Gríma, Théoden fails to live up to the heroic deeds of his ancestors, neglecting his kingly duties. He also forgets the courtesy and hospitality of his hall and expresses bitterness during Gandalf’s visit. Ultimately, Gandalf, an angelic figure, renews him with divine power, and the king takes the new chance to follow through on the task he has given up. He comes to be called Théoden Ednew (LR 1069), the Old English for “renewed, restored,” and he feels “as one new-awakened” (515). In Niggle’s case, desperation takes form in his failure to finish his painting before his time comes, and he leaves for his long-awaited journey. One day, Niggle finds an Inspector at his door, telling him that his time has come and he should take a journey, which ends up in a Workhouse Infirmary, where Niggle goes through much toil for a long time. Subsequently, he finds himself in sheer darkness, hearing a voice that describes his condition: “He never got ready for his journey. He was moderately well-off, and yet he arrived here almost destitute” (“Leaf by Niggle” 298). The reason that Niggle could not finish his painting is that, in his imagination, always, a single leaf turns into a tree and the tree into a country of forests and mountains (286). His obsession with a single leaf distracts him from finishing his larger work 56 and distances him from his neighbors. In his heart, he curses his coming visitors (288), and even when his neighbor, Mr. Parish, seeks help, Niggle is reluctant to give him some wood or canvas to mend his leaking roof (290). However, there is also Second Voice that emphasizes Niggle’s qualities of humility and good-heartedness (300). Théoden is given a chance to make up for his past failures by mustering his armies, fighting two battles, and ultimately dying heroically. Niggle is ultimately treated with generosity and given a chance to go back only because “he did answer a good many Calls” (“Leaf by Niggle” 299), mainly when, though desperate for time to finish his painting, he chose instead to help his neighbor Parish without any expectation of gratitude. Similarly, Théoden, having already suffered an enormous loss in battles and still fighting in his north and east frontier, answers the call of Gondor, expecting no personal or collective gain: “Even if Rohan itself felt no peril, still we would come to his aid” (LR 799). Both go through a long passage of time, “Long years in the space of days” (LR 792) for Théoden and centuries for Niggle (“Leaf by Niggle” 296). Rewarded at last, Niggle comes to a green country and sees in his astonishment “the Tree, his Tree, finished,” which he recognizes as a gift (241). His further work with Parish turns the tree into a whole country of trees, birds, forests, lakes, and mountains just “as he had imagined them rather than as he had made them” (241). The enlargement and completion of Niggle’s imagined vision, impossible to achieve in his lifetime (Vaninskaya 170), responds to Tolkien’s description of heaven in a letter to his son Michael “where the good here unfinished is completed; and where the stories unwritten, and the hopes unfulfilled, are continued” (Letters 76). In Tolkien’s perspective, one’s earthly deeds, thoughts, and wishes can receive an augmentation in the afterlife. Like Niggle, Théoden is rewarded with a profound augmentation in his lifetime. Théoden’s glorious 57 charge and association with the divine figure of Oromë might suggest a glimpse of the enlargement promised in Men’s afterlife, which Tolkien attributes to Eru’s gift of death “of [Men’s] operation everything should be, in form and deed, completed, and the world fulfilled unto the last and smallest” (MR 21). Tolkien’s essay “On Fairy-stories” is fundamental to understanding his legendarium. In this essay, he disqualifies various fairy stories, attempting to create a proper model. As Shippey argues, Tolkien was too modest to argue that the only “very interesting” stories about fairies and elves were those written by himself (Tales xi). He corrects the representation of fairies in “diminutive size” by arguing that it is humans that are indeed “of diminutive stature” (317). In his legendarium, especially The Lord of the Rings, there are moments when a character grows in stature and dignity, bringing wonder or fear upon the beholder. Gandalf appears “tall and menacing” in his anger at Bilbo Baggins (LR 34); also, sitting with Elrond and Glorfindel in Rivendell, he seems to Frodo as “some wise king of ancient legend” (226). Glorfindel, as an Elf returning from Valinor as an emissary of the Valar, when encountered by the Ringwraiths, is revealed as “a white figure that shone and did not grow dim,” and his wrath scares the dark riders and maddens their horses (223-4). Aragorn, the last true Númenórean, discloses his power and greatness before Éomer’s investigation: “He seemed to have grown in stature while Éomer had shrunk; and in his living face they caught a brief vision of the power and majesty of the kings of stone” (434). What Gimli and the men of Rohan cannot see in Aragorn is described through the Elvish vision of Legolas as “a white flame flickered on the brows of Aragorn like a shining crown” (434). Also, in his coronation after the victory of Middle-earth, people “gazed in silence” as Aragorn is described as “Tall as the sea-kings of old, he stood above all that were near; 58 ancient of days he seemed and yet in the flower of manhood; and wisdom sat upon his brow, and strength and healing were in his hands, and a light was about him” (968). During the perilous quest for saving Frodo, Samwise bravely climbs up the Tower of Crith Ungol. However, the nearby Orc sees “not a small frightened hobbit trying to hold a steady sword: it saw a great silent shape, cloaked in a grey shadow, looming against the wavering light behind” (904). These moments are primarily associated with a divine, otherworldly, or ancient quality, or in other words, where Faërie and our world momentarily meet. For Tolkien, chances to encounter fairies are rare but not impossible, especially if we are adventurers “upon the shadowy marches” of the Perilous Realm (“OFS” 322). Such crossing paths with fairies are not only about wonder but also “reflecting in a particular way one of Man’s visions of Truth” (322). In The Fall of Numenore, Tolkien explains that as a reward for their services in the War of Wrath, the Dúnedain lived in Númenor “under the protection of the Valar and in the friendship of the Eldar” (FN 329). Númenor is an in-between place, an island between Middle-earth and the Blessed Realm, and among many blessings from the Valar, the Dúnedain also “increased in stature both of mind and body” (329). In Tolkien’s works, the enlargement or growth in one’s stature, dignity, or greatness always comes as a moment of revelation, an epiphanic vision resulting from a character’s elevation above the ordinary world. Gandalf is a Maia, and Glorfindel an Elf-lord, both sent and blessed by the Valar. Aragorn has pure Númenórean blood and is favored by the Valar due to his ancestry. However, Samwise the Gardener, although carrying the Phial of Galadriel as a Hobbit, has no direct connection to the Valar or the Eldar. His augmentation, therefore, comes only as the result of his unwavering hope, courage, and fellowship beyond expectations. Similarly, 59 Théoden’s transformation from despair, ignorance, and darkness to hope, wisdom, and light deserves a last glorious charge and heroic imagery equal to Oromë. The King of Rohan, first renewed in Meduseld and then