First off: what on earth are the Wild Men supposed to be?? Much like the Oathbreakers, the Paths of the Dead, the return of the Rangers, Eowyn's dilemma, and so many other elements in Book V, their appearance just feels so left-field (no matter Merry's awkward insistence that he had seen them before), unnecessary, puzzling, random and above all beside the point. More egregiously: Their grass-skirts, stilted patois, and "Noble Savage" demeanor straight out of Dryden or James Fenimore Cooper, all comes from an uncomfortably racist lineage of indigenous caricatures that the English long used to romanticize Natives even as they slaughtered them. I am disappointed to find the Professor indulging in such lazy stereotypes, for reasons both ethical and aesthetic.
Moreover, on a thematic level, the Wild Men don't appear to fit in with anything--as the very title of this novel suggests (not to mention the unqualified fanfare that will greet King Aragorn), Tolkien, like a true British subject, is a big fan of civilization and its contents. As such, the paleolithic Wild Men fit nowhere within Tolkien's larger schema. By contrast, consider the Hobbits in their tidy little holes, Tom Bombadil with his flowers, the Elves in their tranquil realms--Tolkien harbors obvious affection for domesticity and stability. Nature is nice and all, but only insofar as it is carefully tended and pruned (no Old Forests or Caradhras Mountains for Tolkien, thank you very much!). He no more advocates for a turn towards the "primitive" than he does towards the totalitarian Mordor state. So then why introduce the Wild Men at all? They are clearly not intended as an alternative to Middle-Earth medievalism, nor does Tolkien evince the slightest interest in exploring the ethics of indigenous rights (e.g. the blasé manner in which Tolkien alludes to how Rohan had previously hunted Wild Men like animals--as though that were no big deal, just something that happened--likewise disconcerts me).
Even on a strictly technical level, their contribution to the plot is largely nil--why did we even need to introduce these one-off stock-figures to help Rohan get around Mordor's forces in the first place? What, Rohan's own scouts couldn't have found a way themselves? Come to think of it, why did we even need a whole chapter for them to figure that out? Or why did there need to be an obstacle in their way at all? Why couldn't we just cut straight to the battle, since the previous chapter literally ends with them arriving to save the day? Why drag out a foregone conclusion? Why does this chapter even exist?
For that matter, why is Merry's pointless POV privileged here? And why has Tolkien suddenly chosen now of all times to romanticize warfare with such giddy language, after describing it all in such drab terms before? This is just such an odd, redundant, retrograde, excisable chapter.
No comments:
Post a Comment