I've been bitten by the essay bug.
Jul. 17th, 2004 10:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rabidsamfanI know I owe reviews and comments, several days worth now, but I keep reading and writing and... well... here:
“Well, I’m Back.” Sam and the Language of Story.
In one of Tolkien’s letters, he mentions the epilogue chapter where Sam is talking to Elanor and says that it is “universally condemned,” and so won’t appear. We get to read it, thanks to Christopher, in HoME (in two variants yet!) and while I love it very much for the glimpse it give us of the Gamgee family and Sam’s life, I find myself siding with the folks who didn’t want it included. But until recently – okay, yesterday – I hadn’t figured out why I felt that way. At least not in words. Writing my response to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
teasel suddenly gave me a clue.
You see, when Sam says “Well, I’m back,” he’s feeling a lot of things he has no better words for, and which, for once, the narrator has not felt the need to explain. But Sam’s best appreciation for words and language arises from his love of “tales” – of Story with a capital “s” – and it is that context where he has gradually learned the art of metacognition.
Remember the stairs of Cirith Ungol?
"Yes, that's so," said Sam. "And we shouldn't be here at all, if we'd known more about it before we started. But I suppose it's often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of a sport, as you might say. But that's not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually -- their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn't. And if they had, we shouldn't know, because they'd have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on -- and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same -- like old Mr. Bilbo. But those aren't always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we've fallen into?"
"I wonder," said Frodo. "But I don't know. And that's the way of a real tale. Take any one that you're fond of. You may know, or guess, what kind of a tale it is, happy-ending or sad-ending, but the people in it don't know. And you don't want them to."
"No, sir, of course not. Beren now, he never thought he was going to get that Silmaril from the Iron Crown in Thangorodrim, and yet he did, and that was a worse place and a blacker danger than ours. But that's a long tale, of course, and goes on past the happiness and into grief and beyond it -- and the Silmaril went on and came to Earendil. And why, sir, I never thought of that before! We've got -- you've got some of the light of it in that star-glass that the Lady gave you! Why, to think of it, we're in the same tale still! It's going on. Don't the great tales never end?"
"No, they never end as tales," said Frodo. "But the people in them come, and go when their part's ended. Our part will end later -- or sooner."
"And then we can have some rest and some sleep," said Sam. He laughed grimly. "And I mean just that, Mr. Frodo. I mean plain ordinary rest, and sleep, and waking up to a morning's work in the garden. I'm afraid that's all I'm hoping for all the time. All the big important plans are not for my sort. Still, I wonder if we shall ever be put into songs or tales. We're in one, or course; but I mean: put into words, you know, told by the fireside, or read out of a great big book with red and black letters, years and years afterwards. And people will say: "Let's hear about Frodo and the Ring!" And they'll say: "Yes, that's one of my favourite stories. Frodo was very brave, wasn't he, dad?"
"Yes, my boy, the famousest of the hobbits, and that's saying a lot.""
"It's saying a lot too much," said Frodo, and he laughed, a long clear laugh from his heart. Such a sound had not been heard in those places since Sauron came to Middle-earth. To Sam suddenly it seemed as if all the stones were listening and the tall rocks leaning over them. But Frodo did not heed them; he laughed again. "Why, Sam," he said, "to hear you somehow makes me as merry as if the story was already written. But you've left out one of the chief characters: Samwise the stouthearted. "I want to hear more about Sam, dad. Why didn't they put in more of his talk, dad? That's what I like, it makes me laugh. And Frodo wouldn't have got far without Sam, would he, dad? ""
"Now, Mr. Frodo," said Sam, "you shouldn't make fun. I was serious."
"So was I," said Frodo, "and so I am. We're going on a bit too fast. You and I, Sam, are still stuck in the worst places of the story, and it is all too likely that some will say at this point: "Shut the book now, dad; we don't want to read any more.""
"Maybe," said Sam, "but I wouldn't be one to say that. Things done and over and made into part of the great tales are different.”
The distinction between the “great” tales and tales “like Mr. Bilbo’s” is important to Sam, and when placing himself and Frodo into the context of the ongoing tale of the history of the Silmaril’s, he is quick to find himself awkward in it. That is “not for my sort”, he says, and then puts Frodo into the great story instead. Frodo, of course, puts Sam right in alongside himself, and we love him for it. But the distinction remains.
