Well here we are. The climactic chapter of The Lord of the Rings, and one I found very intimidating to write about. There’s no way to say all I have to say about this succinctly, so I’m just going to do a series of quotes with commentary.
So! The last stage of the Quest. The end is in sight, but hope is at an ebb. Even ever-hopeful Sam is dealing with despair - but luckily he’s a Hobbit, and as has been noted, for all their soft exteriors they have hearts of steel.
‘So that was the job I felt I had to do when I started,’ thought Sam: ‘to help Mr. Frodo to the last step and then die with him? Well, if that is the job then I must do it. But I would dearly like to see Bywater again, and Rosie Cotton and her brothers, and the Gaffer and Marigold and all. I can’t think somehow that Gandalf would have sent Mr. Frodo on this errand, if there hadn’t a’ been any hope of his ever coming back at all. Things all went wrong when he went down in Moria. I wish he hadn’t. He would have done something.’ But even as hope died in Sam, or seemed to die, it was turned to a new strength. Sam’s plain hobbit-face grew stern, almost grim, as the will hardened in him, and he felt through all his limbs a thrill, as if he was turning into some creature of stone and steel that neither despair nor weariness nor endless barren miles could subdue.
Nowhere is Sam’s acceptance that they will not be returning made more clear than when he and Frodo decide to ditch all their extra gear. Sam leaving his pans behind is just heartbreaking to read.
(Observant readers of The Blade Itself may have noted that Joe Abercrombie was telling you precisely what kind of story you were reading when, at the beginning of the book, Logan left his cookpot without a second thought, because you have to be realistic about these things.)
Frodo’s torment is at this point constant and nigh-unbearable. We get this very striking description:
‘Do you remember that bit of rabbit, Mr. Frodo?’ he said. ‘And our place under the warm bank in Captain Faramir’s country, the day I saw an oliphaunt?’ ‘No, I am afraid not, Sam,’ said Frodo. ‘At least, I know that such things happened, but I cannot see them. No taste of food, no feel of water, no sound of wind, no memory of tree or grass or flower, no image of moon or star are left to me. I am naked in the dark, Sam, and there is no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I begin to see it even with my waking eyes, and all else fades.’
The journey across Gorgoroth to the foot of the mountain is brutal - much more strikingly so then I remember from previous reads. Tolkien is once again incredibly evocative here, describing the heat, the dust, the fumes, the thirst. It’s painful to read.
Partway up the mountain, we have this moment:
Suddenly a sense of urgency which he did not understand came to Sam. It was almost as if he had been called: ‘Now, now, or it will be too late!’ He braced himself and got up. Frodo also seemed to have felt the call. He struggled to his knees. ‘I’ll crawl, Sam,’ he gasped.
We know that Eru Ilúvatar is not above putting his thumb on the scales from time to time. I assume that was him doing so here.
Much has been written about how Sauron actually had a body, unlike how he was done in the movies, and it’s true that Philippa Boyens in particular should have known better. But for those who haven’t done a close read, I can forgive it, given this passage - the closest thing we get to a glimpse of Sauron himself:
Far off the shadows of Sauron hung; but torn by some gust of wind out of the world, or else moved by some great disquiet within, the mantling clouds swirled, and for a moment drew aside; and then he saw, rising black, blacker and darker than the vast shades amid which it stood, the cruel pinnacles and iron crown of the topmost tower of Barad-dûr. One moment only it stared out, but as from some great window immeasurably high there stabbed northward a flame of red, the flicker of a piercing Eye; and then the shadows were furled again and the terrible vision was removed. The Eye was not turned to them: it was gazing north to where the Captains of the West stood at bay, and thither all its malice was now bent, as the Power moved to strike its deadly blow.
A couple of things to note about corporeal Sauron. Tolkien says explicitly several places that he has a body, for one thing. The other is that, for this brief passage, we are actually back to Frodo’s point of view. It’s the first time we’ve been there for a while, and we won’t be back again for another while. I imagine if Sam had been looking towards Barad-dûr he would have seen things differently. Frodo after all has the “benefit” of the lingering effects of the Morgul-blade he was wounded with on Weathertop, to say nothing of his intimate communion with the Ring itself. I think he was seeing a glimpse of how Sauron would appear in the wraith-world, just as he got a glimpse of Glorfindel shining with light at the Ford of Bruinen.
