All's well that ends well

I'm not sure how this Guardian columnist can call the ending to The Lord of the Rings a happy one, let alone the trilogy one of the top ten books with a happy ending. This is what she writes:

Forget the films, read the book. It's too reductive to call it an allegory but you'll feel like you've survived a world war - which is how the author must have felt when he'd finished writing this giant epic. After the advancing armies of Sauron and his allies have been defeated at last, there's nothing happier than a cosy cup of tea back in the green and pleasant Shire. This is one of those books which reminds you to be really happy that England exists.

Did she actually finish reading The Return of the King? It doesn't end with tea and crumpets, or the defeat of Sauron, but with Frodo, Bilbo, Gandalf, and the elves departing Middle-earth for the Grey Havens in a partly symbolic act which marks the closing of the Third Age. Like Samwise, I've never understood why this had to take place. It comes so suddenly, and seems so unnecessary. It certainly isn't a happy ending, comparable to the others which she mentions (A Midsummer Night's Dream, Pride and Prejudice, etc.):

But to Sam the evening deepened to darkness as he stood at the Haven; and as he looked at the grey sea he saw only a shadow on the waters that was soon lost in the West. There still he stood far into the night, hearing only the sigh and murmur of the waves on the shores of Middle-earth, and the sound of them sank deep into his heart. Beside him stood Merry and Pippin, and they were silent.

I know that Sam, Merry, and Pippin return to the Shire after this, and that Sam (and Legolas and Gimli, according to the Appendices) actually ends up in the Grey Havens many years later, but the overwhelming sensation that one feels at this point is loss: things can't just go back to the way they once were, before the rise of Sauron, before the loss of innocence that the journey to Mordor and back entailed.

Two books that immediately come to mind when I think about happy endings are Lucky Jim and The Divine Comedy. The first time I read Lucky Jim, I focused too much on its depiction of academia -- I was writing my thesis at the time and contemplating a professional career in History (I still am); only the second time around, while in transit through Hungary on the way home from a summer holiday in Croatia, did I pay attention to its plot, and the character of Christine. As for Dante, well, if you accept the premises of the Comedy, what greater happiness can there be than having a divinely-inspired orgasm (and knowing that the horrifically boring Paradiso is finally at an end)?
Posted by kungfuzi at 2:36 pm |