Sam doesn’t forget that conversation. It stays with him right to the Sammath Naur and the end of all things. There, at last, he accepts his place in the story.
"What a tale we have been in, Mr. Frodo, haven't we?" he said. "I wish I could hear it told! Do you think they'll say: Now comes the story of Nine-fingered Frodo and the Ring of Doom? And then everyone will hush, like we did, when in Rivendell they told us the tale of Beren One-hand and the Great Jewel. I wish I could hear it! And I wonder how it will go on after our part."
He expects to die then, although he doesn’t entirely give up hope, and as we know, his hope is justified, and he gets his chance to hear the tale that he thinks is “done and over and made into part of the great tales”. But the story hasn’t ended, yet. Beyond expectation, he and Frodo will have the chance to go “back again” as Bilbo once did. But when they do, they don’t find the Shire “all right, though not quite the same,” thanks to Saruman.
Still, Sam keeps working toward the happy ending. He cleans, and plants, and marries – doing all the things he hoped to do when his hopes were all he had of the Shire. And I don’t think he realizes until that moment in Woody End that Frodo is still entangled in the “great tale” of the Third Age – and that the end of that tale is both happy and sad.
Riding home with Pippin and Merry, Sam would have had a lot of time to see the trees he had planted, and to contemplate the choices he had made. By marrying Rosie, by having a child, he has bound himself to the “happily ever after” of Bilbo’s sort of tale, and now he is both blessed and trapped by those choices. He cannot regret that Frodo has chosen a different sort of ending for his own tale too much without blighting the gift that Frodo has given to Sam and the rest of the hobbitfolk – the end of an evil, the renewal of life, and the hope of the future are all too valuable to waste. The best that Sam can do is to take that gift, and use it as well as he possibly can. And so, like Bilbo, his road leads back to Bag End, back to a happy ending and home.
Perhaps the great stories don’t end with “Back Again,” but then again, perhaps they do.
“Well, I’m Back.” Sam and the Language of Story.
In one of Tolkien’s letters, he mentions the epilogue chapter where Sam is talking to Elanor and says that it is “universally condemned,” and so won’t appear. We get to read it, thanks to Christopher, in HoME (in two variants yet!) and while I love it very much for the glimpse it give us of the Gamgee family and Sam’s life, I find myself siding with the folks who didn’t want it included. But until recently – okay, yesterday – I hadn’t figured out why I felt that way. At least not in words. Writing my response to
teasel suddenly gave me a clue.You see, when Sam says “Well, I’m back,” he’s feeling a lot of things he has no better words for, and which, for once, the narrator has not felt the need to explain. But Sam’s best appreciation for words and language arises from his love of “tales” – of Story with a capital “s” – and it is that context where he has gradually learned the art of metacognition.
Remember the stairs of Cirith Ungol?
"Yes, that's so," said Sam. "And we shouldn't be here at all, if we'd known more about it before we started. But I suppose it's often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of a sport, as you might say. But that's not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually -- their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn't. And if they had, we shouldn't know, because they'd have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on -- and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same -- like old Mr. Bilbo. But those aren't always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we've fallen into?"
"I wonder," said Frodo. "But I don't know. And that's the way of a real tale. Take any one that you're fond of. You may know, or guess, what kind of a tale it is, happy-ending or sad-ending, but the people in it don't know. And you don't want them to."
"No, sir, of course not. Beren now, he never thought he was going to get that Silmaril from the Iron Crown in Thangorodrim, and yet he did, and that was a worse place and a blacker danger than ours. But that's a long tale, of course, and goes on past the happiness and into grief and beyond it -- and the Silmaril went on and came to Earendil. And why, sir, I never thought of that before! We've got -- you've got some of the light of it in that star-glass that the Lady gave you! Why, to think of it, we're in the same tale still! It's going on. Don't the great tales never end?"
"No, they never end as tales," said Frodo. "But the people in them come, and go when their part's ended. Our part will end later -- or sooner."
"And then we can have some rest and some sleep," said Sam. He laughed grimly. "And I mean just that, Mr. Frodo. I mean plain ordinary rest, and sleep, and waking up to a morning's work in the garden. I'm afraid that's all I'm hoping for all the time. All the big important plans are not for my sort. Still, I wonder if we shall ever be put into songs or tales. We're in one, or course; but I mean: put into words, you know, told by the fireside, or read out of a great big book with red and black letters, years and years afterwards. And people will say: "Let's hear about Frodo and the Ring!" And they'll say: "Yes, that's one of my favourite stories. Frodo was very brave, wasn't he, dad?"
