The True Hero

“Ever Your Desire is To Appear Lordly and Generous as a King of Old”. Is This True of Faramir? What is The Difference Between Appearance and Reality?

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The Return of The King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 793-796

The words in this title are spoken by Denethor to Faramir. They are spoken in the private chamber of the Steward of Gondor and as well as Denethor and Faramir, Gandalf and Pippin are present too. That these characters should be gathered together at this meeting is not just a useful plot device. We all know by now that the story that Tolkien tells is almost always told through the eyes of the hobbits. There are very few scenes in the story in which one or another of them is not present. But Denethor has other reasons why he wants a hobbit present now. He is an intelligence gatherer, always seeking to build the most comprehensive picture of events possible. Later on we will learn that this desire almost cripples him as a man of action, but now it is enough to know that Pippin, the halfling out of ” northern legends” needs to be present. Denethor wants him there.

And it is there that he learns, along with Denethor and Gandalf, of Faramir’s encounter with Frodo and Sam in Ithilien, and how, just two days before the hobbits had set off with Gollum as their guide to the Morgul Vale and to Cirith Ungol. Gandalf makes little effort to hide his interest, indeed to hide his concern. It is the welfare of Frodo and Sam that matters most to him at this moment, and with their welfare the welfare of their mission, and the welfare of the world.

Denethor has other concerns. For him the issue that matters most is the welfare of Gondor. How can Gondor survive the attack that it is about to meet? How can Gondor emerge victorious from this war? Compared to those questions every other matter is of little or no importance. We will think more about this in a later blog, especially when we think about the Ring of Power, that we know is now on its way into Mordor, and which, for a little while, was in Faramir’s hands, even though he never even wished to look upon it.

But now we are thinking of Faramir himself. In the last two pieces that I wrote on this blog I wrote about him as a leader of men, about how his men would follow him, trust him, even in the most dangerous of circumstances. How his men would feel themselves greater than they really were, how they would know themselves as faithful. But what manner of man is this leader? Denethor shows what he thinks about this here.

“I know you well. Ever your desire is to appear lordly and generous as a king of old, gracious, gentle. This may well befit one of high race, if he sits in power and peace. But in desperate hours gentleness may be repaid with death.”

Denethor might be speaking of contemporary politics here. Indeed he is effectively accusing Faramir of playing a political game, of making a bid for power. He is aware of how his son is regarded by the people of Gondor. They may respect the Lord of the Tower but they love his son. We may never see a popularity poll in Gondor. Such things did not exist. But if they did it would probably show that Faramir is more popular than Denethor. How could he not be when in full view of the walls of Minas Tirith, the nearest that Gondor could come to a live broadcast, they watch him risk his own life to save that of his men? No wonder that crowds gathered at the gate to cheer for him and for Gandalf.

But we have seen enough of Faramir to know that his character and his appearance are of one kind, of one reality. He is as he appears to be. He appears “lordly and generous as a king of old, gracious, gentle” because that is what he truly is. For him this is not a luxury that belongs to a time of leisure, a pleasant thing to be cast aside when times are desperate, as Denethor puts it. He believes that victory for Gondor only has meaning if Gondor lives up to its highest qualities. Can there be ever victory for its own sake, victory because the only thing that matters is that our side rather than our opponents are the winners? If we win but behave like orcs, then the orcs have won, whoever may win the actual battle. Faramir refuses to think like this, and he refuses to act like this. He may never become a king but he behaves as a true king and not a false one.

“Down Into The Land of Shadow.” Tolkien’s Ending of The Fellowship of the Ring.

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The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp.397-398

Those who came to know The Lord of the Rings through the films that were made some twenty years ago by Peter Jackson will have been surprised when they first read Tolkien’s own ending to the first volume of his trilogy, The Fellowship of the Ring. Tolkien gives us no battles, no brave self-sacrifice from Merry and Pippin offering themselves to the orcs so that Frodo can escape, no farewell by Aragorn to Frodo, and no heroic death of Boromir. That last will take place off stage at the beginning of The Two Towers. Instead he gives us this…

“So Frodo and Sam set off on the last stage of the Quest together. Frodo paddled away from the shore and the River bore them swiftly away, down the western arm, and past the frowning cliffs of Tol Brandir”

Frodo and Sam struggle to get past the current of the river that seeks to drag them over the mighty falls and so at last make their way to the east bank, and then…

“At length they came to land again upon the southern slopes of Amon Lhaw. There they found a shelving shore, and they drew the boat out high above the water, and hid it as well as they could behind a great boulder. Then shouldering their burdens, they set off, seeking a path that would bring them over the grey hills of the Emyn Muil, and down into the Land of Shadow.”

We can understand why Peter Jackson decided to end his first film differently and I, alongside the packed theatre audience who witnessed the film, was glad to stand and applaud it. It was a masterpiece in its own right and I could not wait for the release of The Two Towers which is what Jackson had intended.

