Quote:
Originally Posted by Lalwendė
...I think Saruman genuinely thought that he could do things differently. It is backed up by his character and him being one of Aule's people. He is proud and he also possesses incredible skill - and he has that urge that a lot of people have, to see how things work and try and improve them (like a bloke taking apart his bike). But it's more serious than someone taking apart their bike, as Gandalf points out to him. ...
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In the foreword to LotR JRR says that
IF he had intended the book to be an allegory of WWII then he would have had Saruman go, not to the Shire, but to Mordor to find
"the missing links in his own research..."
In the real war the victorious powers plundered many things from the defeated Germany, most well known are V2 rocket technology and the research of Josef Mengele. Both these fields produced positive and negative results in the form of the space race vs the nuclear arms race, and insights into genetics vs genetic engineering.
The benefits are with us still, as are the fears of the abuses, but one might say that good intentions make the Sarumans of our world brave or heroic, since they acheived what the morally restrained could not ("conscience doth make cowards of us all". as Hamlet says). Saruman's aims justify his means, in his own eyes at least.
By avoiding making LotR an allegory, Tolkien denies us the ability to point to any one figure or event in history and make them a scapegoat; as if to say "X = bad therefore I must be good." Instead, by making the books' themes "applicable", we're left with the uncomfortable questions:
"Who/what does this apply to?"
and
"How might this apply to me?"
ie. Is a man who dissassembles his bike any better than Saruman? I have dissassembled a rat so am I any better then Saruman? Does the fact that I did this as an obligatory part of studying 'A' level Biology provide me with justification?
The power of Saruman's (and Smaug's) Voice lies in saying things that are valid; but these things only work on those who are unprepared, who have not already decided where to draw the line they will not cross.
Gandalf gave Saruman the opportunity to redraw his lines (also a theme of the recent Dr Whos), on the terms that he lay aside his staff and the keys to Orthanc until he'd proved himself trustworthy. He declined and so lost his staff, but in this Gandalf appears to have made a similar mistake to that of Hama at the doors of Edoras. Where Hama failed to part Gandalf from his staff, Gandalf failed to part Saruman from his ring. He knew it existed, so was this an oversight or would removing his ring have had some effect Gandalf would deem undesirable?