Further musings on Tom Bombadil

maswan

New Member
So, in episode forever ago, when we said goodbye to Tom Bombadil, class was discussing his general activities:

"I've got things to do," he said: "my making and my singing, my talking and my walking, and my watching of the country."

The conclusion I most clearly remember from Corey was that this is a good argument for this being distinct activities, and in particular that Tom's making and singing being two different activities (making boots like a cobbler, not singing boots into existence).

Having had this ferment in my mind for a while, I've come to a disagreement. When we see Tom do one of these activities, he is usually doing more than one of them at the same time. His talking is his singing, his walking also overlaps his singing, and his watching of the country is both walking and singing (his approach to Old Man Willow before encountering the hobbits is something I'd count as good example of "watching of the country").

So, my conclusion is that his making is also his singing, something which probably occurs while walking, and this is my case for "I sang of boots, of yellow boots, and yellow boots there were."
 
Tom Bombadil said:
"I've got things to do," he said: "my making and my singing, my talking and my walking, and my watching of the country."
The conclusion I most clearly remember from Corey was that this is a good argument for this being distinct activities, and in particular that Tom's making and singing being two different activities (making boots like a cobbler, not singing boots into existence).

Having had this ferment in my mind for a while, I've come to a disagreement. When we see Tom do one of these activities, he is usually doing more than one of them at the same time.
Hmm...that Bombadil quote isn't particularly iambic, is it? It makes me wonder for the first time if Tom has an actual language deficiency, rather than just a distinctive idiosyncrasy. Let's first consider a literal parsing of Tom's words:
Tom Bombadil paraphrased said:
"I've got things to do, my making/singing, my talking/walking, and my watching of the country."
But you go beyond that, and put making, singing, talking, and walking all together, even placing them all "within" his watching of the country. I have, actually, no problem with that at all: I like it, in fact. Bombadil has a thing that he does, which he characterizes as "things to do" because his thing encompasses all those different things together.

But you've gone beyond the evidence when you conclude he just sang his boots into being. I would certainly believe he sang while he made them--perhaps that's essential to the yellow color!--but I'm also pretty sure he used tools and natural materials, just as the Elves did in making the ropes and the cloaks of Lorien, not to mention the Lembas.

You are putting Tom's abilities up another level, on par with the making of Lothlorien rather than on par with the making of a cloak, and Galadriel needed a Ring to do that. [Or--wait a minute--does Lothlorien post-date the Three? Hmm...seems the answer is appropriately both no and yes: there were Elves there already, but Galadriel and her Ring turned it into the realm we know from LotR.]
 
True, I did go too far. Just because my reading of that quote doesn't exclude it, doesn't mean it is good support for it.
 
"I sang of boots, of yellow boots, and yellow boots there were."
I have one more comment (at this time: I'm not claiming this will be my last one!).

Even the "making" of Lorien is very much exaggerated in Galadriel's song. I don't want to claim she's self-aggrandizing, and it's actually quite probable that she's not the author of the song anyway, but... The words "I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold, and leaves of gold there grew" seem to imply that she created Mallorn trees out of thin air (or, at least, out of barren soil). But we know that is not the case. There were already Mallorn trees in the region. They just became better Mallorn trees when touched by Galadriel's magic.

I can't think of any instance of anyone's magic creating any thing from "thin air" (barring Ilúvatar 's creation of Arda itself).
Of course, there are some who advocate the theory that Bombadil is Ilúvatar. . . see https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Theories_about_Tom_Bombadil

One of the other "theories" on that page is that Bombadil is the Witch King! This theory was first posed in jest and also appears on the Tolkien Sarcasm "crackpot theories" page http://flyingmoose.org/tolksarc/theories/bombadil.htm but it appears that the wiki has accepted it on face value. o_O
 
Yes, but there are better documented cases of creation by singing, Lúthien is the one that springs to my mind (well, outside of the Valar). Not out of thin air, but with the power of song rather than needle and thread.
 