But Tolkien had his reasons for ending this first part of his great story in this way and if I were to try to create the scene as I think Tolkien intended us to see it I would slowly draw the camera back from Frodo and Sam as they set off on their journey until all we could see was two small figures set against a vast and empty wasteland.

There is an old and deeply poignant prayer of the Breton people of France whose ancient language is related to Welsh, a tongue that Tolkien loved. It simply states that “O God, thy sea is so great and my boat is so small.” I have known it for some time through a collection of prayers from the Celtic tradition of which the Breton tongue is a part but discovered while preparing this blog post that an American admiral gave a small plaque to President John Kennedy, a fellow sailor, with this prayer inscribed upon it. The point of the prayer, as President Kennedy received it, was to remind us of our smallness against the vastness of the universe in which we are set. Kennedy kept the plaque on his desk in the Oval Office throughout his term of office to teach him humility. Presidents need such reminders in a way that Breton fisher folk do not. For them, and for all the “little” people of the earth, it is enough that they must set out each day into a world that is so much bigger than they are, and Tolkien intends us to see Frodo and Sam among such people. Their journey is not heroic in the sense that it is a conquest of the world although Elrond was right to compare Frodo to the great heroic figures of the First Age like Hurin and Beren, it is heroic in the sense that ordinary life is heroic. Ordinary folk shoulder their burdens and set out, seeking a path through a life that is so much bigger than they are. Frodo and Sam know that what they seek to do is far too big a task for people like them but they do it anyway because it is a task that they have been given to do.

Surely Tolkien drew here upon his memories of the ordinary soldiers on the Western Front in the First World War who did their job against overwhelming odds and did not see their lives as wasted because doing their job was what life was all about. It reminds me of a conversation I once had with a woman whose husband had worked all his life in a job that he hated in order to feed his family and did it with pride so that the high point of his week was to cook breakfast on a Sunday morning and to share it with them all. That is the kind of heroism that Frodo and Sam represent.

Some Reflections on The King of Gondor

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To become a man, truly and healthily drawing upon the King archetype, it is necessary to serve an apprenticeship, serving a master and learning all that can be learned from him. Aragorn has been such an apprentice. The great fathers of his life have been Elrond of Rivendell and Gandalf the Grey but he also contested against the forces of Mordor under Ecthelion, the father of Denethor, the Steward of Gondor, and under Thengel, father of Théoden, the King of Rohan. There is a passage in a letter from St Paul that speaks of such apprenticeships and their outcome.

“I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”

We live in a world in which we desire wealth and success as soon as possible.  In the words of Simba, the lion cub, “I just can’t wait to be king!” I confess that when as a young man I found myself, for a time, working on factory production lines when I thought I was destined for great things I used to fantasise about marching into a great corporate building surrounded by an entourage who hung upon my every word. I had no idea then that in working in factories alongside other workers that I was serving the kind of apprenticeship that St Paul speaks of and that it had just as much significance for my life as did my university studies.

In 1943 the pastor and theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, wrote a paper for fellow members of the conspiracy to overthrow Adolf Hitler. It was a reflection on what had been learned through 10 years of living under the tyranny of the Third Reich and asked questions about the way ahead. At its heart Bonhoeffer wrote these words:

” The ultimate responsible question is not how I am to extricate myself heroically from the affair, but how the next generation is to live.”

For Bonhoeffer the idea of responsibility was the same as the biblical idea of righteousness and it perfectly describes what Aragorn is in Tolkien’s story. Last week we drew the contrast between him and Saruman in terms of ambition. Saruman really wants to be king! Now we also see in what way Aragorn is different from Boromir. Boromir desperately wanted to be the hero of the story. He wanted to raise a banner that the whole world would flock to and march under. Aragorn wants to make room for the next generation to live. Not just to exist but to live. When the moment comes to raises his banner and to declare himself king he will do so but not in order to be the hero but in order to serve the people and the people know it.

Next week we will think about the terrible journey that Aragorn must take in order to reach the battle in time. He must tread the Paths of the Dead. And when he does so he will be followed by the Rangers of the North because they love him; he will be followed by Legolas of the Greenwood Realm and Gimli of the Lonely Mountain because they love him; and Merry would have followed him if he could, as would Eowyn of Rohan, but he would not permit them to come with him. All are willing to lay down their lives with and for him because they know that he would lay down his life for them.

It is important to know that the kind of apprenticeship, spoken of by St Paul, does not refer to a particular period of our lives. It does not mean that at some point I must serve an apprenticeship in order that I can become a master and direct the labours of others. To be an apprentice is a way of life. I choose to learn all that I can each day from what each experience can teach me. And each day I am ready to act boldly  and responsibly when called upon to do so. Aragorn is about to tread the Paths of the Dead. I have duties to perform. I can do all things through him who gives me strength.