enlightened by Gandalf in Isengard, grows in spirit and knowledge in his journey from Edoras. Also, in the darkness and despair of the Siege of Minas Tirith, he rises above old age and fear of death to greatness and blessing worthy of “mighty matter of legend.” Apart from his greatness in battle, Théoden’s enlargement manifests in the admiration and reverence he receives from various characters. Éowyn finds both honour and peace in his heroic death (LR 960) and praises the king in an unpublished story draft: “You have turned the tide…The enemy is broken by fear. Never did an old Lord of Men die better (WoR 879). Merry remembers Théoden as a father and polite man (LR 869, 977), followed by Aragorn’s affirmation that “he was a gentle heart and a great king and kept his oaths, and he rose out of the shadows to a last fair morning” (869). Théoden is conscious of his inadequacy to equal the heroic expectations of his culture and forefathers when Saruman attempts to humiliate him: “A lesser son of great sires am I, but I do not need to lick your fingers” (580). Misled and withered by the counsel of Gríma, Théoden initially fails in his kingly responsibilities and leaves his house, as Éowyn puts it, “sunk in honour less than any shepherd’s cot” (868). However, the episode of his funeral suggests that Théoden ultimately, through his heroic choices and glorious death, not only matches the honour of his forebearers as he “ended in honour no less than the greatest of his sires” (977) but also surpasses them in one aspect: “Never had any king of the Mark such company upon the road as went with Théoden Thengel’s son to the land of his home” (976). 60 What Théoden and Niggle go through to deserve the enlargement and fulfillment is similar to a purgatorial journey. Given the fundamental Catholic qualities of both The Lord of the Rings and Leaf by Niggle, the concept of purgatory can be relevant to these stories. Dorothy L. Sayers, in her translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy, references Origen’s Treatise on Prayer to explain purgatory as “benefaction for the cleansing of the evil contracted in their error, along with salutary sufferings” (Origen 65). Sayers also draws upon St. Augustine’s notions about purgatory: "Some endure the temporal pain here and some hereafter, and some both here and there” (City of God 739). In a letter to his son Christopher, expressing his pain for the time lost in his life and missing his son, Tolkien says: “Let us hope at any rate that some of these pains (if taken in that way) may be taken for anticipated Purgatory!” (Letter 88a). Tolkien’s view that Man can experience purgatory even during his lifetime will help us consider Théoden’s heroic deeds after his renewal by Gandalf to have a purgatorial quality. Théoden spends his final days journeying and engaging in battle despite his declining health—a taxing endeavor as he reflects, “Long years in the space of days it seems since I rode west” (LR 792). Théoden’s continuous activity until his death is reminiscent of the Fourth Cornice of Purgatory, where Dante encounters the souls of those guilty of Sloth practicing its opposite virtue: Active Zeal (Divine Comedy 209). Sayers notes that Sloth is not merely physical passivity but also idleness of mind, morbid introspection, and despair (209), all suited to Théoden’s initial condition. Sayers mentions another aspect of Sloth that fits Niggle: “the withdrawal into an ivory tower of isolation…the peculiar temptation of the artist…popularly called escapism” (209). Corey Olsen points out that in the Workhouse Infirmary, Niggle is given mundane tasks such as digging, carpentry, and “painting bare 61 boards all one color” (“The Tolkien Professor" 29:20 – 29:30), which are in contrast to his artistic perfectionism and fixation on details. Even after coming to his green country, rather than completing it alone, Niggle seeks Mr. Parish’s help. As in Dante’s purgatory, Théoden and Niggle practice virtues opposite to their past flaws. The King of Rohan, once fallen into despair, passivity, and hostility, now hopes, rides to war, and dies for friendship. For Niggle, hopelessness to finish his painting, neglect of his garden, and unsociable solitude change toward hope for the greater reality of his imagination, creating a green country for people, and working together with his friend. While Niggle’s ascension with the shepherd to the mountains (“Leaf by Niggle” 307) can be interpreted as a journey toward further beauty and goodness of purgatory, Théoden’s afterlife remains uncertain as he is a Man from a pre-Christian era. However, for Théoden, a man who frequently expresses his desire to die in battle, death would come as a gift. This contrasts sharply with Denethor’s Numenorean fear of death and obsession with time and power. Théoden’s readiness to embrace death liberates him from any attachment to temporal power and possession. Throughout the narrative, his outward journey and mental development contradict Denethor’s jealous self-regard, which only narrows his mental and physical confinement. Théoden’s humility and openness make him socially active, while Denethor’s pride isolates him. Théoden inspires love and is remembered and glorified by those who love him, while Denethor’s selfish death is neither mourned nor remembered, not even by his son. The profound irony in their narratives lies in Théoden’s fearless readiness to die but his choice of life, which is in contrast to Denethor’s obsession with life but his choice of death. Although the concept of death as a gift is unknown to Théoden, it is manifest in his attitude toward death: he is ready for death and hopes for something beyond it. However, instead of rushing toward 62 death, he chooses to endure and defend the beauties of Middle-earth. He chooses to fight despite dread and despair. 63 Chapter 5 “Not So Dark Here”: Mourning and Melancholia in The Lord of the Rings Both Denethor and Théoden experience the loss of a son in The Lord of the Rings, and while they initially react similarly, they come to take opposite paths in coping with their losses. Denethor frequently laments the death of Boromir and persists in his despair, while Théoden, listening to the counsel of Gandalf, relinquishes his gloom in favour of hope. One way to better understand the psychological interplay of mourning and grief in the narratives of Denethor and Théoden is through Sigmund Freud’s essay “Mourning and Melancholia,” a seminal work in psychoanalysis. The distinct responses of Théoden and Denethor to their bereavements can be interpreted as what Freud defines as a healthy process of mourning and the pathological stage of melancholia, respectively. However, given the extensive scholarly development of Freud’s primary ideas, this chapter attempts to explain a nuanced relationship between mourning and melancholia that goes beyond the simple binaries of healthy versus pathological and detachment versus attachment. The Old English and Scandinavian works of literature, which underpin J.R.R. Tolkien's scholarly pursuits as a Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford, frequently portray old men lamenting the loss of their sons. Notably, in Beowulf, King Hrethel is overwhelmed by grief following the death of his son Herebeald, ultimately succumbing to his 64 sorrow, similar to a nameless old man who is unable to do anything to prevent the execution of his son (Shippey 197). Similarly, Egil's Saga depicts Egil Skallagrimsson withdrawing into seclusion to fast himself unto death after