Totally agree that Tom sings his and Goldberry’s clothes into existence.

Tom is busy with all that making, singing, walking, talking, and watching. Goldberry also seems to be kept quite busy with chores such as her Washing Day.

They do not have the time to tend sheep, shear sheep, card wool, spin yarn, make dyes (blue and yellow, silver and green), dye yarn, weave yarn into cloth, and then tailor it into jackets, stockings, dresses, etc. Singing up the clothes also solves the problem of what Tom’s boots were made of. They are unlikely to be leather (given the Bombadil household’s vegetarian diet), and unlikely to have been made of rubber (given the geography), but all such problems solved, as they are made of song.

Now, why does Tom sing about his clothes and their colors so often?
Simple:

As he heads out of the house to go down the Withywindle, Goldberry stops him, and asks him to sing up some clothes (they don’t bother when they don’t have company). “There are hobbits in the woods”, she says, “and odds are, they will end up here, sooner or later.”
Tom does, but as he heads off, Goldberry calls after him, “And keep singing up the clothes. We don’t want another incident like the one that so embarrassed poor dear Maggot!”

PS. Of course, Tom is not creating clothes (though perhaps he could). The illusion of clothes works just fine.
 
Even without assuming that Tom is some kind of Maia, or near equivalent, which seems to be the prevalent opinion, there's nothing to say that clothes he creates with the power of song are any less real than those created on a loom in the Shire.

The bodies created by Valar and Maiar (referred to as fanar to distinguish them from the obligatory hröar of incarnates) are not said to be illusory, and we know that they can be hurt, damaged or even destroyed. Morgoth went lame on one foot after Fingolfin stabbed him, and Sauron lost the ability to assume fair form when Númenor fell.
 
...They do not have the time to tend sheep, shear sheep, card wool, spin yarn, make dyes...

At the risk of picking nits, we should remember that Tom and probably Goldberry are Maiar of some type, or they are at least very closely related to Maiar. They'd have no more need for physical clothes than they have need for physical bodies. They could simply will the clothes into existence as part of their manifestation. This is fairly similar to the idea of singing the clothes into being, with the exception that the clothes would be no different from the bodies themselves.

Physical beings need clothes and a mechanism to make them; spiritual beings need neither.
 
You guys keep leaping ahead and leaping ahead.

What the heck are "Maiar'?

This is a concept unknown to the first time reader of TLOTR. We meet Bombadil. He sings. He sings about his clothes. Why is he singing about his clothes? To manifest them. This should be pretty clear. All that stuff about 'Maiar' comes later. From stuff that Tolkien never published.

I don't care if he is a 'Maiar' (of some type) or not. This is not even a concept. There has been no mention of 'Maiar'. However, we can certainly deduce that Tom is too busy to make physical clothes. We can certainly guess that he is singing them into existence. We can then speculate that he and Goldberry do not usually bother to do this. (Adam and Eve, etc.) And then go on to speculate that Tom sings about his bright blue jacket and yellow boots a bit obsessively due to an injunction from Goldberry not to repeat that embarrassing incident with Farmer Maggot. (Totally speculating beyond the evidence, of course.)

So, I don't know about 'Maiar' when I read the Lord of the Rings, and I don't care about 'Maiar'. I only know about what I see of Tom Bombadil and Goldberry. From what I see. From what I speculate about what I see. I think Tom sings up the clothes (pretty sure about that). Then I speculate that Tom and Goldberry don't usually bother with clothes, and that Tom is a bit obsessive about how often he sings about clothes due to some embarrassing incident (less sure about that, but it is fun).

So, no discussions based on theories about what 'Maiar' are like, is going to alter my conceptions of Tom and Goldberry one way or the other. 'Maiar' don't exist in the Lord of the Rings. (Or, they only exist in so much as we can deduce them from the published works.)

Christopher Tolkien has given us some fun stuff, but, he also has a lot to answer for.
 
