[ 3 / biz / cgl / ck / diy / fa / ic / jp / lit / sci / vr / vt ] [ index / top / reports ] [ become a patron ] [ status ]
2023-11: Warosu is now out of extended maintenance.

/lit/ - Literature

View post   
File: 42 KB, 360x450, Bombadil010607a.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
15093701 No.15093701 [Reply] [Original]

What the fuck was Tolkien thinking?

>> No.15093853 [DELETED] 

>>15093701
shiut the fuck up tom bombadil is a chad

>> No.15093859

>>15093701
shut the fuck up tom bombadil is a chad

>> No.15093914

>>15093701
Mary Sue.

>> No.15093918

Congratulations, you got pleb filtered. You are a pleb.

>> No.15093949

bombadil chapters were top comfy

>> No.15094065

>>15093701

>today I will write the best part of my already awesome book

something like that

>> No.15094552

>this isn't pipe weed lewis

>> No.15094631

>>15094065
>>15093949
Agree

>> No.15094657

nibba didn't give a fuck

>> No.15094828

>>15093701
Bombadil was best character in franchise

>> No.15094973

I love the Tom Bombadil chapters, but I don't think Tolkien was thinking much at all when he put him into the books. When Tolkien started writing the first LOTR book he did not even know where he wanted to take the story. Later on he even said that the tone of the first book is completely different from the later parts. I think people mistakenly have this idea that Tolkien had a grand vision of the story beforehand and that Bombadil is somehow integral in it, whereas I'm pretty sure he put him in just for the fun of it and later realized he wasn't writing another The Hobbit.

>> No.15095261
File: 815 KB, 440x329, tolke.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
15095261

>>15094065
based

>> No.15095478

>>15093701
Consider some of the following aspects of the text:
This is the first time outside the shire for at least a few and i think actually all of the hobbits
Merry and pippin have been treating the whole ordeal like a bit of fun so far
The hobbits have all expressed a desire for an "adventure"
The earlier scenes in the forest show rhe importance and power of singing, i.e frodo singing against the trees and their apparent response, old man willow's song, then bombadil comes in as the greatest singer of all
Bombadil slyly suggests that it was oure coincidence that he happened to be in the right place at the right time to rescue them, following on the general trend of providence that occurs throughout the book to suggest that higher powers are more involved in the quest than they appear

All in all i'd say the importance of the forest+bombadil section, aside from introducing aspects of the world like magic singing and evil tress to the reader serves two purposes narratively:
Firstly, it makes it clear to the hobbits how much they really do need all the help they can get. This revelation will be important later when frodo makes the decision to trust strider.
Secondly, it serves as an interesting event that would have more than qualified for any hobbits desire for an "adventure", but by the end of their tale will seem quaint and silly in hindsight. The hobbits really were in mortal danger in the forest, and they encountered evil trees and were saved by the master himself. They met his incomparably beautiful wife, the river woman's daughter, stayed the night, and got sent on their way. In a world without the ring that would be plenty of adventure for a few noble hobbits and their servant, but one day it will be a harmless little aside at the beginning of their story. As such it provides, in hindsight, a sense of the escalation of the stakes that occurs once they reach rivendell.

>> No.15095486

>>15093701
Bombadil was Tolkien's way of telling us "if everyone had a 100% loyal & cheerful loli like Goldberry to drain your nuts every night, it would create world peace overnight. All the temptation in the world (i.e. the Ring) would become laughably meaningless."

>> No.15095554

>>15093701
Bombadil was there to recreate the feeling of the oral stories around a fire.

>> No.15095566
File: 130 KB, 1024x885, groy-mc-bbd.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
15095566

>>15093701
His boots should be yellow...

>> No.15095743

>>15095566
there really is a pepe for every occasion

>> No.15095850

>>15093701
Goofy grandpa gary stu self insert.

>> No.15095996

I think you need it to show how harrowing their journey so far has been. It's a piece of Shire life without returning to the safety of the Shire.

Also second half of
>>15095486
I'm sure I'm about to get cockslapped by some lor3m4st3r, but as far as I can remember Tom is the only person not tempted by the ring. People resist, but Tom's the only one who just absolutely does not give a single fuck about it.

You could probably extrapolate to some kind of statement about ambition as it relates to good or evil if you were trying to milk a concept for an essay or something. Is Gandalf less "good" than Tom because he engages in violence? Would Sauron have won if all good characters had a Bombadilian disposition?

>> No.15096022

>>15095996
>as far as I can remember Tom is the only person not tempted by the ring.
You're pretty much correct, yeah. A few other characters are tempted by it but resist it successfully, like Faramir. Bombadil is the only guy who doesn't give a flying fuck. He is master of his own realm; nothing from the world outside can bother him.

