Ben Gunn and Frodo, the Elijah connection and The Sea-bell

[illyria_novia]

Comments

[claudia603]

oh my gosh, I was JUST thinking about you yesterday morning and wondering if you'd ever post again! :D

(sorry, I have nothing intelligent to say about your actual post, but I loved seeing your name on my flist this morning!)

[illyria_novia]

I always thought I'll post again, but I never do. I've been sneaking in and lurking and thinking of posting for a while, but every time I worried that I would not be able to keep it up again. But yesterday, I can't just not post after watching Treasure Island. :)

[gentlehobbit]

I think Frodo would simply want them to bring their voices, to talk. Throughout the poem he mentions chances for communication that either slip away or won't happen as people refuse to talk. As reserved as Frodo was, he was a witty and intelligent conversationalist, and LotR showed how much he also cherished listening and learning from people.

Lovely to hear from you again! *hugs you*

[illyria_novia]

That is a very interesting observation (and a perceptive one) about Frodo and what he would miss from society. His love of conversation and his fear of losing it is palpable in the poem.

And it's good to hear from you! Good to know you are still on LJ. *hugs*

[jan_u_wine]

I'm not sure I can make intelligent comment on this powerful poem, either, but i'll try. It's too easy, I think, to imagine that it is Frodo in the Undying Lands. It feels to me, literally, like what the sub-title calls it, "Frodo's Dreme", a dreme which moves and acts like most of our dremes, filling our sleep with images that jump out of sense, out of focus, out of time and place and even logic with little seeming-sense. At first, I did imagine that he was over-sea, and still at the mercy of all of the terrible things which he sailed to let loose of. And so might he be, in reality *or* in dreme. For all of us, I think, have dremes, upon occasion, of those things which, in our waking lives, we have come to terms with

[illyria_novia]

In all honesty, my thought on this poem is that it was written either within that period when Frodo had just returned to the Shire, when his life grew ever darker, when the people he had given all to save turned their faces from him, OR upon his recent arrival in the Undying Lands.

That is very interesting! It would make more sense that he wrote it upon his arrival. I think the insinuation, encouraged by Tolkie, obviouslt, that it was found it in the margins or loose blank pages of the Red Book, is what makes it ominous, giving it that much more darkness and despair, to be further aggravated by Ben Gunn's desperation.

Healing was surely not an instantaneous process. Tolkien said, in his letters, that Frodo was sent there so that he could be cured, if he might, before he died. That indicates a process, and a wealth of work on Frodo's part.This is also very interesting. How does one heal someone as broken as Frodo? Especilally given that, while Elves have notable healing skills, they know little of hobbits. Gandalf who had been

[jan_u_wine]

well, my goodness. In reading your reply, I realized that I knew little about the background of where Sea Bell came from. And in googlling to find out more about it, I came upon this, from my own good friend and Tolkienista, Mechtild. This is very worth reading, I think. She makes a great case for her pov and a most beautiful (as ever) post

[shirebound]

*welcome-back hugs*

[illyria_novia]

Thank you *hugs back*

[grey_wonderer]

Wow, that's a lot to think about this early in the day. I believe I will mull it all over and then come back later. Glad to see you posting here. You've been missed. : )

[illyria_novia]

Awww, I miss LJ too. I just feel I couldn't contribute much, what with interest shift and all.