Episode 16 Summary

[Tony Meade]

SESSION 16

Comment on Sam’s character depiction:

• Sam is one of the most thoughtful characters in the book, which is often missed in adaptations.
• He may be a bumpkin, but he is not an idiot.
• Sam has not traveled like Bilbo and Frodo, but his imagination has gone far and wide.

On education in the Shire:

• Does Hobbiton have a schoolhouse? Probably not, considering the prejudice against literacy.
• Note: Literacy as a mark of education is a modern phenomenon, post the printing press. Many intelligent, educated, and accomplished people throughout history were not literate. Without the printing press, and thus the easy availability of written works, it was possible to go far without literacy. This is not true now, and we project negatively backwards on older times.
• The Gaffer and his peers do not need to be literate, and so may not see the necessity of it for others. For working class hobbits, it may be a distraction from their proper work.
• Those unlettered hobbits may have seen literacy as something for the upper classes, and possibly something dangerous for those in the lower classes, as they would be above themselves.
• There is a literate subculture in the Shire, as they like to send and receive letters and borrow books and create written works, but this is not dominant.

Sam’s new world:

• All of this experience is new to Sam, as he’s never been beyond the limits of his hometown.
• Frodo and Pippin are also having new experiences, with the Black Riders and Elves, for instance.
• Other Hobbits who’ve encountered the Black Riders have not had their worldview broadened, as they don’t know who the Black Riders are, but Frodo and Co. have.
• Gildor points out that the worldview of the Hobbits is inward facing and isolationist.
• The Hobbits often try to pretend that the outside world does not exist.
• Gildor characterizes this type of isolation as fencing themselves in, rather than keeping the outside world outside. This makes them sheltered.
• The Hobbits who have traveled outside the Shire have been changed in their viewpoint, no longer seeing the differences between the different regions of the Shire as important.
• Frodo has to confront the idea of the isolation and sheltering of the Shire on this journey.

The Elves and literature:

• The Elves aren’t great book writers, as they don’t need to preserve memories for posterity.
• The Elves instead have memory that lives on from age to age.

The Bottle Song:

• The poem again is in iambic pentameter, or “hobbit meter”. It is also very regular.
• The context and content of the poem match precisely. They are in fact resting and drinking as they sing this song, avoiding traveling on the road for a time.
• The reference to “many miles to go” is an uncomfortable reminder and place in the rhythm.
• This is a song that is clearly meant to be sung as a group without stumbling, and the words are simple enough to remember when drunk.
• The rhyme shape sounds like rhyming couplets, but the first four lines share the same rhyme, and two lines rhyme the same word. The last two lines are a shift.
• The content is all about hitting the bottle, and the reasons why.
• The first two lines are descriptive, while the second two lines show their declaration of intent.
• The content is about drowning woe, but it is very cheerful, nonetheless.
• This is about drinking among friends, and the joy of community.

The cry of the Nâzgul:

• Note: Nâzgul’s cry described in the book is very different from the shriek in the films.
• This cry is described as a wail, which implies that this is a form of speech.
• The wail inspires both fear and pity in the hobbits, as it also sounds lonely.
• The pity of the hobbits is an acknowledgement of the terrible state of the Riders.
• Frodo alone recognizes this as a form of communication.
• The wail of the Riders is another form of song, being sustained and with words.
• The description of the wail is another example of putting words to the ineffable.
• Singing is usually a form of power in Tolkien’s writing, i.e. Sauron vs. Finrod.
• There is something ritualistic about the sound of the Nâzgul’s cry.
• Whenever the cry is heard, this moment will be referred to throughout the text. This is a serious and important moment for the hobbits.

An attempt at light-heartedness:

• Pippin tries to turn this into a conversation typical of Hobbit cheer, but Frodo cannot join him.
• Frodo also will not speak the name of the Black Riders.
• The motionlessness of the hobbits is evidence of what Frodo spoke with Gildor about.
• The experience of the Riders’ cry changes their perception of the land around them.
• It’s possible that the cry itself has had a spiritual effect on the hobbits similar to the enchantment of the Elves, but negative and fearful.

