Book II, Chapter 7: The Mirror of Galadriel and Book II, Chapter 8: Farewell to Lorien
These two chapters are a wonderful respite on the journey, and really the last such moment of peace for a very, very long time, given the perils into which the Fellowship is now journeying. Much of what I have to say about these two chapters is simply a series of reflections on the Lady of Lothlorien herself, Galadriel, so that’s where I’ll go first -- and as I do, here’s a really beautiful painting of Galadriel in her treetop city of Caras Galadhon, by Sara M. Morello. http://tolkiengateway.net/w/images/a/a9/Sara_M._Morello_-_Caras_Galadhon.jpg
Galadriel is a fascinating figure, and Tolkien himself played around a lot with the details of her backstory -- I won’t do a ton with it, given how slippery it is, although I will get to it when we reach Frodo and Galadriel at the Mirror. Her first appearance, however, is really wonderful, and I want to bask in it just a little. I love her strength -- when her husband, Celeborn, learns of Gandalf’s fate, he loses it just a little, and tells them off for venturing into Moria, saying he’d never have let them into Lothlorien had he known, and commenting bitterly that Gandalf had gone from wisdom into folly, leading them “needlessly into the net of Moria." And Galadriel’s rebuke is immediate and so perfectly phrased: “He would be rash indeed that said that thing. Needless were none of the deeds of Gandalf in life.” The edge on that crisp, formal sentence, “he would be rash indeed that said that thing”, comes across like an Austen heroine. And then Galadriel moves on to talk so movingly -- of how, were they parted from Lorien for many years, how they would long to return to see it “though it had become an abode of dragons.” She turns her face directly to Gimli, poor fellow, who’s been taking abuse ever since he got to the Golden Wood, and they have that beautiful moment where she speaks this deep, heartfelt praise of Moria in the words of the Dwarven tongue, and he encounters “love and understanding” from her where he expected enmity or rebuke, and he addresses her in turn with deep, heartfelt praise. I do love the Legolas/Gimli friendship in the Jackson films, but it is very much a bromance, heavy on the BRO, grounded in their shared ability to be acrobatically lethal on the battlefield and then high five about it later. Here, it’s very evident to me that their sudden friendship, which even the narrator comments on by the end of these two chapters, is based on this moment -- on Legolas hearing this Elven queen of great antiquity treat Gimli like an old, beloved friend, and then to hear the dwarf offer Galadriel such a courtly reply with deferential awe. It’s clear that something about that encounter resets his understanding of Gimli, who he starts to escort around Lothlorien shortly thereafter. There’s a sweetness and a gentleness to their friendship in the books (that, of course, will also be shaped by battlefield experiences that lie ahead of us) that I love and had, if not forgotten, at least misplaced a little among my memories of the films’ different take on them.
I mentioned in my last post that Lothlorien is a land of bittersweet joy and goodness: isn’t it so? One of the most poetic and heartbreaking things Galadriel says is in this first encounter, when she tells the Fellowship that she has dwelt with Celeborn since long before the fall of Gondolin, “and together through the ages of the world we have fought the long defeat.” The long defeat. What a proud lament to make about the work of the Elves in Middle-earth -- that they have fought bravely and for many years, and the result of all that striving is to find themselves in the position they are in now -- teetering on the brink of defeat, with the knowledge that, as Galadriel will say later to Frodo and Sam, even if the Ring is destroyed, it will end in sorrow for Lothlorien, which will fade at last from its golden glories.
Eventually we get the second, more personal encounter with Galadriel -- Frodo and Sam are discussing Elf-magic when she shows up and offers to do some. It’s not totally clear from the text how Galadriel’s Mirror works -- is it powered by her own incredible abilities personally, or does it relate to Nenya, the Ring of Adamant, which Frodo will eventually spot on her hand? Hard to say. I like that Galadriel’s magic tends always to the same end -- that whether we look at her psychic encounters with the members of the Fellowship initially or her use of the Mirror, she’s interested in temptation, desire, and loyalty. Will each of them choose the path of honor over the path of comfort? What will Sam do if he sees Cirith Ungol and Frodo hurt paired up against Sandyman felling trees and a Shire in need of Scouring? Her conversation with Sam is powerful, I think -- she helps him see that he knew from the beginning that there were risks in taking this journey, and that he had taken them openly. It deeply wounds Sam, though, to face it -- his love for Frodo and the urgency of Frodo’s quest taking precedence over his father who might be in great need of help. She wants Sam to understand the nature of his sacrifice. That’s powerful. Frodo has a very different encounter with the Mirror, of course -- I suspect, myself, it’s because she doesn’t have the same kind of control over his experience, since as a Ringbearer himself he’s got more ability to tune the Mirror to see what he wants or hopes to see? Anyway, he doesn’t really see much of a trade-off here, other than maybe a nice image of Bilbo back in his study -- for the most part what Frodo sees intimidates him. Jackson’s film, of course, turns this into sort of a horror moment -- it can very easily feel that Galadriel has engineered the encounter to scare Frodo. But to me, this is at least a little surprising to her -- she’s clearly (again, in my reading) reacting to it rather than planning out this conversation.
