Finally I am back to this! Here’s a link to Book 2 (and thence to Book 1).

And now we get the split: the Fellowship has broken: Frodo and Sam have gone East; Merry and Pippin have been nicked by Orcs; Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas choose to follow along after. Boromir is dead. And for this entire book we have only those second two sets; for a while, we have no knowledge of Frodo and Sam and the Ring, just like their friends. Which is really quite a remarkable choice, when you think about it: in theory this story is meant to be all about the Ring, isn’t it? But we go 170-odd pages with no knowledge of its whereabouts!

Other thoughts:

• I still really enjoy following Aragorn et al as they track the Orcs and hobbits. There’s something delightful to me in the description of the land, and of the chase.
• My attitude is now very coloured by the film-version of the Rohirrim – and especially their theme – but I do find them a magnificent, romantic, people. Dreadfully violent and arrogant, of course, but nonetheless. Tolkien captures their bravery and their pride, as well as the sense that the time for those attitudes might be coming to an end.
• Everything about Fangorn Forest, and Fangorn himself, delights me. The way Tom Bombadil’s forest is a foreshadowing of this one delights me; that much of the forest is untouched by other people delights me; Fangorn’s stoicism that can also be kindled to action delights me.
• I cannot imagine how it must have been for the first readers to have Gandalf back; I do not recall my own reaction. The metaphors-made-real of purifying by fire and ordeal are resonant and powerful, and I still find it awe-some.
• I’m sure readers who come to this from having seen the films must be very surprised by the swiftness of the Helm’s Deep battle. I do love that section in the film, don’t get me wrong; but I also like that it’s actually just another part of the action, and then the key folks go off to Isengard.
• At some point in high school, I won a book prize (okay, I won a lot of book prizes; but this is the only specific one I remember). The librarian knew me fairly well (unsurprisingly), and she chose the prizes, so I was given David Day’s Tolkien’s Ring – a beautiful hardcover version. It might have been the first time I read anything vaguely academic (it’s not academic) about Anglo-Saxon people, and about the Norse. Most importantly, that book introduced me to the idea that there are two moments in LOTR where Tolkien is chastising Macbeth, and the first one occurs at Helm’s Deep when the Huorns arrive and deal with the Orcs. That is how one should have Birnam Wood come to Dunsinane, Mr Shakespeare.

The last couple of times I’ve watched these films, I’ve often skipped through the Frodo and Sam sections. They’ve become the least interesting parts for me. Partly it’s the lack of action, and also the lack of colour; partly it’s that I find them so earnest and (genuinely) pathetic – I find them too hard to watch. But now there’s 150 or so pages of nothing but Frodo and Sam and Sméagol/ Gollum.