Return of the King review

The Lord of the Rings series does some very important things for our understanding of humanity.  Tolkein was able to show us how we are as people without all of the readers being consciously aware of the fact that he was doing as such.  It was not obvious that it is his comment on the good and bad of human nature. 

The concept of overcoming our own personal pasts could be found within the character of Smeagol.  Yes, he was a warped creature who took to the possession of the Ring far too quickly for anyone’s liking.  The Ring wants to be found and returned to its master, but it does make the reader wander if the Ring meant to be found by Smeagol at all.  To someone who would kill so quickly for it and to be overcome with love for it.  That was the big difference with Smeagol.  He loved the Ring and therefore, he was cunning and insane but never truly evil.  (To be evil is just a matter of perception any way.  No one who is evil thinks of themselves as such.)  He is consumed with his love for the Ring and because love is a positive force Smeagol is not lost when Gollum starts to take form.  If there was no good left in him, there would have only been Gollum for the hobbit, Frodo and Sam, to contend with.  The results of the books would have changed drastically if that were the case.  Frodo saw not only that he could end up like Gollum (empathy/sympathy), but he saw the little bit of goodness that was left to be taken of within the creature that was Smeagol.  Another point in Smeagol’s side is that he kept and cherished the Ring (the Precious), but he did not use it.  He did not abuse its power.  It never seemed to occur to him to do as such which seems to be another sign of someone that has goodness still within them in possession of the Ring.

Tolkein also showed how we could transcend expectations with the characters of Meriadoc (Merry) and Eowyn.  They were simply a hobbit and a woman to contend with the leader of the Nazgul.  They were people who did not have much expected of them, but who were exceptional and rose above it all to do what they felt had to be done.  This action turned the tide of the war.  Meriadoc froze at first, but he acted when he was needed and he did it stealthily and without any trace of clumsiness as would be expected from a hobbit.  Eowyn knew what the consequences could be, but she did what needed to be done to avenge/save Theoden and those within the battle.  She was overcome with love and hate and these opposing forces worked together within her in order to give her the needed courage.

Smeagol was not the only one to be overcome by love.  Denethor, the Steward of Gondor, was overcome with love and regret when he saw the war not turning in his while he watched his youngest son dying.  Faramir was very much alive and fighting off the poison within his body, but because Denethor let emotions other than the love he felt take over him; he made the wrong decisions.  Pippin was the hero in this regard because he did the right thing by going against Denethor and thinking straight.  He went to the perfect people to be able to save Faramir(a man whom he knew loved and respected Faramir.)

The consumption and temptation of power was quite prevalent within the third book also.  Frodo gets to the Precious stage with the Ring while Sam watches.  Sauron and Saruman still want the Ring because to them it is power.  Frodo loved the Ring, as Smeagol did, and he only used it when he needed to. 

Another big them laid within was subservience.  Denethor had respect and fear. Faramir had respect and love.  Gandalf had respect, fear, and love.  He was the one who did not want to take charge and yet was the only one truly suited to at times.

749, 'Hope and memory shall live still in some hidden valley where the grass is green.'(Hope and memory are representatives of Utopia.)

755,‘The Darkness had begun.  There will be no dawn.’

767,‘A cage,’ she said, ‘to stay behind bars, until use and old age accept them, and all chance of doing great deeds is gone beyond recall or desire.’

789,‘We who have lived long under the Shadow may surely listen to echoes from a land untroubled by it?  Then we may feel that our vigil was not fruitless, though it may have been thankless.’

1007, ‘I will not say : do not weep; for not all tears are an evil.’

review of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

Douglas Adams reviewed human nature and pointed out the strange contradictions in hilarious ways.  He played with how we think of things.  Our strange perception that limits the world around us.  He understood human nature to a bizarre degree, so he presented his knowledge in a bizarre fashion.  It could be argued that he was the savior of science fiction by making it into something comical that people who don’t like sci-fi would be able to listen to and read.

One of his many understandings of human nature could be found in the quote, ‘Life is wasted on the living.’  (The idea that people do not value what they have and take things for granted.)  People do take life for granted these days.  Since it is something that is a part of our existence, we are stuck with it.  Life is simply something to go through to us when it should be something that is lived.

The idea of being controlled is something that people also struggle with on a daily basis.  If someone feels as if another is controlling them, they start to act differently.   It would depend on the person, but it tends to lead to rebelling attitudes.  ‘I’m not going to be anybody’s puppet, particularly not my own.’  (He doesn’t want to be owned even by himself.  He doesn’t want to be something/someone to be simply used.)  We get so blinded with the idea of something such as being controlled that we don’t even consider who should have it.  We simply resist.

Regret and anger are also dealt with only a daily basis.  Especially, blaming ourselves.  The mantra in our head of ‘why did I do/say that?’  This is what makes us unsure of ourselves. ‘If I ever meet myself, I’ll hit myself so hard I won’t know what hit me.’  (Playing with the strange sayings that we use and still understanding that we make our own mistakes and go on from there.)  We are so afraid of being wrong that we can’t even risk being right at some points.

 ‘”Future Perfect” has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be.’ ( A play on grammar and the idea of time and how it is something that we try to define and live our lives by but cannot.)

‘In an Infinite Universe anything can happen.  Even survival.  Strange but true.’

‘One’s never alone with a rubber duck.’

‘Totally mad, utter nonsense.  But we’ll do it because it’s brilliant nonsense.’

‘We were just about to do nothing at all for a while but it can wait.’

‘You could say I’m more differed from than differing.’

‘Please don’t hesitate to get lost.’

‘The Guide is definitive Reality is frequently inaccurate.’

‘Oh fine, if you happen to like being me, which personally I don’t.’

‘What a depressingly stupid machine,’ said Marvin and trudged away.

‘He was clearly a man of many qualities, even if they were mostly bad ones.’

‘I’m afraid you cannot leave, you are entwined in the Improbability Field.  You cannot escape.’

Murder with Puffins review

Meg and Michael try to vacation together on an island in her Aunt Phoebe’s house.  It turns out that the family is already there.  A storm hits, the dad disappears to watch the storm hit the harbor, and a murder is committed.  Once again, no one misses the dead guy.  He tended to shoot at people and electrocute the wildlife (puffins).   They cannot reach the authorities on the mainland until the weather clears.  Meg decides to investigate.  They end up with a dead puffin, nude paintings of her mother, a strange biography, and an estate developer as clues that lead in a roundabout way to the killer.

A good book to laugh at the quirkiness of Meg’s family and the island inhabitants.  The funniest of all have to be the bird watcher tourists who swarmed onto the island and pop up everywhere.