New Year

Mar. 25th, 2005 03:46 pm
rabidsamfan: samwise gamgee, I must see it through (Default)
[personal profile] rabidsamfan
In Gondor they celebrate the New Year in the spring, to commemorate the day that Frodo reached the Crack of Doom, and Gollum took the Ring into the fire. Aragorn thinks that we should do the same, but Sam says there's more about the day that he wants to forget than he wants to remember, and I just nod. Merry wishes we'd celebrate, I know, but it's different for him. He wasn't there like me and Sam were -- not that day anyway. I asked him if he wanted to celebrate the victory of Pelennor Fields and that shut him up.

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Date: 2005-03-26 12:04 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lame-pegasus.livejournal.com
Very good. Sometimes it's better to forget than to remember, isn't it?

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Date: 2005-03-26 03:19 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Sometimes.

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Date: 2005-03-26 12:13 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] danachan.livejournal.com
Oh. This is perfect, it is.

And I just do love it when you write Pippin.

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Date: 2005-03-26 03:20 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Why thank you. I'm always a little chary when I step away from Sam, but Pippin's fun.

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From: [identity profile] danachan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-26 03:26 am (UTC) - Expand

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Date: 2005-03-26 12:21 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] periantari.livejournal.com
wow powerful ending~
very great drabble.

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Date: 2005-03-26 03:20 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Thank you!

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Date: 2005-03-26 12:47 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mariole.livejournal.com
Pippin has really grown. Fantastic. There's the Captain of Gondor.

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Date: 2005-03-26 03:21 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Oh, yes. I think the quest changed Pippin as much or more than it did Sam and Merry.

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Date: 2005-03-26 01:35 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rubynye.livejournal.com
Never has this icon been more appropriate. :)

I knew who the speaker was two lines in, too. You are *so* good at this.

*invites them all to Elanor's birthday party instead*

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Date: 2005-03-26 03:22 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
.,....

I saw your ficlet you know....

This giant plotbunny attached to my ankle?

The one with the fangs?

It's yours, isn't it?

Or it was!

ouchouchouchouchouch... well, I did want more Sam angst...

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From: [identity profile] danachan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-26 03:26 am (UTC) - Expand

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Date: 2005-03-26 03:14 am (UTC)
dreamflower: gandalf at bag end (Default)
From: [personal profile] dreamflower
Oh brilliant! I had *never* thought of it that way before!
And you do Pippin so well!

(no subject)

Date: 2005-03-26 03:24 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Thank you. It's always struck me queer that the Shire doesn't celebrate the New Year. You'd think with Sam and Merry and Pippin all attaining prestigious positions that they'd encourage ways to remember Frodo, and what he did for everyone.

But something gets in the way, obviously...

Re: Not remembering Frodo

From: [identity profile] eykar.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-30 11:28 pm (UTC) - Expand

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Date: 2005-03-26 04:39 am (UTC)
ext_28878: (Default)
From: [identity profile] claudia603.livejournal.com
Oooh, interesting take on it! But it makes sense, his POV, especially with Frodo gone and it having caused Frodo to have to leave Middle earth....

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Date: 2005-03-26 12:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Yeah, and in spite of all the good that came of it, when you think of it, that day was a slice of hell for both Sam and Pippin. Pippin's main memory is despair and nearly dying under that troll. And Sam... well, in his nightmares he sees Frodo put on the Ring and is helpless to do anything about it -- nightmares that are all the worse because in dreams he has a chance to attempt doing something, and being Sam, it would never occur to him that he'd already saved Frodo when he let Gollum go before he ever walked into the mountain.

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From: [identity profile] izhilzha.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-27 05:27 am (UTC) - Expand

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From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-27 09:31 pm (UTC) - Expand

Re: Pippin's main memory

From: [identity profile] eykar.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-30 11:31 pm (UTC) - Expand

Re: Pippin's main memory

From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-31 12:09 am (UTC) - Expand

Re: Pippin's main memory

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Re: Pippin's main memory

From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-31 12:58 am (UTC) - Expand

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Date: 2005-03-26 06:08 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] caraloup.livejournal.com
I'm curious to find out when this conversation takes place. Is it after Frodo has left Middle-earth? And why do you think Sam would want to forget about the Ring's destruction? (Could he, even if he tried?)

