• The (True) Lord of the Rings

    Author(s):
    Patrick McEvoy-Halston (see profile)
    Date:
    2017
    Group(s):
    GS Children’s and Young Adult Literature, GS Speculative Fiction, TC Cognitive and Affect Studies, TC Psychology, Psychoanalysis, and Literature
    Subject(s):
    Affect (Psychology), Fantasy literature, Psychoanalysis and literature
    Item Type:
    Essay
    Tag(s):
    Identification, J. R. R. Tolkien, object relations, The Lord of the Rings, Affect, Psychoanalytic criticism
    Permanent URL:
    http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/qmmf-c478
    Abstract:
    The critic, as guide, is here in the penultimate of a four-part series on "Lord of the Rings," suggested to be, if not Sarumon himself (Sarumon's voice is used), certainly someone who could readily imagine him as someone who could have been presented in the text as a flat-out ally, if he himself wasn't relegated to being the reader's guardian and was actually the text's inscriber. The essay confronts the reader with the possibility that the text argues for one esteeming one's possible regression, and for only ostensibly understanding it as adventurous growth; for not really being able to recognize one's self-growth at all, but really only to take pleasure in others' mistaking you for having changed, having matured, having developed, requiring your thereafter necessitating the company of fools in order to buttress one's self-esteem. Confronts the reader with the fact that the hobbits they are leant in the text to identify with, function essentially as the Fellowship's toilet, a place in which to project and deposit all their own insecurities. As such, they were functionally useful, actually ESSENTIAL, for the mission, for the group, but they are denied understanding this about themselves -- which however disagreeable a reality, might nevertheless have leant some genuine self-pride: without "you," Evil would have ruled the land -- for "the great" needing to deny that they have such vast doubts and fears nested anywhere within them to source and supply their company toilet with -- and rather to esteem themselves for attributes that are either actually common or that ultimately serve to flatter someone else. Essay pronounces that the text did supply one hobbit with evidence that he was actually perhaps more remarkable than perhaps any other in Middle-earth -- Sam -- and encourages his not denying himself conscious awareness of this incontrovertible, evidence-supplied felt truth, for keeping a previous sense of personal equilibrium in place.
    Notes:
    Last in a four-part essay series on "Lord of the Rings." Focus on reader identification and reader regression and/or self-growth.
    Metadata:
    xml
    Status:
    Published
    Last Updated:
    4 years ago
    License:
    Attribution-NonCommercial

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