LotR -- Book 3 - Chapter 01 - The Departure of Boromir

[Bêthberry]

Thank you again for another well-wrought intro to the discussion, Estelyn. I do indeed have other things to say about the chapter, but for now let me get Boromir out of the way.

This chapter provides the one of the remaining pieces of evidence in my point that, in Boromir, Tolkien was depicting his concept of the Northern Heroic Warrior. (See Tolkien's "The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth" for his ideas about noble errors and heroes dying for their folly. I don't want to repeat myself too much here, however much I enjoy listening to my argument again.)

Saucepan has said in the previous chapter that we are analysing Boromir psychologically. Here let me extricate my argument from that statement. Rather, I consider Boromir narratologically. Whoa! Big word. Not as big as verisimilitude, but up there. I mean simply that I consider Boromir the character's function in terms of plot or narrative/story.

Tolkien the writer has a problem. He's got the son of the Steward of Minas Tirith who thinks he's the One thank you very much, oldest son and Dad's favourite and the Big Man on Campus. Having won election as campus leader, he just knows he is going to be President of the University someday. However, Tolkien's got the 'once and future King', Aragorn-Arthur, who is going to return to claim the throne for righteousness and true love's sake. (My flippancy here does not do justice to how Tolkien rewrites the courtly love scenario in Aragorn and Arwen, but that is for another chapter anyway.) Now, how does a writer resolve that situation? He can let them go mano e mano, duking it out for the top dukedom, so to speak. But that will interfer with his depiction of Elessar's true nobility. Better to get the pretender out of the way somehow. And out of the way before the big A starts his lonely journey of proving himself.

What kinds of 'somehow' are available? Well, there's a chance to demonstrate by opposition the kind of true nobility which the rightful king will demonstrate. That is, show how the Pretender does not measure up. Then, there is the very attractive opportunity to demonstrate something of the power of the Ring over a character who can safely, without damaging the main plot line, be done away with. And, finally, there's a wonderful opportunity to call into play the most important moral value which the quest to destroy the Ring will show: the value of pity. Boromir the character didn't have a chance. He was just too perfectly expendable.

He can, then, go greatly in to that goodnight. Boromir's death provides Tolkien with the chance to create an essential feature of the Norther Warrior's demise: the funeral boat. Expending time on this scene demonstrates two things: the value of the dead in this kind of society--as the earthly home of the spirit they deserve a respectful closure-- as well as the funeral rites befitting a hero. Here, for example, is the funeral boat of Scyld Scefing from Beowulf. I'm using Seamus Heaney's translation, so his name is Shield Sheafson.

Shield was still thriving when his time came
and he crossed over into the Lord's keeping
His warrior band did what he bade them
when he laid down the law among the Danes:
they shouldered him out to the sea's flood,
the chief they revered who had long ruled them.
A ring-whorled prow rode in the harbour,
ice-clad, outbound, a craft for a prince.
they stretched their beloved lord in his boat,
laid out by the mast, amidships,
the great ring-giver. Far-fetched treasures
were piled upon him, and precious gear.
I never heard before of a ship so well furbished
with battle tackle, bladed weapons
and coats of mail. The massed treasure
was loaded on top of him: it would travel far
on out into the ocean's sway.
They decked his body no less bountifully
with offerings than those first ones did
who cast him away when he was a child
and launched him alone out over the waves.
And they set a gold standard up
high above his head and let him drift
to wind and tide, bewailing him
and mourning their loss. No man can tell,
no wise man in hall or weathered veteran
knows for certain who salvaged that load.

This contrasts with Beowulf's death, where Beowulf had decreed a barrow be built and his body was first consumed upon a pyre with his gold and treasures. Yet consider these last lines from the poem:

So the Geat people, his hearth companions,
sorrowed for the lord who had been laid low.
They said that of all the kings upon the earth
he was the man most gracious and fair-minded,
kindest to his people and keenest to win fame.

Well, just a final little note to the extended edition of the Heroic Northern Warrior arguement.