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I just haven't had the proper ... I don't know ... inspiration to post in this thread lately. I just want to say though, that your explanations and answer to my questions were very clear and illuminative, Semprini.

I do hope to get back to this thread sometime ...

Bombadil! Bombadil! Bombadil!

Melkor!

Bombadil!

Orcs!Trolls!

Bombadil!

Goldberry Lass...

Bombadil!

Old Man Willow!

Bombadil.

There can never be enough Bombadil.â„¢

BrianIs AtYou

Surreal!

That reminds me of John Malkovitch going through his own portal.

Jn

I've been thinking about the following angle on Tom, if you'll indulge me on it. This has been touched on several times here, but perhaps not directly:

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he is a symbolic embodiment of the exuberance of the natural world

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Is Tom merely intended to embody nature?

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Tom embodies the natural world

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If Tom represents Nature, then he is a bit silly and unromantic, perhaps, to our minds.

Does Nature itself actually need an "embodiment" (or a personification)? Wouldn't that better be, say, a tree (an Ent?). If Tom really represents "Nature", then that implies that Mankind must be considered an intrinsic part of Nature, I think (this may be what everyone has been assuming all along, in which case my point is rather moot ). Tom did not live in the wild Forest, he lived at the boundary between forest and the cultivated Down. He himself farmed plants and animals, and while no doubt being vegetarian, he "controlled" nature to his own ends, both in the sense of carving out his own little homestead, and in "taming" the River-daughter to be his bride.

Not that Tom represents a farmer. In fact, Tolkien refers to him as being like botany and zoology, as opposed to husbandry (Letters #144). He is not "Nature", nor master of it... but he is about Nature, perhaps as Unfallen Man was supposed to be..?

Wilko ---

First a and a at seeing you here ...

To me Tom represents not nature but a way of living within nature. Tom shows us a way of living in relation to nature. The reason Tom seems to embody nature is that his way of living in nature is to almost melt into it, to become a part of it.

Mankind can live as if it is not an intrinsic part of nature, of course. At one extreme you have Sauron and those who follow him ... they obliterate nature, and certainly attempt to act outside of nature. I think we can consider Tom the other end of the extreme, completely acting within nature. As Semprini says Tom knows exactly who he is and how he fits into the world. This is not something men have, this ability to know exactly who we are, so we cannot fit perfectly into nature as Tom does. What you call control of nature I would call rather a perfect harmony with nature ... though I suppose it could be argued that there are times he "controls".

I don't think Tom's way of living is an ideal we should strive to match either. We would lose something of our true identity that way. I think in many ways Gandalf is the better example for mankind ... and Frodo of course. And Sam, in his way. There are no easy answers in LOTR, which makes it so wonderful.

Tom as unfallen man ... I wouldn't say he is exactly that, but something to think about for certain ...

<catches breath>

I saw Wilko's name on the outside of the forum, popped inside and found a new post by Farmond, went immediately to make a sandwich because nothing is better than eating and reading two great posters.

(Especially when they're writing about Bombadil)

_________

The paradox of control and harmony is resolved when one realizes that where Nature is concerned, control arises from obedience.

(I hate to keep paraphrasing Carse but his words fiut Bombadil so well. I have read more than one book in my life; it's just that most of them ended up being irrelevant)

Funny how we use the word "harmony" in so many different ways. You were the one, Faramond, who talked about Pullman's Bells, and the echoes within us of one another ... there's 'harmony' when the sound waves coincide and disharmony when they collide. Control can also be harmonious when it is completely reponsive, waiting for the right time and the right place so that force is not needed. The waves fit together with one another.

One friend of mine offered this analogy: watch a flock of birds circling and wheeling. It appears chaotic but they never run into each other.

But we need to think about control differently to understand this kind of harmony - usually we do think of control in connection with prediction and manipulation and necessary force - but sometimes the greatest control is achieved by doing nothing. Just responding when the space appears.

(MariaHobbit posted from the I Ching earlier, which made me thing about this - the power of doing nothing.)

Jn

Well said, both of you!

*crawls back into hole*

* sends a Chantico down the hole for V *

Wilko!!!!!


Great posts and much food for thought.

I sat down several weeks ago to write my own responses to Tom’s character, quite certain that I knew what I wanted to say, quite sure of what Bombadil means to me. But putting my thoughts into words has proved to be rather more difficult than I anticipated, because, I realize, my feelings about old Tom continue to ebb and flow and evolve with each reading of LOTR, as well as with each discussion I have with others (most especially the others here) about the beautifully complex and powerful nature of Tolkien’s world that can, it seems, be constantly rediscovered as something totally unexpected, or newly recognized as a slightly different expression on an otherwise deeply familiar face. The Tom I “knewâ€

Athrabeth,

Nothing in the past five days brought tears to my eyes, but your post did.