his son Bodvar drowns in the sea (Palsson 203). In The History of the Danes, Saxo Grammaticus recounts Regner's despair and resignation to death upon learning of his son Vithserk's demise (289). Kirsten Mills, in Grief, Gender, and Mourning in Medieval North Atlantic Literature, analyzes several instances of bereavement in Anglo-Saxon and Icelandic sagas. Ruth Wehlau’s “Seeds of Sorrow: Landscapes of Despair” delves into themes of despair and confinement through characters such as The Wanderer, Hrethel, and Egil. The application of Freud’s “Mourning and Melancholia” to these ancient texts remains scant despite the evident relevance of his theories on the dichotomies of hope versus despair and action versus inaction in the wake of loss. Wehlau’s comparison of Hrethel’s inconsolable grief to Egil’s retaliatory stance against Odin underscores the varied responses to bereavement. Linda Georgianna’s “King Hrethel's Sorrow and the Limits of Heroic Action in Beowulf” scrutinizes the limitations of heroic responses to loss and despair in Hrothgar, Hrethel, and Beowulf. Lynn Forest-Hill’s “Boromir, Byrhtnoth, and Bayard: Finding a Language for Grief in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings”—a study of Tolkien’s language of grief in Boromir’s death—barely engages Théoden and Denethor. Benjamin C. Benson’s thesis, “This Passing Shadow: The Role of Trauma in Reforming Individual and Cultural Identity in The Lord of the Rings and Anglo-Saxon Literature,” contrasts Théoden’s and Denethor’s reactions to cultural loss rather than to personal bereavement. This gap in scholarship indicates a potent area for research. Applying Freudian psychoanalytic theory to these medieval narratives in relation to Tolkien’s may illuminate the deeper psychological mechanisms at play in the mourning processes of these storied figures. 65 In their first appearance in the story, Denethor and Théoden are old, withered men sitting in their gloomy halls, both fallen into despair (LR 512, 754). Their burden of loss and grief, moreover, is deepened and exploited by malicious forces: the use of the Palantir for Denethor and the counsel of Gríma Wormtongue for Théoden (765, 514). The intervention of Gandalf aids Théoden’s emancipation from despair and the recovering of his strength to fight two battles and earn the glory of a heroic death. In contrast, Denethor’s direct contention with Sauron has made him resist help, disregarding Gandalf’s counsel and succumbing to despair and suicide. Two narratives recounted in Saxo Grammaticus’ The History of the Danes resonate with the choices made by Denethor and Théoden when confronted with despair. These narratives, like The Lord of the Rings, explore the themes of hope and despair in the face of loss. In Book Four, an old King, Vermund, attends his son Uffi, who engages in combat with two Saxon champions. During this confrontation, the blind father positions his chair at the edge of a bridge, prepared to drown himself should his son fall. However, upon hearing of his son’s victory, Vermund is overcome with tears of joy and leaves his seat, “now thirsting for life as eagerly as he had done for death before” (109). Vermund’s chair on the bridge’s edge symbolizes the thin line between hope and despair. Metaphorically, there is a similar precipice in The Lord of the Rings when various characters, including Théoden and Denethor, must choose between hope and despair. During the fellowship’s stay in Lothlórien, Galadriel emphasizes the crucial nature of hope in their decisions amidst crisis: “Your Quest stands upon the edge of a knife. Stray but a little and it will fail, to the ruin of all. Yet hope remains while all the Company is true” (LR 357). Similarly, Aragorn highlights the critical situation in the debate before they ride to the Black Gate: “We come now to the very brink, where hope and 66 despair are akin. To waver is to fall” (LR 880). In Book Five of The History of the Danes, King Frothi III, shipwrecked after a loss in pursuit of Erik, in his ultimate despair, attempts to drown himself in the sea. Regardless of the peril, Erik swims to rescue the king, and despite Frothi’s lament over his past grief, Erik persuades him that the shipwreck is a trial rather than his doom. Ultimately, Frothi is dissuaded from suicide, takes Erik as his counselor, and transforms into a legendary king renowned for peacemaking and law-giving. Vermund and Frothi’s choice of hope over despair mirrors the contrast between Denethor and Théoden. Denethor’s self-immolation in a pyre reflects Vermund and Frothi’s initial suicidal intentions, while Théoden’s heeding of Gandalf—who parallels Erik’s role in giving the counsel of hope—results in his renewed vigor and a noble kingship. These comparisons, elucidating the difficult and enormously consequential choice between hope and despair, set the ground for a Freudian examination of Théoden and Denethor’s responses to the loss of a son. Freud examines mourning and melancholia as responses to the loss of a loved person or an abstraction such as country, liberty, or an ideal (“Mourning and Melancholia” 243). Despite their distinct psychological outcomes, the two reactions, indistinguishable in the initial stages, share a painful frame of mind, loss of interest in the outside world, and incapacity to adopt a new object of love or replacement (244). Théoden and Denethor display the same condition in their early stages of grief. Théoden’s despondency following Théodred’s demise, characterized by his suffering from dark dreams, leads him to confine himself to his hall and imprison his nephew, Éomer, the only viable replacement for Théodred. Likewise, Denethor’s obsession with Boromir’s death has deteriorated his leadership ability in times of war, tied him with the darkness of the Palantir, and made him blind to the love and merits of his younger son Faramir. Freud explains that the mourning process entails a withdrawal of libido or object-67 cathexis from the lost person and its attachment to a new object (249). This transition, predominantly conscious and comparatively more straightforward, contrasts with the complexities of melancholia, wherein the person “knows whom he has lost but not what he has lost in him” (245). In melancholia, the libido, unable to attach to a new object, is absorbed into the person’s ego, engendering an identification with the lost object and promoting a form of narcissism, metaphorically described as “the shadow of the object [falling] upon the ego” (249). Borrowing from Otto Rank, Freud justifies the intense attachment to the lost object and reluctance to accept a replacement due to an initial narcissistic object choice (249). Therefore, melancholia’s essence resides not solely in mourning the lost person but in lamentation for the aspects of oneself perceived as lost through them. Freud interprets this phenomenon as a regressive shift from narcissistic object choice back towards narcissism (250). Théoden and Denethor’s reactions to the loss of a son respond to the transformation from melancholia to mourning. Despite his initial signs of melancholia, Théoden listens to Gandalf’s exhortation and no longer clings to his dark and downcast mood. He re-engages with life and leadership, symbolized by receiving his sword from Éomer and fostering a father-son bond with his nephew (LR 517-18). This investment of love for a son in a sister’s son illustrates Théoden’s progression toward mourning. Conversely, Denethor’s fixation on Boromir as an irreplaceable figure underscores a static