The Lord of the Rings: Prolegomenon to The Two Towers

 

Soon (convenient term, soon) I will begin on the second volume of The Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers. It consists of two ‘books’, The Treason of Isengard and The Ring Goes East. The first ‘book’ of the volume deals with the adventures of Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas as they go in search of Merry and Pippin; this puts them all in conflict with the traitorous wizard Saruman’s machinations. It is not until we reach the second ‘book’ that we again take up the major quest of Frodo and Sam into the East, into Mordor, and their dealings with the creature Gollum.

So, what are the Two Towers? Tolkien actually explains this in a note at the end of The Fellowship of the Ring: ‘The second part is called THE TWO TOWERS, since the events recounted in it are dominated by ORTHANC, the citadel of Saruman, and the fortress of MINAS MORGUL, that guards the secret entrance to Mordor; it tells of the deeds and perils of all the members of the now sundered fellowship, until the coming of the Great Darkness.’ This fact has been a bit muddled by the Jackson films, where Saruman states: “The world is changing. Who now has the strength to stand against the armies of Isengard... and Mordor? To stand against the might of Sauron and Saruman... and the union of the Two Towers?” But Tolkien’s intent is clearly shown on the proposed book cover he drew (shown above).

Ursula K. Le Guin had an interesting ‘first contact’ with The Lord of the Rings via this book. They were on the new acquisitions rack at her university, having recently completed publication. Sometimes all three were there, sometimes only one or two. “Once I went so far as to pick up Volume II, when it alone was on the rack, and looked at the first page. “The Two Towers.” People were rushing around on a hill, looking for one another The language looked a little stilted. I put it back. The Eye stared through me.” –  Ursula K. Le Guin, “The Staring Eye.” Then one day, being tired with trying to read all the Grub Street work of George Gissing and seeing all three volumes were there, she picked up The Fellowship of the Ring and took it home. She was back the next day for the other two, and read them all in three days.

I had an almost inverted experience years later. Mike supplied me with The Fellowship of the Ring and The Return of the King but could not get The Two Towers until a week later. I finished Fellowship quite quickly, and then was biting my nails in my eagerness to continue. In my desperation and weakness, I went ahead and read at least the first chapter of Return and maybe a couple more. I was (quite understandably) rather confused, but I knew two facts. One was that Gandalf was alive (how?) and the other was that Pippin was with him. Eventually even I realized that it was not a good idea to forge ahead in this manner and forced myself to wait until Towers arrived.

In the post-9/11 world, the speech that Tolkien wrote in the Fellowship so many decades before got a special meaning and currency thanks to the Jackson films. Many clung to these words for encouragement and as a way to go forward:

“I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.
"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

The fact that the next movie was coincidentally titled The Two Towers further cemented this strange association of the LOTR movies with the fall of the Twin Towers; I even heard the movie called The Twin Towers a lot at the time.  Such are the odd workings of … fate? … happenstance? … luck, as you call it?

It seems like an odd literary choice to abandon your main protagonist for 200 pages or so. Tolkien has a trick to keep Frodo in mind, though. Every once in a while, the characters will wonder what he is doing or if he is even still alive, and Frodo and Sam wonder the same about them. Sometimes Tolkien will remark what others are doing or seeing at the time of some action in the parallel storyline, without revealing any big spoilers.  He took remarkable efforts to make sure all the interlacing actions lined up correctly in chronological order, with special labor over the phases of the moon.

So. Now we are poised to begin The Two Towers. Whether I’ll start posting it over the weekend or wait until Monday, I haven’t yet decided. The fact is that I am almost too eager to proceed. As it is, the project is taking over my time and my attention, so much so that it seems I only come up for air between chapters and almost immediately need to plunge back in. I know the posts don’t seem very long. But between trying to condense the story, deciding what to leave in or what to leave out, and researching various facts and history, it’s taking up quite a bit of my day and my thought. I love doing it, but I need to attend to the other details of my life every now and then.