Luthien weilding Vilya

[Mithalwen]

I don't know I want to get deep into this because for me there are too many variants from the rings as written, in this hypothesis that one might as well say if it were a different book it would be a different book... however I so agree that you have to take the superlatives with a pinch of salt especially when referencing drafts and versions not published by JRRT. Some characters didn't appear til later. However regardless I think Luthien would have been useless aa a ringbearer because she is essrntially passive and only acts when motivated by the need to fulfil her own desire.

[Pervinca Took]

I wouldn't call Luthien passive. I agree, though, that, highly heroic as her and Beren's deeds were, their motives were far less selfless than those of many others in The Silmarillion.

[Mithalwen]

She lets herself get shut in a tree.. I find it very hard to see a woman as powerful when she can't even manage daddy...a skill most girls pick up by five months...

[Pervinca Took]

Can't believe she really couldn't manage a twit like Thingol. I think she was just letting him think she couldn't get out of it, when all along she knew the opening spell.

I've always honoured Beren and Luthien's tale because I knew/read it was Tolkien's favourite - but it seems a little like the Romeo and Juliet tale of Middle-earth - and now in comfortable middle age, I find the latter a pair of rather selfish irritants. Beren and Luthien less so, but in the same semantic field. Then again, passionate young love (and how it blinds people to all else) is as true to real life as anything else in Tolkien's mythology. It has a rightful place there. I just admire other characters more (although as a younger person I probably felt differently).

[Mithalwen]

Having read the Carpenter biography and also the Carpenter Inklings book whick talks of the unhappiness at times of the Tolkiens marriage I have never thought of the story without thinking of poor Edith..being deified ain't all it is cracked up to be. And Beren and Luthien create such collateral damage in satifying their own wants. I always found Thingol and Melian's own love story far more impressive.

[Pervinca Took]

Arwen and Aragorn seem a lot maturer and more realistic, too. Also Arwen is someone I really feel for, even if she did rather imperiously scorn her husband's race as "wicked fools" until she learned what mortality was really like.

I suppose Beren and Luthien are more mythical - and more magically long ago than Arwen and Aragorn.

[Mithalwen]

Arwen to me is just a pawn of fate just Luthien reborn and not enough of a character in her own right to really care about. She reminds me of my sister's theory that very good looking people are often dull because they have never needed to develop personalities.

[Belegorn]

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

She lets herself get shut in a tree.. I find it very hard to see a woman as powerful when she can't even manage daddy...a skill most girls pick up by five months...

True. You said the same thing I said about Lúthien in an earlier post. I cannot see her having charge of any state. Being effeminate in all honesty is not a good quality in a monarch as we have seen with Alexander of Rome. He let his mother basically control him and the army murdered him.

[Mithalwen]

Originally Posted by Belegorn

True. You said the same thing I said about Lúthien in an earlier post. I cannot see her having charge of any state. Being effeminate in all honesty is not a good quality in a monarch as we have seen with Alexander of Rome. He let his mother basically control him and the army murdered him.

I wouldn't say that to Galadriel who clearly wasn't called Nerwen for nothing and Idril has leadership qualities. However there are issues for female rulers and they do tend to have to compromise their femininity unless the have the foil of a supportive consort.

However while Galadriel had the potential to be a warrior I dont think her defence of kin at Alqualonde is enough to say she was..it wasn't something she trained for as Elrond would have been. Now I am sure Galadriel as one of the old Noldor of Valinor might have had greater innate power but with weapons you have to rate Elrond, scionof Fingolfin, Turgon, Tuor and Earendil..father of Elladan and Elrohir..ok they might takecafter grannie! Herald of Gilgalad, who according to one accounts actually wrestled Sauron, leader of the task force to Ost in Edhel. Once Glorfindel had returned he may have abstained from combat for the sake of his healing but I bet if he had to...

[Belegorn]

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

it wasn't something she trained for as Elrond would have been.

Maybe or maybe not. She could certainly have been trained and I think she was schooled to some degree as a warrior. I'm not quite sure what you mean by "as Elrond would have been".

[Mithalwen]

Galadriel was born into the peace of Aman with no need of learning weaponcraft and itvwas only when Melkor stirred up the diatrust and rivalry between the noldorin princes that they started making them so at the point of the kinslaying none of the noldor had real battle experience or training and thecteleri only had light bows. So Galadriel may well have fought bravely and used her native strength but I doubt she would have been trained..who would have had the skill to pass on. Elrond born into was wouldchave been trained in warcraft from an early age and would have fought in the War of Wrath and been experienced enough to have command of the force sent to Eregion and to be second only to Gilgalad and arguably Cirdan during the last alliance. Now whilee Galadriel had thecsame level of experience as her cousins and brothers at alqualonde they fought in the battles of middle earth while she simly did not. So Galadriel was very useful in a pinch but not a warrior in the way they became.