[littlemanpoet]

Thanks for the fascinating responses, all.

Allow me to recap my thought process as I read the quoted text.

a quirky character known as The Trickster

I immediately thought of Tom Bombadil, not least in context of the visible souls thread, which somehow devolved into yet another attempt to grapple with who and what Tom Bombadil was. It seemed to me that I had stumbled upon the best answer yet.

a special and permanent appeal and an unusual attraction for mankind from the very beginnings of civilisation.

This validated my thought of Bombadil.

Trickster is at one and the same time creator and destroyer, giver and negator, he who dupes others and who is always duped himself

At this point I thought, "more or less yes to creator and destroyer (made a home for Goldberry and himself; destroyed Old Man Willow's hold on the hobbits, and later that of the Barrowwight on them); yes to giver and negator (he gave the hobbits shelter & safety & good stories); but no to dupe and duped. In fact, he proves to be quite immune to being duped; think of how Frodo put on the Ring and it didn't work with Tom. Well, if not Tom, then who? Gollum! Okay, he is a destroyer, and a negator, and does dupe and is duped. But only the negatives. Hmmm....."

At times, he is constrained to behave as he does from impulses over which he has no control.

The tame by comparison to the archetype, Bombadil can't help but dance and stomp, not to mention rhyme even in normal conversation, and can't help being devoted to Goldberry (which maybe takes on new meaning in the context of his Trickster identity). But this fits Gollum even better.

He knows neither good nor evil yet he is responsible for both.

Okay, this doesn't work for Tom. Tolkien removed this part of the Trickster from him. On the contrary, Tom seems to be quite aware of both good and evil, but is affected by and responsible for good but not evil. Whereas Gollum knows good and evil, his appetite for the Ring overpowers.

He possesses no values, moral or social, is at the mercy of his passions and appetites, yet through his actions all values come into being.'

Okay, this is less true of Tom but true of Gollum in terms of the Ring's power to overcome all other considerations in his life.

How is one to reconcile a figure at once benefactor, buffoon, and malignant tease; who is at the same time incarnate spirit of destructive mischief, and yet culture hero...?

Indeed. It occurred to me that Tolkien's answer was to separate out the positives to Tom and the negatives to Gollum. What I find most interesting is that Gollum, of the two, is more amenable to the status of culture hero than is Tom; something that could only be true in our own age, I wager!

The Trickster represents an elemental, whimsical being, whose integration into human society is only partial.

All three aspects of this are true of both Tom and Gollum in their own ways.

There is a dichotomy in his nature, which prevents his ever breaking entirely free of his chaotic, primordial mould.

In the case of both Tom and Gollum, again, in different ways, quite.

He violates the most sacred taboos of society in a manner not normally contemplated even in myth. He is destructive, even murderous, on occasion; and yet his ready wit at other times leads him to teach his fellows...

Okay, this time we've moved away from Bombadil and find ourselves very much with Gollum, especially in terms of leading, if not teaching.

Symbolic of Trickster's efforts to rid himself unavailingly of the crudely bestial aspects of his nature are violent struggles maintained within himself, as when his left hand struggles against his right.

Ah. Gollum versus Sméagol.

In other Indo-European mythologies it seems that this [Master of the Woods] aspect of the Trickster-god has been hived off onto another, darker deity.

It was this quote that sealed it for me: Tolkien had done the same thing with the Trickster in LotR: Tom Bombadil received all the positive traits, and Gollum some of the positive but all of the negatives.

I too found it startling to be comparing these two characters out of all of them in LotR.

If you have not read the two poems that make up The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, I assure you that they will only serve to cement the notion of Tom as Trickster.

I was interested to see the other characters some of you thought of, and I can see how you could have thought of them. For me, I decided to play the game of seeing which character(s) from LotR best fit the most aspects.

davem's gives us wise words of caution, and I agree in part; nevertheless, the two characters of Bombadil and Gollum succeed in filling out the role of Trickster in LotR. Indeed, I think that to understand Bombadil as Trickster, answers much of the puzzlement that we have about him. This answers how Bombadil is "oldest" - he is the oldest archetype.

The Trickster has no place in orthodox Christianity.....

On the contrary. Orthodox Christianity has long since adopted the Trickster as one of the primary manifestations of Satan. Think of Christ's 40 days in the desert and the three ritual temptations that followed. Since you've read the book, davem, I would have thought you'd maybe remember Tolstoy's comments about how the Christian "myth" dovetails so amazingly with the myths of Trickster, Three-fold Death, the god dying to himself for the sake of his people, etc.