No Married Persons

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Aganzir

As for Legolas and Gimli, while it's possible, I'm quite sure it would've been mentioned because it was mentioned about everybody else, and because Tolkien also told us about the more significant things that happened to them after the war.

I have doubts about Legolas and Gimli in that respect as well. ROTK Appendix A gives no indication that Gimli fathered any offspring, and that would seem to be the primary reason for Dwarven matrimony.

As for Legolas, it's just not easy to believe he would have left Middle-earth when he did, if he'd had a wife. I always thought that his and Gimli's leaving together stemmed from both having nothing else to hold them there.

[Sarumian]

So many valuable points has been already made here! I'd like, however to tackle a very delicate subject. I strongly believe that there is (was) no sexuality of our kind in Tolkien's universe. Apparently, there are sexes and conception but there is no sexual lust. What precipitates lust here is power, not the attraction to opposite sex. Due to this reason celibacy in this universe seems to be much more a way one can choose without committing oneself to the struggle against sexual desire.

Those in love in Middle Earth are free of persistent sexual attraction and thus is ready to wait for a proper time to build a family. There is also no problem with love that people of the same sex can feel to each other as there is nothing "sexual" in such love. It is a kind of philia or even agape, rather than eros. I would risk to say this about Frodo and Sam as well as about Legolas and Gimli, but in Middle Earth the lack of lust is typical even for relationship between different sexes.

[Bêthberry]

Hmm. I don't think Luthien and Beren are free of sexual lust. There is an Oo la la Luthien thread here that discusses their attraction for each other. And Daeron is said to love her and for that love betrayed her and Beren.

Maeglin certainly harbours a cruel lust for Idril. Eol also has a cruel lust.

There are several cases of assault and rape as well and women being forced to submit to marriage against their will. This is in the Silm, of course, not LotR.

I think there are suggestions that Aragorn and Arwen do have a sexual attraction for each other. And Eowyn's attraction for Aragorn is very interesting as it mixes her attraction for his power with something else.

I do think there is the suggestion that as the elves age they lose sexual desire but there is eros in LotR. Not writ large by any means, but it is subtly suggested. Sex was not openly discussed in Victorian literature but there's lots of it in those long tomes. It just becomes represented differently from our modern graphic ways.

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

Hmm. I don't think Luthien and Beren are free of sexual lust. There is an Oo la la Luthien thread here that discusses their attraction for each other. And Daeron is said to love her and for that love betrayed her and Beren.

Maeglin certainly harbours a cruel lust for Idril. Eol also has a cruel lust.

There are several cases of assault and rape as well and women being forced to submit to marriage against their will. This is in the Silm, of course, not LotR.

Not to mention the "evil lust" of Morgoth as he watched Lúthien dance and sing.
With the exception of Beren/Lúthien, it may be notable that "lust" seems to lead to negative consequences.

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

I think there are suggestions that Aragorn and Arwen do have a sexual attraction for each other.

I would classify those two as a later version of the Beren and Lúthien pairing, as the basic stories are quite similar.

x/d with Legate

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by Inziladun

Not to mention the "evil lust" of Morgoth as he watched Lúthien dance and sing.
With the exception of Beren/Lúthien, it may be notable that "lust" seems to lead to negative consequences.

I think it is very interesting that the negative examples of lust certainly are full of issues of power, as Sarumian suggests. It is of course modern legal and psychological definitions of sexual assault that remove rape from sexual desire and describe it not as desire but as power. In a book about the misuses of power, sexual assault would be prime examples of abuse. Wormtongue, as Legate remarks, is a particularly creepy example.

The ability not to impose one's wishes on others is a central value in LotR and that refers to sexual desire as well as other attempts at control. Tolkien really has a remarkably modern view of sexual assault.

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

I think it is very interesting that the negative examples of lust certainly are full of issues of power, as Sarumian suggests. It is of course modern legal and psychological definitions of sexual assault that remove rape from sexual desire and describe it not as desire but as power.

I think that is mostly valid in the context of Tolkien, though I would question it in the case of Morgoth. It seems there that the "power" motive might not have been primary, as he already held (as he thought) tremendous power in Middle-earth. In any case, Lúthien would have been, to his mind, completely in his power, being deep inside his stronghold, with countless minions standing between her and escape. In that instance, it appears that a sexual lust was possibly independent of a desire to assert power.

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Inziladun

I think that is mostly valid in the context of Tolkien, though I would question it in the case of Morgoth. It seems there that the "power" motive might not have been primary, as he already held (as he thought) tremendous power in Middle-earth. In any case, Lúthien would have been, to his mind, completely in his power, being deep inside his stronghold, with countless minions standing between her and escape. In that instance, it appears that a sexual lust was possibly independent of a desire to assert power.

