Tolkien=Matchmaker?

[Nevolosse Maehayanda]

There's Arwen and Aragorn. Faramir and Eowyn. Elrond and Celebrian. Just to name the ones mentioned in the Lord of the Rings.

Is Tolkien trying to find an easy way out? Or is it just his matchmaking heart calling? Or something else entirely?

Personally, I think that Tolkien was taking the easy way out. He didn't want to daddle his books on romance, so he took a political alliances. Imladris and Lotholrien. Gondor and Rohan.

Please post your ideas.

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[Manardariel]

I totally agree that Elrond/Celebrian was anarranged marriage for political alliance. I know that in the UT it says something a bit different, but who are we kidding?? I mean Lorien&Rivendell, two most powerfull strongholds of the elfs in ME, united. That cannot have been a marriage for love. If you ask me, Galadriel was behind that one. But that´s just my general opinion.

However, I do NOT agree on the other two.
Eowyn/Faramir is the cutest and most touching part in LotR and the best romance Tolkien ever wrote... okay, besides Beren and Lúthien. But apart from that. I love the way Faramir "rescues" Eowyn from her desolation and lets her hope and love again. That is just sooo touching.

Arwen&Aragorn? Nice, and brilliant in the movies, but still just a copy of Beren and Lúthien. I liked it, I don´t think Aragorn could have maried a normal person, but still.

[Angry Hill Troll]

Well, since Middle-earth has kind of a pseudo medieval character, the marriage=political alliance aspect is consistent with that. Marriages did tend to be made on that basis: Ferdinand and Isabella, William of Orange and Mary, Henry VIII and ... well, alliances don't always last for very long! [img]smilies/rolleyes.gif[/img]

But you do have a point that Tolkien didn't seem very fond of writing about romancy and certainly not about sexuality. This device provided a convenient reason not to have to.

[Diamond18]

An easy way out of what? And anyway, I think the whole "political allaince" thing is rubbish. Tolkien was writing romantic epics, not historical textbooks. There's no reason why we shouldn't assume Galadriel and Celeborn married for love.

[Lush]

Um, if Tolkien himself wrote that Elrond married Celebrian for love (I haven't read the UT but deducing from your comment regarding it, I assume that it alludes to that somewhere; please correct me if I am wrong, or provide a quotation), it's not exactly possible for us to say he's "wrong."

This is fiction, right? There are his characters, correct? Or is it okay for us to say something along the lines of: "well, Tolkien didn't really know what he was talking about, let's set him straight."

As for Galadriel and Celeborn, that one is pretty straightforward. They met, fell in love, got married. I don't see why Celebrian could not have followed in her mother's footsteps. Same with Arwen. For God's sake, Elrond wouldn't even allow that marriage until Aragorn had made something out of himself, and they had to go through all that careful planning and waiting. If Aragorn really wanted a marriage of convenience and political significance, he would have gone with Eowyn, or someone along those lines, I believe.

[Manardariel]

Well if I recall this correctly (I don´t have the UT, just from the library) it says something like "They met in Rivendell, and they married." Which can mean just about everything, can it not? And I think it smells arranged marriage 8 miles against the wind. I think that´s all Tolkien ever wrote on the subject...

[Diamond18]

If he said, "Celebrian went to Rivendell to marry Elrond" perhaps it would smell of an arrangement, but "they met in Rivendell and married" says to me that they married after they'd met because they fell in love.

[Anardil]

Actually, as far as Elrond and Celebrian are concerned I believe that the story goes something like this. During the years of the Second Age leading up to the forging of the One Ring, Celeborn was living in Eregion while Galadriel and her daughter Celebrian were in Lorien. When war broke out between Sauron and the Elves (around 1693) Eregion was laid waste and Celeborn was forced to flee Northwards until he met Elrond's army coming in from Lindon. Under the force of Sauron assault, they were forced to retreat to the upper Bruinen valley, and Elrond founded Rivendell there at that time. Thus, Celeborn was in Rivendell at the end of the War. Galadriel and Celebrian came looking for him there, and it was at that time that Elrond and Celebrian met for the first time. It is said that Elrond loved her, though he said nothing of it. It was not until some 2000 years later that he married her.

[Estelyn Telcontar]

This is an interesting topic; however, from what I have read about Tolkien in his biography and letters, I would not agree that he used the convenient device of political matches for the marriages of his main characters. (There are matches like that in the Silmarillion and other stories, but they are not normally happy ones.) He himself married the woman he loved, against the will of his guardian. I think rather than being pragmatic about marriages, he was an idealist, with highly romantic notions of love. That the marriage itself did not go on in that idealistic way, did not daunt him. He kept those ideals.

When I read the title of this thread, I remembered two past discussions which used the word "matchmaker" and looked them up. They do not take the same turn of thought, but are certainly interesting supplements to this topic. Here they are for your enjoyment: Matchmaker, matchmaker and Galadriel, the matchmaker.

[Iargwath]

Heres the quote from Unfinished Tales

She [Galadriel] committed Loriand to Amroth, and passing again through Moria with Celebrain she came to Imaldris, seeking Celeborn. There (it seems) she found him, and there they dwelt together for a long time; and it was then that Elrond first saw Celebrain, and loved her, though he said nothing of it

[Lalaith]

I really don't think elves married for expedience, or that their parents would encourage such an arrangement. Remember, elvish unions last for eternity and are not dissolved, so marriage was not entered into lightly!
For further information on what Tolkien thought of Elvish marriage, I recommend following the link posted by the Elf Herself in the Elvish Reproduction thread. It should answer your questions.

[The-Elf-Herself]

Yeah, I love that link. All of the information it taken directly from Morgoth's Ring, one of the best books in the HoME. Personally, I think it's partly due to our modern-day cynicism that we assume those marriages were arranged. I know that for me it was hard to believe at first that all of them could be for love. THen when you start reading more of the background information on Middle Earth, such as what's documented in the HoME, you start to understand that maybe in this ideal world they were.