Two Visions of the Racial Politics of *The Lord of the Rings*

I was sitting in a coffee shop this morning getting my daily dose of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings when I came across this passage from The Return of the King. Some context: the battle of the Pelennor Fields is waging and the battle rage of the Rohirrim has been stoked due to the death of their king and Eowyn, a princess of Rohan. The Rohirrim ride forward and confront many "evil" races of men who serve Sauron in the War of the Ring. Here is how they are described:

"Easterlings with axes, and Variags of Khand, Southrons in scarlet, and out of Far Harad black men like half-trolls with white eyes and red tongues" (132).

This description is disturbing for its overt racism. We have here non-European races allegorically figured as evil. From the east, from the south, dark-skinned: any "man" who is other is here part of the "evil" host. And even more disturbing, they are compared to monsters with the simile "like half-trolls."

Passages like this are disturbing and difficult to wrap my mind around as a modern. Obviously, I cherish The Lord of the Rings, but passages like this--which are undoubtedly blots--give me pause. The allegorical logic is laid bare here that transmutes orcs and trolls into other human beings. The City of the White Tree, fighting the dark masses of the east, takes on a different connotation in light of this passage.

Such passages are indeed sad reminders that the writers and artists we love were living in a time of great misunderstanding, when other human who looked and lived differently (who were outside of their lived experience--at least on an intimate level) scared them.

I wonder if rather than see a passage like this as confirmation that Tolkien was a racist (a kind of low blow, I think) we could see it more constructively, as symptoms of an ideologically troubled modernity that was demanding that intelligent people come to terms with multi-valence, poly-vocality, and the juxtapositions of many worlds. Let me explain. At the same time Tolkien is writing of "half-troll" black men he is also writing about the relationship of Gimli and Legolas, their coming to terms with cultural/racial differences. In contradistinction to the passage above there is a later passage that becomes relevant. Commenting on the city of Gondor, Gimli the dwarf states,

"'There is some good stone-work here,' he said as he looked at the walls; 'but also some that is less good, and the streets could be better contrived. When Aragorn comes into his own, I shall offer him the service of stronewrights of the Mountain, and we will make this a town to be proud of.'

'They will need more gardens,' said Legolas. 'The houses are dead, and there is too little here that grows and is glad. If Aragorn comes into his own, the people of the Wood shall bring him birds that sing and trees that do not die.'" (163).

So, in opposition to the overt comparison of black men to half-trolls, we have this image of multiple races making plans to bring together multiple cultures to create a better community. To compare these passages is to remind me that these works are "undecided" on the level of ideology. They are not decided on "race" or "cultural hegemony." Rather, they are sites where racial contradictions are considered, negotiated, and ultimately are tested and solved and hopefully brought out of the fantasy world and into the real world to make things better.

Scaling Down War: the Narrative Function of Hobbits

I was reading  The Return of the King this morning and I came upon a passage that I believe demonstrates a key narrative strategy if not pioneered at least put to good work by J.R.R. Tolkien, namely, the act of suturing together two distinct narrative scales: the epic and the mundane. Consider the passage. Pippin is conversing with a guard of Minis Tirith, Beregond, and he's complaining about his serving duties to Denethor, Steward of Gondor:

"I have kicked my heels at the door of my master's chamber for many slow hours, while he has debated with Gandalf and the Prince and other great persons. And I'm not used, Master Beregond, to waiting hungry on other while they eat. It is a sore trial for a hobbit, that. No doubt you will think I should feel the honour more deeply. But what is the good of such honour? Indeed what is the good even of food and drink under this creeping shadow?" (89, Ballantine Trade Paperback).

I love this image of Pippin standing off as Denethor absently eats a spread of delicious food amid an important conversation with Gandalf. I imagine a look of sincere frustration on the poor hobbit's face.

We have here two separate worlds brought together through the experience of the hobbit: (1) the epic world of politics and cities and dark lords and armies being debated by Denethor and Gandalf, and (2) the quotidian world of food and drink and boredom experienced by Pippin. We have here two scales brought in contact with each other: the global-political and the local-experiential. Denethor and Gandalf are concerned with politics and the logistics of fighting a war; Pippin is concerned with grabbing an ale and some food. But both Gandalf/Denthor and Pippin are reacting to the same historical situation, the coming of the great war of the ring.

This juxtaposition of multiple narrative scales in the same scene makes, I think, Tolkien's portrayal of the experience of war--in spite of it being fantastical--somewhat realistic. In reading these novels, you're not simply dwelling on the level of the epic, a narrative mode that somewhat cruelly relates the death of thousands and political backs and forths with scant a comment. You also get to connect with the participants in the war on the level of their personal experiences. For example, the reader is introduced to Beregond's son in the previous chapter. He is not simply one of the many guards of Minis Tirith who die in the approaching seige.

To put it simply: Tolkien uses the mundane perspective of the hobbits looking onto great things, important meetings, in order to "humanize" the experience of the war of the ring, to scale it down to an accessible level for his reader.