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A
very peculiar thing happened to me yesterday. When I went looking for a particular
quote to preface my post on Tolkien’s birthday, I pulled out my old ex-library
copy of The Return of the King as the easiest to go searching in, as it
would lay open at the page while I transcribed it. And then something happened
that I had not intended.
I
became re-enchanted.
Let me
explain. The set that this volume belonged to is the very first place that I
ever read The Lord of the Rings, way back in middle school, the
1976-1977 school year. As such, it carries not only my first impressions of the
tale, but also of all the sensory experiences I had while reading it, from its
size in my hand to its unfamiliar British quotation marks to its characteristic
letter font. The runes, the metallic embossment on the covers (coppery-orange,
red and purple) shining in the black covers as if out of the deeps of time, the
maps, perhaps even the (then to me) unfamiliar format of one enormous story
told in a trilogy, made reading it an intense and immersive experience.
The
years passed, and I must have read The Lord of the Rings dozens of
times, first in these books and then in many other editions. I became so
familiar with it that I did not even have to read it again; all I had to do was
summon up a scene, and it would play out in my mind. Indeed, it became almost
impossible to reread it as a whole without losing patience and trailing off at
some point. I would still review certain sections at times, but it had become
like one’s nose: you can always see it, but your mind usually edits it out
unless for some reason you become aware of it.
Well,
I found my quotation, and then started flipping around a bit, assessing the condition
of the book, and sniffing its old, somehow watery smell. I started reading,
almost at random, the section concerning the Siege of Minas Tirith and the
arrival of the Rohirrim, certainly one of the most enthralling episodes of the
book. And here I made a rather unsettling discovery.
I
found that I had been expecting the arrival of Aragorn with the Dead Men of
Dunharrow, only to realize or remember with a bit of a shock that that happened
only in the Jackson movies, that Aragorn’s army in the black ships consisted of
living men that he had gathered coming upriver after defeating the Corsairs
with the undead host! Perhaps my memories could use a bit of touching up after
all; perhaps I was finally ready for a complete rereading at last. One other
line cemented my resolve. It says that it was ‘given’ to Gandalf to see what
was happening on the battlefield while he went to rescue Faramir and take him
to the Houses of Healing, a detail, and a power that I never paid attention to
before. Who gave it, and under what circumstances? There were clearly corners
where I could still find little mysteries and surprises. And the format was giving me very strong nostalgic vibes, and ... I was re-enchanted again.
So,
I have determined to begin my new reading tomorrow and chronicle it here. My plan
is to read a chapter a day, remark on passages that particularly strike me, and
even add background points of interest mentioned in places like The Lord of
the Rings: A Reader’s Companion (Hammond and Scull) or the four volumes in The
History of Middle-earth that deal with the composition of the tale. I doubt
if my reviews will be exhaustive (though possibly exhausting after a while) and
will be interrupted by other subjects in the blog, but by the end I should have
a renewed understanding of Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings. Anyway,
that’s my proposed story arc going into 2023. Let’s see how far it will take
me.
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