melancholic state. He views Boromir not only as a loyal military leader but also as a symbol of his dynastic aspirations, notably through Boromir’s potential acquisition of the Ring (813). Despite his loyalty and service, Faramir fails to mitigate Denethor’s grief, primarily due to his lack of ambition in Denethor’s view and his refusal to seize the Ring. Therefore, Denethor’s enduring attachment to Boromir may originate from a narcissistic object choice, reflecting a more profound preoccupation with power and control 68 rather than a genuine paternal bond. Denethor’s covetousness for political leadership, prioritizing Gondor over the rest, and his rivalry against Sauron, acknowledged by Tolkien (Letters 347), portray him as a power-seeking figure. His main concern is Sauron “not because he was ruthless and wicked” but since, as if in a race for dominance, he had become stronger and was to be feared (385). Denethor’s narcissistic ambitions are further disclosed as he praises Sauron’s method of using others as instruments for his purposes (LR 818), secretly uses the Palantir, and often wishes for the Ring. Thus, Boromir’s death represents not just the loss of a son but a significant blow to Denethor’s political ambitions and strategies. Denethor’s descent into melancholia is also marked by physical symptoms, such as “sleeplessness and refusal to take nourishment” (“Mourning and Melancholia” 246) as he wrestles with the Palantir at night and rejects Gandalf’s aid—the same aid that acted as nourishment for Théoden (LR 765). Freud explains that the melancholic person feels slighted, as if treated with great injustice, a sentiment originating from “a mental constellation of revolt that has passed over into the crushed state of melancholia” (248). This helps to explain Denethor’s indignation and wounded pride as a steward rather than king, which surfaces in various narrative moments. For instance, when Boromir, displeased that his father was not a king, asks Denethor the duration required for a steward to ascend to kingship, Denethor’s response underscores his resentment at the deep-seated aristocratic pride of Gondor: “Few years, maybe, in other places of less royalty…In Gondor, ten thousand years would not suffice” (LR 670). Tom Shippey in The Author of the Century highlights the initial depiction of Denethor in The Lord of the Rings as one who ostensibly reflects humility, with his seat placed on a simple chair beneath the throne of Gondor (120). However, this apparent modesty belies a deeper tumult of aspirations and grievances. Denethor’s covetousness for the Ring and its associated power stems from this 69 underlying turmoil—a desire to revolt against his limited authority, aspiring to establish a dominion surpassing even that of Sauron. However, this rebellion of the spirit ultimately degenerates into despair and melancholia following the loss of Boromir. Tragically, his ambition leads him to psychological desolation. Carlos M. Aslan in “Mourning and Melancholia: a Freudian metapsychological updating” posits that the divergence between mourning and melancholia can be attributed to the distinct psychical structures and the specific personal and cultural contexts in which loss is experienced (On Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia, 169). The cultures of Rohan and Gondor differ in many aspects, but the most critical aspect for our discussion is their contrasting attitudes toward death. In Rohan, similar to the Germanic cultures of Anglo-Saxon and Gothic people, heroic death is the utmost achievement. In contrast, Gondor, echoing its post-Númenórean heritage, remains overshadowed by a pervasive dread of mortality, reminiscent of the fears that brought about the fall of Númenor. In The Sweet and the Bitter, Amy Amendt-Raduege elaborates on this dichotomy’s cultural manifestations, noting that the dead kings are honoured in Rohan. Their barrows are prominently placed, symbolizing a society that reveres and identifies with its deceased leaders, while in Gondor, the embalmed kings are kept deep down in the dark tombs of Rath Dínen, a fearful place to avoid (68). Culturally, Théoden is more likely to see and admire his son’s death as heroic, while for Denethor, the death of Boromir, though an example of heroism and self-sacrifice, offers no such consolation. Théoden longs for his son, and he holds a cultural belief in rejoining their fathers after death (LR 842). He also might have a sense of survivor guilt declared as: “The young perish, and the old linger, withering” (517). This can be the reason that even after his renewal by Gandalf, he displays a rather hopeless resignation: “I myself will go to war, to fall in the front 70 of the battle, if it must be” (518). In her essay “Acute Melancholia,” Amy Hollywood examines the cases of two medieval Christian nuns, Beatrice of Nazareth and Margaret Ebner, who were fixated on Jesus Christ as the object of loss and died of melancholia as they idealized and attempted to become one with Jesus’ crucifixion and death. In her discussion of the idealization and incorporation of the lost person, Hollywood finds Beatrice and Ebner’s approaches to loss problematic as “the idealized other they incorporate is idealized precisely in his suffering and death” (402). In melancholia, therefore, not only the enormity of one’s loss but also the attempt to go through the pain and suffering of the lost person can lead to a desire for death. Hollywood contrasts the previous cases with the story of her own brother’s death, Lazarus. Her sisters, Martha and Mary, initially fall into melancholia until an old couple shows up at his funeral and tells the sisters that Lazarus, with love and care, had built “the house of her imagination…[where] the man and the woman lived out the rest of their lives in the house of their dreams” (406). The sisters’ shift of focus from Lazarus’ death and suffering to his goodness, indeed a lasting goodness helps them overcome their melancholia. Hollywood further points out that one’s loss and grief should not be disavowed but incorporated since loss and grief contribute to one’s “subjectivity, agency, and responsibility” (402). For Hollywood, there is a link between those we have lost and those we have around us, which depends on how we treat our losses. Our grief and loss create part of our subjectivity and impact our social relations “from which our ethical and political projects emerge” (402). Therefore, disavowal and detachment from loss and grief only deny the development of self. Théoden sees an impending demise for himself and his kingdom—“Not long now shall stand the high hall which Brego son of Eorl built. Fire shall devour the high seat” (516)—and this makes him consider Théodred’s death as vain and lamenting it as an unnecessary loss, just like how Denethor sees 71 Boromir’s. However, Gandalf’s encouraging hope allows Théoden to find meaning, value, and lasting goodness in his son’s death. Théodred’s sacrifice is now part of a grand purpose to which even Théoden can contribute. Aslan points out that in mourning, “the identifications with the lost person become the identifications with their most positive features, achievements, and ideals” (On Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia 177). Similarly, in “Mourning for Missing People,” Maria L. Pelento highlights a difficult task in mourning described by Jean Laplanche as “the attempt to work through the messages of the other” (“Duelo y temporalidad” 4). The mourner, therefore, should find what the deceased would