"Yes, my boy, the famousest of the hobbits, and that's saying a lot.""
"It's saying a lot too much," said Frodo, and he laughed, a long clear laugh from his heart. Such a sound had not been heard in those places since Sauron came to Middle-earth. To Sam suddenly it seemed as if all the stones were listening and the tall rocks leaning over them. But Frodo did not heed them; he laughed again. "Why, Sam," he said, "to hear you somehow makes me as merry as if the story was already written. But you've left out one of the chief characters: Samwise the stouthearted. "I want to hear more about Sam, dad. Why didn't they put in more of his talk, dad? That's what I like, it makes me laugh. And Frodo wouldn't have got far without Sam, would he, dad? ""
"Now, Mr. Frodo," said Sam, "you shouldn't make fun. I was serious."
"So was I," said Frodo, "and so I am. We're going on a bit too fast. You and I, Sam, are still stuck in the worst places of the story, and it is all too likely that some will say at this point: "Shut the book now, dad; we don't want to read any more.""
"Maybe," said Sam, "but I wouldn't be one to say that. Things done and over and made into part of the great tales are different.”
The distinction between the “great” tales and tales “like Mr. Bilbo’s” is important to Sam, and when placing himself and Frodo into the context of the ongoing tale of the history of the Silmaril’s, he is quick to find himself awkward in it. That is “not for my sort”, he says, and then puts Frodo into the great story instead. Frodo, of course, puts Sam right in alongside himself, and we love him for it. But the distinction remains.
Sam doesn’t forget that conversation. It stays with him right to the Sammath Naur and the end of all things. There, at last, he accepts his place in the story.
"What a tale we have been in, Mr. Frodo, haven't we?" he said. "I wish I could hear it told! Do you think they'll say: Now comes the story of Nine-fingered Frodo and the Ring of Doom? And then everyone will hush, like we did, when in Rivendell they told us the tale of Beren One-hand and the Great Jewel. I wish I could hear it! And I wonder how it will go on after our part."
He expects to die then, although he doesn’t entirely give up hope, and as we know, his hope is justified, and he gets his chance to hear the tale that he thinks is “done and over and made into part of the great tales”. But the story hasn’t ended, yet. Beyond expectation, he and Frodo will have the chance to go “back again” as Bilbo once did. But when they do, they don’t find the Shire “all right, though not quite the same,” thanks to Saruman.
Still, Sam keeps working toward the happy ending. He cleans, and plants, and marries – doing all the things he hoped to do when his hopes were all he had of the Shire. And I don’t think he realizes until that moment in Woody End that Frodo is still entangled in the “great tale” of the Third Age – and that the end of that tale is both happy and sad.
Riding home with Pippin and Merry, Sam would have had a lot of time to see the trees he had planted, and to contemplate the choices he had made. By marrying Rosie, by having a child, he has bound himself to the “happily ever after” of Bilbo’s sort of tale, and now he is both blessed and trapped by those choices. He cannot regret that Frodo has chosen a different sort of ending for his own tale too much without blighting the gift that Frodo has given to Sam and the rest of the hobbitfolk – the end of an evil, the renewal of life, and the hope of the future are all too valuable to waste. The best that Sam can do is to take that gift, and use it as well as he possibly can. And so, like Bilbo, his road leads back to Bag End, back to a happy ending and home.
Perhaps the great stories don’t end with “Back Again,” but then again, perhaps they do.
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 02:20 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 02:27 am (UTC)*is speechless*
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 02:48 am (UTC)(Makes note that copy and paste from Word does strange things to quotaton marks inside of html tags.)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 02:50 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 03:40 am (UTC)I remember reading the Epilogue in which Sam tells about the fates of other members of the Fellowship, but I agree that the main body of the story concluded quite nicely with just "I'm back." These simple words say a lot even though it's not that much...
I think Sam more than Frodo really went "there and back" though, and that is why Sam's simple line, "Well I'm back" seems to ring more true with him... Sam will be whole and happy for many years while Frodo's is a more bittersweet type of ending.
