The Lord Of The Rings Explained

[Nathen Paisley]

Writtenin stages between 1937 and 1949, with much of it during World War II,[1] it was originally published in three volumes in 1954 and 1955. It has since been reprinted numerous times and translated into at least 38 different languages,[2] becoming one of the most popular works of twentieth-century literature.

The action in The Lord of the Rings is set in what the author conceived to be the lands of the real Earth, inhabited by humanity but placed in a fictional past, before familiar history but after the fall of his version of Atlantis, Nmenor.[3] Tolkien gave this setting a modern English name, Middle-earth, a rendering of the Old English Middangeard.[4]

The story concerns peoples such as Hobbits, Elves, Men, Dwarves, Wizards, and Orcs (called goblins in The Hobbit), and centers on the Ring of Power made by the Dark Lord Sauron. Starting from quiet beginnings in the Shire, the story ranges across Middle-earth and follows the courses of the War of the Ring. The main story is followed by six appendices that provide a wealth of historical and linguistic background material,[5] as well as an index listing every character, place, song, and sword.

Along with Tolkien's other writings, The Lord of the Rings has been subjected to extensive analysis of its literary themes and origins. Although a major work in itself, the story is merely the last movement of a larger mythological cycle, or legendarium, that Tolkien had worked on for many years since 1917.[6] Influences on this earlier work, and on the story of The Lord of the Rings, include philology, mythology and religion, as well as earlier fantasy works and Tolkien's experiences in World War I. The Lord of the Rings in its turn is considered to have had a great impact on modern fantasy, and the impact of Tolkien's works is such that the use of the words "Tolkienian" and "Tolkienesque" have been recorded in the Oxford English Dictionary.[7]

The back story begins thousands of years before the action in the book, with the rise of the eponymous Lord of the Rings, the Dark Lord Sauron, a malevolent reincarnated deity who possessed great supernatural powers and who later became the ruler of the dreaded realm of Mordor. At the end of the First Age of Middle-earth, Sauron survived the catastrophic defeat and chaining of his lord, the ultimate Dark Lord, Morgoth (who was formerly counted as one of the Valar, the angelic Powers of the world). During the Second Age, Sauron schemed to gain dominion over Middle-earth. In the disguise as "Annatar" or Lord of Gifts, he aided Celebrimbor and other Elven-smiths of Eregion in the forging of magical Rings of Power which conferred various powers and effects on their wearers. The most important of these were the Nine, the Seven and the Three (which he did not touch or know of the three.) called the Rings of Power or Great Rings.

However, he then secretly forged a Great Ring of his own, the One Ring, by which he planned to enslave the wearers of the other Rings of Power. This plan failed when the Elves became aware of him and took off their Rings. Sauron then launched a war during which he captured sixteen and distributed them to lords and kings of Dwarves and Men; these Rings were known as the Seven and Nine respectively. The Dwarf-lords proved too tough to be enslaved, although their natural desire for wealth, especially gold, increased; this brought more conflict between them and other races, and fed a dangerous greed. The Men who received the Nine rings were slowly corrupted over time and eventually became the Nazgl, Sauron's most feared servants. The Three Rings Sauron failed to capture, and remained in the possession of the Elves (who forged these independently). The war ended as Men of the island-kingdom of Nmenor helped the besieged Elves, and Sauron's forces were practically destroyed. At this time he still held most of Middle-earth, excluding the coasts, Imladris (Rivendell) and the Gulf of Lune.

Over 1500 years later, word reached the King of Nmenor, Ar-Pharazn, that Sauron had claimed the title "King of Men". This provoked Ar-Pharazn and gave him an opportunity to display the glory and strength of Nmenor. He arrived in Middle-earth with such overwhelming force that Sauron's armies fled at the sight of the Nmenreans. Abandoned by his minions, Sauron surrendered to the Nmenreans, and was taken to Nmenor as a "prisoner". Sauron then started to poison the minds of the Nmenreans against the Valar. Thus, Sauron set into motion events that brought about Nmenor's destruction. He did this by corrupting the King's mind, telling him that the immortality of the Elves was his to take if he set foot upon the lands of Aman, the Blessed Realm, where Valinor, the realm of the Valar, was located. Fearing death, Ar-Pharazn led an invasion of Aman and Valinor with the greatest host seen since the end of the First Age. However, upon reaching Aman, he and his army were buried by a landslide, and there they would remain until the Final Battle in Tolkien's eschatology. Manw, the King of Arda, called upon Eru Ilvatar (God), who opened a great chasm in the sea, destroying Nmenor, and removed the Undying Lands from the mortal world. The destruction of Nmenor destroyed Sauron's physical body and his ability to take a fair and handsome shape, but his spirit returned to Mordor and assumed a new form: black, "burning hot", and terrible.