have wanted from the bereaved, which are the lost person’s wishes, mandates, and ideals to be followed (Pelento 57). Tolkien must have been well aware of this task since the death of his mother, of whom he writes: “a mother who killed herself with labour and trouble to ensure us keeping the faith” (Carpenter 39) has left him with love and responsibility for Catholicism. Carpenter argues that Tolkien’s dedication to philology increased to some extent because “it was she, after all, who had been his first teacher and who encouraged him to take an interest in words” (39). After Robert Gilson, a member of T.C.B.S., died, Tolkien's friend Geoffrey Bace Smith wrote to him shortly before his own death on December 3, 1916. Smith conveys to Tolkien that, should death separate the members of their group, their shared goals and dreams must continue to endure. He entrusts Tolkien with a profound burden: “May you say the things I have tried to say long after I am not there to say them” (94). In 1918, Tolkien edited Smith’s poems and wrote the preface for a collection published as A Spring Harvest. During the events of the War of the Ring, Théodred, Théoden’s son, is slain, and his final words before dying in the battles of the Fords of Isen are: “Let me lie here – to keep the ford until Éomer comes” (UT 359). Théoden receives these words (360), 72 encapsulating his dead son’s heroic ethos and profound connection with Éomer. These words symbolize his defiance even in death and underscore his commitment to his people and values. Théodred’s heroic death can inspire the father to follow the same path of honour, love, and glory. Although one might interpret Théoden’s seldom speaking of Théodred in the narrative as his detachment from the loss of his son, there are moments where he either implicitly acknowledges the loss of his son or is told to remember it. When told about Boromir’s death, which happened only one day after Théodred’s, Théoden laments the bitterness of such losses before Gandalf: “The young perish and the old linger, withering” (LR 517). However, Gandalf carefully directs the king’s focus from grief and loss toward hope and action, and when Théoden asks for counsel, Gandalf advises, “To put your trust in Éomer… To cast aside regret and fear. To do the deed at hand” (518). Thereafter, Théoden’s remarks no longer bear regret and melancholy, even after further losses. Having buried Hama, his captain, after the Battle of Helm’s Deep, Théoden shows awareness of his losses and a determination to honour them: “Great injury indeed has Saruman done to me and all this land, and I will remember it when we meet” (546). Even later in Isengard, confronted with Saruman’s cunning voice, Éomer urges Théoden to think of his losses before making any decision: “Remember Théodred at the Fords, and the grave of Háma in Helm’s Deep” (580). In Théodred’s death, Théoden lost that father-son relationship of mutual love and care. But in his growth, he can now invest his fatherly love in both Éomer and Merry. Théoden forgives Éomer’s disobedience and calls him his son and later the king of Rohan. Éomer stands with the king in every battle, treats him with care and respect, and defends his dead body. As for Merry, Théoden loves and respects him despite their remarkable social difference, and when the hobbit offers his sword, he gladly accepts (777). 73 Théoden’s care for Merry, seating him next to his chair in a feast and promising to talk to him about herb lore, inspires such love and courage in a Hobbit to defend him by stabbing Sauron’s chief captain, the Witch-king. Théoden’s love for Théodred, embodied in his father-son relationship with Éomer and Merry, allows him once again to be a father and commit to a purpose that Théodred himself cherished. On the other hand, he receives the love and support from Éomer and Merry that he had lost in the death of Théodred, his son and heir. In contrast, Denethor’s Númenórean fear of death entangles him in a psychological struggle to cling to life and seek power. Despite Gandalf’s encouragement, Denethor refrains from joining the battle and confines himself to the citadel. Denethor displays an attitude similar to what Wehlau analyzes in the saga of Egil, whose son Bodvar drowns in the sea. Egil initially falls into melancholy and despair because he cannot take revenge on the gods, but his despair abates as he composes poetry and dedicates it to his dead son. Wehlau finds Egil’s composition a symbolic exchange with Odin, a trick Egil uses to steal the gift of poetry from Odin, who has, in a way, stolen his son (“Seeds of Sorrow” 12-17). Gandalf points out Denethor’s tricky personality, which is evident in his use of grief as a cloak to take information from Pippin (LR 758). His other trick, using the Palantir to conjure visions that offer a false reality, ironically adds to his distress, though, as Shippey states, “We cannot see what it is that is absorbing him so entirely” (“Curious Case” 22). Sauron’s strategy of heaping shadows and clouds upon Minas Tirith (LR 808) deepens Denethor’s psychological turmoil. In addition, his lust for power and implicit desire for the Ring to defeat Sauron is another example of seeking a trick in compensation for a loss. However, in the end, the solution of trick and exchange that works for Egil only worsens Denethor’s case. Denethor’s paradoxical sentiments toward Sauron and the Ring—contesting their power and hating them for his losses while admiring and craving 74 them—corresponds to another symptom of melancholia: constitutional ambivalence. Freud explains that such ambivalence stems from traumatic experiences that “may have activated other repressed material” (“Mourning and Melancholia” 257). Denethor’s loss of Boromir as a threat to his military power triggers his suppressed desire for power as a steward, complicating his case even more with his love and hate toward the power of the Ring. While Théoden, immediately after being restored by Gandalf, asks, “What is to be done?” (LR 516), implying a sense of agency and action, Denethor succumbs to despair and inaction. Théoden's defence of Helm's Deep and his decision to answer Gondor's call stand in stark contrast to Denethor's reaction, which is marked by lamentation and complaints, highlighting their different approaches to coping with the loss of a son: one marked by responsibility and contribution, the other by expectation and entitlement. Their motivations behind receiving Merry and Pippin’s service further elaborate on this contrast. Before the muster of Rohan, Merry asks Théoden why the king received his service if not for war. Théoden’s reason, which is solely for Merry’s safety, attests to his generosity and responsibility. Immediately after his arrival with Gandalf to Minas Tirith, Pippin offers Denethor his sword. Though initially despising and humiliating the hobbit, Denethor accepts Pippin’s oath and immediately interrogates him about the death of his son. Having already warned Pippin of Denethor’s questions, Gandalf speaks out the steward’s intention: “You can use even your grief as a cloak. Do you think that I do not understand your purpose in questioning for an hour one who knows the least, while I sit by?” (LR 758). Therefore, unlike Théoden’s fatherly protection of Merry, Denethor’s channelling information from Pippin shows his entitled and possessive mindset. Théoden’s attitude toward death and loss embodies a positive and creative model aligned with the process of mourning, while Denethor’s fear and 75 disdain for death