I hesitate to try to analyse Bombadil as that's sort of a dead end, but I do feel that he's more of a nature figure; he just is who he is and does not (cannot) strive to be anything else.

>> No.15096077

Comic relief to lower the tension after something dramatic happened. Did you not pay attention in high school English?

>> No.15097180

>>15094552
lel. I had a friend who unironically thought that Tolkien was a stoner.

I can sort of see it, some of his rants about trees really make sense when youre high

>> No.15097204

>>15096077
But it all feels so silly. The trees capturing them makes me cringe everytime

>> No.15098355

>>15097204
>Cringe
What? At Helm's Deep trees kill and disposes of thousands of the Uruk-hai.

>> No.15098480

Kind of related, I recently watched the LOTR and it left me with a ton of questions. I've read the Hobbit but not the LOTR trilogy, if I read them will I get a general understanding of the lore or do I need to read other Tolkien books?

>> No.15099325

>>15098480
You'll probably need to read his other books to fully understand what's going on.

>> No.15099757

>>15093701
He had a pretty nasty bath salts and nitrous habit for a crazy summer while he was writing the first book.

>> No.15099912

>>15098355
No but that bit is cool.

>> No.15099925 [DELETED] 

>tfw you realise Tom bombadil made cuc.K porn in the forest with Goldberry and an Orc. Feels awful man.

>> No.15100005

I don't care for Bomb but no matter what website I browse everyone is sucking his dick so obnoxiously it's unbearable, big fucking cringe

>> No.15101133

>>15094973
fellowship is such a drag
>I think people mistakenly have this idea that Tolkien had a grand vision of the story beforehand
not like he was famous for his gigantic volume of notes and world building or anything

>> No.15101498

>>15101133
>fellowship is such a drag

Fuck you, the long exit from the Shire is great. It helps emphasize how wonderful and beautiful the life of the Hobbits is, so that you understand why it's worth protecting and why it's worth fighting for at the end of ROTK.

>> No.15101640

All I remember is that Tom kept urging the hobbits to run around naked on the grass. I'm sure that Merry and Pippin in particular took him up on the suggestion bc they are gay.

>> No.15101655

>>15093859
/thread

>> No.15102494

>>15101498
its arguably the best part of the whole work, and the only part worth reading

>> No.15102532

>>15101655
samefag

>> No.15102550

>>15093701
Tom Bombadil was Sauron's true form and the eye was just a giant bluff. He let the Hobbits have the ring as a 9001D chess move to corrupt the free peoples of Middle Earth and fuck them from the inside while they get attacked by Mordor. He didn't actually expect Frodo to hold onto the ring for so long.

>> No.15102640

Why didnt they just bury the ring under bombadil's home and go and try to get rid of mordor's army?

>> No.15102729

>>15102550
makes sense

>> No.15103033

>>15102640
>and try to get rid of mordor's army?
even after the huge loss at minas tirith and with much of his armies off fighting dwarves and elves and shit, the combined strength of man was dwarfed by his reserves he had sitting in mordor, there was no conventional victory

>> No.15103075

Bombadil exists as the mystical guide on the border between the known world (the Shire) and the unknown world (everything outside the shire). He provides a place of rest and then as soon as the hobbits depart from him and venture out into the unknown the first thing that happens is they fall into the underworld (the barrow wight's dungeon). Tom brings them back into the living world and furnishes them with magical weapons from the barrow. They have now undergone a form of initiation and this is the true beginning of their journey both physically and spiritually.

>> No.15103077

>>15093914
literally no importance in the story

>> No.15103115

>>15102640

Because Sauron had too big an army for this to be possible, the army they just beat by the skin of their teeth at the Pelennor Fields is said to be a fraction of the size of what's behind the Black Gate. Even casting all that aside and saying they could defeat him militarily, that doesn't do anything about his presence in Middle Earth. He'd still be there causing trouble.

>> No.15104133

>>15093701
I DIND'T like Bombadil chapters. They were just annoying.

>> No.15104210

>>15094973

Bombadil existed in Tolkien's writing before The Hobbit or LOTR. He is linked to LOTR through those earlier writings, since he visits Farmer Maggot for example.

>> No.15104276

>>15098480

LOTR is plenty explanation by itself.
>>15099325
is on drugs

>> No.15104373

>>15104210
ever heard of Kill your darlings? Fact is he sticks out as a sore thumb

>> No.15104450

>>15098480
You will have plenty of things explained to you.
Plenty of characters who didn't appear in the movies appear in the books but they are in general of little importance to the overall plot
The books also has a story teller who will sometimes explain things that can't be explained by a character, like that the armies that occupies the wastes of mordor are feed by gigantic slave plantations around a great lake to its south

>> No.15105749

>>15104276
>>15104450
Thanks anons. I think if anything I might also read silmarillion.

