Green as a representation of evil

[Lyta_Underhill]

Ah, it seems that white was so simple and singular; now, we have all these colors to contend with! It's like the electromagnetic spectrum of the Tower of Babel, isn't it? Perhaps someone who has read Splintered Light could shed more "light" on this thought, but I suppose the wisdom of Gandalf would apply here:

He who breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom.

Also, on the "green" theme, didn't Frodo's face turn a livid shade of green as he lay poisoned by Shelob, just before becoming fair again? As I recall, Sam saw this green shade and gave up hope for Frodo, but then, when his back was turned and his thoughts on what should he do, Frodo's face regained the fair hue when Sam wasn't looking...ah, the irony!

Cheers,
Lyta

[HerenIstarion]

just before becoming fair again

Seems like thing to stress on.

[Kransha]

To be honest, green and its 'brethren' in the color spectrum. In the olde days (ah, I miss 'em so), there was a great deal of importance labeled in colors, primarily in the days of yore that share a literary chromosone or at the genetic level with our friendly neighborhood Professor's work. Namely, the Middle Ages and beyond. Primarily on heraldic devices, which frequent Tolkein, who goes into detail about the heraldic device of most of his pro and antagonists, colors were all but crucial. To be more poignant, there was always a good and a bad side to those colors too. To cite some examples from literature and generic culture.

For Green itself: To fence for the pro side, green is a representation of constancy, luck, fortune, happiness, merriness, and the like. Blue is a color of royalty, regalia, nobility, but that has downsides. It is more regal and less powerful. As the color blue lacks the strength and prowess to survive eternal, like resolute brown, the strong color of ancient trees. Purple is significant of mourning, almost entirely negative, as is black, which signifies death, but black also contains power, as death does.

Green's examples: The aforementioned line in Othello, said by Iago, I believe "that green-eyed monster, jealousy," the typicality of green in nature, either anarchic or beautiful. In Edmund Spenser's "The Faerie Queen" each character and challenge faced by the unamed brave knight is a representation of some evil. One of his first foes was a monstrous she-dragon, who bore 'a sickly hue of green and gules about her;" when she was slain, her serpentine children spouted from her hewn neck and were "a ghastly green seen in the muddy blood surrounding." In Middle Age nobility, green was a hindered color. Joan de Arc of France, if you've heard the tale, was able to deduce that a man parading as the King of France was not, since he was wearing green and yellow, not royal colors in France, which showed the real monarch that she was not mad, since she knew of such things. What about, the most obvious; but, here comes another tangent.

GREENLEAF! (Pardon my all-capital diversions) Tolkein references, my friends! And here, the blade is twice-edged too! Greenwood the Great was once a thriving, happy realm of Silvan Elves, but then spiders and Nazgul and orcs came to it, and it was renamed Mirkwood, but it was still green. Legolas Greenleaf himself bears the color in his name to further our purposes. He is surely not evil, and fights for another good aspect of greenery. Green is a common color in Tolkein, very common. It is often paired with another color, though, which is what makes the difference. Hobbits wore "bright clothes, of yellow and of green," a very merry pairing (no pun intended). Rohirrim were of greens and brown, more rustic and equestrienne colors. Morgul green is paired with black, in my opinion, since I always envisioned Mordor to be a black, grim place, with that sickly green as an augmentation.