Misplaced Pages

Boromir

Article snapshot taken from Wikipedia with creative commons attribution-sharealike license. Give it a read and then ask your questions in the chat. We can research this topic together.
#345654

103-557: Boromir is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien 's legendarium . He appears in the first two volumes of The Lord of the Rings ( The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers ), and is mentioned in the last volume, The Return of the King . He was the heir of Denethor II (the 26th Steward of Gondor ) and the elder brother of Faramir . In the course of the story Boromir joined

206-498: A Dwarf to Lothlórien, completely won him over. The critic Tom Shippey notes that in creating Galadriel, Tolkien was attempting to reconstruct the kind of elf hinted at by elf references in Old English (Anglo-Saxon) words. The hints are, he observes, paradoxical: while ælfscyne , "elf-beautiful", suggests a powerful allure, ælfsogoða , "lunacy", implies that getting too close to elves is dangerous. In Shippey's view, Tolkien

309-622: A frame story that changed over the years , first with an Ælfwine-type character who translates the "Golden Book" of the sages Rumil or Pengoloð; later, having the Hobbit Bilbo Baggins collect the stories into the Red Book of Westmarch , translating mythological Elvish documents in Rivendell . The scholar Gergely Nagy observes that Tolkien "thought of his works as texts within the fictional world " (his emphasis), and that

412-544: A book that Tolkien acknowledged as an important influence, and to Tennyson 's The Lady of Shalott , which recast the Arthurian legend of Elaine of Astolat ; she notes that Ayesha was herself an Arthurian figure, transposed to 19th century Africa. Sarah Downey, in Mythlore , likens Galadriel to a medieval guide-figure such as Dante 's Beatrice and the pearl-maiden in the 14th-century English poem Pearl . Galadriel

515-565: A continuing examination of Tolkien's works and supporting mythology, became a scholarly area of study soon after his death. A legendarium is a literary collection of legends . This medieval Latin noun originally referred mainly to texts detailing legends of the lives of saints . A surviving example is the Anjou Legendarium , dating from the 14th century. Quotations in the Oxford English Dictionary for

618-596: A departure from the structure of Tolkien's book, Boromir's death is shown at the end of The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), instead of being related at the beginning of The Two Towers . In The Two Towers (2002), Boromir appears in the theatrical version only briefly during the beginning flashback sequence of Gandalf's fight with the Balrog in Moria. The Extended Edition adds two additional flashbacks: first when Faramir remembers finding Boromir's body and his cloven horn in

721-492: A frenzy scatter to look for Frodo. Aragorn, suspecting Boromir's part in Frodo's flight, orders him to follow and protect Merry and Pippin . The Fellowship is attacked by a band of orcs . Fighting to defend Merry and Pippin, Boromir is mortally wounded by orc-arrows. In Pippin's words: Then Boromir had come leaping through the trees. He had made them fight. He slew many of them and the rest fled. But they had not gone far on

824-514: A fully-fledged figure of "history, true or feigned", with problems of her own making, rather than being a flat allegorical symbol of goodness and purity. The fact that Galadriel is a "penitent" seeking readmission to Aman, Downey comments, makes it clear, too, that she cannot be straightforwardly equated with a figure of perfection like the Virgin Mary. The Tolkien scholar Mac Fenwick compares Galadriel and what he sees as her monstrous opposite,

927-593: A golden belt and an Elven-cloak. Boromir had always planned to go to Minas Tirith, and despite the consensus reached at Rivendell that the Ring must be destroyed in Mordor, he urges the Fellowship to accompany him to Minas Tirith before going on to Mordor. As Frodo ponders his course from Parth Galen , Boromir privately urges him to use the Ring in Gondor's defence, rather than to "throw it away". Finally, he succumbs to

1030-475: A guide-figure such as Dante 's Beatrice and the pearl-maiden in the 14th-century English poem Pearl . Another scholar, Marjorie Burns , compares Galadriel in multiple details to Rider Haggard 's heroine Ayesha , and to Tennyson 's The Lady of Shalott , both being reworked figures of Arthurian legend . Galadriel, lady of light, assisting Frodo on his quest to destroy the One Ring , opposed to Shelob ,

1133-523: A just cause" indicates, writes the Tolkien critic Tom Shippey , only how matters would begin. He comments that Boromir never quite says " the end justifies the means ", though the thought makes his corrupted behaviour entirely believable. In Christian terms , Boromir atones for his assault on Frodo by single-handedly but vainly defending Merry and Pippin from orcs, which illustrates the Catholic theme of

SECTION 10

#1732776838346

1236-554: A man's unconscious, and the masculine side of a woman's, respectively." He adds that in the case of Tolkien's writing, the anima is more important, but also "ambivalent", both supportive and destructive. He gives as examples of the supportive and "nourishing" anima Dante 's Beatrice , the Muses of classical mythology who provided creative inspiration, and the Virgin Mary ; on the destructive side, she can be symbolised, he writes, by

