Parrhesia

“A Very Valiant Man”. Thoughts Upon The Journey to Manhood of Peregrin Took.

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The Return of The King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 807-809

It suddenly struck me after I had written and posted my last piece on this blog that the Peregrin Took, the Pippin, that I have been writing about recently was no longer a boy, but a man, and so I decided for my title to go back to the words that Gandalf used about him when he introduced him to the soldiers at the outer walls of the Pelennor Fields. “His name is Peregrin, a very valiant man”.

What I could also have done in looking for a title for this piece would have been to turn to two moments in the events around the inner collapse of the spirit of Denethor, and his orders to prepare a pyre for his own ritual suicide and the murder of Faramir.

We remember that when Denethor dismisses Pippin from his service and asks him to send for the servants who will light the pyre, we read that Pippin “stood up and looked the old man in the eye”. And soon after we read of Pippin’s encounter with Beregond, a soldier of the Guard of the Tower in Minas Tirith, and how Pippin speaks to this warrior with the words, “You must choose”.

These are two moments that show how Pippin has come into his manhood. It is not as a defiant teenager that Pippin speaks to the Steward of Gondor, but as one man to another. At no point does Pippin cease to respect his lord, at no point does he fail to grant that respect to him, but he chooses to speak truth. And when he meets Beregond and bids him do what he can to prevent Denethor from what he seeks to do, he does so with the words, “You must choose”. Again, this is not a boy speaking to a man, but a man to a man.

And here I am reminded of Rudyard Kipling, a poet of the early 20th century, often dismissed merely as a mouthpiece of British imperialism. Many remember his words, “Oh East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet”, assuming that what Kipling is talking about is an inevitable clash of civilisations, but they fail to go on to read what the poet wrote next.

“But there is neither East not West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth, when two strong men stand face to face, though they come from the ends of the earth.”

And so a hobbit stands “face to face” before the Steward of Gondor and a soldier of the Guard, and there is no hobbit and man. Gandalf is right. This is “Peregrin Took, a very valiant man”.

We have come a long way in a very short space of time from the young hobbit in Moria who dropped a stone into a well out of a curious desire to know how deep it was. We have come a long way from the young hobbit who had to stand with bowed head as Gandalf growled: “Fool of a Took! This is a serious journey, not a hobbit walking-party. Throw yourself in next time, and then you will be no further nuisance.”

And then we remember that in the few days since that unhappy event Pippin had been forced to witness the fall of Gandalf into the abyss with the Balrog that perhaps he had awoken. And he had been forced to witness the death of Boromir at the hands of orcs who had been sent to take halflings prisoner and take them to Isengard, there to be tormented at the hands of Saruman. And he had been forced to endure captivity in the hands of those same orcs and to escape from them during a battle into the Forest of Fangorn. And he had been forced to look into the face of the Dark Lord himself after looking into the Stone of Orthanc, and to endure the humiliation of being discovered as the culprit who had stolen that Stone.

Pippin has been through humiliation and has emerged on the other side, not with resentment but with humility and strength. He has been through a refining fire and has emerged a man who is able to look at another man face to face and not be ashamed or afraid.

” Good Night, Captain, my Lord,” Sam Said to Faramir. “You Took the Chance, Sir.” Praise From the Praiseworthy in Henneth Annûn.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 891-892

The effort that Frodo used to speak of his mission openly at last to Faramir was the last that he was able to give that night. As he tried to stand he fell into a swoon, was caught by Faramir and laid upon a bed. Sam was about to lie in another bed beside his master’s but then he paused, bowed low before Faramir and spoke.

“Good night, Captain, my lord,” he said. “You took the chance, sir.”

“Did I so?” said Faramir.

“Yes sir, and showed your quality: the very highest.”

You can feel Faramir wince slightly as he hears these words. He comes from a strictly hierarchical society in which only those of equal or higher rank are permitted to speak so freely to one another. In Gondor only the Prince of Dol Amroth and, of course, Boromir and Denethor, would be permitted to speak to Faramir in this way. Faramir describes Sam as a “pert servant” as he responds to his words, as one who is speaking more freely than he has a right to do, but then he continues:

“But nay the praise of the praiseworthy is above all rewards.”

Faramir recognises that in Sam’s courageous service to Frodo, a service that will almost certainly cost him his life, that Sam has won the right to speak freely. The early Greek fathers of the Christian Church had a word for this freedom of speech that is close to the way Sam speaks here. They called it parrhesia, likening it to the way in which Adam was able to speak freely, openly, confidently, face to face with God in the garden, a freedom that had been restored through the obedience of Christ. In recent years some philosophers, such as Michel Foucault, have argued that this freedom of speech is a quality that belongs inherently to all humans although it always comes with a risk. If I speak frankly I may put myself in danger. But Sam is able to make himself equal to Faramir at this moment, not because of some innate quality that he possesses but because he, as Faramir recognises, is himself “praiseworthy”.

And as Faramir speaks here, perhaps he carries within himself his deep sadness that the one person whose praise he desires above all others is the one who will never give that praise to him. Faramir will never hear that praise from his father, Denethor. Eventually Denethor will learn that for a brief moment his son had the Ring of Power, the One Ring, within his grasp, but that he let it go. He will declare bitterly that Boromir would have brought him “a mighty gift” because Boromir would have done his father’s bidding. And in his anger towards Faramir Denethor will go further in his bitter criticism. He will take the love that his son’s men so clearly have for him and he will say that this is only given because his son likes to appear lordly. Faramir has nothing praiseworthy within himself. He is merely an actor; one who is playing a part.

The part that Denethor accuses his son of playing is that of a lord of Númenor. It is merely a game that Faramir indulges himself in while Gondor is in imminent danger of destruction. Faramir, the “wizard’s pupil”, as Denethor bitterly names him, has chosen to play his lordly games, to imagine himself as one of the heroes of an age long ago, to let Frodo and Sam go free, carrying the Ring with them, when what was needed was a weapon, a weapon so great that even Sauron would quail in fear before it.

Sam sees Faramir quite differently from Denethor. Faramir had the opportunity to take the Ring for himself just as Boromir had tried to do so, but he had chosen not to do so. This is a deed, as Sam sees it, worthy of the highest praise. But in one sense Sam sees things just as Denethor does. For Denethor Faramir is who who is an adopter of a pose in order to win popularity. Sam sees something else.

“You have an air too, sir, that reminds me of, of – well, Gandalf, of wizards.”

“Maybe,” said Faramir. “Maybe you discern from far away the air of Númenor. Good night!”