Bruce N H
Active Member
Hi all,
I missed a couple of classes in December and now I'm listening back to session 283 - the end of the road, and I have a couple of thoughts. This is all from A Journey in the Dark, when the fellowship is traveling towards the entrance to Moria.
Trough
We looked at the clause: "but their path lay in a deep trough of land" and there was some discussion of the word "trough". I don't know what the geological terms are here, but if you think of the metaphor comparing this to a food trough used for feeding animals, a trough suggests something wider and flat-bottomed, not something V-shaped. Another thing, here switching to a water trough, is that the water is stagnant, sitting still rather than running quickly. This all fits the picture of a flat-bottomed valley with trickling water. Something like this:
I should note that the word "trough" is used two other places in Fellowship. Up on Caradhras Gandalf says "if I remember rightly, this path leaves the cliff and runs into a wide shallow trough at the bottom of a long hard slope" - again fitting the idea of a wide flat-bottomed area that provides little shelter. Later, as they are approaching Lorien, we see the Silverlode - "before them they could see the stream leaping down to the trough of the valley, and then running on and away into the lower lands" To me it has the picture of the stream running down quickly from a height, but slowing down as it reaches flatter ground below.
Perspective
Another discussion in this session was of the point of view of the narration. Is it from the ground below, or from above (Corey suggested a description drone) looking down. I've thought about this before, to me it seems that we have two hobbit-perspectives. One is of the hobbits in the moment, and from that point of view it's definitely from the bottom looking up. But the book was actually written by Frodo (and Sam, and Findegil), later, thinking back on his travels. Now, when Frodo was writing, he could put himself back into his memories from how he looked at things as they were occuring, but he could also be sort of constructing the story, for instance using maps to figure out where they must have been at different points. We know that Frodo likes maps. Back in Shadow of the Past we're told "he looked a maps, and wondered what lay beyond their edges." In Rivendell Aragorn and Gandalf "pondered the storied and figured maps and books of lore that were in the house of Elrond. Sometimes Frodo was with them". When they first see the mountains of Khazad-dum in the distance (and Gimili waxes eloquently and gives us some Dwarvish names) Pippen says he doesn't remember maps, but "Frodo has a better head for that sort of thing." A map has a bird's eye view, so Frodo the writer might be imagining the view from above as he's going back and writing his tale.
Bruce
I missed a couple of classes in December and now I'm listening back to session 283 - the end of the road, and I have a couple of thoughts. This is all from A Journey in the Dark, when the fellowship is traveling towards the entrance to Moria.
Trough
We looked at the clause: "but their path lay in a deep trough of land" and there was some discussion of the word "trough". I don't know what the geological terms are here, but if you think of the metaphor comparing this to a food trough used for feeding animals, a trough suggests something wider and flat-bottomed, not something V-shaped. Another thing, here switching to a water trough, is that the water is stagnant, sitting still rather than running quickly. This all fits the picture of a flat-bottomed valley with trickling water. Something like this:
I should note that the word "trough" is used two other places in Fellowship. Up on Caradhras Gandalf says "if I remember rightly, this path leaves the cliff and runs into a wide shallow trough at the bottom of a long hard slope" - again fitting the idea of a wide flat-bottomed area that provides little shelter. Later, as they are approaching Lorien, we see the Silverlode - "before them they could see the stream leaping down to the trough of the valley, and then running on and away into the lower lands" To me it has the picture of the stream running down quickly from a height, but slowing down as it reaches flatter ground below.
Perspective
Another discussion in this session was of the point of view of the narration. Is it from the ground below, or from above (Corey suggested a description drone) looking down. I've thought about this before, to me it seems that we have two hobbit-perspectives. One is of the hobbits in the moment, and from that point of view it's definitely from the bottom looking up. But the book was actually written by Frodo (and Sam, and Findegil), later, thinking back on his travels. Now, when Frodo was writing, he could put himself back into his memories from how he looked at things as they were occuring, but he could also be sort of constructing the story, for instance using maps to figure out where they must have been at different points. We know that Frodo likes maps. Back in Shadow of the Past we're told "he looked a maps, and wondered what lay beyond their edges." In Rivendell Aragorn and Gandalf "pondered the storied and figured maps and books of lore that were in the house of Elrond. Sometimes Frodo was with them". When they first see the mountains of Khazad-dum in the distance (and Gimili waxes eloquently and gives us some Dwarvish names) Pippen says he doesn't remember maps, but "Frodo has a better head for that sort of thing." A map has a bird's eye view, so Frodo the writer might be imagining the view from above as he's going back and writing his tale.
Bruce