[Boromir88]

Well of course both were known for their ability to do exactly as you put it...'influence and captivate' the crowd. In many ways manipulate them. Other than those loose similarities, I don't see much of a resemblance as they both did so in different ways.

Saruman was a skilled orator. He had a great ability of argumentation and skill of speech. As was observed he had a certain 'charm' about his voice and as remarked in the Voice of Saruman, he began to lose this charm:

'Turn elsewhither. But I fear your voice has lost its charm.' (Theoden)

'First Saruman was shown that the power of his voice was waning.' (Gandalf)

Eventhough if this remarks about Saruman losing the 'power' and 'charm' of his voice, this certainly does show that at one time he did have a certain charm in his voice.

In Letter 210:

Saruman's voice was not hypnotic but persuasive. Those who listened to him were not in danger of falling into a trance, but of agreeing with his arguments, while fully awake. It was always open to one to reject, by free will and reason, both his voice while speaking and its after-impressions. Saruman corrupted the reasoning powers.

Says it all right there, Saruman had a great ability at being persuasive. And if you are using persuasiveness with an 'evil intent,' you can definitely corrupt people's reasoning abilities.

I had a discussion with somebody who had heard the English politician Oswald Mosley speak and a description of him by Professor AJ Tayler said:

"The greatest comet of British politics in the twentieth century . . . an orator of the highest rank"

Ever since hearing the description of politician Mosley I got a stronger connection with him (compared to Saruman) than I ever did with Hitler (I'll get to that more in a bit).

Mosley was once a gifted politician, known for a great voice, but he fell from grace in the 1930's when he wanted to take the Labour Party and turn it into the British Fascist Party and he was exiled. He came back to England in the later 1950's to speak at rallies of the British National Party. The person I talked to described his voice as such:

But his voice was like the lute of Orpheus- beautiful, mellifluous, and the words - when he spoke them- seemed so reasonable- though they were tainted words.

Ever since that moment I've always connected Saruman to Mosley more than Hitler. Mosley seems much more Saruman-like than Hitler, and as this man went onto say...'it would be interesting if Tolkien heard him speak at one point.'

Anyway, Mosley had a definite gifted charm in his voice. Which I think is most similar to what Saruman had...as well as several other politicians. There's people that just have the natural ability of speech to 'bring you in' and to 'captivate' you just like Saruman.

The reason I don't really connect Saruman to Hitler is this. As far as an orator, Hitler really wasn't all that good. Most people only see parts of his speeches where he gets 'fired' up. The majority of the time his speech was rather dull and boring, and then he would slowly build up to the end to this furious rage of anti-semitism and anti-democracy.

Hitler wasn't gifted like Saruman in the sense that he had a charm to drag people in. Hitler dragged people in because he told the people of Germany exactly what they wanted to hear...which means he was a smart politician; not necessarily a gifted speaker.

After WW1 the German people were greatly angered at the ridiculous treaty the Weimar Republic (the democratic government of Germany) signed...which in time devestated Germany and sent them into a spiralling economic depression. Whenever a people are hurt and aggrieved they never want to hear they are the cause of their own problems...they want scapegoats; and Hitler gave them scape goats.

Hitler would go on to blame democracy (The Weimar Republic) for Germany's problem and use already anti-semetic feelings of the German People to fuel them into more hatred against what he called 'the inferior races.' What Hitler did was play smart politics. He took an injured and troubling people...he took what the believed (The Weimar Republic was weak and useless, these 'inferior races are holding us back') and used that to 'bring the people to his side.' Nobody wants to hear they are the cause of their own problems. Hitler took the beliefs already within the German people and propelled them to get them to do what he wanted to do (which was overthrow democracy...establish himself as the dictator and annihilate the deemed inferior races).

So, overall, besides the fact that both Hitler and Saruman were good at 'captivating' people, their styles were completely different. Saruman had a skilled and certain charm about his voice, much like Mosley. He had the gifted voice that some people just have. Hitler played smart politics, he told the German people what they wanted to hear, so he could get what he wanted.