[davem]

A single red light burned high up in the Towers of the Teeth, but otherwise no sign could be seen or heard of the sleepless watch on the Morannon.
For many miles the red eye seemed to stare at them as they fled, stumbling through a barren stony country. They did not dare to take the road, but they kept it on their left, following its line as well as they could at a little distance. At last, when night was growing old and they were already weary, for they had taken only one short rest, the eye dwindled to a small fiery point and then vanished: they had turned the dark northern shoulder of the lower mountains and were heading southwards.
With hearts strangely lightened they now rested again, but not for long

Its interesting that this ‘single red light’, introduced in one paragraph has become by the next a ‘red eye’. Clearly we are meant to think of the presence of Sauron. When the travellers pass beyond the range of it’s sight they feel their hearts’ ‘strangely lightened’. In a sense they have passed out of his realm & back in to the world of Men - albeit a world that bears his mark. Perhaps what we are seeing with this ‘red eye’ is a literal manifestation of the earlier statement that Sauron watches some places more than others. He is looking for attack from the Gate. It seems that being seen by the Eye is not simply to be put in danger of capture, but it is oppressive, it makes the heart heavy, increases the individual’s sense of hopelessness - Sam certainly seems to lighten up & rediscover some strength of spirit. And now we see that Gollum wasn’t speaking metaphorically when he told the Hobbits that ‘All roads are watched’ - they literally are...

Ithilien, the garden of Gondor now desolate, kept still a dishevelled dryad loveliness.
South and west it looked towards the warm lower vales of Anduin, shielded from the east by the Ephel Duath and yet not under the mountain-shadow, protected from the north by the Emyn Muil, open to the southern airs and the moist winds from the Sea far away. Many great trees grew there, planted long ago, falling into untended age amid a riot of careless descendants; and groves and thickets there were of tamarisk and pungent terebinth, of olive and of bay; and there were junipers and myrtles; and thymes that grew in bushes, or with their woody creeping stems mantled in deep tapestries the hidden stones; sages of many kinds putting forth blue flowers, or red, or pale green; and marjorams and new-sprouting parsleys, and many herbs of forms and scents beyond the garden-lore of Sam. The grots and rocky walls were already starred with saxifrages and stonecrops. Primeroles and anemones were awake in the filbert-brakes; and asphodel and many lily-flowers nodded their half-opened heads in the grass: deep green grass beside the pools, where falling streams halted in cool hollows on their journey down to Anduin.

I wanted to give this passage in full, if only to counter claims that Tolkien couldn’t write. This is one of the most beautiful & evocative passages of description in the whole of LotR. In one of his letters Tolkien stated that Itillien was a beautiful land & I think he made a special effort to communicate this to the reader. One can see why the Rangers of Ithilien fought so hard to defend the place & drive out the orcs. As an aside, in the documentary ‘JRRT: A Film Portrait of Tolkien’ CT remarks on the similarity of the part of northern France in which he & his wife live to Ithilien as described by his father.

Frodo after a few mouthfuls of lembas settled deep into the brown fern and went to sleep. Sam looked at him. The early daylight was only just creeping down into the shadows under the trees, but he saw his master's face very clearly, and his hands, too, lying at rest on the ground beside him. He was reminded suddenly of Frodo as he had lain, asleep in the house of Elrond, after his deadly wound. Then as he had kept watch Sam had noticed that at times a light seemed to be shining faintly within; but now the light was even clearer and stronger. Frodo's face was peaceful, the marks of fear and care had left it; but it looked old, old and beautiful, as if the chiselling of the shaping years was now revealed in many fine lines that had before been hidden, though the identity of the face was not changed. Not that Sam Gamgee put it that way to himself. He shook his head, as if finding words useless, and murmured: "I love him. He's like that, and sometimes it shines through, somehow. But I love him, whether or no."

Well, it seems that Gandalf was right about Frodo seeming to be filled with a ‘shining light’ for those with eyes to see it. Here we see into Sam’s heart. We see his motivation laid out plain. All his own struggles & sacrifices have been made not out of a sense of service or duty, but out of love. Probably that’s why the Quest succeeds in the end. Service & duty are all very well, but one rarely lays downs ones life willingly for such things - & perhaps Tolkien would not have approved of such an attitude. Sam is willing to give his life in the Quest, but not out of a sense of ‘duty’ or ‘obligation’. He has given up everything, he had, & is prepared to give up his life for love of Frodo.