1339-572: A marvellous gift of insight into the minds of others, but judged them with mercy and understanding, and she withheld her goodwill from none save only Fëanor. In him she perceived a darkness that she hated and feared, though she did not perceive that the shadow of the same evil had fallen upon the minds of all the Noldor, and upon her own. Her sympathy for Gimli the Dwarf, when she rebuked her husband Celeborn for being tempted to regret his decision to admit

1442-473: A private project to create a mythology for England . The earliest story, "The Voyage of Earendel, the Evening Star", is from 1914; he revised and rewrote the legendarium stories for most of his adult life. The Hobbit (1937), Tolkien's first published novel, was not originally part of the larger mythology but became linked to it. Both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings (1954 and 1955) are set in

1545-510: A publisher would take it, and notes that Tolkien was a perfectionist, and further that he was perhaps afraid of finishing as he wished to go on with his sub-creation , his invention of myth in Middle-earth. Tolkien first began working on the stories that would become The Silmarillion in 1914. His reading, in 1914, of the Old English manuscript Christ I led to Earendel and the first element of his legendarium, "The Voyage of Earendel,

1648-655: A result, Galadriel departed to Lórien via the gates of Moria , but Celeborn refused to enter the dwarves' stronghold and stayed behind. Her distrust was justified, for Annatar turned out to be the Dark Lord, Sauron . When Sauron attacked Eregion, Celebrimbor entrusted Galadriel with Nenya , one of the Three Rings of the Elves. Celeborn joined up with Elrond, whose force was unable to relieve Eregion but managed to escape back to Imladris . Celeborn reunited with Galadriel when

1751-445: A searching look, testing their resolve—though Boromir interpreted this test as a temptation. She was in turn tested when Frodo Baggins offered to place the Ring in her keeping. Knowing that its corrupting influence would make her "great and terrible", and recalling the ambitions that had once brought her to Middle-earth, she refused the Ring. She accepted that her own ring's power would fail, that her people would diminish and fade with

1854-484: A sequel to The Hobbit . Tolkien began to revise the Silmarillion, but soon turned to the sequel, which became The Lord of the Rings . Writing The Lord of the Rings during the 1940s, Tolkien was attempting to address the dilemma of creating a narrative consistent with a "sequel" of the published The Hobbit and a desire to present a more comprehensive view of its large unpublished background. He renewed work on

1957-474: A symbol of faith, hope and goodwill. Her husband Celeborn likewise provided the Fellowship with Elven-boats. On the day that the Fellowship left Lórien, but unknown to them, Gandalf arrived, carried by the eagle Gwaihir . Galadriel healed his wounds and re-clothed him in white, signalling his new status as head of the Istari, the order of wizards. After Sauron perished, Celeborn led the host of Lórien across

2060-534: A tree, plucking out an arrow; then darkness fell suddenly. Blasts from Boromir's horn alert Aragorn, but he comes too late to prevent the hobbits' capture. As Boromir lies dying, he remorsefully confesses to attempting to take the Ring from Frodo. He urges Aragorn to save Minas Tirith, as he himself has failed. Aragorn reassures him that he has not failed, that indeed "few have gained such a victory". Aragorn, Gimli , and Legolas place Boromir's body in one of their Elven boats, with his sword, belt, cloak, broken horn, and

2163-506: A vision of the end of the world, its breaking and remaking, and the recovery of the Silmarilli and the 'light before the Sun'"; and in 1954, "Actually in the imagination of this story we are now living on a physically round Earth. But the whole 'legendarium' contains a transition from a flat world ... to a globe ". On both texts, he explained in 1954 that "... my legendarium , especially

SECTION 20

#1732776838346

2266-596: Is "tall and white and fair", while the pearl-maiden appears in white and gold, and Beatrice shimmers "clothed in the colour of a living flame". In Downey's view, Galadriel's colours, and her association with both light and with water, connect her with the celestial ladies of the Middle Ages. On the other hand, those figures are allegorical . Downey notes that Tolkien's protestation that he "cordially dislike[d] allegory" has not spared him from much analysis of his writings to be interpreted, but states that Galadriel appears as

2369-492: Is a gift, I say; a gift to the foes of Mordor. It is mad not to use it, to use the power of the Enemy against him. The fearless, the ruthless, these alone will achieve victory. What could not a warrior do in this hour, a great leader? What could not Aragorn do? Or if he refuses, why not Boromir? The Ring would give me power of Command. How I would drive the hosts of Mordor, and all men would flock to my banner! After seeing that Frodo

2472-582: Is no record of the day when at last he sought the Grey Havens". The Dúnedain said that her height was two rangar , or "man-high" – some 6 feet 4 inches (193 cm). However, Galadriel's most striking feature was her beautiful long silver-golden hair. The Elves of Tirion said it captured the radiance of the Two Trees Laurelin and Telperion themselves. Even among the Eldar she

2575-533: Is said that these two kinsfolk, being considered the greatest of the Eldar of Valinor, remain unfriends forever." Her character was a blend of characteristics of the Eldar from whom she was descended. She had the pride and ambition of the Noldor, but in her they were tempered by the gentleness and insight of the Vanyar. She shared the latter virtues of character with her father Finarfin and her brother Finrod . She