There is power and power. Sure, she was inside his stronghold, and seemingly helpless. That's one type of power. But Morgoth has a desire to posess her - not only to have control over her, but more like Ungoliant wanted to devour all Light, and Morgoth wanted to posess the Silmarili. Knowing that you have control is not always enough "power" in this sense.

Saying that, though, it does not mean that there was no sexual lust whatever.

[Faramir Jones]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

I think it is very interesting that the negative examples of lust certainly are full of issues of power, as Sarumian suggests. It is of course modern legal and psychological definitions of sexual assault that remove rape from sexual desire and describe it not as desire but as power. In a book about the misuses of power, sexual assault would be prime examples of abuse. Wormtongue, as Legate remarks, is a particularly creepy example.

The ability not to impose one's wishes on others is a central value in LotR and that refers to sexual desire as well as other attempts at control. Tolkien really has a remarkably modern view of sexual assault.

That's very interesting, Bêthberry, considering what Tolkien said about the Elves and their attitudes to sex and marriage in 'Laws and Customs among the Eldar', from Morgoth's Ring, the tenth volume of The History of Middle-earth. In a revised manuscript, which Christopher Tolkien called 'B', he had this to say:

The Eldar wedded once only in life, and for love or at the least by free will upon either part. Even when in after days, as the histories reveal, many of the Eldar in Middle-earth became corrupted, and their hearts darkened by the shadow that fell upon Arda, seldom is any tale told of deeds of lust among them.

In an earlier completed manuscript ('A') on the same topic, he said:

But among all these evils there is no record of any among the Elves that took another's spouse by force; for this was wholly against their nature, and one so forced would have rejected bodily life and passed to Mandos. Guile or trickery in this matter was scarcely possible (even if it could be thought that any Elf would purpose to use it); for the Eldar can read at once in their eyes and voice of another whether they be wed or unwed.

So elves seldom committed sexual misbehaviour, let alone what we would call sexual or sex offences. Also, it was totally against their nature to rape a married elf, the raped elf feeling so violated if it happened he or she would die as a result. I smiled a little when I read how the use of guile or trickery in this area was impossible, elves knowing in the eyes and voice of each other who is married. It would certainly make adultery difficult!

[Aganzir]

Wasn't it also implied that Celebrían suffered sexual violence in the hands of the orcs that captured her, or am I imagining things?

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Sarumian

So many valuable points has been already made here! I'd like, however to tackle a very delicate subject. I strongly believe that there is (was) no sexuality of our kind in Tolkien's universe. Apparently, there are sexes and conception but there is no sexual lust. What precipitates lust here is power, not the attraction to opposite sex.

I can see where you are coming from, but I disagree. There is a lot of evidence. For instance, starting even with a Vala and an Elf-maiden:

Originally Posted by Silmarillion, Of Beren and Lúthien

Then Morgoth looking upon her beauty conceived in his thought an evil lust, and a design more dark than any that had yet come into his heart since he fled from Valinor. Thus he was beguiled by his own malice, for he watched her, leaving her free for awhile, and taking secret pleasure in his thought.

Or, what Gandalf had discovered about Wormtongue and his desire for Éowyn:

Originally Posted by Two Towers, The King of the Golden Hall

How long is it since Saruman bought you? What was the promised price? When all the men were dead, you were to pick your share of the treasure, and take the woman you desire? Too long have you watched her under your eyelids and haunted her steps.

Aside from this, from the top of my head I recall there being something about Maeglin, very probably about Eöl, maybe even about others, very likely something with Nienor and some of the men around her etc. Oh, and let us not forget the part about Túrin rebuking Forweg's followers, the outlaws:

Originally Posted by UT, Túrin among the Outlaws (or CoH)

Then one day Túrin missed Forweg, and also Andróg his friend; and he asked where they were, but his companions laughed.
"Away on business of their own, I guess," said Ulrad. "They will be back before long, and then we shall move. In haste, maybe; for we shall be lucky if they do not bring the hive-bees after them."

And the very interesting episode follows with the woman, Túrin killing Forweg, and rebuking the men for "doing such things".

So, lust very much exists. Even, as we see e.g. in the last episode, among the men of the House of Hador. But it is definitely shown only in the case of the bad characters, because they don't have the self-restraint the other characters possess (or, rather, they don't even have the desire to restrain themselves - not like e.g. Aragorn who was able to hold himself until he could finally be with the one he loved, or even Sam, that's basically the same case).

EDIT: cross-posted with Bethberry.