Her exchange with Frodo -- the only time in his journey that he will talk openly with a Ringbearer about being one (Elrond and Gandalf, for their own reasons, I guess, never discuss this with him) -- is really powerful. I love how open she is with him about the Doom that the Ring represents to her people and their way of life, and that they nevertheless want to see him succeed. This is the long defeat, isn’t it? And Galadriel’s comment is so on target -- “For the fate of Lothlorien you are not answerable, but only for the doing of your task.” She doesn’t know it, but this echoes his conversation with Gandalf the day he realized this was his task in the first place, when Gandalf tells him that some things are not for them to decide, and that he should focus on what to do with the time that is given him. By now, he’s made that choice, and Galadriel is reminding him that he can’t unmake it just because it will have other consequences that cannot be avoided. Frodo is moved -- again, I think the book has really sold this in a way the film never does, since by now he’s seen the beauty of her lands, the depth of her love and courtesy, and now a taste of her magical powers and her understanding of the burdens of bearing them -- and offers her the Ring. Here’s where I’ll say what little I want to say about Galadriel’s background -- Galadriel was at the Kinslaying of Alqualonde. Long ago, when Morgoth and Ungoliant drained Valinor of its light and destroyed the Two Trees, some bad, bad decisions were made, and Galadriel was involved. There are different versions of the story, but here’s the one that I think is in Tolkien’s mind when he writes this scene -- Feanor and his sons swear a terrible oath to go across the water to Middle-earth and avenge themselves on Morgoth and show the Valar that the Elves are the ones in charge now. Galadriel isn’t quite as blasphemous as Feanor, but she and her brothers are excited to go make war on this evil dude, and she can’t help but be excited about the possibility of exploration and even the chance to rule her own land out there somewhere in the darkness under the stars. She’s definitely not there when Feanor and his sons decide to steal some boats to leave Valinor, and she’s definitely not there when they start killing some Teleri Elves who try to stop them -- but she shows up eventually, and (though accounts differ about the exact details) she takes part in the violence somehow, and then boards one of the ships for Middle-earth. She’s not a murderer -- in general the versions of this story involve her either being ignorant of what caused the battle (and therefore jumping in just to defend her friends) or she realizes that Feanor’s in the wrong (and actually sides with the Teleri who are being slaughtered). In the end, she is too tempted by the possibilities (and, yes, the power) that might be waiting for her in Middle-earth, and so she takes the journey anyway, in spite of the Valar being really, REALLY angry about the Kinslaying and forbidding it. So when the Doom of Mandos is pronounced, exiling all those involved from Valinor, she is one of the Elves on whom that Doom falls. She was cast out of Middle-earth’s blessed realm, in other words, and she would not be welcome back without repenting.
That’s the subtext of this incredible scene between her and Frodo -- I love her gentle laughter, as she acknowledges that for once the tables are turned, and Frodo is testing her as she is accustomed to testing others, Frodo included. Her heart swells, and she is caught up in this terrible vision -- Galadriel, the Dark Queen, dreadful as the storm, stronger than the foundations of the earth. She recognizes in that moment that she could indeed wield the Ring -- that she could shatter Barad-dur and rule Middle-earth from Lorien, and be powerful beyond her wildest dreams. This is the desire that drew her out of Valinor, and that has held her here in exile for millennia. And then that temptation passes, and she laughs, saying that she has passed the test -- she will “diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.” In that moment, she recognizes that there are only two paths for her -- to become Sauron, and prove the Valar right to have exiled her. Or to accept that she is not “Queen of Lorien Forever” but rather a “slender elf-woman, clad in simple white” who will return to her childhood home in the West beyond the Sea because she understands now the folly of the ambition that led her away. The rejection of the One Ring is therefore a turning point in her life, and one she has long waited to see and understand -- and she says almost immediately to Frodo that he must go the next morning, “for now we have chosen and the tides of fate are flowing”. Lothlorien will come to an end because of this meeting -- because Galadriel has chosen the same fate that Frodo did, to see an end to what she might have sought for herself, for the sake of others. It’s a moving moment.
The chapter that follows is less eventful -- it is fun to see all these gifts handed over, knowing how much foreshadowing is happening here (and looking forward a little excitedly to the scenes in which these things will figure). Even something as simple as the elven cloaks with their clasps will play a role ahead, of course. The most moving of the exchanges here are Galadriel and Gimli, again -- his courteous praise seeming to be, at first, a show of Dwarven gallantry, but then when she presses him, he reveals that this is not some practiced rhetoric of a Dwarf prince praising her, it is simply his unabashed admiration for her that nearly ties his tongue. He asks for a gift that I can’t call anything but intimate, even though that word often carries sexual connotations and there’s no hint of that here -- he simply is acknowledging to her, as he will say more directly to Legolas later on the boat, that he will never look again on anything that so moves him out of beauty. Again, I think it’s really crucial to see Legolas and Gimli’s friendship as forged completely here in Lorien, away from any kind of martial prowess from either fellow, thanks to Gimli’s openness in expressing his awestruck wonder at this place and the woman who tends it.
There’s darkness ahead of us, of course -- Celeborn has prepped us, since it’s clear that the Fellowship will have to choose a river bank soon, and Boromir and Frodo will almost certainly need to make opposite choices. The weight of all this on Aragorn is maybe heaviest -- Frodo is worried, but in the end he knows he will just need to make the best choice for the Ring’s journey to Orodruin. Aragorn, though, is caught between feeling the need to fill Gandalf’s boots and act as Frodo’s guide, and his sense that Boromir’s dream (or maybe Faramir’s dream) is a summons to him, to bring the reforged Anduril to Minas Tirith where his crownless head will accept its destiny as King. I wish there was a little more about how the other members of the Fellowship are handling this conflict -- I know Legolas and Gimli are buds now, but how are they thinking about these things? Are Merry and Pippin engaged in these conversations much, and if not, why do they think they came on this quest -- they’ve been a little bit sidelined ever since Weathertop, and it’s a shame, since I think both of them have personalities that are fun to see at work. I’m curious to see how much detail the book can give me, since there’s only a couple of chapters left here before everything falls apart.
For now, though, we’ll keep floating down The Great River in Book II, Chapter 9.