a5be2244   
   XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien   
   From: Troels@ThisIsFake.invalid   
      
   In message   
   <7cbb2839-f3af-4a3f-a96e-04053dd603fa@a15g2000yqf.googlegroups.com>   
   Jerry Friedman  spoke these staves:   
   >   
   > On Feb 20, 4:11 pm, Troels Forchhammer    
   > wrote:   
   > ...   
   >>   
      
   Discussing Steuard's Bombadil appendix (his critique of Hargrove's   
   essay), and in particular in comments regarding a too (IMO) literal   
   interpretation of words such as 'oldest', 'eldest' and 'first' within   
   Tolkien's story, I said   
      
   >> On the other hand, however, I think you are too restrictive in   
   >> the possible interpretations of 'first' and 'eldest' -- given   
   >> what is known about Tolkien's propensity for exaggerations[#], I   
   >> think that several other interpretations can be offered that are   
   >> also perfectly reasonable, but do not take the 'first' or   
   >> 'eldest' quite as literally.   
   [...]   
   >   
   > I agree completely about the "rhetorical superlatives".  Also, I   
   > imagine Tolkien may simply not have been thinking of one passage   
   > when he wrote the other.   
   >   
   > However, I can't help pointing out that there's no contradiction   
   > if Tom isn't "living".  Then Treebeard can be the oldest living   
   > thing and Tom can be older.  Since Gandalf is hugely (infinitely?)   
   > older than Treebeard, he should also have been using "living" to   
   > except himself.   
      
   I do see the point, but I have to admit that it doesn't feel entirely   
   satisfactory to me. For one thing, I am dubious of such constructed   
   senses of the words -- e.g. to rule out Gandalf, Saruman, the Balrog   
   or Tom from the living: if Gandalf wasn't 'living', what, then, does   
   it mean when he said that he died?  If you reject that Tom and   
   Gandalf are living, then we get the inevitable question of what they   
   /are/? Are they 'unliving' as the Ringwraiths are 'undead'? I really   
   wouldn't like the implications of that ;-) so I am far more   
   comfortable saying that they, too, are 'living'.   
      
   In this situation I am more inclined to ascribe all of this to the   
   rhetorical superlatives and read these instances as simply meaning   
   something like 'very, very old' -- probably 'from before the Sun and   
   the Moon' (in the well-known flat-world-made-round cosmogony of the   
   published /Silmarillion/ -- from before Morgoth's return to the wide   
   lands in the round-world version), and leave it at that.   
      
   > I realize this might be an argument that Tom is a Maia, which I   
   > don't believe, or a Vala, which I think is ridiculous, but as I   
   > said, I couldn't help it.   
      
   -)   
      
   It is my belief (certainly not a belief that is universally accepted)   
   that if the question of Tom's nature is to make sense at all, then we   
   must restrict ourselves to the known taxonomy of Arda: i.e. to the   
   races and natures that Tolkien has described in his writings. With   
   this restriction, I think there is only one possibility: Tom was of   
   the Ainur, certainly not a Vala, but one of the lesser Ainur,   
   possibly a Maia, but there seems to have been also other Ainur in   
   Arda than just the Valar and the Maiar. If you reject my premise (to   
   only look at what Tolkien actually described as belonging to his   
   world), then you can, of course, come up with several possibilities   
   -- even to the point of acknowledging that Tom is 'the spirit of the   
   (vanishing) Berkshire and Oxfordshire countryside', which, while   
   certainly true, is of little use (as is, in my opinion, any answer   
   found here, since we will have no idea whatsoever of what role such   
   undescribed creatures and spirits might have in Tolkien's world).   
      
   In the end I much prefer to look at Tom's /role/, both in Middle-   
   earth and in the story -- and I think that the question of his   
   precise nature is rather irrelevant to this (and, frankly, to our   
   appreciation of the story).   
      
   --   
   Troels Forchhammer   
   Valid e-mail is    
   Please put [AFT], [RABT] or 'Tolkien' in subject.   
      
       In this case the cause (not the 'hero') was triumphant,   
       because by the exercise of pity, mercy, and forgiveness of   
       injury, a situation was produced in which all was redressed   
       and disaster averted.   
    - J.R.R. Tolkien, /The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien/ #192   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)