2678-715: Is said to have remembered the words and translated them long afterward. It is a lament in which Galadriel describes her separation from the Blessed Realm and the Valar , her longing to return there, and at the end a wish or hope that even though she herself is forbidden (by the Ban) to return, that Frodo might somehow come in the end to the city of Valimar in Valinor . The poem was set to music by Donald Swann with Tolkien's assistance. The sheet music and an audio recording are part of

2781-597: Is telling the literal truth that "beauty is itself dangerous", as Chaucer did in The Wife of Bath's Tale where both elves and friars are sexually rapacious. So when Faramir says to Sam Gamgee in Ithilien that Galadriel must be "perilously fair", Shippey comments that this is a "highly accurate remark"; Sam replies that "folk takes their peril with them into Lorien... But perhaps you could call her perilous, because she's so strong in herself." Shippey also considers

2884-611: Is the One Ring, and he is chosen by his father, despite his reluctance to go, in response to a summons from Elrond . In The Return of the King (2003), Boromir appears in the theatrical version during a brief flashback as Pippin remembers his heroic self-sacrifice. In the Extended Edition of the film, Boromir appears briefly when Denethor looks at Faramir and imagines for a moment that he sees Boromir walking towards him, smiling. Legendarium Tolkien's legendarium

2987-460: Is the body of J. R. R. Tolkien 's mythopoeic writing, unpublished in his lifetime, that forms the background to his The Lord of the Rings , and which his son Christopher summarized in his compilation of The Silmarillion and documented in his 12-volume series The History of Middle-earth . The legendarium's origins reach back to 1914, when Tolkien began writing poems and story sketches, drawing maps , and inventing languages and names as

3090-436: Is unconvinced, Boromir half begs, half commands him to at least lend the Ring, and when Frodo still refuses, Boromir leaps to seize it. Frodo vanishes by putting on the Ring and flees, intending to continue the quest alone. Boromir, realizing his betrayal, immediately repents of his actions and weeps. Searching unsuccessfully for Frodo, he tells the Fellowship of Frodo's disappearance, though not of his own misdeeds. The hobbits in

3193-484: Is unnerved by the thought of entering, pleading with Aragorn to find another way "though it led through a hedge of swords"; he cites stories of elvish witchcraft, and the "strange paths" they had already taken which had caused Gandalf's death. Once in Lórien, Boromir is greatly disturbed by Galadriel 's testing of his mind, telling Aragorn "not to be too sure of this lady and her purposes". On parting, Galadriel gives Boromir

Boromir - Misplaced Pages Continue

3296-681: The Fellowship for the first part of the journey, he pledges to protect the Ring-bearer, Frodo . Boromir accompanies the Fellowship south from Rivendell. Before departing, he sounds the Horn of Gondor, saying he "would not go forth like a thief into the night". On the journey south, he questions the wisdom of their leader Gandalf . On the Fellowship's attempt to pass over the Misty Mountains , he advises that firewood be collected before

3399-485: The Fellowship of the Ring . Boromir is portrayed as a noble character who believed passionately in the greatness of his kingdom and fought indomitably for it. His great stamina and physical strength, together with a forceful and commanding personality, made him a widely admired commander in Gondor's army and the favourite of his father Denethor. As a member of the Fellowship, his desperation to save his country ultimately drove him to betray his companions and attempt to seize

3502-524: The Phial of Galadriel , which by her power contains the light of Eärendil 's star, able to blind and ward off Shelob in her darkest of dark lairs. Galadriel's gifts, too, are Homeric, including cloaks, food, and wisdom as well as light, just like those of Circe and Calypso. Patrick Grant, a scholar of Renaissance literature, notes the multiple character pairings in The Lord of the Rings . He interprets

3605-566: The Silmarils and Morgoth's killing of Finwë, but did not mention the kinslaying of elves by elves. Galadriel and Celeborn travelled first to Lindon , where they ruled over a group of Elves, and were themselves ruled by Gil-galad . According to Concerning Galadriel and Celeborn, they then removed to the shores of Lake Nenuial (Evendim) and were accounted the Lord and Lady of all the Elves of Eriador. Later, they moved eastward and established

3708-515: The Silmarils . Many thought that this saying first gave to Fëanor the thought of imprisoning and blending the light of the Trees that later took shape in his hands as the Silmarils. For Fëanor beheld the hair of Galadriel with wonder and delight. Nevertheless, Galadriel never repaid Fëanor's admiration. Fëanor "had begged her thrice for a tress and thrice she refused to give him even one hair. It

3811-532: The Third Age of Middle-earth , while virtually all of his earlier writing had been set in the first two ages of the world. The Lord of the Rings occasionally alludes to figures and events from the legendarium to create an impression of depth , but such ancient tales are depicted as being remembered by few until the story makes them relevant. After The Lord of the Rings , Tolkien returned to his older stories to bring them to publishable form, but never completed

3914-401: The siren of mythology who lures a man to disaster, or a "poisonous and malevolent" witch . Grant states that the anima and animus are "further from consciousness" than the shadow archetype. Both the anima/animus and the shadow are presented in conjunction with the hero archetype, signifying an "individuation process which is approaching wholeness". The set of archetypes creates an image of