Great essay, thanks for sharing =)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 05:49 am (UTC)But I wouldn't like to have a different ending either.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 08:19 am (UTC)Is this available online anywhere in its entirety? I plan to acquire the whole HoME and read it one of these days, but I'd *love* to see the discussed material soonest. :-)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 09:04 am (UTC)That's an amazing essay.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 11:08 am (UTC)I wonder what you think of the final, final endings for both Bilbo and Sam? Bilbo, as we know, only has a respite of the Happily Ever After, and then he is brought once more onto the borders of the Great Tale of the Ring, and finds his end across the sea with the great Elf-lords.
Now that I think about it, it's quite telling that none of 'our' hobbits spend their final hours in the Shire. Merry and Pippin go off to Gondor, and Sam (if we are to believe the tradition according to Elanor) goes off to Tol Eressea and Frodo. Both of these places belong in the Great Tale that they have lived through (and I imagine it's fair to say that in both places the hobbits would be pretty deeply reverenced, in a way that they are just not viewed in the Shire). So, might I hypothesise that, despite a long life in which the three have slipped into 'Happily Ever After', when 'After' comes along they realise (perhaps not in a cognative way) that for such 'Greats' as them, Happy Ever After is just a subplot woven into the Great Tale of their time.
Just a thought.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 01:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 01:50 pm (UTC)There's so much to find in this book, isn't there?
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 01:51 pm (UTC)Thanks!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 01:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 01:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 02:52 pm (UTC)Essay bunny?! Oh, dear...
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 02:53 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-18 07:18 pm (UTC)"Well dear, Celeborn still lives there among his trees and his Elves, and there I don't doubt your flower grows still. Though now I have got you to look at, I don't hanker after it so much."
"But I don't want to look at myself, Sam-dad. I want to look at other things." Elanor scowled, because Rose-girl had been at her all day about how pretty she looked, and it had become exceedingly boring. "I want to see the hill of Amroth where the King met Arwen, and the silver trees, and the little white niphredil, and the golden elanor in the grass that is always green," she sighed "And I want to hear Elves singing." (...)
"I know," Sam nodded. "The light is fading, Elanorelle. But it won't go out yet. It won't ever go quite out, I think now, since I have had you to talk to." He paused, as he always did when he was trying to find exactly the right words to explain something to her. "For it seems to me now that people can remember it who have never seen it. And yet even that is not the same as really seeing it, like I did."
"Like really being in a story?" Elanor scratched at the side of her nose, screwing up her mouth and chin as she thought about it. "A story is quite different, even when it is about what happened. I wish I could go back to old days!" (...)
"Folk of our sort often wish that," agreed Sam. "You came at the end of a great Age, Elanorelle; but though it is over, as we say, things don't really end sharp like that," he smiled softly. "It's more like a winter sunset." They sat together in the quiet for a while, thinking thoughts they didn't venture to share with each other. Then Sam spoke again.
"The High Elves have nearly all gone now, with Elrond. But not quite all; and those that didn't go will wait now for a while. And the others, the ones that didn't go, will wait now for a while. And the others, the ones that belong here, will last even longer. There are still things for you to see, and maybe you'll see them sooner than you hope." (...)
"And there is one other reason, which I shall whisper to you, a secret I have never told before to no one, nor put in the Book yet. Before he went, Mr. Frodo said that my time maybe would come, and that there's a place for our Mistress Rose in the story still to be written. I can wait. I think maybe we haven't said farewell for good. But I can wait," Sam said again, and Elanor thought maybe he was reminding himself more than he was telling her. "I have learned that much from the Elves, at any rate. They are not so troubled about time. And so I think Celeborn is still happy among his trees, in an Elvish way. His time hasn't come, and he isn't tired of his land yet. When he is tired he can go."
"And when you're tired, you will go, Sam-dad, and Mum. You will go to the Havens with the Elves. Then I shall go with you. I shall not part with you, like Arwen did with Elrond."
"Maybe, maybe," Sam kissed her hair again, and tickled her as he had when she was smaller. "And maybe not. The choice of Luthien and Arwen comes to many, Elanorelle, or something like it; and it isn't wise to choose before the time.(...)
Happily Ever After is just a subplot
Date: 2004-07-18 10:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-19 12:44 am (UTC)I have divided feelings about the Epilogue myself and can see why it wasn't included when LOTR was published... sort of. And yet, Sam's conversation with Elanor is intriguing in many ways, so I'm very glad that it's available in print by now.
