How hard and long was it, Aragorn?

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Elmo

I reckon "I've had a hard life, and long" rolls off the tongue slightly better.

Better than "I have had a long life, and a hard", anyway.

[Guinevere]

I like the fall of that sentence too, and agree with Squatter that it fits Aragorn perfectly.I never felt it was an "awkward phrasing"! Anyway, I'd like to applaud Squatter's erudite post, it gives the perfect explanation.

I love Tolkien's language and for me, it is just the use of all these contrasting styles that makes reading LotR such a pleasure and adds to the reality of the characters and to the feeling of really being in another time. (I have read too many "historical" novels where just the setting is historical but as soon as the characters speak, the atmosphere is destroyed)

Originally Posted by Galadriel55
I sometimes oppose to close-reading novels for litte details as such

It's the same with me. When first reading Tolkien, I just enjoyed his special language unconsciously, without thinking about how and why it had this effect. But then I bought Prof. Shippey's excellent book " Tolkien, author of the century" which was really an eye opener. Especially because English is not my mothertongue, I profited a lot from it.

[alatar]

Just one question, Guinevere: Is there any other utterance of Aragorn's or others that is so...well...different (and odd to these ears)? Why (to me) just the one?

[Mithalwen]

I have a feeling that I have misread that as "a hard life and long" for years but now I look at it it does seem a bit peculiar - if you use the substitution trick - the first thing that came to mind was "I have had a red sweater and a blue"...... then it seems clear that two separate thigs are referred to as opposed to I have had a red and blue sweater. Now obviously it is far more likely that my grammar is at fault than the Prof of Philology's but it still seems peculiar.

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

I have a feeling that I have misread that as "a hard life and long" for years but now I look at it it does seem a bit peculiar - if you use the substitution trick - the first thing that came to mind was "I have had a red sweater and a blue"...... then it seems clear that two separate thigs are referred to as opposed to I have had a red and blue sweater. Now obviously it is far more likely that my grammar is at fault than the Prof of Philology's but it still seems peculiar.

It seems to me that "a long life and hard" is a hendiadys, of which Wikipedia says:

Originally Posted by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hendiadys

The basic idea is to use two words linked by a conjunction to express a single complex idea.

As Wikipedia also says on that same page, it's a figure of speech used for emphasis. Instead of saying "long, hard life," the use of a hendiadys to break up "long" and "hard" gives emphasis to both the length and hardness of the life, rather than one of them singly.

I quote Mith because I think she's right to say that it seems peculiar, because this isn't how we normally speak--but insofar as the main examples (both on Wikipedia and in the contexts in which I've learned about them) of hendiadys tend to be Biblical, epic, and Shakespearian, they are indicative more of rhetoric, perhaps, than ordinary speech.

In Aragorn's case, to emphasize both long and hard puts him in a doubly superior position towards Boromir: Aragorn is both older than Boromir (giving him more time to accumulate experience and wisdom) and has had a harder life than Boromir (giving him more "experienced experience," if you known what I mean--as well as a possible morally superior claim). Aragorn and Boromir are definitely testing each other in this early part of their relationship to establish (in cruder sociological terms) a "pecking order." Notably, I think, Boromir will ultimately accept Aragorn's superiority, as Frodo attests to Faramir.

[Guinevere]

I never heard about "hendyadis", but I agree with Formendacil about the emphasis.

Originally Posted by alatar

Just one question, Guinevere: Is there any other utterance of Aragorn's or others that is so...well...different (and odd to these ears)? Why (to me) just the one?

Well, I am hardly competent to point out any peculiarites to an native English speaker! As I said, to me it didn't seem odd at all (you could say it like that even in my Swissgerman dialect), so I can't tell what else would sound odd to you.

What I notice are the many cases of inversion (as Squatter pointed out, Tolkien often used these to emphasize key words)
e.g. "whence it came, we did not at first perceive" (Gloin speaking of the shadow of disquiet) or "too deep we delved there" "Only to the north did these tidings come" (Elrond) and Aragorn begins his answer to Boromir with "Little do I resemble the figures of Elendil and Isildur as they stand carven in their majesty..."
But I think these inversions seem less unusual to me, because in German the order of the words is much less fixed than in modern English.

Frodo tells Strider already in Bree:" You began to talk to me like the Bree folk, but your voice has changed ." And really, even then Aragorn uses "cannot" instead of "can't", "do not" instead of "don't", "let us" instead of "let's", "I will" instead of "I'll" "I think not" instead of "I don't think so" "have I not?" instead of "haven't I?" (In fact, only Hobbits and Bree-folk speak like that)

To me all this makes his speech sound more noble and ancient, and not commonplace.
Another example that comes to my mind is Faramir asking "Whence come you?" when first seeing Pippin in Minas Tirith. This is unusual in English, but the word order is exactly like in German!

(In letter #171 that Squatter quoted Tolkien gives an example of what Theoden said and of how it would sound in colloquial English. But I'd have to look that up.)