In the novel The Children of Hurin by J.R.R.Tolkien, the main theme is the “sorrowful consequences of war”. These consequences are depicted through the betrayal of allies, loss of friends and relatives, and death of their friends. This novel reveals a tragical life of Turin, Son of Hurin, who lost his father in a battle of “Nirnaeth Arnoediad” (Tolkien,56), The Battle of Unnumbered Tears, lost his mother and sister due to the departure to elves’ castle Menegroth, lost his friends due to the slayer of them, and in the end killed himself because he could not bear the guilt and sorrow of his deeds. Thus, all this evidence portrays that the theme of this novel is the sorrowful consequences of war between powers of Morgoth, “Elder King” (Valar-God) (64) and armies of elves and men.
The tragical story of Turin Turambar and his family starts with the capture of his father Hurin. After the defeat in Nirnaeth Arnoediad, powers of Morgoth captured Hurin and brought him to the fortress of Morgoth, Angband, “Therefore the Orcs grappled Hurin with their arms; and ever their numbers were renewed, till he fell buried beneath them. Then Gothmog (orc captain) bound him and dragged him to Angband with mockery” (60). After the arrival to Angband, Hurin mocks Morgoth, “Blind you are, Morogth Bauglir (The Constrainer), and blind shall ever be, seeing only the dark” (62). Morgoth becomes infuriated because of this and curses the kin of Hurin, “But upon all whom you love my though shall weight as cloud of Doom, and it shall bring them into darkness and despair. Wherever they go, evil shall arise. Whenever they speak, their words shall bring ill counsel. Whatsoever they do shall turn against them. They shall die without hope, cursing both life and deat...
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...ism, in this novel, is reflected through the stone throne in which Morgoth sets Hurin as a punishment for his mockery, “He (Morgoth) set him (Hurin) in a chair of stone upon a high place of Thangorodrim (Mountains of Tyranny), from which he could see afar the land of Hithlum in the west and lands of Beleriand in south. Morgoth standing beside him cursed him again and set his power upon him, so that he could not move from the place, nor die, until Morgoth should release him” (65). Hence, stone throne portrays sorrow, suffer, torment, torture, pain, and inescapable agony. The stone throne also symbolizes punishment which one receives if he or she defies God. Thus, J.R.R.Tolkien uses symbolism of throne in this novel in order to show that one should not defy God or he will be punished and to show that one’s wrongdoings will lead to his eternal and inevitable suffering.
In the text the narrator is celebrating the brotherhood of his fallen comrades and the enjoyment he felt when they were all gathered in the great rooms of the palaces of their Kings. This ideology is a celebration of the Germanic culture and gives great insight to the reader of a period of time that is lost to history. The narrator is living in the glory of a culture that has passed him by and he is yearning for it. Particularly in the “Lament of the Last Survivor” (Beowulf 2242-2270) the narrator is questioning what remains for him since all that he has known and loved is now gone: “I am left with nobody to bear a sword”(2252). This is an example of Ubi sunt verse; the narrator is reflecting and floundering in his grief of all that he has lost. He is not complaining about the loss of acquaintances that did things for him or kept him entertained. These men were a part of the core of his self and identity. They held a bond that would take them through life and battles. When they were taken from him, a piece of his soul was ripped from the flesh of his heart and he was made to wonder what would become of his life now that he was missing such an intricate part of his existence. The lament “pillage and slaughter have emptied the earth of entire people’s” (2265) represents the emptiness he feels and while the definition of Ubi sunt is not explicit, it is assumed by the longing and desire felt by the
It will be the contention of this paper that much of Tolkien's unique vision was directly shaped by recurring images in the Catholic culture which shaped JRRT, and which are not shared by non-Catholics generally. The expression of these images in Lord of the Rings will then concern us.
Before entering the battle, Theoden becomes preoccupied with the rays of sunlight breaking through Sauron’s clouds. Gazing at this particular view initiated Theoden to strike hope into his soldiers as he claimed, “A sword day...a red day...ere the sun rises!”, Within that statement, parallelism is utilized to enhance his powerful tone as he proclaims the significance of this battle and how this day was especially important in ensuring the safety of the human race against Sauron and his army. This vigorous tone is also demonstrated through the development of alliteration, especially when Theoden states, “Spears shall be shaken, shields shall be splintered!” Theoden’s dynamic tone is amplified within this particular statement as it exemplifies how his soldiers will inflict damage to the enemy while they battle. The phrase in itself works to initiate motivation and dignity within the soldiers, thus allowing them to defend the last hope for human life. The dynamic tone, supported by parallelism and alliteration, was thoroughly instilled within this brief speech in order to invigorate optimism towards the
The Trojan War veterans of The Odyssey succeeded in defeating their enemies on the battlefield. The end of combat did not mean relief from burdens for them. War is cruel, but in it these men see a glory they cannot find outside. Achilleus’ death in war is treated with ceremony and respect. Agamemnon, having survived that same war, dies a pitiful death and Klytaimestra “was so hard that her hands would not/ press shut [his] eyes and mouth though [he] was going to Hades” (XI, 425-426). Dying at home meant being denied even simple acts of dignity. Reflecting back on it Hades, Agamemnon characterizes the veteran’s struggles when he asks, “What pleasure was there for me when I had wound up the fighting?” (XXIV, 95).
