Let's Read Tolkien 81: The Grey Havens

The clearing up certainly needed a lot of work, but it took less time than Sam had feared.

The victorious hobbits liberate Sharkey's prisoners, including Lobelia and Fredegar Bolger, and get to work fixing the Shire. All of the horrible modern buildings are destroyed, and Sam puts Galadriel's gift to use replanting trees. Everything is great, there's a bumper crop at the next harvest, Sam gets married and everything. Frodo, though, still suffers from his wounds, and eventually the time comes: Frodo and Sam ride out to meet Elrond, Galadriel and Bilbo, on their way to the Grey Havens. There, Frodo and Bilbo get on a boat with the elves and Gandalf. Merry and Pippin show up just in time to say goodbye, and the ship sets sail over the Sea to Valinor. The three hobbits left behind head back home, and the novel ends with Sam arriving home to his family.

**

So, Sharkey is gone, and the Shire can be restored to how it was always meant to be. You might think this would be a moment for some reflection on how things work there, given that an enterprising tobacco merchant managed to accidentally transform it from a minarchist utopia to Mordor on the Brandywine in what, two years, but no, everything will go back to exactly how it was. Remember, making things better is Sarumanism.

The restoration of the Shire is maybe where the analogy to the world wars is clearest. Tolkien finished the Lord of the Rings after the war, and after Labour won the 1945 elections with a landslide, getting a clear mandate to build a new society. It wasn't just Britain; we now know that the time after the Second World War would become the Great Acceleration, ushering in the most profound period of change in the history of mankind. So there's a sense, at least looking back, in which the rebuilding of the Shire is a fantasy alternative to what actually happened after the Second World War: in reality, the factories, airbases and hospitals weren't knocked down and replaced with an agrarian utopia, but it's easy to believe that Tolkien wished they had been.

The Shire, of course, was never a utopia for everyone. This time, it's Frodo who doesn't fit in, underlined by one of Tolkien's most direct biblical references: "Frodo dropped quietly out of all the doings of the Shire, and Sam was pained to notice how little honour he had in his own country."

But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house.
- Mark 6:4

Apart from prophethood, Frodo is troubled by his wounds, especially the Morgul-knife at Weathertop, but also by the after-effects of the Ring. You'll need to read the appendices to find this out, but in fact, even Sam doesn't live happily ever after in the Shire: eventually he, too, takes to the Havens as the last Ringbearer. The last event in the history of the Fellowship is when Legolas and Gimli eventually cross the Sundering Seas to arrive in Valinor, presumably to be greeted by "Legolas what the fuck" when the dwarf disembarks. Somehow it makes me happy that the end of the story is three hobbits and a dwarf hanging out in elf Valhalla.

**

So, here we are: I started this whole thing in November 2013, made it as far as the Lord of the Rings in May 2016, and now it's finished. It's been quite a project. I'd like to thank my three regular readers and especially my regular commentator! The first offline consequence of all this will hopefully be a lecture on Tolkien and the heresies of the early church, to be delivered at the Helsinki Adult Education Center when circumstances permit. I might also try to publish a little something; we'll see. But it's been a real pleasure doing this.

Do I have some kind of final verdict on the Lord of the Rings? I don't know. It's still almost certainly one of the best-selling novels of all time, and the horrible movies supposedly based on it have cemented its status in popular culture to such an extent that it feels like it doesn't matter what I think of it. I hope I've been succesful in demonstrating that the Lord of the Rings is more complicated and more interesting than the strawman it's so often made into, and how understanding at least a little bit about Tolkien's theology sheds some light on quite a few things about it that I feel are otherwise misunderstood.

Other than that, I don't really have any grand conclusions to offer. Personally, I think the theology is complete nonsense, and some parts of the Lord of the Rings quite objectionable on many grounds. I also first read it at a sensitive age, and while I could certainly do without some of it, the world Tolkien created, and the compelling story he set in it, have been a major inspiration in my life and continue to be. I use that inspiration to try to do my part to make the world a better place for everyone. Sarumanism, Tolkien would say, which is frankly reactionary garbage. Tolkien's stories inspire me to do work which is directly contrary to the ideals he held. Make of that what you will, I guess.

Next time: well, let's see. I'm taking a break for a bit, but I think I might then do something completely different.

Thank you for reading!