portray pathological melancholia. Théoden mourns Théodred by completing his path as he defends Rohan and contributes to the survival of Middle-earth, all with the help of his son’s cousin and dearest friend, Éomer. However, Denethor fails to do the same, refusing to learn from Boromir’s selfless sacrifice in his hour of death. Instead, he clings to the same temptations that once deceived his son Boromir. His suicide reflects the melancholic person’s profound identification with the lost object to such an extent that, as John Steiner articulates, “if the object dies, then he must die with it” (“The Conflict” 97). Freud further elaborates on this dynamic in “The Ego and the Id,” explaining that the ego perceives its survival as contingent on the love of the superego, and as soon as the ego feels hated and persecuted by the superego, it gives itself up (58). Denethor experiences the loss of his ego, followed by his renunciation of the Ring and his power to defeat Sauron. This process is intensified by the realization that even his son Faramir is more loyal and loving toward Gandalf, culminating in self-reproach, rage against the Valar, and burning in fire. In “Cultures of Death and Dying in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: An Introduction,” Mia Karpiola and Anu Lahtinen observe that the death of a child led medieval people to melancholy and depression; however, they would console themselves with hope for rejoining the lost ones in the afterlife (6). In her study of responses to death, “Godly Grief: Individual Responses to Death in Seventeenth-Century Britain,” Annie Laurence explains “spiritual preparation” as a practice to invoke resignation and acceptance in the face of one’s own and others’ deaths (Death, Ritual, and Bereavement 76). Similarly, Théoden’s cultural background, seeing heroic death as an achievement and overcoming of death’s finality, a continuing existence either in the company of their ancestors or in songs of praise, consoles his grief for his son and turns it into a creative possibility of heroism. Such acceptance and 76 hopefulness toward death help Théoden leave his melancholia through his re-engagement with life and the people around him. Meanwhile, Denethor’s melancholia—his fixation on his loss without noticing and following the example of Boromir’s heroic sacrifice for the fellowship of the Ring—deprives him of any heroic and social possibilities, imperils the fate of Middle-earth and leads him toward despair, dotage, and tragic death in flames. Théoden and Denethor’s distinctive approaches to grief—one leading to redemption and the other to indignity—resonate with the distinction that Ruth Wehlau and Fabianne Michelet draw between good and bad sadness, or according to Ælfric, the sadness for loss of possessions in life is evil while sadness for one’s sins is healing and thus good. (“Darkness in the Universe, Darkness in the Mind in Anglo-Saxon Literature” 4). Perhaps Tolkien’s most explicit and significant comment on mourning lies in Merry's response to Théoden's death. In the houses of healing, Merry lies in a deathly paleness, physically impaired and emotionally laden as if with “years of sorrow” (LR 868). Aragorn acknowledges he can cure only the hobbit’s physical suffering, not the weight of his grief. However, Aragorn asserts that Merry’s sorrow, while profound, will ultimately cultivate wisdom rather than engender darkness: “His grief he will not forget; but it will not darken his heart, it will teach him wisdom” (869). Upon recovery, Merry's initial contentment, triggered by the simple pleasures of food and pipe, swiftly gives way to sorrow upon recalling Théoden's demise. He knows that each attempt to smoke will bring back the weight of his mourning, a burden seemingly insurmountable for the hobbit. Nevertheless, Aragorn advises Merry to reflect on Théoden not with pity but with admiration and remembrance for his virtues: “Smoke then, and think of him!... for he was a gentle heart and a great king and kept his oaths: and he rose out of shadows to a last fair morning” (869). Aragorn's counsel to Merry—to honour 77 Théoden's enduring qualities and integrate his grief rather than repudiate the pain—mirrors academic perspectives by Aslan and Hollywood on constructive mourning processes. Tolkien’s portrayal of Merry’s grief transformed into reflective remembrance highlights the therapeutic potential of mourning, suggesting that the proper guidance can transform profound loss into an opportunity for personal growth and deeper understanding. 78 Chapter 6 Conclusion and Future Work Despite the Eldar’s lessons and counsel throughout the history of Arda, the debate over whether mortality is a gift or a curse remains unresolved among Men in the legendarium. The Second Music of Ainur, which shapes the ultimate fate of Arda, is still a design in the mind of Eru; its predictions exist in Finrod’s visions and intuitions, and Aragorn refers to its content as more than memory. This inherent uncertainty makes faith and hope challenging but thereby all the more valuable. The Elvish understanding of death as a gift, largely unknown to Men, emphasizes a life beyond the circles of Arda—a life blessed with enlargement and completion. This perspective fosters hope in death rather than viewing it as an ultimate end. Thus, one who finds hope beyond death will not cling to earthly existence, whereas one who sees no existence beyond death will desperately hold onto life. Théoden and Denethor’s attitudes toward death illustrate the dichotomy of viewing death as a gift or a curse. Théoden, inspired by his heroic culture and Gandalf’s guidance, sees dying in battle as a redemptive end that allows him to reunite with his ancestors. In contrast, Denethor, whether he has any sense of something beyond death, follows the footsteps of his Númenórean forebears and chooses possessiveness and a thirst for power. Théoden’s hopeful acceptance of death not only grants him redemption and glory but also transforms his grief for his son into motivation and a meaningful path. Conversely, Denethor’s rejection of death, a tragic stance that leads to despair in times of crisis, is a poignant reminder of the potential 79 consequences of such a belief. Viewing death solely as loss, Denethor is consumed by grief for his son, ultimately falling into madness and death. The contrast between Théoden and Denethor reflects Tolkien’s explanation of the difference between freedom from Time and clinging to Time (Letters 386). This study has provided a detailed historical account of the concept of the gift of death in Middle-earth as presented in The Silmarillion, The Fall of Númenor, and Morgoth’s Ring. Through this historical lens, it traced the fear of death to the evil of Morgoth, revealing a pattern of Men succumbing to the same temptations over thousands of years in Middle-earth. This consistent fallibility among Men underscores the existential problem of fearing death and failure to understand it as a gift, a challenge that requires more than tales, debates, and warnings to overcome. By bringing the concept of death as a gift into a heroic context, this study examines Denethor’s suicide, mainly studied theologically, with the heroic tradition of Old English literature, and highlights Théoden’s heroic journey, whose mental and spiritual development has been underexplored by researchers. Théoden’s legendary and providential last charge reveals the spiritual and psychological enlargement promised through the gift of death. Moreover, a Freudian approach to these characters’ grief and loss interprets their mourning and melancholia as reflecting their attitudes and perspectives on death. At the approach of death, Théoden’s remark, “My body is broken,” (LR 842) signifies only a physical demise but with hope for joining his fathers, whereas Denethor’s statement, “My life is broken” (825) hopelessly suggests the destruction of his very self. Théoden’s acceptance of death allows him to risk his life for the love of his son, people, and Middle-earth. Denethor’s fear of death leads to self-centeredness and possessiveness, devoid of capacity for love or sacrifice. 