4017-427: The "greatest of elven women". The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey has written that Galadriel represented Tolkien's attempt to re-create the kind of elf hinted at by surviving references in Old English . He has compared his elves also to those in a Christian Middle English source, The Early South English Legendary , where the elves were angels . Sarah Downey likens Galadriel to a celestial lady of medieval allegory,

4120-485: The "primary 'legendarium'", for the core episodes and themes of The Silmarillion which were not abandoned in his father's constant redrafting of the work. The scholars Verlyn Flieger and Carl F. Hostetter edited a scholarly collection " Tolkien's Legendarium: Essays on The History of Middle-earth ". Flieger writes that "...the greatest [event] is the creation of the Silmarils, the Gems of light that give their names to

4223-606: The 'Downfall of Númenor ' which lies immediately behind The Lord of the Rings , is based on my view: that Men are essentially mortal and must not try to become 'immortal' in the flesh", and in 1955, "But the beginning of the legendarium, of which the Trilogy is part (the conclusion), was an attempt to reorganise some of the Kalevala ". "Tolkien's legendarium" is defined narrowly in John D. Rateliff 's The History of The Hobbit as

Boromir - Misplaced Pages Continue

4326-660: The Anduin and captured Dol Guldur. Galadriel came forth and "threw down its walls and laid bare its pits". She travelled to Minas Tirith for the wedding of her granddaughter Arwen to King Aragorn Elessar after the end of the war. Galadriel passed over the Great Sea with Elrond, Gandalf , and the Ring-bearers Bilbo and Frodo, marking the end of the Third Age. Celeborn remained behind, and Tolkien writes that "there

4429-560: The Christian Middle English attitude of the South English Legendary , a hagiographic work which he supposes Tolkien must have read, that elves were angels . In Shippey's view, Tolkien's elves are much like fallen angels, above Men but below the angelic Maiar and the godlike Valar . He comments at once that Galadriel is in one way certainly not "fallen", as the elves avoided the war on Melkor in

4532-509: The Evening Star". He intended his stories to become a mythology that would explain the origins of English history and culture, and to provide the necessary "historical" background for his invented Elvish languages . Much of this early work was written while Tolkien, then a British officer returned from France during World War I, was in hospital and on sick leave. He completed " The Fall of Gondolin " in late 1916. He called his collection of nascent stories The Book of Lost Tales . This became

4635-527: The Finnish epic, the Kalevala ; or of St Jerome , Snorri Sturlusson , Jacob Grimm , or Nikolai Gruntvig, all of whom Tolkien saw as exemplars of a professional and creative philology. This was, Nagy believes, what Tolkien thought essential if he was to present a mythology for England , since such a thing had to have been written by many hands. Further, writes Nagy, Christopher Tolkien "inserted himself in

4738-560: The First Age in The Silmarillion . The eleventh steward of Gondor, Denethor I, had as well a son called Boromir who was described as a great warrior. This might have been an inspiration for Denethor II to name his first son. Boromir's desire for the Ring has been described as well-intentioned but uninformed by the potential danger. His perception of Middle-earth is biased by a belief that divine powers have chosen Gondor to lead

4841-636: The First Age; but all the same, "Galadriel has been expelled from a kind of Heaven, the Deathless land of Valinor, and has been forbidden to return." Shippey suggests that the Men of Middle-earth might have thought the fall of Melkor and the expulsion of Galadriel added up to a similar fallen status; and he praises Tolkien for taking both sides of the story of elves into account. The Tolkien scholar Marjorie Burns compares Galadriel to Rider Haggard 's heroine Ayesha in his 1887 novel She: A History of Adventure ,

4944-811: The Morning and the Night! Fair as the Sea and the Sun and the Snow upon the Mountain! Dreadful as the Storm and the Lightning! Stronger than the foundations of the earth. All shall love me and despair!' [Galadriel] lifted up her hand and from the ring that she wore there issued a great light that illuminated her alone and left all else dark... Then she let her hand fall, and the light faded, and suddenly she laughed again, and lo! she

5047-448: The One Ring's destruction, and that her only escape from the fading of the Elves and the dominion of Men would be to return at last to Valinor. It is implied, backed up by other writings, that in acknowledgement of this renunciation of power her personal ban from Valinor was lifted. When the Fellowship left Lothlórien, she gave each member a gift and an Elven cloak, and furnished the party with supplies, both as practical support and as

5150-575: The Ring , Boromir arrives at Rivendell just as the Council of Elrond is commencing. There he tells of Gondor's attempts to keep the power of Mordor at bay. He tries to persuade the Council to let him take the One Ring to defend Gondor, but is told that it would corrupt and destroy its user, and alert Sauron to its presence. He accepts this for the moment. He agrees to accompany Aragorn to Gondor's capital, Minas Tirith , and since their path lies with

