Quote:
Originally Posted by Sauron the White
"This is this. This isn't something else. This is this."
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I've anticipated your reply as in rereading my post I can see where I wasn't clear. Anyway, so here we go again:
One day a long time ago in class a friend of mine was rubbing her hands in a pained way. Seems that her fingers hurt, and this did not bode well as we were in a sign language class, and that required the use of one's fingers. I asked if she were okay, and she said that her arthritis was acting up. It was then that the conversation got interesting.
"Can't figure out why it's acting up...I've been eating peanut butter."
My brain stopped for a moment and reanalyzed what I thought that I'd heard. I checked the tape; yes she was somehow saying that peanut butter would help her joints. Sure, peanut butter, as far as I knew, wasn't bad, but somehow I guessed that she meant more than eating protein was good. So I asked.
My friend looked at me as if I were stupid and replied, "Peanut butter has oil in it.
"
I must have still looked incredulous, so she continued, "The nuns told me that to prevent arthritis I should eat peanut butter." I figured that the nuns were just trying to get someone to eat peanut butter and found a lever in which to move one person. I asked by which mechanism peanut butter worked, and she explained, matter-the-factly that the oil therein lubricated joints, and with the quantity of peanut butter she was consuming, her joints should not be stiff.
She was and is a dear friend, and so I gently let her know that this isn't how it works.
Anyway, what does peanut butter oil have to do with Gollum/Smeagol and running? Little, but the point it that people see something - a creaky door hinge - and extrapolate from there. My friend, I think, saw the door hinge, saw how oiling it made it better, saw the hinges in her hands, knew that there is oil in peanut butter, added 2 + 2 and arrived at 22.
Tolkien gets us to 22 by choosing careful data from which to extrapolate - to go beyond the data. I can run so far (and though I am taller, not every reader obviously is, and just how much smaller do I see Gimli as being, having a mental and not real image with which to compare?) in a day. Aragorn and company are proved heroes. I've already bought the farm, and so 22.
Yes, I know you'll say 4, and in math/running/physiology/reality I agree, but Tolkien still gets most people to 22, and that's why he's one of the best. If PJ had Smeagol/Gollum wear a goofy hat each time the personality changed, the average viewer would add 2 +2 and get 4, then subtract 4 for stupidity.
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