Tom Bombadil – An Intriguing Answer !

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Balfrog

Morthoron

I'm surprised and to be honest a little perturbed as to why you unable to acknowledge Tolkien's statement that Tom is an 'allegory'. I am even more surprised that you are unable to entertain that Tom was an exception – and to Ms Seth's inference - fell outside the general use of no allegory.

Oh, gosh, I have perturbed you. Whatever shall I do?

Originally Posted by Balfrog

Either Tolkien said/implied these things or he didn't. But because he did, we have to live with them.

We can try pushing Tom as 'allegory' under the carpet (as so many scholars have done). Or we can try to come up with some rational explanation as to what he meant or why he said it.

Ms Seth has asked the reader to look at the issue dispassionately and objectively. Many of us think we know Tolkien well, but the bottom line is – we really don't. And so, a logical person would say - okay let's entertain the possibility and see where it leads.

Simply put, it is not an allegory because Tolkien defined "allegory" with the caveat: " I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but the one resides in the freedom of the reader, and the other in the purposed domination of the author." This is the crux of the entire conversation and why Ms. Priya's theory falls like a deck of cards in a wind storm.

The refusal of Tolkien to define him directly and with any specificity, and the multiplicity of definitions by every commentator who has ever considered Bombadil, leads me to believe it is not an allegory. If one is to strictly read the story (whether that reader is a Professor of Literature or a high school student) and then is asked to define Bombadil, how many would choose to believe he is an allegory? An allegory of...what? There is no basis to specifically infer Bombadil is allegorical to anything by reading the book.

This is not like Plato's Allegory of the Cave or even C.S. Lewis' Narnia Chronicles in which one can draw a direct line or parallel to what is being implied. The reader has the "freedom", as Tolkien put it, to infer just about anything regarding Bombadil. Hence, adroit readers at all reading levels will insist he is a Maia, he is Eru, He is Adam, he is Tolkien himself, etc. Tolkien does not in any way force the reader to allegorize Bombadil. He neither imputes nor infers a status on Bombadil. He simply "is". Even the other characters in the book, whether it is one of the Hobbits or lore masters like Gandalf and Elrond, cannot define him with any assurance, and offer only bemused guesses as to what Bombadil is.

For Ms. Priya (and you in your sycophantic insistence on precluding all else from your lap-dogged adherence to her theory) to conclude that Bombadil is an allegory based on selected quotes from Tolkien after the fact, precludes all other quotes that contradict the assumption. "The play" that Priya provides is just another theory in the long line of theories that lacks authorial authority to surmise it is the correct assumption. Tolkien refers to him on more than one occasion as an "enigma" which, in itself, would preclude an allegory, because allegorizations require an imputed goal, an artifice, to draw the reader to a conclusion the author wishes the reader to make. That is not the case with Bombadil.