5253-615: The Ring , but he was redeemed by his repentance and brave last stand. Commentators have remarked on Boromir's vainglory and desire for the Ring. They have compared him both to other proud Tolkien characters such as Fëanor and Túrin Turambar , and to medieval heroes like Roland , who also blew a horn in battle and was killed in the wilderness. His boat-funeral, too, has been likened to Scyld Scefing 's ship-burial in Beowulf . Boromir appears in animated and live-action films of Lord of

SECTION 50

#1732776838346

5356-591: The Rings , The Silmarillion , and Unfinished Tales . She was a royal Elf of both the Noldor and the Teleri , being a grandchild of both King Finwë and King Olwë. She was also close kin of King Ingwë of the Vanyar through her grandmother Indis. Galadriel was a leader during the rebellion of the Noldor, and present in their flight from Valinor during the First Age. Towards the end of her stay in Middle-earth, she

5459-609: The Rings and The Hobbit trilogies, Galadriel is played by Cate Blanchett . In The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring , Galadriel narrates the prologue that explains the creation of the One Ring, as well as appearing in Lothlórien. While Galadriel does not feature in Tolkien's The Hobbit , the story was amended so that she could appear in Jackson's films based on the book . On stage, Galadriel

5562-442: The Rings , and in radio and television versions. Boromir is the son of Denethor II and Lady Finduilas of Dol Amroth . He has a younger brother Faramir . A year after Faramir was born their father became the ruling Steward of Gondor , and Boromir became heir apparent, inheriting the Horn of Gondor. When Boromir's mother Finduilas dies, he is only 10. Denethor always favours Boromir over Faramir; he loves Boromir "too much, perhaps;

5665-401: The Rings , did he realise the significance of hobbits in his mythology. In 1937, encouraged by the success of The Hobbit , Tolkien submitted to his publisher George Allen & Unwin an incomplete but more fully developed version of The Silmarillion called Quenta Silmarillion . The reader rejected the work as being obscure and "too Celtic ". The publisher instead asked Tolkien to write

5768-536: The Rings: The Rings of Power . Stories of Galadriel's life prior to the War of the Ring appear in both The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales . She was the only daughter and youngest child of Finarfin, prince of the Noldor , and of Eärwen, daughter of Olwë and cousin to Lúthien . Her elder brothers were Finrod Felagund , Angrod, and Aegnor. She was born in Valinor . She had the ability to peer into

5871-405: The Silmarillion after completing The Lord of the Rings , and he greatly desired to publish the two works together. When it became clear that would not be possible, Tolkien turned his full attention to preparing The Lord of the Rings for publication. John D. Rateliff has analysed the complex relationship between The Hobbit and The Silmarillion , providing evidence that they were related from

5974-672: The Viking age as described in the Prose Edda and in the Old English poem Beowulf ; Boromir is similarly given a boat-funeral. As with Scyld Scefing 's funeral ship in Beowulf , no-one knows where the boat goes to in the end, but for Tolkien the suggestion that it goes to a mysterious land in the uttermost West was fascinating, and he developed it at length in The Lost Road . In both Ralph Bakshi 's 1978 animated film and in

6077-405: The West" for the closing credits of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King . Originally sung by Lennox, the song was conceived as Galadriel's bittersweet lament for those who have sailed across the Sundering Seas . The lyrics include phrases from the final chapter of the original novel. The song has since been covered by Yulia Townsend and Will Martin . On their album Once Again ,

6180-414: The White Tower", while Faramir called him "High Warden of the White Tower" and "our Captain-General". Boromir was described by Tolkien as a name "of mixed form"; it combines Sindarin bor(on)- 'steadfast' and Quenya míre 'jewel'. But the Stewards of Gondor also often bore names "remembered in the songs and histories of the First Age ", regardless of meaning, and the name Boromir did appear during

6283-414: The attempt to climb Caradhras, saving them from freezing in a blizzard. In the retreat from Caradhras, Boromir proves his strength as he and Aragorn force a way through shoulder-high snowbanks back down the mountain. The Fellowship then pass under the mountains through the caverns of Moria where Gandalf is killed, and Aragorn becomes their guide. At the borders of the Elven realm of Lothlórien , Boromir

SECTION 60

#1732776838346

6386-416: The band Barclay James Harvest featured a song called "Galadriel". It gained notability because guitarist John Lees played John Lennon 's Epiphone Casino guitar on this track, an event later recounted in a song on the band's 1990 album Welcome To The Show titled "John Lennon's Guitar". Hank Marvin and John Farrar wrote a song "Galadriel", recorded by Cliff Richard ; the four five-line stanzas include

6489-505: The body of Tolkien's work consisting of: These, with The Lays of Beleriand , written from 1918 onwards, comprise the different "phases" of Tolkien's Elven legendary writings, posthumously edited and published in The Silmarillion and in their original forms in Christopher Tolkien's series The History of Middle-earth . Other Tolkien scholars have used the term legendarium in a variety of contexts. Christopher Tolkien's introduction to The History of Middle-earth series talks about

6592-460: The couplet "Galadriel, spirit of starlight / Eagle and dove gave birth to thee". An Australian band named Galadriel released a self-titled album in 1971 which "became a highly sought-after collectors' item among European progressive rock circles". Galadriel was voiced by Annette Crosbie in Ralph Bakshi 's 1978 animated film of The Lord of the Rings , and by Marian Diamond in BBC Radio 's 1981 serialisation . In Peter Jackson's Lord of