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Date: 2005-03-26 01:00 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
I think of it as being around the time that Sam has the mayorship (or it's become clear that he will have it) but Pippin and Merry have not yet come into their inheritances -- or perhaps when Merry is very new at being the Master of Buckland and wanting to make his mark. It could be earlier, but I definitely think of it as being after Frodo left.

Part of the reason is in the comment above, but I may wind up writing an essay in answer -- after I get back from work! Thanks for asking!

(no subject)

Date: 2005-03-27 09:51 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Well, no essay, just an anklebiting plotbunny which I've posted. But essentially, the mental argument runs like this -- if knowing that everything turned out all right were enough, Frodo wouldn't have suffered the anniversary illnesses that he does, and being me, of course, I'm always interested in how the journey impacted Sam. I suspect that March 25th -- or rather, the days leading up to it and especially the night before -- is a bad time for him.

There's not much to contradict the idea in the book: In 1420, the first March after the quest, Sam is away on forestry work, and misses Frodo's illness on the thirteenth. In spite of having seen Frodo have a bad time on the first anniversary of his stabbing on Weathertop (as they rode back to the Shire from Rivendell), Sam doesn't seem to have made any effort to be there for the anniversary of the sting by Shelob. In fact, he doesn't get back to Hobbiton until the twenty fifth itself. In 1421, Rosie's in labor by the 24th because Elanor is born on the 25th, so chances are Sam didn't try to sleep at all any way. Frodo's not doing well for most of that month, and trying to hide it, (and if Sam was having nightmares he was probably trying to hide it from both Frodo and Rosie, given how close the baby was to arriving.) By 1422, Frodo has gone.

When you think about it, having survived a disaster, or just missed being involved in one, doesn't exempt you from nightmares. I had a guy take a swing at me on the subway, and for weeks everytime I closed my eyes I could see his fist. And what does Sam have to remember about that day? Carrying Frodo until he didn't even have strength to crawl? The fear of being too late? The dread of being under Sauron's eye? Gollum's attack outside the Sammath Naur? Frodo's deliberate acceptance of the Ring? Gollum falling into the fire? Even after the Ring was destroyed, he had the vision of the destruction of Sauron's towers, and after that he most certainly must have wondered whether or not the fumes would kill him before the lava burned him up. Nightmare fodder, all of it, if you ask me.

And of course, I need an excuse -- a reason why the Shire doesn't celebrate the same New Year as the rest of Aragorn's realm. That's canon, but why? You'd think that Merry and Pippin and Sam would have had enough reason to want the change, and later enough authority to enforce it, but they never seem to have done so...

*grin* Aren't plotbunnies fun?

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From: [identity profile] caraloup.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-29 01:30 am (UTC) - Expand

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Re: Father -son?

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Re: Father -son?

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Re: Father -son?

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Re: Father -son?

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Re: Father -son?

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Re: Father -son?

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Re: Father -son?

From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-31 04:13 pm (UTC) - Expand

Re: Father -son?

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Re: Father -son?

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From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-29 02:04 am (UTC) - Expand

Re: Sam's memories of March 25

From: [identity profile] eykar.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-30 11:40 pm (UTC) - Expand

Re: Sam's memories of March 25

From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-31 12:07 am (UTC) - Expand

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Date: 2005-03-26 08:14 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lily-the-hobbit.livejournal.com
That's fantastic. It really shows how much Pippin has grown.

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Date: 2005-03-26 01:00 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
It weren't all just Ent draft, if you see what I mean.

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Date: 2005-03-26 10:10 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] unhobbityhobbit.livejournal.com
that shut him up.

Hee hee, I don't think any other hobbit would have put it that way but it works when Pippin says it. It proves he can't stay completely serious for any length of time.

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Date: 2005-03-26 01:00 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Or completely mature... not just yet, anyway!

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From: [identity profile] unhobbityhobbit.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-03-26 02:48 pm (UTC) - Expand

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Date: 2005-03-26 10:33 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ansostuff.livejournal.com
OH, this was nice! I never thought of it that way, but of course this is also a way of seing it!

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Date: 2005-03-27 09:32 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
Thank you! I like trying to see the story from new angles.

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Date: 2005-03-27 03:26 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] illyria-novia.livejournal.com
*squees!* Wonderful and deep, and so perfectly Pippin! Thank you!

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Date: 2005-03-27 09:32 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rabidsamfan.livejournal.com
*grin* I love it when I get someone to squee...

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