Ok, too few strong women characters in LotR, lots in the Sil writings. One thing to recognise is that there are many stories in the Sil tradition whish have even less than LotR. The problem is that hardly any of the Sil stories were written in the style or at the length of LotR. The problem, perhaps, is that the one stolry out of the Legendarium that Tolkien chose to write in real depth was one which had so few women characters. The published Sil compresses thousands of years of history into a book a third of the length of LotR. There are fewer strong female characters in the Tale of Turin than in LotR for instance. If that had been written, as it could have been, in the 'romance' style of Lotr Lush would have even more trouble with it than with LotR.
Maria Tatar:
"The real magic of the fairy tale lies in its ability to extract pleasure from pain," Tatar writes in the introduction to "The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales." It's this complex duality that fascinates her and, she says, that imbues fairy tales with powers therapeutic as well as entertaining."
Is that the
real magic of the fairy tale? Not for me. For me it is, in Tolkien's phrase the glimpse they offer of something 'beyond the circles of the world'. Of course, the 'extracting pleasure from pain' thing is simply Tolkien's Eucatastrophe on a more mundane level.
Back to the subject of the thread (if I understand it) Yes, Tolkien was capable of writing strong female characters, but didn't introduce us to many in LotR. Why?
I have no idea. I just can't help feeling this is another 'Balrog's wings' debate. Why didn't Tolkien just come out & say whether Balrogs have wings or not? I'm reminded of the scene in Monty Python's Meaning of Life:
Quote:
Exec #1: Item six on the agenda: "The Meaning of Life" Now uh, Harry, you've had some thoughts on this.
Exec #2: Yeah, I've had a team working on this over the past few weeks, and what we've come up with can be reduced to two fundamental concepts. One: People aren't wearing enough hats. Two: Matter is energy. In the universe there are many energy fields which we cannot normally perceive. Some energies have a spiritual source which act upon a person's soul. However, this "soul" does not exist ab initio as orthodox Christianity teaches; it has to be brought into existence by a process of guided self-observation. However, this is rarely achieved owing to man's unique ability to be distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia.
Exec #3: What was that about hats again?
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Exec # 1:Gandalf, the incarnate Angel, sacrifices himself for his friends. He lays down his life in the face of pure evil. He passes beyond thought & time, & returns, resurrected, having passed through fire & death to heal those who suffer & lead the struggle against Sauron to free the people of Middle-earth...
Exec # 2: 'Ok, but did the Balrog have wings or not?
Exec # 3: And why weren't there any strong women characters there?
I have absolutely no idea why Tolkien didn't put lots of strong female characters in LotR. He just didn't. He could have put more in. Maybe it would have been a better book if he had, but he didn't. We could draw up a list of reasons - have a poll (somebody shout Heren!).
Yes, he could write strong women characters. Maybe, though, he set out his thoughts & feelings, told the stories he had to tell about women in the other stories he wrote, & wanted to write about other things in LotR.
Why didn't Shakepeare explore the theme of racism in Hamlet - he'd shown he was more than capable of doing it in Othello? Most probably because he had dealt with it elsewhere & wanted to deal with something else in Hamlet.