Just to put another possibility out there, maybe Tom orders his clothes custom-tailored from his few secretive contacts with outsiders, and pays for them with rare private singing performances. Like, what if Elvis was still alive but hiding way out in the woods and if you brought him some really snazzy yellow boots in his size, he’d perform for your birthday? But only if you agreed to never tell anyone.
 
'Maiar' don't exist in the Lord of the Rings. (Or, they only exist in so much as we can deduce them from the published works.)
I would not go so far about the nonexistance of Maiar in the LOTR. In the Hobbit, sure, but there the Necromancer could still have been a human being. But in LOTR Sauron clearly is not, the Valar got mentioned several times, neither Saruman nor Gandalf are human, a Barlog appears. The hobbits do not know a Maia when they see one, but that's does not mean they are not there.
 
All that stuff about 'Maiar' comes later. From stuff that Tolkien never published.
You're falling into the trap of thinking that because it was published later it didn't have any effect on LOTR.

JRRT was working on that stuff for decades, it had a huge effect: just because it was behind the scenes does not diminish it.
 
Hello Odola and NotACat,

I take your point that Maiar might well have (indeed, did) exist in Tolkien’s mind at the time he published LOTR. However, we the readers, reading the book for the first time, know almost nothing (perhaps absolutely nothing) about Maiar by the time we encounter Tom Bombadil.
(I would be very interested if either of you can point out references or clues, we might have encountered so far, that could lead us to Maia speculations.)

We have in the LOTR a work of art by Tolkien. It is a work of art which he considered complete enough, finished enough, enough of a masterpiece, to publish and share with an audience.

Now, let’s look at an analogy, or metaphor.

Suppose we are looking at a work of art by Leonardo, “The Last Supper”, for instance.
Leonardo finished this work of art, and it is on public display on the walls of a convent in Milan.

Now, suppose that after Leonardo’s death, a number of sketches which Leonardo had made prior to painting ‘The Last Supper’ were discovered and displayed. What if many of them were sketches of figures and scenes which obviously related to the depictions in ‘The Last Supper’, but which either differed from what ended up in the painting, or, included material which never made it into the painting?

What if we obtained a bunch of letters from Leonardo, both talking about the painting while he was working on it, and musing on it after he had painted it?

Well, these would all be fun, and interesting, but, they should not influence us too much. We should look at the painting. See what the painting says. See what story the painting is trying to tell. The work of art is the work of art. The stuff around it is perhaps connected to the work of art, but not of it.

Now, suppose that the son of Leonardo had in his possession a number of sketches, which seemed linked to the Last Supper. Indeed, they might be a vast frame, that was perhaps intended to surround ‘The Last Supper’ with many other pictures, illustrating other scenes, looking as though these sketches were intending to place the painting of ‘The Last Supper’ within a much larger context?

If the son of Leonardo, placed these sketches in the positions in which he thought they belonged, and filled in what he surmised to be missing bits with his own sketches, and then painted the result, would we have another Leonardo masterpiece called ‘The Frame of the Last Supper’?

No.

Because this painting was not made by Leonardo. We know, from the sketches and drafts that Leonardo made of ‘The Last Supper’ that he often changed his mind and made alterations and additions to his drafts right up until the last minute. So, we cannot take the sketches which he made for ‘The Frame of the Last Supper’ (even if he had completed most of them, and there had been no need for his son to interpret and add much), and call a painting of them Leonardo’s painting of them.

Leonardo’s painting of them would have looked much different both in small and large ways if he had ever been confident enough in his vision to have painted it.

So, we cannot take Leonardo’s son’s painting of ‘The Frame of the Last Supper’ as what Leonardo would have painted had he done so.

We also cannot now reliably make our interpretation of ‘The Last Supper’ as a work of art, by using . much of Leonardo’s Son’s painting of ‘The Frame of the Last Supper’ to influence our interpretation.