In The Hobbit, set 60 years before the events in The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien relates the story of the seemingly accidental finding of the Ring by another hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, who takes it to his home, Bag End. Story-externally, the tale related in The Hobbit was written before The Lord of the Rings, and it was only later that the author developed Bilbo's magic ring into the "One Ring." Neither Bilbo nor the wizard, Gandalf, are aware at this point that Bilbo's magic ring is the One Ring, forged by the Dark Lord Sauron.

The Lord of the Rings takes up the story about 60 years after the end of The Hobbit. The story begins in the first volume, The Fellowship of the Ring, when Frodo Baggins, Bilbo's adoptive heir, came into possession of Bilbo's magic ring. Bilbo's old friend, Gandalf the Grey, who got Bilbo involved in the adventures in The Hobbit that led to the discovery of the Ring, discovered that it was in fact the One Ring, the instrument of Sauron's power and the object for which the Dark Lord has been searching for most of the Third Age, and which corrupted others with desire for it and the power it held.

Sauron sent the sinister Nazgl, in the guise of riders in black, to the Shire, Frodo's native land, in search of the Ring. Frodo escaped, with the help of his loyal gardener Samwise Gamgee and three close friends, Meriadoc Brandybuck, Peregrin Took, and Fredegar Bolger. While Fredegar acted as decoy for the Ringwraiths, Frodo and the others set off to take the Ring to the Elven haven of Rivendell. They were aided by the enigmatic Tom Bombadil, who saved them from Old Man Willow and took them in for a few days of feasting, rest, and counsel. At the town of Bree, Frodo's party was joined by a man called "Strider", who was revealed, in a letter left by Gandalf at the local inn for Frodo, to be Aragorn, the heir to the thrones of Gondor and Arnor, two great realms founded by the Nmenrean exiles. Aragorn led the hobbits to Rivendell on Gandalf's request. However, Frodo was gravely wounded by the leader of the Ringwraiths, though he managed to recover under the care of lord Elrond, the Half-elf.

In Rivendell, the hobbits also learned that Sauron's forces could only be resisted if Aragorn took up his inheritance and fulfilled an ancient prophecy by wielding the sword Andril, which had been forged anew from the shards of Narsil, the sword that cut the Ring from Sauron's finger in the Second Age. The treachery of Saruman, formerly head of the White Council and now in league with Sauron is also revealed. A high council, attended by representatives of the major races of Middle-earth; Elves, Dwarves, and Men, and presided over by Elrond, decide that the only course of action that can save Middle-earth is to destroy the Ring by taking it to Mordor and casting it into Mount Doom, where it was forged.

In the second volume, The Two Towers, a parallel story, told in the first book of the volume, details the exploits of the remaining members of the Fellowship who aid the country of Rohan in its war against the emerging evil of Saruman, leader of the Order of Wizards, who wanted the Ring for himself. At the start of the first book, the Fellowship was further scattered; Merry and Pippin were captured by Sauron and Saruman's Orcs, Boromir was mortally wounded defending them, and Aragorn and the others went off in pursuit of the Hobbits captors. The three meet Gandalf, who has returned to Middle-earth as "Gandalf the White": they found out that he slew the Balrog of Moria, and although the battle also proved fatal to Gandalf, he was then sent back and "reborn" as a more imposing figure. At the end of the first book, Gandalf, Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli help defeat Saruman's armies at the Battle of the Hornburg while Saruman himself was cornered by the tree-like Ents and Huorns, accompanied by Merry and Pippin, who escaped from captivity, and the two groups are reunited.

The second book of the volume tells of Frodo and Sam's exploits on the way to Mount Doom. They managed to capture and "tame" Gollum, who then showed them a way to enter Mordor secretly (as opposed to the Black Gate), albeit through the dreaded realm of Minas Morgul. At the end of the volume, Gollum betrayed Frodo to the great spider, Shelob, and though he survived, he was captured by Orcs. Meanwhile, Sauron launched an all-out military assault upon Middle-earth, with the Witch-king (leader of the Ringwraiths) leading a fell host from Minas Morgul into battle against Gondor, in the War of the Ring.

3a8082e126