Happy Tolkien Reading Day! On March 25 every year – the date of the fall of Barad-dûr – Tolkien lovers worldwide celebrate by reading and promoting the Professor’s life and work. For this special, Alan and Shawn read and discuss favorite passages related to this year’s theme of Life, Death, and Immortality, and indulge in a little inter-fandom rivalry.
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Hi guys! I’m just starting listening to your podcast from the very beginning and I absolutely love it. I laugh and nod along with you and gosh today as I listened to you read the story of Aragorn and Arwen I shed tears. You both do such an honourable job respecting the incredible life and works of Professor Tolkien. I’m excited to catch up to the present day episodes! :’)
Seconded! I also just started the podcast and this episode gave me shivers. I really appreciated it and all the other episodes so far!
I’m also starting from the beginning and trying to drag my cousin along with me. I’m really enjoying this podcast so far and I”m really excited to start the reread of Silmarillion.
You guys see Aragorn’s death so differently than I do. I didn’t read the appendixes the first couple of times I read LotRs because I thought it was just genealogy charts and such. Once I finally did it affected how I viewed Aragorn and I could no longer count him as one of my favorite characters because it made me so angry at him.
He marries a woman who has to give up EVERYTHING for him including a much reduced life span and then decides that a little grey hair and maybe a touch of arthritis are grounds for suicide making him little better than Denethor. Her life is linked to his but not only does Arwen get no say in his decision he actively defies her wish that he go on a little longer. Sorry, hon, I know you’re going to die of grief but think of my image! Got to go out while I’ll still leave a good looking corpse ya know?
I would have been understanding if he had been diagnosed with something serious and knew he would have a short time to live and wanted to go under his own terms but he seems to have been in generally good health and could have lived another couple of decades at least. If he felt that it was time for his son to become king he could have abdicated and spent a happy retirement spoiling grandchildren like everyone else fortunate to live so long.
The Numenoreans feared death and clung to life too long but is fearing old age and letting go too early really any better.
It’s been over 30 years since I found out what happened and as you can tell I’m still angry at him.
Welcome aboard, and thank you for listening! I’m glad you’re enjoying the podcast. You’ll get to hear even more of our thoughts on this when you get to Episode 10, in which we discussed the topic of death and mortal Men in a lot more detail.
I can understand how you interpret it that way, but I’m certain based on my reading of the legendarium and his letters that that’s not how Tolkien intended it. In Tolkien’s world, death is not a morbid fate to be avoided and feared, but a gift to be embraced: rest from one’s labors and the fulfillment of mortal destiny.
For Aragorn, I don’t believe it’s vanity (a little grey hair) or anxiety (of growing old) that makes him choose to lay down his life, but dignity. He’s recognized that his time has come, that he’s done what he was put on earth to do, and he’s ready for the next part of his journey. This seems to him a much better fate than clinging to life until he’s old and senile.
But if he did choose to cling stubbornly to life, how much more time will he get? 30 years? 50? Any feasible amount of time would be a blink of an eye for Arwen, who’s been alive for thousands of years. A few more decades of prolonging the inevitable might give Arwen another few short years of happiness (coupled with fear of the prolonged inevitable), but for Aragorn it’s a significant fraction of his life spent in physical and mental decline. She must know this. But of course she grieves. She’d grieve no matter when his death came, today or another day.