...and Gandalf suddenly had a brilliant idea of how to win the war.

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by drigel

... seriously though my personal rebellion would say that, while fortune has allowed the author to show us via literature the ME condition, Im not sure its the only vision.

Fair enough, although that is largely dependent on one's personal spiritual beliefs. Surely we can all agree, however, that there are no situations in real life (on a physical - as opposed to metaphysical - level at least) comparable to the struggle with Sauron, a being of pure evil. Real life situations are much more akin to the situations portrayed in connection with the likes of Gollum (as Lalwendë points out) and Boromir.