Wormtongue a cannibal?
After reading the new theme on Saruman, I have a question concerning the following passage of The Return of the King, "The Scouring of the Shire:"
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[ September 02, 2002: Message edited by: ElanorGamgee ] |
Yep, Wormtongue et Lotho. No two ways around it, I'm afraid.
I heard he served him up with some fava beans and a nice "kee-yan-tee". (slurp-slurp-slurp!) |
BIRDIE!!!!!! That's gross!!!!
I really hope Worm didn't eat Lotho. I'm still trying to understand my feeling toward Worm. I knda like him, pity mostly. I'm still wondering wether I would have let him stay if the other Hobbits hadn't made Grima-kabobs out of him with their arrows. Hobbit-eating *shudders* *sniffle* [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img] [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img] [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img] |
Some people have already given their thought on this question in the Saurman Theme Topic.
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I think that is sick. But to soften the blow it really wasn't cannibalism. Since Wormtounge was a man and Lotho was a hobbit. There different speices so tecically its not canibalism.
But it's still sick. I hope Lotho was buried. Of course if Saruman hadn't wasted the Shire there might have been enough food for Wormtounge. |
Actually, hobbits were Men, only a different breed (like the difference between Great Danes and Dachsunds, I guess [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]) so if Wormtongue did indeed feast on poor Lotho, it would have still been categorized as cannibalism.
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There's no explicit confirmation of Saruman's words, but it isn't unlikely that Gríma should do such a thing, poor debased creature that he was. My suspicion is that Saruman had been forcing him to find his own food, possibly as a punishment for throwing away the Palantír of Orthanc, and that hunger might well have driven him to eat Lotho. I suspect, however, that Wormtongue's words were a reference to the murder itself: I doubt if he would admit to the other crime before a group of armed and angry Hobbits. The point is that whatever Wormtongue had done, Saruman had forced him to it. Normally I would regard this as a pathetic excuse, but Saruman was more than capable of controlling the thoughts of one as weak-willed as Gríma even in his diminished state.
I should perhaps point out that Gríma wouldn't technically have been a cannibal even if he had eaten Lotho, since they weren't of the same species. In a moral sense, though, the line is a very fine one indeed. |
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[ September 02, 2002: Message edited by: The Barrow-Wight ] |
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If you add up the parts, you can clearly see a Christian theme that is potrayed (intentional or not) - Saruman was given a chance to be forgiven but he refused and he suffered the consequences of his actions. The irony is that it wasn't one of the 'Good Guys' who finished him off, but one of his own servants and one with free-will at that. [ September 02, 2002: Message edited by: Shadowstrife911 ] |
However crazy it may sound but it seems to me Saruman knew quite well what he was doing while accusing Wormtongue of cannibalism, even if that wasn't true. Thus he made Wormtongue look the meanest of all creatures beyond redemption and pardon. And the cornered rat, you know, fights back most fierously.
I see this scene as Saruman's suiside. His fight was lost. He couldn't ask for mercy (was too proud for that and too used to dominating others). He wouldn't be ever accepted back to Valinor after his treachery. I don't think he was willing to spend the rest of his eternal life in M-E in the shape of an old man despised by everyone. But getting a wretched creature to kill him, or better say his body, and making all the good guys feel guilty and full of foreboding after his 'prophesy' - that was his style to get out of the situation with all his pride and wits. |
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I believe the "sigh" was not only literal, but figurative...a lament for lost chances, wrong turns taken on the road that goes ever on and on...
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As for Saruman, I think his contempt for Gríma and his belief that this servant at least would always be loyal, if only through fear were so complete that the sudden attack came as a total surprise. I'm almost certain that Saruman's name for Gríma was a deliberate reference on Tolkien's part to the phrase "the worm has turned": another example of his ironic punning. Quote:
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And yet another thought. I've read that it's believed by Christians that anyone who was murdered goes straight to heaven, no matter how and why it happened. This is used as one of the arguments for banning death penalty. If I'm mistaken here please don't take offence and correct me. But to me this explains the shadowy figure was looking to the west, perhaps believing that by his death he could get a pass home. |
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One topic from 2002?
Thought this would be more of a thing |
I agree with the topic starter.
Saruman was showing his contempt for Wormtongue both by calling him "Worm", and by insinuating the cannibalism. Wormtongue's protest that Saruman "made him do it" referred only to the actual murder of Lotho in his sleep. Debased as Wormtongue was, I wouldn't think he was fallen enough to eat a Hobbit out of an Orcish evil, or that the food situation at Bag End was that bad. |
Saruman was skilled in treachery and lies. So I'm on that side more, however Grima was so ill used so corrupted such a pitiful thing a pet, that I could see him doing it. Not out of malice, just out of pure hunger and survival...
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Granted, he'd been ordered apparently to stay out of sight and do his dirty work at night, but surely there was some sort of wretched food he could subsist on. There were the Shirrif-houses, and local Hobbit-holes and houses would have had gardens he could raid. |
Good question. It has been noted that the appetizers known as "finger food" originated in the Shire.
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I agree that Wormtongue's confession is to the murder of Lotho, not eating him.
It is a great topic though, because it's the skill of Tolkien to leave questions like this up to the freedom of the reader. You could easily argue yes, as you could no. Putting myself in as Grima's defense attorney for a moment, the confession to the murder is undeniable. But the evidence of cannibalism is so slim there's no way he would be convicted in a court of law :p It's solely based on the word of a liar, and quite an effective liar as this blast from past will show. A liar trying to save his own skin and use a "mob's moral outrage" against the only victim he had left to blame. *takes off defense attorney hat* I do agree that cannibalism is as low that the poor and mean characters in the story can fall. It's a sign of complete moral depravity (as noted with Saruman's orcs getting fed "man-flesh.") There is another character that has fallen so low, there's also accusations of cannibalism: Quote:
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Not sure it's comparable to the case against Gollum, though, which I'd say is a good deal stronger- and from a skim of that thread, you and Sauce aren't so much concerned with disputing the alleged baby-eating as with pleading insanity on behalf of the accused. |
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That is all. |
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I would say Wormtongue at that stage was capable of cannibalism but only as a last resort, and once the murder victim disintegrates enough to be unrecognisable. I see him more as feeding on rotten stuff, being forbidden to touch Saruman's food, which would prompt the comment.
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Bending all one's will toward "possession" has a degrading effect, regardless of the initial motives behind the want. |
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I primarily meant in the behavioral and physical outcome sense. Their behaviors in their degraded states had a resemblance. |
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or, a threat to induce compliance, as with Shagrat to Snaga at Cirith Ungol: Quote:
Perhaps hearing of, or maybe even watching Orcs eat one one another could have helped inure both to such an act, if it was down to either that or starving. |
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Was it something used as a punishment? |
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Out of curiosity, were there other variations of the name in other translations (if you know of any)? I've seen two variants on Glorfindel (Gorislav and Vseslavur), and the "C" names are wonky (Celeborn, Cirdan, Celebrian...). But I haven't come across a second Wormtongue. |
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And he's Червеуст (Wormlips/wormmouth) in Каменкевич-Каррик version (You see, I've been somewhat obsessed with it as a teenager (not yet speaking English), laying my hands on any translation I could get hold of) |
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Forgiving someone, treats them as a member of the human race. Saruman has fallen so low, that, not content with refusing forgiveness for himself, he tries to deny it to Wormtongue as well. He is acting in the spirit of Sauron, even though Sauron is now powerless. That may be why the description of the passing of Saruman is like that of the passing of Sauron. |
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