As with my fictional Leonardo, so with Tolkien. We know that Tolkien kept altering and amending and changing the LOTR right up until he finally said to himself, ‘That’s it. It is done.’, and sent it off to the publishers. We also know that Tolkien kept altering, amending, and revising, all the stuff that his son was later to piece together as the Silmarillion (and a multitude of other works). However, Tolkien never said, ‘That’s it. It’s done.’ and sent it off to his publisher.

In Tolkien’s mind, it remained sketches, and never satisfied him as a finished work of art.

So, what we have beyond the LOTR is not a finished work of art by J.R.R. Tolkien.

We may have a work of art in the Silmarillion, but it is a work of art by Christopher Tolkien creating something from the sketches of his father.

So, we should look at the LOTR as a work of art on it’s own, and be cautious about using too much of the Christopher Tolkien material in interpreting it.

In The LOTR, when we reach Tom Bombadil’s house, I don’t think we have the faintest idea about Maiar.
 
Still using Leonardo's painting to claim Saint Peter didn't have a mother in law just because he hasn't painted her in would be a stretch. Leonardo -as any educated person of his time- clearly must have known of her existance. He painted just a part of a story from a certain point of view. Still the painting is not just random patches of paint placed there to evoke a certain visual effect (That's what's modern art does. And such approach was almost as foreign to Tolkien as it was Leonardo). Both Tolkien and Leonardo try to tell a story that's goes beyond the limitations of the frame they present. Which is exactly what gives their works the depth and the feeling od importance we admire.
 
However, we cannot just suppose that everything Tolkien wrote but did not publish (including everything about Maiar, in this case), is canon.

Tolkien did not publish this stuff for a reason. He did not publish it because he was not satisfied with it.

I think Tolkien was not satisfied with it because of some unresolved problems. Very important problems to him. Very difficult problems to resolve.

I suspect that even had Tolkien lived to eleventy one, he would not have published this stuff unless he found a way to resolve these problems, and, these problems are so difficult that major chunks of what he had written might have been removed or drastically altered.

Some of the problems that I think were worrying Tolkien were:

1. The problem of the fate beyond the world of all the virtuous Mortals. Of course, Tolkien had tried so far to get around this problem by just saying the souls of Men upon death go 'whither the Elves know not'. But this is just evasion. All these people had not been baptized. They were not Christians. So, according to my understanding of Catholic doctrine, they are going to head off straight to Hell (presumably joining there the souls of the orcs), which is not the fate Tolkien is steering his readers towards, nor, the fate I think he would want his Eru Illuvatar to bestow.

2. The problem of the origin and fate of the Orcs. Is there no free will or salvation for the orcs? Where did they come from, and what is their fate? Or, does it matter, as all are going straight to hell - see problem 1.

I think these problems (and perhaps some others) worried Tolkien a lot. He always wanted to make his sub-creation agree with Christian Catholic doctrine. I think he was worried that he was skating close to heresy.

So, I don't think he would have published the same material that Christopher published. He would either have revised it in ways that resolved the problems (which might well have necessitated massive revisions), or, he might have published a much more veiled and less clear and comprehensive version of his mythology, (which would have made the problems more obscure), or, he might have burned it all, and let The LOTR stand on its own.

Therefor, it is not wise to rely over much on Tolkien's unpublished material, when reading The LOTR.
 
However, we cannot just suppose that everything Tolkien wrote but did not publish (including everything about Maiar, in this case), is canon.

Tolkien did not publish this stuff for a reason. He did not publish it because he was not satisfied with it.

I think Tolkien was not satisfied with it because of some unresolved problems. Very important problems to him. Very difficult problems to resolve.

I suspect that even had Tolkien lived to eleventy one, he would not have published this stuff unless he found a way to resolve these problems, and, these problems are so difficult that major chunks of what he had written might have been removed or drastically altered.

