Our first topic is a doozy: Sam. He gets all the lines in this chapter, as they
say. So Sam gets two posts, just to keep from wearing everyone down.
Sam encounters Ithilien.
the hobbits breathed deep, and
suddenly Sam laughed, for heart's ease not for jest.
A. Why does Sam laugh? Why not Frodo? Have you ever laughed “for heart’s
ease”? Who laughs in Tolkien, and why?
Sam found it difficult to do more
than doze, even when Gollum was plainly fast asleep, … Hunger, perhaps, more
than mistrust kept him wakeful: he had begun to long for a good homely meal,
‘something hot out of the pot’.
Sam had been giving earnest thought to food as they marched…., and after
bathing and drinking, he felt even more hungry than usual. A supper, or a
breakfast, by the fire in the old kitchen at Bagshot Row was what he really
wanted. An idea struck him and he turned to Gollum. …‘Could you find anything
fit for a hungry hobbit?’
B. Why does Sam feel the need for real food now, and not in the previous
days? Is he thinking of himself, or Frodo, at this point?
Sam cares for Frodo.
Sam looked at him. … he saw his
master's face very clearly, and his hands, too, lying at rest on the ground
beside him. … [Frodo’s face] looked old, old and beautiful… Not that Sam Gamgee
put it that way to himself. He shook his head, as if finding words useless, and
murmured: `I love him. He's like that, and sometimes it shines through,
somehow. But I love him, whether or no.'
This is the first and only time Sam says he loves Frodo, though Faramir and
then the narrator will remind us of it several more times.
C. Why does Tolkien introduce this explicitly at this point in the story? In
what way does Sam love Frodo? And what does he mean by “whether or no?”
Tolkien often uses the word ‘love’ to describe feelings between non-related
men, for
instance: Merry of Bilbo; Aragorn of Theoden, Eomer and Merry; Legolas and
Eomer of Aragorn; Gimli of Pippin; and of course Sam of Frodo. Also, here is an
article that discusses (at length) the question of the meaning of same-sex
love in The Lord of the Rings.
D. Why do so many critics and fans seem to ignore the other frequent
expressions of love between various men, and focus on Sam’s loving relationship
with Frodo?
Frodo and Sam by Eiszmann
He was not going to leave Frodo
alone asleep even for a few minutes.
While Gollum was away Sam took another look at Frodo. He
was still sleeping quietly, but Sam was now struck most by the leanness of his
face and hands. 'Too thin and drawn he is,' he muttered. 'Not right for a
hobbit. If I can get these coneys cooked, I'm going to wake him up.'
When he thought all was ready he lifted the pans off the
fire, and crept along to Frodo. Frodo half opened his eyes as Sam stood over
him, and then he wakened from his dreaming: another gentle, unrecoverable dream
of peace.
‘Hullo, Sam!’ he said. ‘Not resting? Is anything wrong?
What is the time?’
‘About a couple of hours after daybreak,’ said Sam, ‘and
nigh on half past eight by Shire clocks, maybe. But nothing’s wrong. Though it
ain’t quite what I’d call right: no stock, no onions, no taters. I’ve got a bit
of a stew for you, and some broth, Mr. Frodo. Do you good. You’ll have to sup
it in your mug; or straight from the pan, when it’s cooled a bit. I haven’t
brought no bowls, nor nothing proper.’
I read Sam’s relationship to Frodo here as that of “mother” rather than “friend
or lover.”
E. Do you find Sam’s tone endearing, or cloying, or just right?
But Sam is Frodo’s junior in age, experience, education, rank, and class.
F. In what way, if any, is Sam “senior” to Frodo? How would Sam answer this
question?
G. How common would it be, in the English country society that Tolkien is
evoking with his hobbits, for a manservant to be cook, butler, and landscape
gardener, as Sam apparently is?
Text of this
chapter
Everyone is laughing for heart's ease, now that they're in Ithilien! Join me in the Reading Room this week for a squireific topic-oriented discussion of Chapter 4, Book IV of The Two Towers: "Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit".
squire online:
Footerama: "Tolkien would have LOVED it!" (improved!)
The Valaquenta discussion
A Shortcut to Mushrooms discussion
