Child and davem,
Hey, I'm no ghost-buster.
I think there is a confusion simply of words here. I never used the word ghost, although Helen did. And my point in referring to these passages in the Lothlorien chapter is not to argue their metaphysical meaning but rather to suggest their symbolical importance.
When I referred to Frodo in "unearthly form" I was simply using my rather inglorious and clumsy way of saying what Tolkien has Aragorn say, "here my heart dwells forever."
And my point is less to expound upon Tolkien's mythology than to suggest a function for Arwen's character, a symbolic or aesthetic function rather than a psychological function.
I read this as a writer trying to get inside a story and feel what is right for each character but I take also a nod from "On Fairy Stories" where Tolkien asks, "But what of the banana skin? Our business with it really only begins when it has been rejected by historians." At the end of the following paragraph he concludes,
Quote:
I wish to point to someting else that these traditions contain: a singularly suggestive example of the relation of the 'fairy-tale element' to gods and kings and nameless men, illustrating (I believe) the view that this element does not rise or fall, but it there, in the Cauldron of Story, waiting for the great figures of Myth and History, and for the yet nameless He or She, waiting for the moment when they are cast into the simmering stew, one by one or all together...
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Arwen, for me, does not function as a psychologically driven character. There is simply too little given to her as a figure in the story. And, actually, I would say the same of Goldberry and Galadriel--not of Eowyn, please note. And this is in no way to demean their depiction. They are like characters out of old narrative whose purpose is to act out an idea--and by this I do not mean allegory. It seems to me absolutely fitting that the elf who choses the doom of man should, once her lover has died and is given all the rituals of the king's burial, return to the place where she made her choice and plighted her troth, particularly given the special sense of magic which Tolkien wishes the elves to represent. She returns to the heart of Elvendom. This is not for me a tenet of belief so much as of good story-telling.
My suggestion about Frodo at Cerin Amroth was designed to show how significant the site is, in terms of its importance to him, of what he understands there with Haldir's help, not to suggest that he or Aragorn linger there as spirits unwilling to leave. This is why the song about Nerindel and Amroth is important. All of this is not to deny what you have to say about the meaning within the Legendarium. For my purpose here the specific contents or the meaning within the Legendarium is not at question.