Book III, Chapter 2: The Riders of Rohan
The incredible physical accomplishment of this chapter -- the race of the Three Hunters across the East Emnet and the West Emnet -- is if anything understated. I mean, Eomer’s eyes widen at their feat, and nicknames Aragorn “Wingfoot”, saying “Hardy is the race of Elendil!” But I still don’t think it really captures the magnitude of what they manage in a single chapter here: distances are a little tricky to measure in Middle Earth, but my best estimate is that between the 45 leagues that Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli manage on foot, and the added distance they ride aboard Hasufel and Arod all the way to the outskirts of Fangorn, the three of them travel almost as far in this one chapter as Frodo and Sam will over the course of ten chapters in the last half of this book. The running portion of the journey is by far the most impressive -- the three of them manage to carry their sturdily-built dead companion, Boromir, a good mile to the Anduin, and then paddle him out to Rauros, and then sprint roughly five marathons over the following three days, carrying heavy gear, while tracking enemies over difficult ground. This establishes a couple of things for us, I think -- one is the incredible devotion these three fellows have to their friends. They spend most of the journey uncertain whether one or both of the hobbits are still alive, and yet they completely refuse to give up the chase. The other is the incredible skill they’re putting on display here -- we haven’t seen them in action much so far, but they’ve got some serious fighting to do in the chapters ahead, and it’s no bad thing for Tolkien to remind us how superhuman they are.
The key encounter in this chapter is of course their run-in with the Riders of Rohan, depicted really nicely here by Ted Nasmith, whose stuff I generally don’t love: http://tolkiengateway.net/w/images/a/a6/Ted_Nasmith_-_The_Riders_of_Rohan.jpg The danger in this encounter is a very effective way to heighten the tensions for a reader -- especially for a first-time reader who knows almost nothing about Rohan, other than that there were rumors they paid tribute to Sauron. The thundering circle of horses, followed by the glittering display of spears aimed at the three of them, and then Eomer coming forward and drawing his sword, all ramp up the sense that this may be life or death for our heroes. Eomer steps wrong, of course, almost immediately, talking a little smack about Lothlorien and Galadriel, and hoo brother, that’s a bad move in front of Gimli son of Gloin. I do love, of course, that when the Lady of Lorien is insulted, it’s a Dwarf of all people who springs to her defense -- that must have puzzled the heck out of the Rohirrim, who would know as well as anybody in Middle Earth how famously the Elves and Dwarves do not get along. Legolas, of course, is absolutely on board with Gimli upping the ante here -- I find their solidarity really sweet: potentially lethal, but sweet. Luckily Aragorn is willing to step into harm’s way to get them to chill the eff out, and to convince Eomer to de-escalate a little, himself.
Aragorn’s really in fine form, here -- I love the moment where he asserts for the first time his kingship, to impress upon Eomer who he is and by what authority he acts. He drops about six nicknames, half of them in foreign languages, while brandishing the most impressive weapon these guys have ever seen, and then drops the hammer on Eomer with “will you aid me or thwart me? Choose swiftly!” He’s lucky that Eomer responds to this kind of display, which definitely could have backfired had the swift choice gone the other way. Aragorn is aided by something like magic -- we can’t call it that, precisely, but what really explains how his stature seems to grow, and how a wispy crown of light seems to appear on his head? He’s certainly tapping into a kind of authority that Eomer wouldn’t have, no matter how boldly he asserted himself. The Riders are a really nice reset button for us that reminds us how remarkable these three guys really are -- we’ve gotten so accustomed to them that it’s easy to forget how wild this combination is. The heir to the throne of Gondor is traveling alone in the wilds with the Elvish Prince of Mirkwood and a noble Dwarf from Erebor -- folk of these three races basically never travel together, and Aragorn in particular might as well be a myth, as are the two strange “hobbit” creatures they’re going to rescue. Granted, this is Middle-earth, but this is a little like me walking through the park and suddenly meeting King Arthur and a leprechaun who are trying to find their two missing Sasquatch friends. It’s fun, though, to see the exchange that results, with Eothain scoffing at the mention of legendary creatures like halflings, and to have Aragorn reply to the question of whether we’re dealing with legends or walking the green earth in the daylight by saying “A man may do both. . . . The green earth, say you? That is a mighty matter of legend, though you walk it under the light of day!” It’s a nice reinforcement, I think, that even though Aragorn is starting to tap into his destiny and his royal identity, he still recognizes that he’s not a legend right now -- he’s just a man. He’s got to do his part now, and leave legend-making for whomever comes after them. It’s also a lovely little bit of foreshadowing that the green things of the earth are about to rise out of legend and go nuts, Birnam Wood style, but even Aragorn doesn’t pick up on that in his own words -- it’s just a bit of fun for the narrator.
