Musings from Ep. 1-116

April Daydream

New Member
So, it has already been a "fantastic" (EXLOTRO, episode 116) journey so far. Some things have occurred to me while I have been catching up that I wanted to write down. Maybe others have insight that might resolve some ideas for me.:)
1. Is it possible that Frodo's Tookishness is not as dominant as we have assumed? It has occasionally come up from time to time over the course of the current first half of our discussions that Frodo's Tookish inclination to adventure popped out much like Bilbo but I have never really felt he was as Tookish as all that. I was having an Ancestry DNA discussion with my father recently when I was reviewing my results and we were discussing family traits, particularly the habit of Hobbitry in our own family and how some people got it (have the trait and understand) and some people just don't, even if they think they do. The idea came to me that I have always associated Frodo with the Brandybucks: intrepid, doughty, dutiful, enjoyers of the river, blowers of horns, beaters of bounds, etc. I don't deny that he has strong Took genes (witness Farmer Maggot) but I have never felt the lighthearted (not happy with this word) view of life/trouble/adventure that other Tooks seem to exhibit. Rather, I get more of a sense of resignation, duty, strength in adversity, sort of a deep-breath-before-the-nasty-chore feeling than that and I don't know if it is just situational (trade Bilbo's adventure for his own and he'd be just as enthusiastic?) or if this is really a basic character trait that has more in common with his Brandybuck relations.
2. Running naked on the grass in the sun seems to be a very young-childlike thing to do. I am reminded of very young children in my family who cannot seem to keep their clothes on and harried mothers running around picking up miniature socks and other items that seem to miraculously shed from their toddler. I wonder if tapping into the innocence and joy that comes with being so new to the world wasn't what Tom had in mind to banish the last of the desiccation, evil and vengeance of the barrows. I get a strong sensation of trying to rebalance the hobbits who have been too long in the dark and death of the wights.
3.The Hobbits enjoy eating but I have to put out there that we never hear descriptions of elaborate feasting with strange and amazing dishes. In fact, the more we read the more I am convinced that it isn't the food itself so much as simple pleasures: a wholesome breakfast first thing in the morning, mushrooms fresh from someone else's farm, a birthday feast, plain food at the end of a long hike. The passages we read all have as much or more to do with the occasion/situations as the consuming of food. It feels more like the event would be incomplete without eating not that eating is the why of the event. "Oh, it's time for second breakfast" for no more reason than it's time seems wrong.
Thanks!
 
1) I'd love to hear more of the Professor on this, but my take is Frodo is a representation of both archetypes. And in light of Sam and Bilbo he presents to us a very different 3rd type of life journey of a "hero."

2) I would agree there is some childness (the Aslan good kind) in this display. I think it is more than that, but this would align well with the spiritual "baptism" they seem to be going through with Tom.

3) I 100% agree. I am not sure where exactly the "love for food" came from apart the movies (and LOTRO). There are all sorts of feasts in the story, but all adventures should have them as it is part of the rhythm I would argue. I found myself equally intrigued by dwarf eating and elf/valar feasts as hobbits, and likely hear more about them. I wonder if our modern sense gets lost on the simplicity of Hobbits (farm, labor, prep, eat, repeat, story telling).
 
1. I agree that Frodo is much less 'Tookish' than Bilbo. He has very little inclination towards adventure. His decision to leave the Shire has two impulses, "I would like to save the Shire if I could', and, "A great desire to follow Bilbo flamed up in his heart - to follow Bilbo, and even perhaps to find him again." Frodo has very little inclination or temptation to seek 'adventure'.

2. Running naked on the grass might reference Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, before the Fall of Man, when there was no self-consciousness about having no clothes. (In my opinion, quite possibly the default arrangement of Tom and Goldberry when there was no company around, and thus no need to sing up jackets and boots.) This return to innocence has something to do with Tom's healing of the Hobbits from the horrors of the Barrow.

3. I think the Hobbits' 'love for food' comes mainly from 'The Hobbit', and the great feast of the Dwarves at Bag End (and Bilbo's dismay at the depredations into his provisions). There are a variety of references to the Hobbits and food in TLOTR, but very few actual examples. The main (I think) reference to the Hobbits' love of food in TLOTR is in the Prologue, "And laugh they did, and eat, and drink, often, and heartily, being fond of simple jests at all times, and of six meals a day (when they could get them)."
 
"And laugh they did, and eat, and drink, often, and heartily, being fond of simple jests at all times, and of six meals a day (when they could get them)."
And don't forget the party, where it "snowed food and rained drink" and they were all left at the end "filling up the corners" with their favorite dainties...
 
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