{The Lord of the Rings [continued (5)]}[20th June 1988]

[Redbook5:190][19880620:1040g]{The Lord of the Rings [continued (5)]}[20^th June 1988]

19880620.1040

[continued]

I don't suppose for one moment that any of this* occurred to Tolkien; and of course it is, and is bound to remain, pure speculation. From an artistic point of view, I do not think I could improve upon the original verse, which is probably the most powerful thing in the whole book. That power may well come from its archetypal significance: as a description of at least a part of the Outer Circle process, it is chilling and not wholly inaccurate, viewed from a particular perspective. | Taken as a whole, the total world-view implied in a circle, **it may be fitted like this bleak reckoning:

		||
And in the darkness bind them	R~		S~	One Ring to rule them all
-	[↑]	+	[↓]	-
One Ring to bring them all	J~	←	U~	One Ring to find them
		|
		A~

***

But a wider view will see it as part of a hemisphere allowing the possibility of redemption:

[In both ms diagrams diagonal stubs (not shown here) are included as well as the cardinal stubs shown here in the ts.]

				||
					S~			One Ring to rule them all
	-			+		M~	-	One Ring to find them
					U~			One Ring to bring them all
				A~				And in the darkness bind them
				|

****

*[See last 4 previous entries, [Redbook5:187][19880620:1040c]{The Lord of the Rings}[20^th June 1988]ff]

**i.e. the 'One Ring' couplet

***An even bleaker view would start and end at A~ – The Cycle of Matter? (cf. Star Cycles, IV....[?[Redbook4:164][19871121:1310e]{Star Cycles (III) [continued (5)] – The Circle of Stars}[21st November 1987]&c]). Everything depends on your point of view. (This resurrects the horrendous problem of Circle alignment of T.II-V). {(↓) See [next entry,] p191}

****{I prefer the first, whole-circle version – which is a horseshoe, S~ → R~.}

cf III.[[Redbook3:35-36][19870326:1543p]{Quest Romances}[26^th March 1987] ] 35

[PostedBlogger22for23072018]