Days Twenty-Two and Twenty-Three: The Ring Goes South

Leaving behind the warmth and comfort of Rivendell, the Fellowship heads south on a cold December morning. JRRT again subtly underlines the nature of the Ring by making it the actor in the chapter title: “The Ring Goes South.” It almost sounds as though it sets out by itself. Since they’re headed by a circuitous route toward Mordor, it’s almost a certainty that the Ring does feel the “pull” of its master. The reluctance comes, not from the Ring, but from the one who carries it and all those who accompany him. Their commitment is strong, but it’s sometimes hard work to convince your feet to do what your heart knows is right.

Part of the enjoyment I get from blogging about our read-through is that I get to ponder the physical act of reading itself. Reading aloud is one of my greatest pleasures, and really the only kind of “performance” art I enjoy doing (though I perform for a very small audience, which is part of why introverted me can relax and enjoy it)! I was realizing anew, as we pushed through this chapter, how physical surroundings and other factors can affect our ability to enter fully into what we’re hearing. We had one night where we read outside on our sidewalk, something we sometimes do on lovely summer evenings, but there were talkative people across the street and some folks setting off small fireworks somewhere close by, which proved highly distracting. Not to mention lightning bugs! We did a little better indoors the next evening, as the Fellowship tackled the snowy and forbidding Caradhras, but S. was fretting about a deadline for some artwork she was entering into a contest (she was working on it while we read) so not the most ideal listening mode there either.

It’s also interesting to read a chapter so steeped in weather opposite to what we’re experiencing: we shivered through the bitter cold and snow of the mountain while living through July. Tolkien leaves it open as to whether or not the sudden snowstorm, unexpected that far south and that low down the mountain pass, is thrown at them by their ultimate enemy Sauron, lesser enemies who may be freelancing, or if the mountain itself is not somehow roused. That’s one of the most interesting notes in Tolkien for me – the idea that living things (trees, rivers, mountains) have a life of their own, quite apart from us.

There are an awful lot of leaders in this band of sojourners. The fact that sometimes they have differences of opinion soon becomes clear, when we learn that Aragorn and Gandalf were of two minds about whether or not to try the mountain pass. By the end of the chapter, the mountain has defeated them, so it looks like they will need to try Gandalf’s dark and secret way…the way no one wants to speak or think about.