Like. The quote “I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend” is such an integral quote/concept to LOTR that I just cannot for the life of me comprehend how people come away from LOTR inspired to write the grimdark i-love-war-and-suffering stories that populate fantasy
literally JRR TOLD us that if more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world. But did we listen? No of course not! More angsting about redeeming our rightful throne by slaughtering hundreds!!!
I personally feel there’s a strong correlation between the ‘heroes save suffering world through WAR AND SUFFERING’ school of fantasy and the people who think Aragorn is the hero.
Instead of, you know, functioning entirely as a) a healer, b) a distraction, and most importantly c) a hobbit delivery system.
Hobbits brought down Sauron AND Saruman, thwarted Denethor’s insanity, stopped the Witch King of Angmar, thwarted Saruman again, and REBUILT AFTER THE WAR. And they did it all with, I swear to God, the POWER OF FRIENDSHIP.
Bilbo befriends Gandalf and a bunch of cranky dwarves, intervenes repeatedly to try to prevent dragon attacks, murder and war, and then just WANDERS HOME WITH THE RING.
Bilbo’s POWER OF FRIENDSHIP allows him to actually leave the Ring, something nobody’s ever done before.
Frodo and his friends set off to take the Ring to Elrond, make friends with the local reclusive demigod and survive purely thanks to THAT FRIENDSHIP.
The hobbits unite the Nine Walkers with FRIENDSHIP.
Merry and Pippin befriend the reclusive tree people, GOODBYE SARUMAN.
Frodo trots across the world befriending people and gets them all the way to the fiery mountain, when Sam’s friendship GETS THEM THE REST OF THE WAY.
Meanwhile, Pippin makes friends in Minas Tirith and SAVES THE DAY AGAIN.
Merry befriends Eowyn and inspires ‘Dernhelm’ to just suit up and go like he does and distracts the Witch King at the crucial moment DAY SAVED THANK YOU.
Then when they think it’s all over, they amble back to the Shire, find it in trouble, and CALL ON THEIR FRIENDS TO FUCKING CARE BEAR STARE SARUMAN OUT OF TOWN.
So, you know, any swords-and-orcs fantasy that has the Aragorn/Boromir character as the hero and no hobbits? You know that author Missed The Point. Aragorn was a great guy, but he wasn’t the hero. The hero, always, was the Ordinary Person, the Little Guy, the kindly souls who never wanted to pick up a sword, but did it because it needed to be done.
many people think they know the ‘ Tolkien hero’, but they do not. they skim, they assume that theres some destined turnip farmer who defeats evil because prophesy and gets the girl and theres a happy ending. missing every point of Tolkien they believe Aragorn is the hero and his virtue was valor the true Tolkien hero hates adventure, every step of the way wishing they were back at home having eggs for breakfast and cake for teatime, and the only reason they havent left to go back home is they fight to preserve eggs and teatime as something that exists at all. on their adventures they saw the beauty of the world and would defend that beauty even if it meant great personal sacrifice. the true Tolkien hero is Samwise and his virtue was compassion the evil may be beaten back, but never truly gone, you may have returned home but your scars remain eggs for breakfast and cake for teatime are not somehow magically better because you bled for them, your journeys should be seen as a necessary pain and not something to glory you spit in the eye of glory for youve seen good men die for honor and never again will they return home or sit beside you in the garden watching the sunset
to understand the heros journey is to understand the pain of loss and the compassion that keeps you together
