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Originally Posted by symestreem
By the Somme I assume you mean the Western Front in World War I. I question your portrayal of the war as 'evil'. Who exactly was evil? The Central Powers, for seeking domination? The Allied Powers, for opposing them and causing bloodshed? I also question the extent to which Tolkien saw real evil on the front lines. Soldiers do what they are told- this was before the Nuremberg trials. The evil to be found would have been in the high command, not the men-at-war. That doesn't mean that the war was right- I just think that evil has to be deliberate. For example, Morgoth was evil because he was trying to be evil, but Feanor was not evil.
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What is your concept of evil, if the Somme battlefield doesn't graphically portray the presence of it for you? Try this link & then tell me there was no
deliberate evil to be seen on the Somme:
http://toosvanholstein.nl/greatwar/t.../tolkiene.html
Its not about individual persons doing 'evil' things - its much deeper & more horrible , a callous disregard, a lack of compassion, a deliberate infliction of suffering & degradation. All too often done for the 'highest' reasons, by people convinced they're in the right . Morgoth is a 'symbol' of something monstrous which is just way too close to most of us, & the 'spirit' of Morgoth was in the air of the Somme.