80 Renewed by a divine touch and elevated to the glory of Oromë, Théoden becomes an instrument of the Valar, exemplifying the workings of grace in the famous Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi: Lord, make me an instrument of your peace: where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console, to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Théoden forgives Gríma’s betrayal and responds to his hatred with compassion, offering him the chance to ride with him to prove his honour and friendship. When Éomer and Éowyn doubt Aragorn’s decision to take the Paths of the Dead, Théoden draws upon his wisdom and knowledge of lore to provide comfort and instill hope. In the darkest hour, as Gandalf confronts the Witch-king of Angmar, the sound of horns announcing Théoden’s arrival brings hope to the besieged city. His charge, illuminated by the rising sun and marked by his shield bearing the symbol of the Sun, breaks through the shadow of the Enemy. When Merry, overcome with grief and regret for disobeying his king, weeps at Théoden’s side, the king forgives him, offering words of joy and blessing. Théoden’s narrative evolves from receiving support to becoming a source of strength and solace for others. He acknowledges and makes amends for his past errors, learns to forgive, and faces death, hoping to reunite with his ancestors. Tom Shippey explains that in Tolkien’s poem “Last Ship,” there are two urges regarding death in Middle-earth: a willingness to escape mortality and go to the Undying Lands and the desire to turn back and live one’s life (Tales xxii ). Odriozola notes that mortals in Middle-81 earth, after glimpsing its beauty, are forever changed, their hearts desiring more than just a memory. Characters such as Bilbo, Frodo, and Gimli, who have experienced the beauty of Rivendell and Lothlórien, struggle with this longing (48). The gift of death, by a promise of greater beauty in the Second Music of Ainur, exhorts Men to master their desires for beauty and live their lives devoid of possessiveness. Accordingly, the significance of Théoden’s death is amplified by his wisdom and strength in overcoming attachment and possessiveness. Despite having only recently encountered the wonders and beauties of Middle-earth, Théoden, rather than developing an attachment and clinging to his life, risks his life to preserve these wonders and beauties. The scope of this study cannot fully explore the gift of death in Arda. Other death scenes, tales of mortality, and debates among Men and Elves in Tolkien’s legendarium remain unexamined. Comparing Denethor’s possessive attitude towards his son with similar cases in Scandinavian sagas could further elucidate his narcissistic personality and issues of attachment and melancholia. Additionally, examining Théoden’s and the Rohirrim’s attitudes in light of Scandinavian literature would enhance these people’s literary and artistic significance. Given the substantial body of scholarship on mourning and melancholia, further research could delve deeper into the intersections between Tolkien’s portrayal of melancholia and its cultural, historical, and philosophical dimensions. 82 Bibliography Abalea, Gaelle. "Death as a Gift in J.R.R Tolkien's Work and Buffy the Vampire Slayer." Journal of Tolkien Research, Vol. 10, Issue. 1, 2020, Article 7. Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy: Volume 2: Purgatory, translated by Dorothy L. Sayers, Penguin Classics, 1955. Amendt-Raduege, Amy. "Dream Visions in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings." Tolkien Studies, Vol. 3, 2006, pp. 45-55. Amendt-Raduege, Amy. The Sweet and the Bitter Death and Dying in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The Kent State University Press, 2018. Aslan, Carlos Mario. “Mourning and Melancholia: A Freudian Metapsychological Updating.” On Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia, edited by Thierry Boaknowski, et al. Routledge, 2009, pp. 162-178. Augustine of Hippo. The City of God, translated by Marcus Dods. Roman Roads Media, 2015. Benson, Benjamin C. This Passing Shadow: The Role of Trauma in Reforming Individual and Cultural Identity in The Lord of the Rings and Anglo-Saxon Literature. 2023. Georgia College & State University, Master’s Thesis. 83 Beowulf. Translated by Kevin Crossley-Holland. Introduction by Bruce Mitchell. L. The Folio Society, 1978. Beowulf: Translation and Commentary. Translated by Tom Shippey. Edited by Leonard Neidorf. Uppsala Books, 2023. Bergland, Magne. “‘This gift of freedom’”: The Gift of Ilúvatar, from Mythological Solution to Theological Problem." Tolkien Studies, Vol. 18, 2021, pp. 131-144. Birns, Nicholas. The Literary Role of History in the Fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien, Routledge, 2023. Brecq, Mahdî. “An Overlooked Root: Tolkien and the Gesta Danorum of Saxo Grammaticus.” Mahdî BRECQ, 2019. Carpenter, Humphrey. J. R. R. Tolkien: A Biography. George Allen & Unwin, 1977. Dickerson, Matthew T., and Jonathan D. Evans. Ents, Elves, and Eriador: The Environmental Vision of J.R.R. Tolkien. University Press of Kentucky, 2011. Eyrbyggja Saga, edited and translated by Hermann Pálsson, Penguin Classics, 1989. Fisher, Jason. “Horns of Dawn: The Tradition of Alliterative Verse in Rohan.” Middle-earth Minstrel: Essays on Music in Tolkien, edited by Bradford Lee Eden, McFarland & Company, 2010, pp. 7-26. Forest-Hill, Lynn. “Boromir, Byrhtnoth, and Bayard: Finding a Language for Grief in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings.” Tolkien Studies, Vol. 5, 2008, pp. 73-97. Freud, Sigmund, “Mourning and Melancholia.” On Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia, edited by Thierry Bokanowski, et al. Routledge, 2009, pp. 19-34. 84 Freud, Sigmund. “The Ego and the Id.” The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume XIX: The Ego and the Id and Other Works, Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psycho-Analysis, 1923, pp. 1-66. Georgianna, Linda. “King Hrethel’s Sorrow and the Limits of Heroic Action in Beowulf.” Speculum, vol. 62, no. 4, 1987, pp. 829–50. Grammaticus, Saxo. The History of the Danes, Books I-IX: I. English Text; II. Commentary. Translated by Peter Fisher. Edited by Hilda Ellis Davidson. Rochester: D. S. Brewer, 1979. Harris, Joseph. “Sacrifice and Guilt in Sonatorrek.” Studien zum Altgermanischen: Festschrift fur Heinrich Beck, edited by Heiko Uecker, De Gruyter 1994, pp. 173-96. Heaney, Seamus, translator. Beowulf: A New Verse Translation Bilingual Edition. WW Norton, 2001. Hieatt, Constance B. The Realism of Dream Visions: The Poetic Exploitation of the Dream-Experience in Chaucer and His Contemporaries, Mouton & Co., 1967. Hollywood, Amy. “Acute Melancholia.” Harvard Theological Review, 99, 2006, 381–406. Honegger, Thomas. “The Rohirrim: Anglo-Saxons on Horseback? An Inquiry into Tolkien’s Use of Sources.” Tolkien and the Study of His Sources, edited by Jason Fisher, McFarland & Company, 2011, pp. 116-133. Ivey, Christin. "The Presence of Divine Providence in the Absence of ‘God’”: The Role of Providence, Fate, and Free Will in Tolkien Mythology." The Corinthian, Vol. 9, Article 2, 2008, pp. 189-199. 