6695-626: The editor, Christopher Tolkien." Dickerson and Evans use the phrase "legendarium" to encompass the entirety of Tolkien's Middle-earth writings "for convenience". This would encompass texts such as the incomplete drafts of stories published before The History of Middle-earth in the 1980 Unfinished Tales . Shaun Gunner of The Tolkien Society has called the 2021 collection of Tolkien's previously unpublished legendarium writings The Nature of Middle-earth , edited by Carl F. Hostetter, "an unofficial 13th volume of The History of Middle-earth series". Unlike " fictional universes " constructed for

6798-422: The elven boat washed up on shore; and in longer flashback (the only scene of the film trilogy where Boromir and Faramir are seen speaking to each other), after Boromir's victory in Osgiliath and before his departure for Rivendell. The two brothers are seen celebrating and laughing before their father interrupts, asking him to go to Rivendell to seek the One Ring. Here Boromir apparently knows that " Isildur 's Bane"

6901-433: The fight against evil. He is always eager to praise the great deeds of Gondor, including his own. Boromir's hubris makes him prey to the malign power of the Ring, and he seals his own doom when he attacks Frodo to seize it. He makes way thereby for Aragorn to become the future king of Gondor, in a manner similar to Virgil 's character Turnus . He speaks of using the Ring in the service of Gondor, but his talk of "strength in

7004-456: The functional place of Bilbo" as editor and collator, in his view "reinforcing the mythopoeic effect" that his father had wanted to achieve, making the published book do what Bilbo's book was meant to do, and so unintentionally realising his father's intention. Galadriel Galadriel ( IPA: [ɡaˈladri.ɛl] ) is a character created by J. R. R. Tolkien in his Middle-earth writings. She appears in The Lord of

7107-634: The giant and evil female spider of darkness, have been compared to Homer 's opposed female characters in the Odyssey : Circe and Calypso as Odysseus 's powerful and wise benefactors on his quest, against the perils of the attractive Sirens , and the deadly Scylla and Charybdis . Modern songwriters have created songs about Galadriel; Tolkien's Quenya poem " Namárië " has been set to music by Donald Swann . Galadriel has appeared in both animated and live-action films and television. Cate Blanchett played her in Peter Jackson 's film series, while Morfydd Clark played her in an earlier age in The Lord of

7210-474: The giant and evil spider Shelob , with the struggle between the good and the monstrous female characters in Homer 's Odyssey . Like Galadriel, Circe and Calypso are rulers of their own secluded magical realms, and both offer help and advice to the protagonist. They help Odysseus to avoid destruction by the female monsters, the Sirens who would lure his ship on to the rocks, and Scylla and Charybdis who would smash or drown his ship; Galadriel gives Frodo

7313-445: The idea of multiple 'voices' who collected the stories over the millennia. When Tolkien published The Hobbit in 1937 (which was itself not originally intended for publication, but as a story told privately to his children), the narrative of the published text was loosely influenced by the legendarium as a context, but was not designed to be part of it. Carpenter comments that not until Tolkien began to write its sequel, The Lord of

7416-446: The importance of good intention, especially at the point of death. This is clear from Gandalf's statement: "But he [Boromir] escaped in the end.... It was not in vain that the young hobbits came with us, if only for Boromir's sake." Boromir has been likened to other Tolkien characters such as Fëanor or Túrin Turambar who display vainglorious excess, a trait in leaders that Tolkien despised. The character of Boromir has been compared to

7519-434: The interactions of the characters as fitting the oppositions and other pairwise relationships of Jungian archetypes , recurring psychological symbols proposed by Carl Jung . He states that the hero 's quest can be interpreted as a personal journey of individuation . Galadriel functions as Frodo's anima , opposed by the evil giant female spider Shelob. Grant explains that the anima and animus represent "the feminine side of

7622-501: The legendary medieval hero Roland . Both blow a horn in the distress of battle and both are eventually killed in the wilderness while defending their companions, although Roland is portrayed as blameless and heroic throughout. Further, Roland's death gives the appearance of signalling the end of the ruling dynasty. The ship-burials of the seafaring Numenoreans in The Lost Road and Other Writings have been compared to those of

7725-605: The minds of others to judge them fairly. She was a member of the royal House of Finwë . Galadriel was often called the fairest of all Elves, whether in Aman or Middle-earth. According to the older account of her story, sketched by Tolkien in The Road Goes Ever On and used in The Silmarillion , Galadriel was an eager participant and leader in the rebellion of the Noldor and their flight from Valinor; she

7828-493: The more so because they were unlike". In response to prophetic dreams that come to Faramir and later to himself, Boromir claims the quest of riding to Rivendell . His journey lasts a hundred and eleven days, and he travels through "roads forgotten" to reach Rivendell, though, as he says, "few knew where it lay". Boromir loses his horse while crossing the Greyflood and travels the rest of the way on foot. In The Fellowship of

