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important characters in the whole story since places are inseparable from the culture of its inhabitants. Moreover, the appearances and characteristics of places often reflect the state of mind of its inhabitants in LotR. For instance, Isengard is shaped by its stone walls and prison-like isolation and Mordor is also depicted as a land of shadow which is unsuitable for living things. On the other hand, Lothlórien and the Shire are depicted as places full of energy and life flourished.
2.2 Symbiotic Relationships with Nature: Lothlórien and the Shire In LotR, places such as Lothlórien and Isengard represent different attitudes of engagement with nature. Places like these create spaces that present the symbiotic and exploitive relationships that are embodied in our relationship with nature. The places where the Elves live, Lothlórien, for example, embodies a perfect co-existing state between nature and its inhabitants. However, Lothlórien, like the Elves, is fading.
In the Third Age of the Middle-earth, the presence of Elves is fading and the influence of Men is becoming more powerful than before. By the end of the Third Age, most Elves departed for Valinor and the Fourth Age is said to be the Age of Men.
The fading of the Elves is important when discussing the relationship between nature and its inhabitants in the Middle-earth since the Elves have deep connections with nature. Although Elf is a species that is different from Men, they can also be
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interpreted as representing another aspect of human nature that is lost in the modern age. According to Tolkien, Elves and Men are just different aspects of the Humane:
In this mythological world the Elves and Men are in their incarnate forms
kindred, but in the relation of their 'spirits' to the world in time represent different 'experiments', each of which has its own natural trend, and weakness. The Elves represent, as it were, the artistic, aesthetic, and purely scientific aspects of the Humane nature raised to a higher level than is actually seen in Men. That is: they
have a devoted love of the physical world, and a desire to observe and understand it for its own sake […] not as a material for use or as a
power-platform. (Tolkien, Letters 252)
The Elves, therefore, represent the genuine understanding of nature, a love of nature for its intrinsic worth and not for its utility. Their appreciation of nature also allows them to maintain a symbiotic relationship with nature. In Lothlórien, the city of the Elves is built within the forest, and the Elves are accustomed to walk and sleep on trees, even their houses are built on trees. Sam describes the intimate relationship
between the Elves and their land in Lothlórien: “they seem to belong here, more even than Hobbits do in the Shire. Whether they’ve made the land, or the land’s made them, it’s hard to say” (Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring 360). The Elves’
relationship with the land is symbiotic in that their way of living is inseparable from
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the land, and the coexisting state between the Elves and the land is mutually
beneficial as the land is also protected by the Elves. Lothlórien is under the protection of Galadriel’s ring, Nenya, which possesses the power of preservation and protection.
The Elves’ desire to preserve what they loved is shown in the unchanged season in Lothlórien. Under the power of Galadriel’s ring, the leaves of the mallorn trees are
ever gold and the season is always spring in the Lothlórien.
Elves are also capable of communicating with animals and even listen to the
whispers of the trees. Treebeard tells Merry and Pippin how the Elves taught the trees to speak because of the Elves’ desire of communication with everything: “Elves
begun it, of course, waking trees up and teaching them to speak and learning their tree-talk. They always wished to talk to everything” (Tolkien, The Two Towers 468).
In his famous essay, On Fairy Stories, Tolkien points out that this desire of communication and connection with other creatures is rooted in our sense of separation with other living things, and fairy stories offer to amend this sense of
separation:
“…fairy-stories offer a sort of escape, and old ambitions and desires (touching
the very roots of fantasy) to which they offer a kind of satisfaction and consolation. […] There are profounder wishes: such as the desire to converse
with other living things. On this desire, as ancient as the Fall, is largely founded
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the talking of beasts and creatures in fairy-tales, and especially the magical understanding of their proper speech.” (Tolkien, On Fairy Stories 22)
The talking beasts such as the eagles and the dragon play important parts in LotR, and the “magical understanding” of other creatures’ speech is a prominent specialty of the Elves. Fangorn Forest, the land that the Elves “woke up” represents the ideal
symbiotic and interconnected relationship with nature, a state which is before the separation of Self and the environment. The Elves’ devoted love and deep connection with nature; however, is also becoming a memory of the Middle-earth as the Elves’
presence gradually fades away from the Middle-earth. In some way, the Age of the Elves embodies the ideal state that is lost and becomes mythological during the development of human history.
Another place that embodies the symbiotic relationship with nature is the Hobbits’ hometown, the Shire. The Hobbits live a quiet and peaceful life in the rural
village. The social structure of the Hobbits in the Shire is the representation of the agricultural society before industrialization:
They love peace and quiet and good tilled earth: a ordered and well-farmed countryside was their favorite haunt. They do not and did not
understand or like machines more complicated than a forge-bellows, a
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mill, or a hand-loom, though they were skillful with tools. (Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring 1)
The living style of the Hobbits is similar to the rural life of England, which the author experienced in his childhood. The Hobbits live in hobbit-holes, and their lives are mainly about farming, doing simple trades, and enjoying foods and pipe-weeds. Since the Shire is a farming community, farmers are often regarded with high respect in the Shire. Farmer Maggot, for example, is highly respected in the Shire. Even Tom Bombadil, one the most mysterious and powerful characters in LotR, thinks highly of him:
He made no secret that he owed his recent knowledge largely to Farmer
Maggot, whom he seemed to regard as a person of more importance than they [the Hobbits] had imagined. “There's earth under his old feet, and clay on his fingers; wisdom in his bones, and both eyes are open” said Tom. (Tolkien, The
Fellowship of the Ring 132)
If the Elves are connected to trees and forests, the Hobbits’ are marked by their close attachment to the earth. Farmer Maggot and the farming society of the Shire express an attitude of respect and gratitude for the land that nurtures them. Sam, being a gardener, also often expresses his love and care for nature. When the four hobbits recovered the Shire from the control of Saruman, it is Sam who replants the trees of
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the Shire through the gift from Galadriel, and he won the honored family name
“Gardener” for doing this. In short, the Shire is a place that embodies an agricultural
society that shares the genuine understanding and care of the land.
2.3 Exploitive Relationship with Nature: Industrialization in LotR