Old Tom Bombadil. Possibly the least liked character in The Lord of the Rings. A childish figure so disliked by fans of the book that few object to his absence from all adaptations of the story. And yet, there is another way of looking at Bombadil, based only on what appears in the book itself, that paints a very different picture of this figure of fun.
What do we know about Tom Bombadil? He is fat and jolly and smiles all the time. He is friendly and gregarious and always ready to help travellers in distress.
Except that none of that can possibly be true.
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- (Anonymous) : Bombadil was awesome [+0]
- (Anonymous) : This is fantastic! ... but wrong. [+1]
livejournal : Link Drawer, "Is the name of my Castlevania tag appropriate here or not?" edition [+0]
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- (Anonymous) : Lovely! [+0]
- (Anonymous) : Does Tom have anything to do with the Entwives [+0]
- (Anonymous) : some problems with this theory [+0]
- (Anonymous) : This could explain a lot [+0]
Comments
According to the Ainulindalë there was NO discord or darkness in Aman or Valinor before Melkor corrupted the song of creation. This completely rules out any possibility of Tom being some forgotten evil force. If darkness and evil were the doing of Melkor during the song of creation, that means Tom would have had to be created BY Melkor and he is NOT "Oldest and Fatherless." However if Tom was a dark or evil presence that existed before the creation of the world, then that would mean the song of creation itself was dissonant and corrupted BEFORE Melkor came along, which directly conflicts with Tolkien himself.
Me, I liked old Tom about as much as I liked Jar Jar Binks... which is to say, "not so much."
Chris
As I said "Do I think that Tolkien planned things in this way? Not at all, but I find it an interesting speculation." The oddity, ambiguity and interest of Tom Bombadil as a character comes in part from the way that Tolkien wove him into the story before he had a complete idea of what the structure of Lord of the Rings was going to be. As it turns out, the Bombadil sequence became a sideline to the main story that was never revisited or explained. Yet Tolkien clearly liked the character too much to edit him out, so we are left with an element of mystery and a field for multiple speculations.
And to those whose comments have been in limbo for many weeks while I forgot to unscreen anonymous comments, my apologies. All non-spam comments have now been restored and I'll be checking up on a much more regular basis from now on.
Likewise, to the original post, Tolkien's penchant for idealizing nature and all the is associated with it seems to run counter to your theories. The forest is not "evil" in any way; rather, it has been attacked repeatedly by the sentient beings of the world, and is defending itself from intrusion and potential damage - animalistic and primal, perhaps, but not evil.
That said, Bombadil represents many things in different ways - he is a relic of LoTR's origins as a direct sequel to The Hobbit (i.e. a children's book), he is an intentionally ambiguous character to add the bit of mystery Tolkien felt was necessary for good storytelling, and, as many have already written, he was partially the embodiment of nature and of certain mythologies' notions of natural spirits. My personal interpretation is that, in addition to all of that, he was the means of balancing the complicated and practical (and scary and dangerous) real world with simple, innocent pacifism and love. He does save the hobbits, and then the hobbits essentially save him. That seems like's Tolkien's way of telling us that as dangerous as the world is, we need sometimes to return to simplicity and happiness and not just worry and struggle all the time; but, at the same time, that we should also be mindful of the real world and not forget that sometimes we need to work to make things better. The two points check each other and balance each other out; neither the realism of the war nor the naivete of Bombadil could have survived in isolation.
My two cents, at least.
You're assuming that the forest being dangerous means it's also evil... instead of you know, just being nature, which is dangerous by default.
And it's implied that the ring didn't affect him because he didn't want anything more then he had, not really a trait of an evil person (and considering Gandalf's reaction to the ring he'd have to be a Valar to resist it outright, and that's just an assumption on ym part as i odn't recall anything canon about the effect of the ring on one).
Apart from that - Awesome post. I think I believe you! :)