7931-641: The name for the first two volumes of The History of Middle-earth , which include these early texts. Tolkien never completed The Book of Lost Tales ; he left it to compose the poems " The Lay of Leithian " (in 1925) and " The Lay of the Children of Húrin " (possibly as early as 1918). The first complete version of The Silmarillion was the "Sketch of the Mythology" written in 1926 (later published in Volume IV of The History of Middle-earth ). The "Sketch"

8034-571: The narrative framing device of an Anglo-Saxon mariner named Ælfwine or Eriol or Ottor Wǽfre who finds the island of Tol Eressëa , where the Elves live, and the Elves tell him their history. He collects, translates from Old English , and writes the mythology that appears in The History of Middle-earth . Ælfwine means "Elf-friend" in Old English; men whose names have the same meaning, such as Alboin, Alwin, and Elendil , were to appear in

8137-508: The nature of evil in Arda , the origin of Orcs , the customs of the Elves , the nature and means of Elvish rebirth, the "flat" world, and the story of the Sun and Moon. In any event, with one or two exceptions, he made little change to the narratives during the remaining years of his life. The scholar Verlyn Flieger writes that Tolkien thought of his legendarium as a presented collection, with

8240-515: The overlapping of different and sometimes contradictory accounts was central to his desired effect. Nagy notes that Tolkien went so far as to create facsimile pages from the Dwarves' Book of Mazarbul that is found by the Fellowship in Moria . Further, Tolkien was a philologist ; Nagy comments that Tolkien may have been intentionally imitating the philological style of Elias Lönnrot , compiler of

8343-445: The purpose of writing and publishing popular fiction, Tolkien's legendarium for a long period was a private project, concerned with questions of philology , cosmology , theology and mythology. His biographer Humphrey Carpenter writes that although by 1923 Tolkien had almost completed The Book of Lost Tales , "it was almost as if he did not want to finish it", beginning instead to rewrite it; he suggests that Tolkien may have doubted if

8446-525: The realm of Eregion (Hollin). They made contact with a Nandorin settlement in the valley of the River Anduin , which became Lothlórien . At some point, Celeborn and Galadriel left Eregion and settled in Lothlórien. According to some of Tolkien's accounts, they became rulers of Lothlórien for a time during the Second Age; but in all accounts they returned to Lórien to take up its rule after Amroth

8549-505: The self. Burns adds that the opposed characters of Galadriel and Shelob are indicated by elements such as the Phial of Galadriel, whose light contrasts with the darkness of the spider. Tolkien wrote a poem " Namárië " that Galadriel sings in farewell to the departing Fellowship, and to Frodo in particular. The song is in Quenya , and "spoke of things little-known in Middle-earth," but Frodo

8652-538: The song-cycle of The Road Goes Ever On . In a recording, Tolkien sings it in the style of a Gregorian chant . Galadriel's songs are omitted from Howard Shore 's music for The Lord of the Rings film series ; instead, Shore created a Lothlórien/Galadriel theme using the Arabic maqam Hijaz scale to create a sense of antiquity. Fran Walsh , Shore, and Annie Lennox co-wrote the Oscar-winning song "Into

8755-473: The start of The Hobbit ' s composition. With the success of The Lord of the Rings , Tolkien in the late 1950s returned to the Silmarillion, planning to revise the material of his legendarium into a form "fit for publication", a task which kept him occupied until his death in 1973, without attaining a completed state. The legendarium has indeed been called "a jumble of overlapping and often competing stories, annals, and lexicons." Much of his later writing

8858-462: The subsequent BBC Radio serial , Boromir is played by Michael Graham Cox . Boromir is played by Carl-Kristian Rundman in the 1993 Finnish miniseries Hobitit . In Peter Jackson 's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , Boromir is played by Sean Bean . His line "One does not simply walk into Mordor" became famous enough for Bean to comment that the "one does not simply" meme (with variant endings) would "probably be my unintended legacy". In

8961-421: The synonymous noun legendary date from 1513. The Middle English South English Legendary is an example of this form of the noun. Tolkien described his works as a "legendarium" in four letters from 1951 to 1955, a period in which he was attempting to have his unfinished Silmarillion published alongside the more complete The Lord of the Rings . On the Silmarillion, he wrote in 1951, "This legendarium ends with

9064-497: The task. Tolkien's son Christopher chose portions of his late father's vast collection of unpublished material and shaped them into The Silmarillion (1977), a semi-chronological and semi-complete narrative of the mythical world and its origins. The sales were sufficient to enable him to work on and publish many volumes of his father's legendarium stories and drafts; some were presented as completed tales, while others illustrated his father's complex creative process. Tolkien research ,

9167-413: The temptation to take the Ring for himself, justifying this by his duty to his people and his belief in his own integrity. True-hearted Men , they will not be corrupted. We of Minas Tirith have been staunch through long years of trial. We do not desire the power of wizard-lords, only strength to defend ourselves, strength in a just cause. And behold! In our need chance brings to light the Ring of Power. It