85 Jordanes, The Gothic History of Jordanes in English Version. Translated by Charles Christopher Mierow, Princeton University Press, 1915. Karipola, Mia and Anu Lahtinen. “Cultures of Death and Dying in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: An Introduction.” Cultures of Death and Dying in Medieval and Early Modern Europe, edited by Mia Karipola and Anu Lahtinen. Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies, 2015, pp. 1-31. Kightley, Michael R. "Heorot or Meduseld?: Tolkien's Use of Beowulf in ‘The King of the Golden Hall’." Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature, Vol. 24: No. 3, Article 8, 2006, pp. 119-134. Laplanche, Jean. “Duelo y temporalidad.” Revista Trabajo del Psicoanálisis, Vol. 4, Issue. 10, 1-15. Lasseter, Helen. Fate, Providence, and Free Will: Clashing Perspectives of World Order in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth. 2006. Baylor University, PhD dissertation Laurence, Anne. “Godly Grief: Individual Responses to Death in Seventeenth-Century Britain.” Death, Ritual, and Bereavement, edited by Ralph Houlbrooke, Routledge,1989, pp. 62-76. Librán-Moreno, Miryam, “Byzantium, New Rome! Goths, Langobards, and Byzantium in The Lord of the Rings.” Tolkien and the Study of His Sources, edited by Jason Fisher, McFarland & Company, 2011, pp. 84-116. 86 Lockerd, Martin."The Stolen Gift: Tolkien and the Problem of Suicide." Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature, Vol. 41, Issue. 2, 2023, pp. 89-109. Mills, Kristen. Grief, Gender, and Mourning in Medieval North Atlantic Literature. 2013. University of Toronto, PhD Dissertation. Mobley, Gregory. "Glimpses of the Heroic Saul." Saul in Story and Tradition, edited by Carla S. Ehrlich and Marsha White, Mohr Siebeck, 2006, pp. 80-87. Njal’s Saga, edited and translated by Carl F. Bayerschmidt and Lee M. Hollander, Geroge Allen & Unwin, 1956. Odriozola, Jon Mentxakatorre. "The Theological Meaning of Tolkien’s Death as a Gift." Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought and Culture, Vol. 25, Issue. 1, 2022, pp. 37-63. Olsen, Corey. “Episode 21: WC Tolkien Course 05- “Leaf by Niggle,” Part I.” The Tolkien Professor. 7 April 2010. www.open.spotify.com/episode/0cO0de7tFSerEBg5yV3p1b?si=kqVCZM_JQTKKGUAMiUf7hw Origen, Origen on Prayer. Christian Classics Ethereal Library. Payne, F. Anne. “THE DANES’ PRAYERS TO THE ‘GASTBONA’ IN ‘BEOWULF.’” Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, vol. 80, no. 4, 1979, pp. 308–14. Pelento, Maria Lucila. “Mourning For Missing People.” On Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia, edited by Thierry Bokanowski, et al. Routledge, 2009, pp. 56-70. 87 Pezzini, Giuseppe. “The Lords of the West: Cloaking, Freedom and the Divine Narrative in Tolkien’s Poetics.” Journal of Inklings Studies, Vol. 9, Issue. 2, 2019, pp. 115–153. Sanmark, Alexandra. “Living On: Ancestors and the Soul.” Signals of Belief in Early England, edited by Martin Carver, Alex Sanmark, and Sarah Semple, Oxbow Books, 2010, pp. 158-181. Shippey, T. A. “Denethor and Theoden.” Recevied by Ali Mirzabayati, July 2024. ---. Roots and Branches: Selected Papers on Tolkien. Walking Tree Publishers, 2007. ---. J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 2001. ---. “J. R. R. Tolkien’s Beowulf with Dr. Tom Shippey- Lecture 1.” Youtube, uploaded by Signum University, 13 January 2017, www.youtu.be/FPBt05KUfzg. 49:23 49: 28 ---. “The Curious Case of Denethor and the Palantír, Once More.” Mallorn: The Journal of the Tolkien Society, Issue. 57, 2016, pp. 6-9. ---. The Road to Middle-earth. 1st American ed, Houghton Mifflin, 1983. Steiner, John. “The Conflict between Mourning and Melancholia.” The Psychoanalytic quarterly Vol. 74, Issue. 1, 2005, pp. 327-63. Sterling, Grant C. “‘The Gift of Death’: Tolkien's Philosophy of Mortality.” Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature, Vol. 21, Issue. 4, 1997, pp. 16-38. Tacitus, Agricola and the Germania. Edited by James River. Translated by Harold Mattingly, Penguin Classics, 2010. 88 Terry, Patricia, translator. Poems of the Elder Edda. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1990. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Translated by James Ingram, Champaign, Ill. : Project Gutenberg, 1996, https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/657/pg657-images.html The Old English Boethius: An Edition of the Old English Versions of Boethius’s De consolatione philosophiae. Edited by Susan Irvine and Malcolm R. Godden. Oxford University Press, 2009. The Old Testament, King James Version, 2 Kings 6:16-18, www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Kings%206%3A16-18&version=KJV Tolkien J. R. R. The Old English Exodus. Edited by Joan Turville-Petre, Clarendon Press, 1981. ---. and Christopher Tolkien. Morgoth's Ring: The Later Silmarillion, Part 1, the Legends of Aman. Harper Collins e-books, 2021. ---. and Christopher Tolkien. The Shaping of Middle-earth: The Quenta, the Ambarkanta, and the Annals, Together With the Earliest 'Silmarillion' and the First Map. Houghton Mifflin, 1986. ---. Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary: Together With Sellic Spell, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014. ---. Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics. Oxford University Press, 1963. ---. et al. The Silmarillion. Houghton Mifflin, 2004. ---. “Leaf by Niggle.” Tales from the Perilous Realm. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2008, pp. 285-312 89 ---. “On Fairy-stories.” Tales from the Perilous Realm. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2008, pp. 315-400. ---. The Battle of Maldon Together with the Homecoming of Beorhtnoth. Edited by Peter Grybauskas. HarperCollins, 2023. ---. The Book of Lost Tales 1. HarperCollins, 2002. ---. The Hobbit. HarperCollins, 2012. ---. The Lord of the Rings. HarperCollins e-books, 2021. ---, and Alan Lee. Tales From the Perilous Realm. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2008. ---, and Christopher Tolkien. The War of the Ring: The History of the Lord of the Rings, Part Three. Houghton Mifflin, 1990. ---, et al. The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien: Revised and Expanded edition. HarperCollins, 2024. ---, et al. Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2020. ---, et al. The Fall of Númenor: And Other Tales From the Second Age of Middle-earth. First US edition. New York, NY, William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 2022. Vaninskaya, Anna. Fantasies of Time and Death: Dunsany, Eddison, Tolkien. Palgrave MacMillan, 2020. Virgil, Aeneid, translated by Len Krisak, Hackett Publishing, 2020. 90 Wehlau, Ruth, and Fabienne L. Michelet. “Introduction: Darkness in the Universe, Darkness in the Mind in Anglo-Saxon Literature.” Darkness, Depression, and Descent in Anglo-Saxon England, edited by Ruth Wehlau, Richard Rawlinson Center Series, 2019, pp. 1-12. Wehlau, Ruth. “Seeds of Sorrow: Landscapes of Despair in “The Wanderer”, Beowulf's Story of Hrethel, and Sonatorrek.” Parergon, Vol. 15, No. 2, 1998, pp. 1-17.
Thesis/Dissertation
eng
English
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
Graduate
Treschow, Michael
Death as a gift : a heroic celebration of life in The Lord of the Rings
Text