Book IV, Chapter 1: The Taming of Smeagol
The turning of my journey from Book III to Book IV is a real tonal shift -- away from the tumult of new characters and urgent military action of III and into the deep character relationships of IV -- particularly every dynamic within the trio of Ringbearers (all of them will carry the Ring, if only briefly, before the end). Frodo-Sam is a really rich relationship to explore, but so is Frodo-Smeagol, and there’s plenty of complexity even to something as simple as the Sam-Gollum dyad. These relationships develop over time, of course, and I’m excited to watch that happen.
The relationships will unfold here in the forbidding landscape of the Emyn Muil, which is really vividly realized, I think, in this painting by Felix Sotomayor: http://tolkiengateway.net/w/images/d/de/Felix_Sotomayor_-_Emyn_Muil.jpg The Emyn Muil is, of course, where we were back at the end of Book II -- the Three Hunters clambered through the western foothills of the Emyn Muil in pursuit of Merry and Pippin, and it sure seems like they got the easy end of the geological feature. Frodo and Sam have been so stymied by the landscape that somehow three days have evaporated before we even return to them, and yet they’ve gotten nearly nowhere -- by this moment, three days into their journey from Rauros (as the narrator helpfully informs us), the Three Hunters have pursued the Uruk-hai more than half-way across the rolling grasslands of Rohan and, if I’ve kept track of my days and nights correctly, Peregrin and Meriadoc have already met Treebeard in Fangorn Forest. We need that setup, I think, given the end of the Frodo-Sam relationship Tolkien wants to drop us into.
That end is the testy end -- in this chapter, we finally see Frodo and Sam just a little raw with each other. They’re certainly still civil enough with each other to avoid getting asked to leave a dance in a Jane Austen novel, but given what we’ve seen from them -- Frodo’s protectiveness of his sheltered servant and friend, Sam’s defensiveness and loyalty to Frodo bordering on idolatry -- seeing them squabble with each other like, well, like the people they are right now, underfed hikers who both regret a little setting out on this trek underequipped and who cannot work out whether there’s even a trail here like the guide said. The argument about the rope is maybe the easiest place to see it -- Frodo insisting in rather plodding fashion that it must have been a bad knot or a fraying, while Sam, in righteously indignant defense of the handwork of Galadriel, the workmanship of Samwise Gamgee, and (certainly not least of all) the gifted pedagogy of Uncle Andy, swears that this rope is nigh unto sentient. Anyone who’s been on a hike that lasted at least a half an hour too long can identify with one side or the other of “hey dude, your knot nearly killed me, man, maybe tie another half-hitch next time” and “hey dingus, my knot was perfect, maybe you weren’t listening closely enough, DAVE, THIS IS REALLY GOOD ROPE”. (My apologies to the Daves I have known. All but two of them.)
Most of the rest of this chapter is about, well, what the chapter title promises -- the taming of Smeagol. And I think the most interesting element in that sequence of events is the way Frodo chooses to react to Smeagol, since it sets the tone for the interactions to come. Here I want to praise something I think the Jackson films get really right about this relationship, and chide those films for something I think they fumble pretty needlessly. It’s always nicer to start with a little praise, so let’s do that.
The place Peter (and maybe more plausibly his writing collaborators, Fran and Phillippa) seem to have located the essential relationship between these two characters is that moment right after Smeagol is subdued, in which Frodo remembers the words of Gandalf, and says aloud to Sam (in Smeagol’s hearing) that he pities the creature before him. Now, Smeagol’s wretchedness is obviously pitiable -- even Sam probably finds it so. But why does it provoke a deeper compassion in Frodo than in Sam? Whether it’s in the writing or the direction, or just Elijah Wood’s instincts as an actor, it’s really clear in the films that Frodo sees himself in Smeagol, and I think that element is clearly here in the novel also. Frodo knows by now what it means to carry the Ring, and to be burdened by it -- he’s even had that glimpse at Rivendell of how the Ring warped his beloved Bilbo -- and so how much would it weigh on him to look at this poor thing who bore that weight for centuries? Hearing Gandalf’s words in his head won’t just reinforce Gandalf’s commentary on the importance of mercy -- it will also remind him that he didn’t possess the Ring for even an instant without the watchful advice and support of Gandalf, whose wisdom and beneficence were turned towards him in exactly the right measures to keep him safe. What would he have been had the Ring come to him without that framework, and that kind of loving protection? If not Gollum, then surely a creature like him -- kinder, perhaps, and not as slinking, but no less withered or desperate once deprived of the Ring by unhappy chance. This is the kind of insight that serves as the best argument for mercy most of the time, I think -- most of us recognize in the failures of others the pathways we might have taken (or even those paths we did take, once, and lived to regret). Smeagol was, as Gandalf once told us, always a bit of a thief and a cheat, maybe even violently so. But he also lacked so many of the privileges that protected Frodo. I like exploring those feelings in this pairing, and I’m really pleased that the films make them so evident.
What’s so disappointing, then, is that the films fumble the even more obvious element in this relationship -- the strength and power exerted by Frodo, who understands the situation very well, and knows what must be done to keep Smeagol on the narrow way forward. The films make Frodo into such a suffering martyr that I think often Elijah feels like a dandelion seed, borne into the next scene only by some fortunate breeze (and the relentless drive of Sean Astin’s performance as Samwise). We lose so much of the moments evident here, I think -- the quiet stern voice that addresses Smeagol as though he can see right through him (and maybe Frodo can). That same empathy that moves Frodo to pity Smeagol allows him to reach into Smeagol’s perspective and speak to both the better angels of Smeagol’s nature and to the most frightened and easily directed voices in Smeagol’s head. When Smeagol foolishly offers to swear on “the Precious”, Frodo is indignant and severe -- like a king who cannot believe a peasant has been vulgar enough as to remind him of their shared need of the restroom or something. But I think we see his sly smile -- all right, Gollum, you want to swear by the Precious, you go right ahead, but have a care. The strength in Frodo as he exacts the oath without bringing the Ring out -- because “it is before you” as he tells Smeagol -- is like iron: Sam’s perception is that Frodo is “a tall stern shadow, a mighty lord who hid his brightness in a grey cloud”. It’s too easy to see such a moment as ‘the Ring acting through Frodo’ or something like it -- just look at how the scene unfolds. There’s no sense that Frodo has been possessed somehow or feels himself out of control. He’s not horrified later by how he’s acted, as though these moments are some kind of dissociation. Frodo has learned how to be the Ringbearer -- this is part of the job. He’s tougher than we often want to give him credit for being. He’s not just a nice guy: a nice guy would have died out here in the Emyn Muil somewhere. He’s got the determination we can see in Sam all the way through this journey. We just have to learn to see it in Frodo, since the constant chronic strain he feels under the Ring’s influence acts as a lens to bend and shape how and where we can see that strength.
We’ll see it in spades on the road ahead, I think, as I tackle the next two chapters in tandem (since I think they build on each other), following our heroes through The Passage of the Marshes, only to find that The Black Gate is Closed in Book IV, Chapters 2 and 3.