>> No.15106043

>>15105749
I read it once a year. It's really good.

>> No.15106522

I enjoy the concept of his character, but ultimately it is really pointless

>> No.15106794

>>15093701
dziadek janusza pawlaka

>> No.15106889

>>15106522
Why are you writing my biography?

>> No.15107185

>>15093701
That chapter alone is a metaphor for Tom's life - completed isolated from the rest of the story as Tom is from Middle Earth. I think it was a nice palate cleanser after the tree attack to set you up for the barrow wights. Otherwise the story just gets dangerous more linearly - also a kind of foreshadowing of Rivendell which is a similarly magical and isolated place in Middle Earth. I feel like Tolkien was justified to kind of relieve the reader's concern for a bit and it clearly sets up Middle Earth to be a very strange place indeed.

>> No.15107193

What is the meaning of the Tom Bombadil chapter(s)? It is a microcosm of the macrocosm, a chapter in full explaining the book in full. It is a story of Life versus Death, in the "full" story it's Frodo (Life) against Sauron (Death), in the microcosm of the chapter, it's Frodo (Life) against Old Man Willow (Death). Tom Bombadil fills the role of Gandalf in this chapter. The wise wizard that knows the secrets of the world and the magical words of power that causes wild Nature to obey your will.

Old Man Willow, for whatever reason, wants to put the hobbits to sleep forever, just as Sauron, for whatever reason, wants to take over the world and order it to his own will. Old Man Willow, compared to Tom Bombadil, there is a distinct difference. Willow is a tree, a plant, Nature; while Tom Bombadil is a human(oid), animal, rational. Tom has power over the world in the same way cavemen shamans/wizards had power over the world via their magical cave-paintings. Art was not just for decorative purposes, but for magical purposes of control of the natural world. Just as Tom's songs were not purely for fun, but were songs that had actual power over the natural world.
Just as Old Man Willow was a danger to rational spirits (i.e. hobbits, men, dwarves, etc.), and wanted to return everything the world to a sleepy state of plant-like stupor, so too did Sauron want to return the world to a less aware state, to a more primitive state of mindlessness. Free will was antithetical to both Willow and Sauron.

There is also an aspect of Jesus Christ, or of a bodhisattva, in the character of Tom Bombadil. Jesus came into a world controlled by Death, controlled by the pagan religion(s) that were "dead to the Spirit", dead to the Word/Logos, and where everyone obeyed the laws of nature. Tom likewise saved Frodo and the others from the dead-realm of the Barrow Downs, where they were on the brink of succumbing to the spiritually numbing reality of the dead spirits, as compared to the Living Spirit that is Tom, who woke up Frodo and company too their danger, to the danger of letting rationality and awareness sleep (forever), of becoming just another spiritually dead ghost. And he saved them yet again with more Words, Spells, dispelling dead Nature that is powerless against Living Spirit.

>> No.15107343

>>15093859
fpbp

>> No.15107999

I want to tie Goldberry up with barbed wire and use a Hitachi on her loli cunt until she screams and comes in a hot wet fish of creamy pussy juice.
Why didn’t Tolkien write that? What a fag.

>> No.15108004

>>15107999
*flush
>fuck me

>> No.15108099

>>15093701
read lanny by max porter
watch the wicker man

>> No.15108102

>>15093701
Tom Bombadil is based on a real entity...

t. /x/ poster

>> No.15108180

>>15102640
They discussed Bombadil at the Council Of Elrond, and decided he wasn't the answer.

>> No.15108274

>>15093701
>what the fuck was Tolkien thinking
oh yeah this is based

The Bombadil chapters are about the Hobbits leaving the Shire and adventuring into a world full of perils. The Barrow Downs are their first true hardship on the road and it's also the point where they have to start taking things seriously.

>>15095566
wonderful Pepe

>> No.15108374

In one of Tolkien's letters, he says that part of the reason for including Bombadil is that he gives another perspective on the ring. Tolkien's cosmology involves good and evil at a fundamental level, and the ring was a vector by which good is turned to evil through its own ambition. Bombadil represented good without ambition whatsoever. He had to be included because there are people like that, but he wasn't central to the story because no one like that accomplishes much of anything. I wouldn't go so far as to say that Tolkien took Bombadil seriously; but the ring was a definite serious thing, and as close to a metaphor as his work ever got. It was used throughout the books as a barometer for various character studies, all of which reflect fundamental types of people.