Welcome Guest 

Register

Forum Home » Books Discussion » BC Archive: Lord of the Rings » 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
Author Topic:
Figwit
Book Club Moderator & Misty Mountain Monster
Posts: 1966
Send Message
Avatar
Post 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: March 14, 2004 09:40
Not so many questions this time, but perhaps you lot can pm me with better ones?

1) The Dead Marshes: how are they depicted? What are they - in the book & what do they symbolize? Why at this place?

2) The relationship between Gollum / Sméagol, Frodo and Sam - how does it develop? What do you make of Gollum's reactions?
PbHf's Quote of the Week deals with this subject too.

[Edited on 31/3/2004 by Figwit]
Luthien_Telperien
Council Member
Posts: 39
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: March 15, 2004 04:30
The Dead Marshes: how are they depicted? What are they - in the book & what do they symbolize? Why at this place?


Even before I knew that Tolkein had fought in WWI, all I could see was trenches, and the faces of dead men under the water that gathered in them. There is shockingly little distance between the trenches of WWI and the Dead Marshes.

To me, that connection helped me to understand how wrenching and all-encompassing the battle against Sauron has been. If the impact is anything like that of WWI on Europe, it is not only life-altering, it is civilization-altering — world-altering.

The lights of the dead in the marshes are of a piece with their preservation for me. It is the "we shall never forget" — because they won't let us. The dead remain visible, just as they must have done for thousands of soldiers who survived the trenches. It can be good to never forget, but that it can also lead to despair is suggested by the attraction they hold to those who choose to watch, who do not break away from that past and focus on the evil that slew the men rather than on the men themselves.
PotbellyHairyfoot
Grandpa Moderator
Posts: 2929
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: March 17, 2004 07:27
The Dead marshes serve to remind the reader just how long this war for supremacy over middle-earth has been going on. Most of the bodies seen in the marsh are those of fighters from a battle that took place before the Third Age even started.
They also serve to remind the reader just where the hobbits are going. It seems that the approaches to Mordor are so full of evil that even the dead cannot rest in peace.

[Edited on 17/3/2004 by PotbellyHairyfoot]
k
Cavegirl
Posts: 1572
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: March 19, 2004 06:22
i always thought the dead marshs represented the ultimate futility of war.

the good and bad faught together and died together and now they are just marsh land, elves mingled with orcs and men evil and good all lying togther. it ultimately takes away the glory of war. it shows it for what it really is... people dying, lives being lost and how battlefields arent glorious but end up as desolate waste lands.

i dont think it matters that the dead marshs were so close to mordor, they used to be the land of the ent wives, it demonstrates the ultimate change that war brings.

i like this section, i like the fact that its not all glorious funerals and being buried at sea.
Aiyana
Council Member
Posts: 287
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: June 09, 2004 02:58
Personally I thought the part in which Gollum says he once tried to touch one of these dead people is very interesting. He said you could not touch them, which is strange. They must be near the surface, you could not see them otherwise because I imagine marsh water is not exactly the clean type Of course Sam has some sarcastic remark about this straight away - here I think the two of them are really starting to hate each other. In the movie they can't stand each other right away, here it takes them a bit longer.
I'd love to hear what others say about this, why nobody can touch the dead people. There must be some magical part there too: I thought they might just be there to remind others, of later generations, what terrible things a war can produce. Maybe they aren't really there anymore, but just like a shadow of them. As some of them were elves, there might well be a bit of magic involved. But maybe this is to show that the real evil through which these people died cannot be understood, reached or /touched/ unless you have been in that very situation, lived in that very age full of war and suffering. Tell me your opinion!
Figwit
Book Club Moderator & Misty Mountain Monster
Posts: 1966
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: June 09, 2004 03:58
Somehow I missed that part everytime, because I can't even remember it! *runs off to find TTT*
Morwinyoniel
Gallery Admin & Realm Head of Estë
Posts: 1637
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: June 09, 2004 05:13
I should think that, they're not really there - their bodies have decomposed long ago, but something of them still lingers there like a shadow, as Luthien_Calanor suggested.

And, it is notable that elves, humans, and orcs all lie there; when you're dead, it doesn't matter on which side you fought...
Aiyana
Council Member
Posts: 287
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: June 09, 2004 08:46
And, it is notable that elves, humans, and orcs all lie there; when you're dead, it doesn't matter on which side you fought...


I do think it matters. You die for something you believe in, to defend your people, or your home. I would not say orcs and elves are alike when they are dead. Orcs live to fight and die, men and elves live to do good and only kill when necessary. But in a way you are probably right, Nobody really deserves death. Although, we do not know what lies beyond that, it might be a wonderful place.
Morwinyoniel
Gallery Admin & Realm Head of Estë
Posts: 1637
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: June 10, 2004 04:59
Of course it does matter on which side you are when the battle is going on. And, I don't think humans, elves and orcs could some day remember the tragedy of the war together, the way for example the British, Americans, and Germans remembered the D-Day last weekend. But, in death, both the good and the bad are equal - their life on the earth has ended, regardless of what they were fighting for. (The afterlife that possibly follows is quite another thing.)
PotbellyHairyfoot
Grandpa Moderator
Posts: 2929
Send Message
Avatar
Post RE: 4.II. The Passage of the Marshes
on: June 14, 2004 03:26
I rarely consider that the dead seen in marshes are of both sides. I'm sure that Tolkien's memories of WWI and the trenches were an influence to this chapter. There can be glory in life and maybe even in the manner of your death but that glory is fleeting. The ghostly bodies in the marshes show no herioism or glory; none of them looks particularly glamorous or brings up any fond memories. The men , orcs and elves are all just dead together irregardless of whatever side they fought on, and how they died is almost forgotten and unfortuneately , they died in a place where their bodies can have no rest.
Members Online
Print Friendly, PDF & Email