Sauron the Gene-maker

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

Good point. It's more in Saruman's style to breed species on purpose with his own mark on it just to show that he can. I can see how Sauron would not have created the flies on purpose, but they were still altered because of his presence.

Back to my comment regarding real-world moths with eyes on wings to scare off larger predators, here is an example:

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Morthoron

Back to my comment regarding real-world moths with eyes on wings to scare off larger predators, here is an example:

Yes, plenty of real world animals have "decoy" eyes, but I don't think that Mordor flies just happened to have them naturally. For one thing, it's too much of a coincidence. The sentence itself begs the question by comparing the flies with orcs. I know I'm the one who brought up evolution, but I was just making a joke on the colour scheme. It's just too random if the flies' appearance had nothing to do with Sauron's presence.

As a side note, the paragraph prior to this sentence describes the twisted nature still struggling for life:

Upon its outer marges under the westward mountains Mordor was a dying land, but it was not yet dead. And here things still grew, harsh, twisted, bitter, struggling for life. In the glens of the Morgai on the other side of the valley low scrubby trees lurked and clung, coarse grey grass-tussocks fought with the stones, and withered mosses crawled on them; and everywhere great writhing, tangled brambles sprawled. Some had long stabbing thorns, some hooked barbs that rent like knives. The sullen shrivelled leaves of a past year hung on them, grating and rattling in the sad airs, but their maggot-ridden buds were only just opening. Flies, dun or grey, or black, marked like orcs with a red eye-shaped blotch, buzzed and stung; and above the briar-thickets clouds of hungry midges danced and reeled.

Everything here perhaps once used to be natural, but became too perverted to be so. The only way to survive is to be disgusting. Whether this influence was imposed knowingly or not, it seems that the flies belong in there too. Once just flies, now little mean red Saurons.

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

Yes, plenty of real world animals have "decoy" eyes, but I don't think that Mordor flies just happened to have them naturally. For one thing, it's too much of a coincidence. The sentence itself begs the question by comparing the flies with orcs. I know I'm the one who brought up evolution, but I was just making a joke on the colour scheme. It's just too random if the flies' appearance had nothing to do with Sauron's presence.

As a side note, the paragraph prior to this sentence describes the twisted nature still struggling for life:



Everything here perhaps once used to be natural, but became too perverted to be so. The only way to survive is to be disgusting. Whether this influence was imposed knowingly or not, it seems that the flies belong in there too. Once just flies, now little mean red Saurons.

I would suggest that the Hobbit's description may have been too literal, or at least the description mirrored the negative perception of the ghastly surroundings they had to drudge through. If you look at the words "marked like orcs with a red eye-shaped blotch" then it opens it up to a wider interpretation. What were they "marked like" that gave the impression of being orkish? And did they just have a blotch of red on their backs that may or may not be "eye-shaped" on closer inspection?" That they were "dun or grey, or black" indicate a bunch of different sorts of flies, did they all have identical blotches? And why didn't the swarms of Morgothian midges not have some sort of markings?

I'm just saying that one has to consider the Hobbits at that point were absolutely miserable. So, perhaps, these obnoxious flies seemed simply orkish, but weren't necessarily Sauronian. They appeared "like" not a one-to-one description.

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Morthoron

I'm just saying that one has to consider the Hobbits at that point were absolutely miserable. So, perhaps, these obnoxious flies seemed simply orkish, but weren't necessarily Sauronian.

Perhaps. It's just odd that Mordor is the only place we see such flies. Normal flies can be nasty too, and the idea of the passage doesn't change if the red blotch part was taken out of it. Like maggots and midgets, they would just be creating the atmosphere. But instead they become "special edition" flies.

I'm not saying Tolkien implied genetic engineering, in the literal sense, with that description. But it's something to speculate about for fun, and I feel that red-dotted flies didn't just happen to live in the land where everything had a red eye painted on it.

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

Perhaps. It's just odd that Mordor is the only place we see such flies. Normal flies can be nasty too, and the idea of the passage doesn't change if the red blotch part was taken out of it. Like maggots and midgets, they would just be creating the atmosphere. But instead they become "special edition" flies.

I'm not saying Tolkien implied genetic engineering, in the literal sense, with that description. But it's something to speculate about for fun, and I feel that red-dotted flies didn't just happen to live in the land where everything had a red eye painted on it.

Flies are different around the world, aren't they? I mean other than common house flies. I've seen certain flies on trips out of the country or even out of state that are different from the ones where I live. Were the "hungry midges" the same species as up by Bree? What you have to ask yourself is would Sauron have a fly breeding program exclusive to Mordor? Did he do it as a light-hearted diversion from breeding sun-resistant trolls and Uruk-hai?

All I am saying is the perception of the Hobbits could be that they likened the flies to Orcs because of the red blotch that looked suspiciously like it was "eye-shaped".

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Morthoron

Flies are different around the world, aren't they? I mean other than common house flies. I've seen certain flies on trips out of the country or even out of state that are different from the ones where I live. Were the "hungry midges" the same species as up by Bree? What you have to ask yourself is would Sauron have a fly breeding program exclusive to Mordor? Did he do it as a light-hearted diversion from breeding sun-resistant trolls and Uruk-hai?

Not necessarily. I'm beginning to lean more and more in favour of Nerwen's interpretation, that Sauron's surroundings might have been altered through "magical pollution" (love that term!). Sauron didn't have to necessarily breed flies of a certain colour for his influence to be present in subtler ways. And yes, I agree with you that the perception is through hobbit eyes, and the link with orcs might have been just in their head. The passage serves to show how horrid and disgusting was any life that could exist in Mordor, and the comparison is meant to underscore that feeling. That doesn't contradict that the mood of the place is in part dictated by Sauron's will.

To take your argument, no, not all thorny horrible maggot-ridden plants are Sauron's. But the only plants we see in his land are of that kind. Could other plants have grown there if the land wasn't corrupted? Probably. Probably some did, and maybe, many years after the Ring's destruction, once the land heals, some will again. That doesn't change that nothing but the meanest life could survive under his rule. With Tolkien's extensive use of pathetic fallacy and description of nature to reflect its inhabitants, this isn't a big leap at all.

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

Not necessarily. I'm beginning to lean more and more in favour of Nerwen's interpretation, that Sauron's surroundings might have been altered through "magical pollution" (love that term!). Sauron didn't have to necessarily breed flies of a certain colour for his influence to be present in subtler ways. And yes, I agree with you that the perception is through hobbit eyes, and the link with orcs might have been just in their head. The passage serves to show how horrid and disgusting was any life that could exist in Mordor, and the comparison is meant to underscore that feeling. That doesn't contradict that the mood of the place is in part dictated by Sauron's will.

To take your argument, no, not all thorny horrible maggot-ridden plants are Sauron's. But the only plants we see in his land are of that kind. Could other plants have grown there if the land wasn't corrupted? Probably. Probably some did, and maybe, many years after the Ring's destruction, once the land heals, some will again. That doesn't change that nothing but the meanest life could survive under his rule. With Tolkien's extensive use of pathetic fallacy and description of nature to reflect its inhabitants, this isn't a big leap at all.

Good post. I would agree the hypothesis you render could easily be correct. Nature or nuture? The environment was obviously nasty and thus like real-world nasty places creatures and plants adapt to the hostile nature of the area. It seems to me many desert or harsh environments have barbed or thorny plants simply as a defense mechanism, or did Sauron plant the devil's garden?