When he thought all was ready he lifted the pans off the fire, and crept along to Frodo. Frodo half opened his eyes as Sam stood over him, and then he wakened from his dreaming: another gentle, unrecoverable dream of peace.

Another ‘gentle, unrecoverable dream of peace’. Where are these dreams of peace coming from - what is their source? Not, in all probability, from Frodo’s unconscious. More likely from the same source as his dream of the West in the house of Tom Bombadil. These dreams seem to sustain Frodo on his journey as much as, or even more so, than the Lembas. The lembas may strengthen Frodo’s body & heart but it seems these dreams are what sustain his soul & keep him going.

You are in peril, and you would not have gone far by field or road this day. There will be hard handstrokes nigh at hand ere the day is full. Then death, or swift flight back to Anduin. I will leave two to guard you, for your good and for mine. Wise man trusts not to chance-meeting on the road in this land. If I return, I will speak more with you."
"Farewell!" said Frodo, bowing low. "Think what you will, I am a friend of all enemies of the One Enemy. We would go with you, if we halfling folk could hope to serve you, such doughty men and strong as you seem, and if my errand permitted it. May the light shine on your swords!"
"The Halflings are courteous folk, whatever else they be," said Faramir. "Farewell!"

As Esty has said, these Gondorians are far more courteous, not to say decent, than the thugs we meet in the movie. They are civilised men, fighting to uphold their values. They may be biassed against their enemies, but that is down to desperation & perhaps a growing sense of hopelessness. What we see clearly, though, is that they are good people, & we can understand them, & more importantly care about them, instantly. We know who’s side we’re on & why - & its not simply because (as in the movies) the ‘good’ guys are prettier than the bad guys. This is a battle of Good vs Evil, not a beauty contest..

They spoke together in soft voices, at first using the Common Speech, but after the manner of older days, and then changing to another language of their own. To his amazement, as he listened Frodo became aware that it was the Elven-tongue that they spoke, or one but little different; and he looked at them with wonder, for he knew then that they must be Dunedain of the South, men of the line of the Lords of Westernesse.

And so we see that even in their speech they are on the side of the good. They speak the language of the Elves, even when they have never encountered any - ‘Elves are wondrous fair so they say’ This shows a sense of tradition, upholding the values of the past even when any connection with a living link to that past has been lost. Elves are ‘wondrous fair’ & so is their language. We see in so many ways, through so many examples, a desire to uphold, to ensure the survival of, what matters. These Rangers are fighting for something, not simply against a bunch of ugly bad guys who want to do them in.

It was Sam's first view of a battle of Men against Men, and he did not like it much. He was glad that he could not see the dead face. He wondered what the man's name was and where he came from; and if he was really evil of heart, or what lies or threats had led him on the long march from his home; and if he would not really rather have stayed there in peace--all in a flash of thought which was quickly driven from his mind.

Sam’s horror & disgust & pity are plain to see. As is the horror of war - which is not the ugliness of broken bodies & maimed souls, the wanton destruction of nature, but rather the individual tragedies it creates, the stories (if we adopt an ‘Entish’ perspective for a moment) which are stopped dead before they are full told. What we get to see through Sam’s eyes is this very thing - Sam wonders about the Swerting’s story, & how it perhaps would have turned out. We see that Sam, as much as Bilbo or Frodo, is the right one to tell us this story. Bilbo began the Red Book, Frodo continued it, but Sam will be the one who completes it, & more importantly, who tells it & begins the long chain of retellings which begin with his readings of it to his own children & continue on down to ourselves & will continue on down the years (hopefullly).

On the great beast thundered, blundering in blind wrath through pool and thicket. Arrows skipped and snapped harmlessly about the triple hide of his flanks. Men of both sides fled before him, but many he overtook and crushed to the ground. Soon he was lost to view, still trumpeting and stamping far away. What became of him Sam never heard: whether he escaped to roam the wild for a time, until he perished far from his home or was trapped in some deep pit; or whether he raged on until he plunged in the Great River and was swallowed up.
Sam drew a deep breath. 'An Oliphaunt it was!" he said. "So there are Oliphaunts, and I have seen one. What a life! But no one at home will ever believe me. Well, if that's over, I'll have a bit of sleep."

Nature, wild & untamed (despite what the Mahuts may have thought), breaks free, & tramples men, & their little hopes & dreams into the dust, & we ourselves, like them, will never know what happens to it.