Another of LOTR’s Greatest Hits is the dialogue exchange between Aragorn and Eomer -- it’s a good set of lines to quote on a t-shirt, but it’s important for character reasons to them both. Eomer famously asks, “How shall a man judge what to do in such times?” This is, of course, yet another revisiting of Frodo’s exchange with Gandalf in the study at Bag End -- if Tolkien poses one question to us relentlessly, I think it must be this one. A centrally important question in the dark hours of the 20th Century he was living through, and relevant to us also, I think, in this dark hour. Aragorn’s reply is similarly in harmony with Gandalf’s comments to Frodo, even if there’s some important and nuanced differences here: “As he ever has judged . . . good and evil have not changed since yesteryear; nor are they one thing among Elves and Dwarves and another among Men. It is a man’s part to discern them, as much in the Golden Wood as in his own house.” My interest here is to unpack what’s distinctive about Aragorn’s advice from Gandalf’s -- both men, of course, are emphasizing to the younger guy asking for advice that this is basically your choice and not theirs, so figure it out yourself. Aragorn, though, introduces the idea of “good and evil” as the options that all are caught between -- we could see this as a sort of rejection of moral relativism, I think (and it might be that), but to me the more compelling point here is simply a reminder to Eomer that your decisions shouldn’t be easily distracted by changing times, or even weird circumstances (like a legendary king showing up in the middle of the wilderness, hunting orcs). If you know the difference between right and wrong, weal and woe, doing good and doing harm, then you can keep your attention fixed on how to accomplish those things. And anyway, Aragorn admits that this isn’t as easy as “do the right thing” -- there’s a discernment element here. A man has to think seriously about things in order to know what good is, in this time. His choice of examples, though, is not accidental, I think -- he says a man must discern in the Golden Wood and in his own home. These are two centrally important locations for Aragorn -- in the Golden Wood, we know that Aragorn made some fateful decisions for his life, including his betrothal. And most recently, he made the choice not to make a choice -- to get boats and go downriver as far as he could before having to pick which bank of the Anduin to take. This was an attempt to avoid having to discern truth until forced to -- and as a result, he delayed so long that evil was introduced into his own company by one of his trusted companions, and the group shattered with consequences he is still trying to undo. As for his own home, Aragorn is a famously homeless character -- never quite at home in Rivendell, despite having been raised there, never really at home in the different human communities in the North that he’s been living in. He alludes to Eomer of a past time in Rohan -- truthfully, Aragorn spent his 30s and 40s (he is, for those who’ve never done the math, in his late 80s during the events of The Lord of the Rings) traveling in Rohan and Gondor, making a name for himself (under yet another pseudonym, of course), and it seems he never found a place to call home then, either. His slow, wayward journey to Gondor now is one last attempt, really, to find a place he can call his own house -- if he’s successful, discernment from that place, the throne room at Minas Tirith, will be crucially important. So is he advising young Eomer? Sure he is. But he’s also speaking to Aragorn son of Arathorn. It takes time to learn how to lead.
Good discernment from both men is key to the chapter’s outcomes. First Eomer, who risks exile or death by letting them go, lets them go -- speeds them, even, with the loan of two horses. He may not fully understand Aragorn, or what could really explain this strange assemblage of creatures who have apparently passed along the borders of, and now within the borders of, his land. But he recognizes the difference between Good and Evil here -- between enforcing an unjust law, and the higher calling laid on someone whose friends are in peril of their lives -- and he chooses wisely. In doing so, he lives up to Aragorn’s description of the Rohirrim -- “true-hearted, generous in thought and deed, bold but not cruel”. And then Aragorn is able to come up with multiple good insights once they reach the edge of Fangorn forest -- chief among them the decision to linger there at nightfall, rather than depart, since he believes there’s something more to get out of that place, and the decision to be very strict about not angering the trees by harming any living branch or leaf. The forest, of course, has a huge role to play in the coming chapters -- Aragorn has no way of knowing it, but even as he’s giving that instruction to Gimli, deep within Fangorn a gathering of folk is taking place, a long, careful, not overly hasty conversation which might easily have gone another way had they been needlessly provoked by a careless axe-swing or two.
There’s a little more that I could say here -- I haven’t talked yet about the dialogues between the Three Hunters, which I think are very revealing (especially the arguments about whether to sleep at night or not -- I think there’s some real metaphor stuff happening there between Legolas and the others), and there’s one comment of Eomer’s that I find fascinating, since Gandalf has told us back in Rivendell that Theoden GAVE him Shadowfax, but Eomer’s version of the story makes it seem really clear that Gandalf TOOK Shadowfax, and the parallels to the two versions of Bilbo’s story of acquiring the Ring seem really weird to me. Like, is that intentional? But if so, what does that mean? I have no idea, but I will ponder it -- and in the meantime, I will turn my attention tomorrow to Saruman’s gruesome servants, The Uruk-hai, in Book III, Chapter 3.