Some of the problems that I think were worrying Tolkien were:

1. The problem of the fate beyond the world of all the virtuous Mortals. Of course, Tolkien had tried so far to get around this problem by just saying the souls of Men upon death go 'whither the Elves know not'. But this is just evasion. All these people had not been baptized. They were not Christians. So, according to my understanding of Catholic doctrine, they are going to head off straight to Hell (presumably joining there the souls of the orcs), which is not the fate Tolkien is steering his readers towards, nor, the fate I think he would want his Eru Illuvatar to bestow.

2. The problem of the origin and fate of the Orcs. Is there no free will or salvation for the orcs? Where did they come from, and what is their fate? Or, does it matter, as all are going straight to hell - see problem 1.

I think these problems (and perhaps some others) worried Tolkien a lot. He always wanted to make his sub-creation agree with Christian Catholic doctrine. I think he was worried that he was skating close to heresy.

So, I don't think he would have published the same material that Christopher published. He would either have revised it in ways that resolved the problems (which might well have necessitated massive revisions), or, he might have published a much more veiled and less clear and comprehensive version of his mythology, (which would have made the problems more obscure), or, he might have burned it all, and let The LOTR stand on its own.

Therefor, it is not wise to rely over much on Tolkien's unpublished material, when reading The LOTR.
1) to point one: "Sheol" is not the same as the "lake of fire" for the demons even in Catholic teaching and beyond the circles of the world time is not really an issue. As such Catholics (I am one, btw.) do not have a problem e.g. with Eliah being taken straight up to the heavens even before Jesus was even conceived in the flesh. A future expected event can have its effects in the past if there is certainty it eventually will happen. So it isn't really so big a problem theologically. The details might be a bit unclear, but nowhere near heresy imho.
2) The orcs issue is resolvable, I was able to find a solution satisfying for me, not claiming that's Tolkien would come to the same solution, but I certainly find the orc/elf connections most convincing and fruitfull. Elves seldom fall, but if they do, their fall more completely than humans do, that's makes complete sense to me, and as original sin is inherited by descendents, so can be orcishness. Not really a big problem there. If orcs can be saved and how is another matter. That's would be for Eru to resolve, but He really does not have to share the details of that with anyone.
Postscript:
I myself do consider the later attempts to dissolve the elf-orc connections as the attempts of later elvish scolars to deny the horryfing and deeply unssettling truth they are not ready to face... ;-) Especially because of the way how elves always have (mis-)treated orcs.
 
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Well, you probably know more about Catholic theology than I do, but I do recall that the issue of the posthumous fate of virtuous pagans was debated on several documented occasions in Medieval Times, and that the usual response of church authorities was that they were damned. Does not Dante encounter them in Hell? (Although in one of the nicer circles of Hell.)

Be that as it may, I stand by the position that Tolkien did not publish the stuff that Christopher later published. One can only believe that this was due to not considering to yet be a finished work of art. (Certainly there was a strong demand and enthusiasm from his publishers for anything he might have released.) If this is so, then it questions how much we can rely on the stuff that Christopher did publish, as components which would not have changed had J.R,R. ever completed the work.

Now, speculations on what problems Tolkien might have been wrestling with, are more difficult. I am not sure that my speculations (heavily influenced by Dr. Tom Shippey) are accurate. There are certainly other possible concerns Tolkien might have had. One concern might have been that he just wondered whether his whole mythology was becoming too closely and obviously a derivative of Catholic mythology (or 'reality' to Tolkien). Another possible concern might have been that he was just worried about the impact on the artistic effect of The LOTR caused by revealing too much of the frame mythology.

After all, Tolkien was modelling the frame of The LOTR as translations of complex texts. Tolkien's life long work was translating and interpreting old texts with largely missing frame and context (the amount we don't know about either the historical background, or the beliefs and mythology surrounding 'Beowulf', is vast). Tolkien may have been uneasy about damaging the mysterious and numinous and tantalizing uncertainties that create some of the artistic atmosphere of The LOTR, by producing too much detail.

