[davem]

Christopher Tolkien makes some interesting observations on an early draft of this chapter:

In this chapter it is made plain that the commands of the Ring-wraiths are communicated worlessly to the bearer of the Ring, & that they have great power over his will. Moreover the idea has now entered that the wound of the Ring-wraith's knife produces, or begins to produce, a similar effect to that brought on by putting on the Ring: the world becomes shadowy & dim to Bingo, & at the end of the chapter he can see the riders plain, beneath the black wrappings that to others cloak their invisibility.

The Return of the Shadow

While he's referring to the early drafts, I think these points are very important. The morgul blade has the same effect on Frodo as the Ring, so it is another means of enslaving & 'wraithing' an individual. Also interesting is the way Frodo is passing into the otherworld, so again we are shown that there is another, underlying 'reality' going on beneath the surface. Its like there are two stories going on, or one story going on in two worlds. Both Glorfindel & the wraiths live in both worlds - yet is it the same supernatural dimension that he & they inhabit? This would appear to bring up all kinds of metaphysical problems & possibilities. Glorfindel manifests plainly to Frodo's eyes the Holy Light of Valinor, the Light of the Trees, which he had known before Morgoth slew them, & he has spent time in the Halls of Mandos, & been purified of his 'sin' in the Rebellion. This quite probably makes him one of the most powerful beings in Middle earth. It also explains why the Nazgul flee from him.

I don't know how uncomfortable some others felt with the episode with the trolls, but to me it felt a little 'forced', as though Tolkien put it in there in order simply to tie the 'New Hobbit' in with the 'Old'. These stone trolls, with bird's nests behind their ears seem too out of place. Still, it got us Sam's song, so I'll be forgiving. It also got us his declaration that he doesn't want to be either a wizard or a warrior, & maybe, just maybe, thats a glimpse of the reason he's able to resist the lure of the Ring - he simply doesn't want anything it could offer him.

Finally, the confrontation with the riders - this shows Tolkien's superiority over the movie scriptwriters, as the culmination of this chapter simply blows away the rather silly version in the movie. Frodo's defiance of the Nazgul, in his near death state, is so moving, so inspiring - though his attempt at commanding them to obey him possibly has darker implications - that what the movie offers us in its place is simply pathetic.

(Oh, I noticed for the first time on this reading that the Nazgul attempt to stop Frodo with the Black Breath:

A breath of deadly cold pierced him like a spear, as with a last spurt, like a flash of white fire, the elf-horse speeding as if on wings, passed right before the face of the foremost rider.