Gollum’s reappearance was no surprise, naturally. Everything is moving to end game, and Gollum has figured out what Frodo is trying to do. Naturally he is unwilling to let the Precious be destroyed, but his attempt to seize the Ring is defeated by the ferocity it provoked in Frodo. But as always, there is a distinct connection between the two of them:
Then suddenly, as before under the eaves of the Emyn Muil, Sam saw these two rivals with other vision. A crouching shape, scarcely more than the shadow of a living thing, a creature now wholly ruined and defeated, yet filled with a hideous lust and rage; and before it stood stern, untouchable now by pity, a figure robed in white, but at its breast it held a wheel of fire. Out of the fire there spoke a commanding voice. ‘Begone, and trouble me no more! If you touch me ever again, you shall be cast yourself into the Fire of Doom.’
So is that Frodo telling him to begone, or is it the Ring itself? I think it could be either, or both. Discuss!
And then we get this moment, after Sam tells Frodo to go ahead and he’ll keep an eye on Gollum. For the third time, Gollum finds himself at the mercy of a Ring-bearer (former and brief, in Sam’s case, but still). And the Ring-bearer, for the third time, takes the path of pity.
Sam’s hand wavered. His mind was hot with wrath and the memory of evil. It would be just to slay this treacherous, murderous creature, just and many times deserved; and also it seemed the only safe thing to do. But deep in his heart there was something that restrained him: he could not strike this thing lying in the dust, forlorn, ruinous, utterly wretched. He himself, though only for a little while, had borne the Ring, and now dimly he guessed the agony of Gollum’s shrivelled mind and body, enslaved to that Ring, unable to find peace or relief ever in life again. But Sam had no words to express what he felt.
Sauron’s reaction to Frodo claiming the Ring is another of my favorite moments in the story.
And far away, as Frodo put on the Ring and claimed it for his own, even in Sammath Naur the very heart of his realm, the Power in Barad-dûr was shaken, and the Tower trembled from its foundations to its proud and bitter crown. The Dark Lord was suddenly aware of him, and his Eye piercing all shadows looked across the plain to the door that he had made; and the magnitude of his own folly was revealed to him in a blinding flash, and all the devices of his enemies were at last laid bare. Then his wrath blazed in consuming flame, but his fear rose like a vast black smoke to choke him. For he knew his deadly peril and the thread upon which his doom now hung. From all his policies and webs of fear and treachery, from all his stratagems and wars his mind shook free; and throughout his realm a tremor ran, his slaves quailed, and his armies halted, and his captains suddenly steerless, bereft of will, wavered and despaired. For they were forgotten. The whole mind and purpose of the Power that wielded them was now bent with overwhelming force upon the Mountain. At his summons, wheeling with a rending cry, in a last desperate race there flew, faster than the winds, the Nazgûl, the Ringwraiths, and with a storm of wings they hurtled southwards to Mount Doom.
Emphasis added. Sauron is far from a fool - he just has a blind spot. The moment when that blind spot is revealed to him is done so, so well.
And with the Ring gone, and death approaching, there is still a moment of victory and joy. Above all shadows rides the Sun, and Stars forever dwell.
‘Well, this is the end, Sam Gamgee,’ said a voice by his side. And there was Frodo, pale and worn, and yet himself again; and in his eyes there was peace now, neither strain of will, nor madness, nor any fear. His burden was taken away. There was the dear master of the sweet days in the Shire. ‘Master!’ cried Sam, and fell upon his knees. In all that ruin of the world for the moment he felt only joy, great joy. The burden was gone. His master had been saved; he was himself again, he was free. ... ‘I am glad you are here with me. Here at the end of all things, Sam.’
Now for some of Tolkien’s commentary on the climax. All of this is taken from Letter #246 of The Letters of JRR Tolkien, a book I highly recommend to anyone who wants to dig deeper into Tolkien’s work. First, here’s what Tolkien had to say about the fact that Frodo failed:
Frodo indeed 'failed' as a hero, as conceived by simple minds: he did not endure to the end; he gave in, ratted. … I do not think that Frodo's was a moral failure. At the last moment the pressure of the Ring would reach its maximum – impossible, I should have said, for any one to resist, certainly after long possession, months of increasing torment, and when starved and exhausted. Frodo had done what he could and spent himself completely (as an instrument of Providence) and had produced a situation in which the object of his quest could be achieved. His humility (with which he began) and his sufferings were justly rewarded by the highest honour; and his exercise of patience and mercy towards Gollum gained him Mercy: his failure was redressed. We are finite creatures with absolute limitations upon the powers of our soul-body structure in either action or endurance. Moral failure can only be asserted, I think, when a man's effort or endurance falls short of his limits, and the blame decreases as that limit is closer approached.