Benjamin Franklin once said, “Idleness and pride tax with a heavier hand than Kings and Governments.” The same can be said about the pride of the major characters in the epic story “The Saga of the Volsungs” (translated by Jesse L. Byock). Every prominent figure from Sigi, to the last sons of Gudrun, suffers from his/her own pride. Pride causes a rippling effect that leads to jealousy, betrayal, and revenge throughout the epic. A hero’s own excessive pride leads to his own jealousy if challenged or leads to the jealousy of others who do not have as much wealth and power. Pride causes some characters to betray oaths, husbands, wives, and even other family members. When pride finishes driving jealousy and betrayal, pride then fuels the lust for revenge. As a part of their very culture, the people of Norse stories must seek out vengeance and/or wergild for broken oaths and killed family members as a matter of what? Pride. Envy, betrayal, and vengeance may be the driving factors behind the great epic: “The Saga of the Volsungs,” but where those three themes begin? What about the Norse culture makes these three sins so common and easily brought about? Pride. Pride is the catalyst for the three major themes of the story and the catalyst that leads to the end of the Volsungs.
In contrast with Beowulf’s concrete depictions of good versus evil, The Odyssey focuses more on the gray areas of punishment and revenge. A main theme throughout the poe...
Kingship in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Ringsand Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings." Tolkien Studies 6.1 (2009): 71-90. Project MUSE. Web. 30 Nov. 2013. .
Frodo’s experiences are universal to humankind. For some, a fight against your own evil that tries to bring you down can relate to both Frodo and the humankind. Facing challenges and tasks that you may not w...
In Tolkien’s lecture, “Beowulf: The monsters and the Critics,” he argues that Beowulf has been over analyzed for its historical content, and it is not being studied as a piece of art as it should be. He discusses what he perceives the poet of Beowulf intended to do, and why he wrote the poem the way he did. Tolkien’s main proposition, “it was plainly only in the consideration of Beowulf as a poem, with an inherent poetic significance, that any view or conviction can be reached or steadily held” (Tolkien). He evaluates why the author centers the monsters throughout the entire poem, why the poem has a non-harmonic structure, why and how the author fusses together Christianity and Paganism, and how the author uses time to make his fictional poem seem real. He also discusses the overall theme of Beowulf and other assumptions of the text. To support his viewpoints, Tolkien uses quotations and examples from the poem, quotations from other critics, and compares Beowulf to other works of art. Tolkien discusses several statements in interpreting Beowulf as a poem.
The relationships between parents and their sons in the Iliad are not relationships we expect to see in today’s society. The Iliad portrays the relationships between fathers and sons as something more than just physical and emotional. It is based on pride and respect for one another. The expectations of their son are more so to pass on their fathers reputable name and to follow in their father’s footsteps of being noble warriors. These relationships are the driving forces in the Iliad, making each son in the Iliad identifiable first by their father’s name. An outcome of the father–son relationships is ancestral loyalty among the characters which play a prominent role in war. Therefore, not only does the Iliad share a major war story, but the strong relationships among fathers and sons, ancestral loyalty among characters, and relationships between mothers and sons.
“Then the screaming and shouts of triumph rose up together, of men killing and men killed, and the ground ran blood.” From first examination the Iliad seems to be an epic founded on an idealized form of glory, the kind that young boys think about when they want to join the army. A place full of heroism and manliness where glory can be achieved with a few strokes of a sword and then you go home and everything is just lovely. Many people view the Iliad this way, based on it’s many vivid battle descriptions and apparent lack of remorse for the deaths that occur. This, however, is not how war is presented in the Iliad. Homer presents a very practical outlook on war countering the attainment of the glory with the reality of its price and the destruction it causes. He successfully does this by showing the value of the lives of each person that dies and, in a sense, mourning their passing, describing the terror and ugliness of war, and, through the characters of Achilleus and Hector, displaying the high price of glory.
One of the most compelling topics The Iliad raises is that of the intricate affiliations between fate, man and the gods. Many events related by Homer in his epic poem exhibit how these three connections interweave and eventually determine the very lives of the men and women involved in the war. Homer leaves these complex relationships slightly unclear throughout the epic, never spelling out the exact bonds connecting men's fate to the gods and what can be considered the power of fate. The motivation for the ambiguousness present in The Iliad is not easily understood, but it is a question that enriches and helps weave an even greater significance of the results into Homer's masterpiece. I feel that the interaction between man, god, and fate can be shown to be one great fluidity that ultimately leaves life mysterious, giving much more depth and complexity to the bonds between the three.
Tolkien, J.R.R.. “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics.” In Beowulf – Modern Critical Interpretations, edited by Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987.
Throughout the Iliad the warriors' dream of peace is projected over and over again in elaborate similes developed against a background of violence and death. Homer is able to balance the celebration of war's tragic, heroic values with scenes of battle and those creative values of civilized life that war destroys. The shield of Achilles symbolically represents the two poles of human condition, war and peace, with their corresponding aspects of human nature, the destructive and creative, which are implicit in every situation and statement of the poem and are put before us in something approaching abstract form; its emblem is an image of human life as a whole.
Homer drives home the bleakness and hopelessness of war with his final book. When thinking of a war, the first thought to pop into one's head is most likely death and suffering, not great triumph and glory. For a great majority of the Iliad, however, Homer writes about the winning of glory, and the pride taken in killing a foe. This gives war an entertainment value, and makes it seem that it is a good opportunity to be fighting in a war. This is not the case whatsoever. With the mourning over the prestigious Hektor, it makes the reader realize that no matter how much glory is attained through battle, the fact remains that you are fighting a war and your life expectancy sub sequentially drops dramatically. The sadness that war creates is neglected for much of the Iliad, but in book twenty-four, the point is emphasized thoroughly. Beginning with the speech of Kassandra to the Trojan people,...