It has happened a few times, that in a moment of crisis or chaos, on our two shared messageboards or in real life, a poster spoke words that were like the star Sam saw shining above Morder.

"The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him."

Your words above are among them.

Jn

You speak for me as well, Jn.

Ath, there is much more that I could say, but I know that you know.

Ath,

That post made me physically ache for its loveliness...having allowed eighteen months to elapse since I last looked at any of Tolkien's works, it had slipped from my consciousness that most of us on this board hold in common a love of something so beautiful.

The eloquence of your writing as well! To quote the full paragraph that moved me most...

Eä’s first form is pure music, its first physical manifestation is as a “light, as it were a cloud with a living heart of flameâ€

*is blushing, but is also so very glad and honored to be in such company*

Awesome post Ath. I mean that sincerely and in the truest form of the word. I am in awe of that post. You've opened a new door to me. None of the arguments about Tom have ever convinced me that he was anything but a misplaced oddity. But Goldberry... now you have struck to the heart of the matter. I have to read that chapter again.

Bravo.

Oh, my goodness, Athrabeth.



Just one of the most beautiful, moving and spiritual posts ever.

[quote="Athrabeth"]Light and song and water: these elements are repeatedly used throughout LOTR and The Silmarillion. It seems that in our discussions in Teremia’s LOTR thread at TORC and the Sil thread here, we have returned time and again to matters related to the nature and meaning of light and music and song, and the power that is inherent in them. And quietly winding themselves through those discussions, perhaps more subtly, yet somehow ever present, are Tolkien’s “watersâ€

Faramond wrote:

First a and a at seeing you here ...

Well I made a similar post over on TORC with no response, maybe because it's a bit too vague and metaphysical for that forum; and there was this wonderful Bombadil thread here .

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Tom shows us a way of living in relation to nature.

Yes, that is what I was driving at. But also the inverse, Tom shows how Nature may need *us*. We are still using terms which imply differentiation between Man and Nature, but Tom is a part of "the countryside" (woods and fields), he is not within a wild Nature that can stand apart from human life.

The Sil provides a picture of the "natural" world as arising from the the Music of the Ainur, and Elves and Men as an addition direct from Eru which the Ainur had no hand in - however, the OT perhaps isn't quite so clear on the distinction between what God made on the sixth day, and on the previous five?

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What you call control of nature I would call rather a perfect harmony with nature ... though I suppose it could be argued that there are times he "controls".

Anthy beautifully pointed out the harmony between Tom and Goldberry (they seemed to weave a single dance, neither hindering the other, in and out of the room, and round about the table ...). There is a bit of control there too, in TAOTB at least:

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He caught her, held her fast! Water-rats went scuttering
reeds hissed, herons cried, and her heart was fluttering.
Said Tom Bombadil: 'Here's my pretty maiden!
You shall come home with me! The table is all laden:
yellow cream, honeycomb, white bread and butter;
roses at the window-sill and peeping round the shutter.
You shall come under Hill! Never mind your mother
in her deep weedy pool: there you'll find no lover!'

I put control within " ", as it's not quite the right term, "Control and harmony" is indeed better. He is the Master, but he doesn't rule. His latent power derives from his Song, his knowledge of the true language - language being what principally separates "men", including the Quendi "the speakers", from "nature". At least, that is one way of seeing the difference, I don't think that the lines are quite that clear.

Beautiful post Athrabeth. Beautifully written (as usual).

Yes, water is where Tolkien's imagination dwells.

Gulp!
I don't come here often enough. I have just read Athrabeth's moving revelations of Tolkien's symbolism written in the most gracious manner. Thank you deeply Ath. And we get to see Wilko too!
I have thought that the incongruous and faintly ridiculous way he sings and capers is because that is the way he would reveal his spirit to hobbits, that is the way they would interpret him, much as Gandalf is seen in the Shire as a conjuror and firework specialist. That he has deeper significance has been shown by our most perceptive friends here.

I would like to add that Bombadil is one more way that Tolkien personalises the landscape. Many of us enjoy the way the landscapes are a part of the story; I sometimes read LOTR as a walking account and try to ignore the adventure! We have Aragorn's reproach to Eomer about the very earth being a subject of mighty legend, of the malice of Caradhras, of the parched Ephel Duath graced by a tiny spring, of the power within areas such as Rivendell, Lothlorien and even the Shire. Bombadil is one more part that strengthens that whole concept.