And then a popular “what if” - what if Sméagol’s repentance had stuck? What if he had remained devoted to Frodo? Tolkien had this to say:
If he had, what could then have happened? The course of the entry into Mordor and the struggle to reach Mount Doom would have been different, and so would the ending. The interest would have shifted to Gollum, I think, and the battle that would have gone on between his repentance and his new love on one side and the Ring. Though the love would have been strengthened daily it could not have wrested the mastery from the Ring. I think that in some queer twisted and pitiable way Gollum would have tried (not maybe with conscious design) to satisfy both. Certainly at some point not long before the end he would have stolen the Ring or taken it by violence (as he does in the actual Tale). But ‘possession' satisfied, I think he would then have sacrificed himself for Frodo's sake and have voluntarily cast himself into the fiery abyss.
And last, another popular “what if” - what if Sméagol hadn’t been a factor, and Frodo had tried to claim the Ring in earnest?
When Sauron was aware of the seizure of the Ring his one hope was in its power: that the claimant would be unable to relinquish it until Sauron had time to deal with him. Frodo too would then probably, if not attacked, have had to take the same way: cast himself with the Ring into the abyss. If not he would of course have completely failed. It is an interesting problem: how Sauron would have acted or the claimant have resisted. Sauron sent at once the Ringwraiths. They were naturally fully instructed, and in no way deceived as to the real lordship of the Ring. The wearer would not be invisible to them, but the reverse; and the more vulnerable to their weapons. But the situation was now different to that under Weathertop, where Frodo acted merely in fear and wished only to use (in vain) the Ring's subsidiary power of conferring invisibility. He had grown since then. Would they have been immune from its power if he claimed it as an instrument of command and domination? Not wholly. I do not think they could have attacked him with violence, nor laid hold upon him or taken him captive; they would have obeyed or feigned to obey any minor commands of his that did not interfere with their errand – laid upon them by Sauron, who still through their nine rings (which he held) had primary control of their wills. That errand was to remove Frodo from the Crack. Once he lost the power or opportunity to destroy the Ring, the end could not be in doubt – saving help from outside, which was hardly even remotely possible. Frodo had become a considerable person, but of a special kind: in spiritual enlargement rather than in increase of physical or mental power; his will was much stronger than it had been, but so far it had been exercised in resisting not using the Ring and with the object of destroying it. He needed time, much time, before he could control the Ring or (which in such a case is the same) before it could control him; before his will and arrogance could grow to a stature in which he could dominate other major hostile wills. Even so for a long time his acts and commands would still have to seem 'good' to him, to be for the benefit of others beside himself. The situation as between Frodo with the Ring and the Eight (The Witch-king had been reduced to impotence) might be compared to that of a small brave man armed with a devastating weapon, faced by eight savage warriors of great strength and agility armed with poisoned blades. The man's weakness was that he did not know how to use his weapon yet; and he was by temperament and training averse to violence. Their weakness that the man's weapon was a thing that filled them with fear as an object of terror in their religious cult, by which they had been conditioned to treat one who wielded it with servility. I think they would have shown 'servility'. They would have greeted Frodo as 'Lord'. With fair speeches they would have induced him to leave the Sammath Naur – for instance 'to look upon his new kingdom, and behold afar with his new sight the abode of power that he must now claim and turn to his own purposes'. Once outside the chamber while he was gazing some of them would have destroyed the entrance. Frodo would by then probably have been already too enmeshed in great plans of reformed rule – like but far greater and wider than the vision that tempted Sam (III 177) – to heed this. But if he still preserved some sanity and partly understood the significance of it, so that he refused now to go with them to Barad-dûr, they would simply have waited. Until Sauron himself came. In any case a confrontation of Frodo and Sauron would soon have taken place, if the Ring was intact. Its result was inevitable. Frodo would have been utterly overthrown: crushed to dust, or preserved in torment as a gibbering slave. Sauron would not have feared the Ring! It was his own and under his will.
This was exhausting.