The journey takes a different turn:

• This is no longer a hobbit walking party, as they journey in fear and suspicion, including Pippin.
• The greater world has invaded the Shire, in spite of the Hobbits’ fencing themselves in.
• It’s only when they start to leave the wild parts and come back the inhabited part of the Shire that they are able to shake their fear and dread of the Black Riders.
• Despite the Black Riders, the hobbits try to return to cheerfulness.
• This is similar to a return from Faerie, as the memories and feelings begin to fade.

A sudden reversal due to Farmer Maggot:

• Farmer Maggot was Frodo’s personal ogre as a child and has never gotten past that fear.
• Note: In the earlier drafts, Farmer Maggot was much more truly unpleasant and violent.
• In this version, the unpleasantness and violence of Maggot is mostly in Frodo’s head.
• Farmer Maggot is compared to dragons, as the narrow perspective of most hobbits, including Frodo as a child, makes Farmer Maggot equivalent to a dragon.
• This is compared to Frodo as an older hobbit, hoping for dragons to invade the Shire.

Farmer Maggot vs The Black Rider:

• The hobbits have been just missed by the Rider, as he had only just left Maggot’s farm.
• Had they taken the road; they would have been caught out in the open on the causeway.
• They are saved by traveling cross-country across the fields instead. They made the right choice.

Mister and Master:

• Farmer Maggot is well-known in the Marish and Westfarthing in general because he is a large landowner and large-scale farmer. This is what attracts young people to steal mushrooms.
• Pippin knows Farmer Maggot well because of his friendship with Merry, who is important in Buckland and lives nearby.
• Maggot clearly has known Pippin for a long time because he uses the term “Master” for him, which is a name for an upper-class child. He still thinks of Pippin as a kid.
• When Maggot switches to “Mister Peregrin Took”, he is acknowledging his age but also teasing him familiarly for growing up.
• Pippin also refers to Maggot as “Mr. Maggot”, acknowledging that he is important in his own way.
• The word “Master” is also used in reference to lower-class hobbits by upper-class hobbits.
• That term of “Master” often follows people into adulthood with people who knew them as kids.
• Sam and Ted, for instance, are not referred to as “Mister”, because they are working class.
• The use of “Master” in reference to Frodo is an understanding of his relationship to Bilbo.

Farmer Maggot vs The Black Rider, again:

• Like Gaffer Gamgee, Farmer Maggot is very willing to stand up to the Rider and to show cheek.
• Maggot is also very parochial, and attribute queerness to all outsiders, but they also get people from across the border, so this is justified.
• He is like Gaffer in that he uses the term “funny customer” and see the Riders as just foreigners.
• Farmer Maggot is the most representative of “normal” hobbits, being a farmer with a family.
• Most of the other hobbits we meet are strange and unusual within the Shire. They are also generally upper-class and bachelors, both of which are unusual and special.
• Note: Farmer Cotton and his family will also be an example of mainstream hobbitry.

Frodo vs Farmer Maggot:

• Frodo has an automatic response to Farmer Maggot’s starting at the sound of the Baggins name. His childhood fears are triggered.
• Maggot’s urgency belies Frodo’s fears, and he shows his wider view of the current situation.
• Frodo’s childhood experience weighs more heavily on Frodo than Maggot, as he was the child and Maggot was the adult.
• Maggot immediately undermines Frodo’s internal image by breaking its spell with his concern.
• The way Maggot treats him shows Frodo how silly his old worldview is, showing that Frodo’s view is widening as he goes on.
• If he had not encountered the Black Rider, how would Maggot have acted towards the approach of Frodo, Pippin, and Sam? Possibly by teasing them.

Note: The name "Bamfurlong" is a reference to fields of beans.

END OF SESSION