NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Doug McCrae" data-source="post: 7827998" data-attributes="member: 21169">One of the balance devices Tolkien uses in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit is to have his higher-powered characters, especially Gandalf, absent for extended periods. The hand of the author is rather visible here imo. Our point of view is always that of the weaker characters and the action generally follows them. Another balance device is to give Bilbo, Frodo and Sam access to lots of magic items.Faramir and Boromir have prophetic dreams. Aragorn commands an army of ghosts. Legolas can walk over the top of snow and possesses superhumanly acute senses. Frodo gains 'second sight' as a result of his proximity to the One Ring. The staves Faramir gives to the hobbits have had a virtue of "finding and returning" placed on them (which suggests that minor magic might be common in Middle Earth).We should also consider magic items. It might be said that these don't count but three of the most magical characters in The Lord of the Rings - Gandalf, Elrond and Galadriel - possess elven rings of power and we don't know the extent to which their displayed powers depend upon these.Frodo carries five (six if we include the staves) magic items - The One Ring, Sting, mithril armour, elven rope, and the Phial of Galadriel. Some of these are also used by Sam. Frodo also uses the Mirror of Galadriel and the Seat of Seeing. Aragorn uses the palantir, contending psychically with Sauron - "I am the lawful master of the Stone, and I had both the right and the strength to use it... in the end I wrenched the Stone to my own will."</blockquote>

Verification