[Ivriniel]

(By the way, since you speak of a "The Land kind of wrongness", I wonder: did you in your reading history come from Tolkien to Donaldson or vice versa?

I read Donaldsonian stuff second. (I thought Lord Foul was 'hotter' than Sauron - hahahaha' at least the former had a corporeal body, or could choose one. And Sauron's 'hot burning eye' hahahaha although literally perhaps 'hot' wasn't very 'hot' hahahaha)[/quote]

Originally Posted by Pitchwife

Hi, Ivriniel! A fine mess you've made of this thread, if I may say so; but I think we've cleared it up by now. At the very least your ideas have the merit of being fresh and unorthodox.

Hi Pitchwife. Unorthodoxy was not at all in any part intended,, but I think ur referring to the Ungoliant/Shelob diversion prose? Still, that's posting. Anonymised text seems to enable lower manners thresholds, I've found over time and I try to make light when it gets so serious it's just not fun anymore.

The invisibility thing in itself didn't strike me as particularly wrong - it's a common fairytale trope, and the scenes in which Bilbo uses the ring are IMO written totally different from those where Frodo uses it in LotR, a lot lighter and largely devoid of the ominous overtones we find there. We don't get that sense of him passing into another world or dimension.

Yes, invisibility is common in fairytales though it's in horror stories a lot as well. I was always intrigued, while some part of me baulked at the Ring's invisibility with Bilbo. Even at 15 years of age, which a very long time ago for now, I remember imagining a friend stalking around invisibly (by perspective taking and imagination) and then trying the idea out myself, and then being troubled by the Ring's power.....

What did strike me as wrong in a Gollumish sense was Bilbo's secrecy about the ring, never mentioning it to his friends until he's practically forced to. And this is, of course, where Gandalf's sideway glance comes into play, which you've been mentioning:

I think so - I also seem to recall words of sorts, and I should probably find the citation. From the LotR perspective, Gandalf was versed in Ring Lore, and so the seeing of - even a Lesser Ring - would have opened Gandalf's eye for history up to the Second Age and the Istari's subsequent arrival later on.

But if you presuppose the Hobbit-ish view (the prof hadn't a cogent narrative for the Ring yet), the prior argument isn't as clear.