The distinction that you point out -- between the 'great' tales and Bilbo’s stories -- says a lot about Sam, not least because he's so attached to Bilbo himself, and Bilbo tells his stories from the perspective of a hobbit. But the scene on the Stairs of Cirith Ungol gives me a more ambivalent impression when it comes to Sam's feelings about being part of a Great Tale. His initial recognition is that Frodo and he are both included in it, and his focus on Frodo after that doesn't necessarily mean that Sam can't properly imagine himself as having a part in it. In your second quote (from the end of the quest), he concludes with: "And I wonder how it will go on after our part," after all.
And I don’t think he realizes until that moment in Woody End that Frodo is still entangled in the “great tale” of the Third Age – and that the end of that tale is both happy and sad.
But don't you think that Sam sees a connection at the very latest when Frodo gives him the Red Book, so that Sam may become the next author who finishes the tale? It's difficult to tell, of course, since the two last chapters of ROTK are so sketchy when it comes to Frodo and Sam's thoughts and feelings.
The best that Sam can do is to take that gift, and use it as well as he possibly can. And so, like Bilbo, his road leads back to Bag End, back to a happy ending and home.
Interesting that you read it that way! For me, the last description that we get of Sam's feelings (when darkness falls and the sound of the Sea sinks into his heart) always gave me the impression of an open ending, pointing towards things yet to come, even before I eventually discovered the Appendix entry about Sam's journey across the Sea. Also, that Sam says "I'm back," rather than "I'm home" implies that he hasn't truly come home yet.
Of course Sam has made a commitment to the Shire, the community, his family, that means very much to him, but the manner of his return never gave me a sense of closure. And the Epilogue echoes that lingering ambivalence. Perhaps that's another reason why the publishers (and Tolkien's friends?) didn't feel it should be included.
Thanks again for sharing your thoughts -- you've given me much to think about. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-19 12:49 am (UTC)I think we can trust that tradition. :) Tolkien confirms it in one of his letters too, when he writes that "certain ‘mortals’, who have played some great part in Elvish affairs, may pass with the Elves to Elvenhome. Thus Frodo (by the express gift of Arwen), and Bilbo, and eventually Sam (as adumbrated by Frodo); and as a unique exception Gimli the Dwarf, as friend of Legolas and ‘servant’ of Galadriel." (from Letter 154)
And I totally agree that it's very significant that none of the Travellers ultimately stay in the Shire. All four of them have been irrevocably changed, and their last journeys give testimony to that.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-19 01:44 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-20 02:56 am (UTC)I think that "happily ever after" is actually a temporary condition for each of them, so long as they stay in the Shire. But the Shirefolk aren't capable (in some ways) of honoring them properly because the long years of protection have prevented most hobbits from understanding just how dangerous things could get. If you think about it, in spite of all the damage to things that Lotho and Saruman caused, there's very little actual damage to the hobbits. And resilient as they are, they bounce back from it pretty well. Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin, have to go beyond the borders of the Shire to really find people who comprehend what they did.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-20 03:00 am (UTC)I'm glad you enjoyed the essay!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-20 03:01 am (UTC)But isn't it fun to speculate?
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-20 12:50 pm (UTC)picking up on something caraloup said...i agree that tolkien always chose his words carefully, and "well, i'm back," is not the same thing as "well, i'm home...."
i think the sense of incompleteness or ambiguity we feel at the ending of lotr is one of the things that fuels fan fiction, and why it was so deeply satisfying to me to see that in the end, sam does sail west...it's truly amazing that through devices such as this, tolkien leaves us wanting more even at the end of 1100 pages.... this conversation and the one on teasel's lj that started it has given me such insight, verbalized and organized, into why frodo and sam's relationship is endlessly fascinating, with slash or without. thank you so much.
Hello... I've jsut friended you.
Date: 2004-07-21 02:09 pm (UTC)My Sam site has an area for essays.. http://www.samwisegamgee.net/essays.php
and I wonder if you would consider allowing me to put both your Sam essays up on SAMNET. Please look the site over. I think you'll find it both loving and respectful.
Thanks.. your essays are wonderful!
Re: Hello... I've jsut friended you.
Date: 2004-07-22 03:34 am (UTC)Thanks. (I'm friending you, too.) (And my ego needed a boost tonight.)