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Discussion (38 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews
>Barges into the narrative.
>Sings a song about how he's older than the world.
>Puts on and takes off the Ring with no effect.
>Refuses to elaborate.
>Leaves.
I think there is no one who read LoTR and ignored Tom Bombadil. If anything, they give him too much importance.
But I would say that Bombadil is hugely important to understanding Middle-earth as a crafted mythos. He gives us valuable insight into Tolkien's ideas about self-satisfaction (the Ring has no sway over Tom because he is his own master), relationships with the land (Bombadil is married to a river spirit), being gentlehearted but stern (accepts the Hobbits gracefully, but defends them from Old Man Willow ardently), and a host of other things. He's like a distillation of what The Lord of the Rings is "about", in a sense, without having much direct impact on the story proper. He also serves to give depth to the world: we are introduced to him as just this sort of enigmatic fellow who deus-ex-machinas our protagonists out of a tight spot and then we move on, but then half a book later we find out the the most learned of the Elves hold Tom in such incredibly high esteem they consider whether to send the Ring to him (and, if I recall, doesn't Treebeard make mention of Bombadil at some point, too? further suggesting his importance to the world at large).
But he is not important to the plot, nor does he really serve to move our characters along their respective arcs in any meaningful way. His chapters really establish, with respect to these elements of the narrative, just a few important things:
- He demonstrates that the Ring's power can be resisted, but it does not come easily.
- He arms our Hobbits, which of course comes in handy at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields.
- The calm of his house nestled in the chaos of the world gives rise to Frodo's foresight of his travel to Valinor: "the grey rain-curtain [...] rolled back, and a far green country opened before him under a swift sunrise."
I thought it was going say Samwise.
Well, he did rescue the hobbits from the Barrow Downs, and gave Merry Brandybuck one of the swords of Westernesse with which Merry ultimately wounded the Lord of the Nazgûl and thus permitted Eowyn to slay him in the battle of the Pelennor Fields...
"Old knives are long enough as swords for hobbit-people," he said. "Sharp blades are good to have, if Shire-folk go walking, east, south, or far away into dark and danger." Then he told them that these blades were forged many long years ago by Men of Westernesse: they were foes of the Dark Lord, but they were overcome by the evil king of Carn Dûm in the Land of Angmar.
"Few now remember them," Tom murmured...
https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Letter_144
https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Letter_153
https://tolkienessays.com/tom.html
But I don't really disagree with your comment in general.
Moreover, his removal dismisses and reduces the work of the unnamed smith who wrought the blade of Westernesse whose work came to fruition in its small part in the undoing of the Witch King of Angmar to a mere clattering of cutlery on a bed in a Bree.
A better way to handle it would've been a fade to black as the Hobbits pass into The Old Forest, and their then awaking on a hill w/ swords menacingly arrayed around them (across their neck would be a bit much w/o someone to actively remove them), some jewelry glittering on a nearby stump, their ponies neatly tied up nearby, and a song fading off into the distance as a man in bright blue jacket, leather pants, yellow boots, and a hat w/ a feather in it rode into the Old Forest.
Why is Bombadil completely unaffected by the ring? Bombadil represents pure being - existence without the will to power. Note the biblical echo to the immortal godhead in Goldberry’s statement “He is” ("I am").
Bombadil doesn’t resist the ring because he’s stronger than it. He resists it because he delights in creation rather than possessing it. The ring can only corrupt what desires power. Bombadil desires nothing, so the ring has nothing to latch onto.
The key to overcoming evil in Tolkien's world isn’t military strength, strategy, nor political authority, but detachment
I love Tom Bombadil, Tolkien's ghost.
I enjoyed Tim Benzedrine, and Hashberry, from Bored of the Rings.
Twee: affectedly or excessively dainty, delicate, cute, or quaint.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/twee
In that book, he was “Tim Benzedrine,” and his wife was “Hashberry.”
They were over-the-top hippie archetypes.
Basically Neo.