9270-505: The two unfinished time travel novels, The Lost Road in 1936 and The Notion Club Papers in 1945, as the protagonists reappeared in each of several different times. There is no such framework in the published version of The Silmarillion , but the Narn i Hîn Húrin is introduced with the note "Here begins that tale which Ǽlfwine made from the Húrinien ." Tolkien never fully dropped

9373-485: The war ended; according to one text, after some years in Imladris (during which Elrond first saw and fell in love with Celebrían) Galadriel's sea-longing became so strong that the couple removed to Belfalas and lived at the place later called Dol Amroth . 'And now at last it comes. You will give me the Ring freely! In place of the Dark Lord you will set up a Queen. And I shall not be dark, but beautiful and terrible as

9476-478: The way back when they were attacked again, by a hundred Orcs at least, some of them very large, and they shot a rain of arrows: always at Boromir. Boromir had blown his great horn till the woods rang, and at first the Orcs had been dismayed and had drawn back; but when no answer but the echoes came, they had attacked more fiercely than ever. Pippin did not remember much more. His last memory was of Boromir leaning against

9579-565: The weapons of his slain foes about him. They set the boat adrift in the river toward the Falls of Rauros, singing the "Lament of the Winds" as his funeral song. Three days later, Faramir, to his and their father's great grief, see the boat bearing his dead brother floating down the River. Boromir is the son and heir apparent of Denethor , the ruling Steward of Gondor. Appendix A calls him "Captain of

9682-544: The whole legendarium", equating the legendarium with the Silmarillion (which with italics denotes the 1977 book published under that name, and without italics means the larger body of un-edited drafts used to create that work). In the J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia , David Bratman writes that " The History of Middle-earth is a longitudinal study of the development and elaboration of Tolkien's legendarium through his transcribed manuscripts, with textual commentary by

9785-555: Was a 28-page synopsis written to explain the background of the story of Túrin to R. W. Reynolds, a friend to whom Tolkien had sent several of the stories. From the "Sketch" Tolkien developed a fuller narrative version of The Silmarillion called Quenta Noldorinwa (also included in Volume IV). The Quenta Noldorinwa was the last version of The Silmarillion that Tolkien completed. The stories in The Book of Lost Tales employ

9888-477: Was accounted beautiful, and her hair is held a marvel unmatched. It is golden like the hair of her father and of her foremother Indis, but richer and more radiant, for its gold is touched by some memory of the starlike silver of her mother; and the Eldar say that the light of the Two Trees, Laurelin and Telperion, has been snared in her tresses. Fëanor greatly admired her hair; it may have inspired him to create

9991-442: Was however concerned more with the theological and philosophical underpinnings of the work, rather than with the narratives themselves. By this time, he had doubts about fundamental aspects of the work that went back to the earliest versions of the stories, and it seems that he felt the need to resolve these problems before he could produce the "final" version of The Silmarillion . During this time he wrote extensively on such topics as

10094-595: Was joint ruler of Lothlórien with her husband, Celeborn , when she was known as the Lady of Lórien , the Lady of the Galadhrim , the Lady of Light , or the Lady of the Golden Wood . Her daughter Celebrían was the wife of Elrond and mother of Arwen , Elladan, and Elrohir. Tolkien describes Galadriel as "the mightiest and fairest of all the Elves that remained in Middle-earth" (after the death of Gil-galad ) and

10197-584: Was lost in the middle of the Third Age. Celeborn and Galadriel had a daughter, Celebrían , who married Elrond Half-elven of Rivendell . During the Second Age , when the Rings of Power were forged, Galadriel distrusted Annatar, the loremaster who taught the craft of the Rings to Celebrimbor . Again according to some of the accounts, Celebrimbor rebelled against her view and seized power in Eregion. As

10300-491: Was portrayed by Rebecca Jackson Mendoza in the 2006 Toronto musical production of The Lord of the Rings ; Mendoza's dress was hand-embroidered with some 1800 beads. The musical was revised and moved to London's Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 2007, with Laura Michelle Kelly in the "glittering" role. Galadriel appears in video games such as The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth II , where she

10403-483: Was proud, strong, and self-willed, as were all the descendants of Finwë save Finarfin; and like her brother Finrod, of all her kin the nearest to her heart, she had dreams of far lands and dominions that might be her own to order as she would without tutelage. Yet deeper still there dwelt in her the noble and generous spirit of the Vanyar, and a reverence for the Valar that she could not forget. From her earliest years she had

10506-620: Was shrunken: a slender elf-woman, clad in simple white, whose gentle voice was soft and sad. 'I pass the test', she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel'. J. R. R. Tolkien , The Fellowship of the Ring In The Fellowship of the Ring , Galadriel welcomed the Fellowship to Lothlórien after their escape from Moria . When she met the Fellowship in her tree-dwelling she gave each member

10609-467: Was the "only female to stand tall in those days". She had, however, long since parted ways with Fëanor and his sons. In Beleriand she lived with her brother Finrod Felagund at Nargothrond and the court of Thingol and Melian in Doriath . In this account, she met Celeborn, a kinsman of Thingol, in Doriath . She carried some dark secrets from those times; she told Melian part of the violent story of

#345654