I am sure that others can come up with further speculations on why Tolkien never felt his vast sketches of LOTR background were ready to be published.

However, he did not feel they were ready to be published. So, the question of how much they might have changed, if they ever formed parts of a completed artistic work, must make us cautious about how far we can accept them as 'true' in the context of LOTR.
 
Well, you probably know more about Catholic theology than I do, but I do recall that the issue of the posthumous fate of virtuous pagans was debated on several documented occasions in Medieval Times, and that the usual response of church authorities was that they were damned. Does not Dante encounter them in Hell? (Although in one of the nicer circles of Hell.)

Be that as it may, I stand by the position that Tolkien did not publish the stuff that Christopher later published. One can only believe that this was due to not considering to yet be a finished work of art. (Certainly there was a strong demand and enthusiasm from his publishers for anything he might have released.) If this is so, then it questions how much we can rely on the stuff that Christopher did publish, as components which would not have changed had J.R,R. ever completed the work.

Now, speculations on what problems Tolkien might have been wrestling with, are more difficult. I am not sure that my speculations (heavily influenced by Dr. Tom Shippey) are accurate. There are certainly other possible concerns Tolkien might have had. One concern might have been that he just wondered whether his whole mythology was becoming too closely and obviously a derivative of Catholic mythology (or 'reality' to Tolkien). Another possible concern might have been that he was just worried about the impact on the artistic effect of The LOTR caused by revealing too much of the frame mythology.

After all, Tolkien was modelling the frame of The LOTR as translations of complex texts. Tolkien's life long work was translating and interpreting old texts with largely missing frame and context (the amount we don't know about either the historical background, or the beliefs and mythology surrounding 'Beowulf', is vast). Tolkien may have been uneasy about damaging the mysterious and numinous and tantalizing uncertainties that create some of the artistic atmosphere of The LOTR, by producing too much detail.

I am sure that others can come up with further speculations on why Tolkien never felt his vast sketches of LOTR background were ready to be published.

However, he did not feel they were ready to be published. So, the question of how much they might have changed, if they ever formed parts of a completed artistic work, must make us cautious about how far we can accept them as 'true' in the context of LOTR.
That's a valid point. Still Tolkien's own explanations (e.g. those in letters) are a fair bet imho. (And Catholic theology has evolved from early medievial times. :) E.g. "Immaculate Conception" depends on grace being able to work "back in time". Or the issue of babies who did die before they could be baptised.)
 
From what I speculate about what I see. I think Tom sings up the clothes (pretty sure about that). Then I speculate that Tom and Goldberry don't usually bother with clothes, and that Tom is a bit obsessive about how often he sings about clothes due to some embarrassing incident (less sure about that, but it is fun).
I had this idea while driving and listening to a podcast, then lost it before I could write it down, but it finally came back when Corey mentioned Goldberry again.

I'm thinking more deeply now about the Narrator's comment about how the Hobbits first saw her as "a fair elf-maid, clad in living flowers". That's very Tolkienian. Nakedness, on the other hand, is very much not. The only instance I can think of in LOTR is when the Hobbits lost their clothes in the barrow. So I really, really do not think that Tom and Goldberry go around naked. Ever.

My new suggestion is that Tom and Goldberry literally wear nature: that would be flowers and reeds for Goldberry, obviously. Tom's a bit harder: "bright blue his jacket is, and his boots are yellow" suggests to me that he wears sky and sunlight. So in this conception, the magic clothing they "put on" (via magic) for the sake of visitors is mostly just changing the appearance of Goldberry's clothing so it looks more like a green dress with flower and reed decoration, instead of just the flowers and reeds that it really consists of.

Frodo's first impression of Goldberry, which he likens to unexpectedly meeting a "fair elf-maid clad in living flowers", is actually a true insight, not a fanciful metaphor. Goldberry IS clad in living flowers! They just look like a green dress, due to Tom's enchantment.
 
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