I am a little confused about the Elves. They are leaving Middle Earth, and I’m not clear as
to why. Are they so sure that Evil will reign, and the ring will triumph? If that is why,
then why do they send Elves to help fight the war at Rohan when they are so sure that
Middle Earth will be destroyed anyway? I’m sure I’m missing something here.
Appreciate any insights.

franz, I've never liked fantasy much, but I enjoy the Rings series. My students used to ask me to read Tolkien, but I didn't. ALL of those students were males. Actually, none of my female students expressed an interest. Interesting. While I enjoyed Book II, I sensed it would attract more males than females, so we have one gender missing out. Silly women!

NP Giant

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Originally posted by joan hue:
(Don’t anyone, on threat of great pain, give
away the ending, although the portents don’t look good for at least one character.)

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I won't tell you how right or wrong you are, but I'm interested: Which character are you talking about?

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I am a little confused about the Elves. They are leaving Middle Earth, and I'm not clear as to why. Are they so sure that Evil will reign, and the ring will triumph? If that is why, then why do they send Elves to help fight the war at Rohan when they are so sure that Middle Earth will be destroyed anyway? I'm sure I'm missing something here.

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Ah, back to the subject of volatileness (and I'm still not sure this is the appropriate term? ). While LOTR is a novel of its own, it's really just the ends of several far longer stories, if you will. Most of them are part of The Silmarillion, on which Tolkien worked for decades but which wasn't released until after his death. That includes the story of Beren and Luthien, for example, to which Aragorn refers in FOTR.

In short (as far as possible), the Elves first appeared in Middle-earth. The Valar (the gods in the west) invited them to live with them in the Undying Lands, west of the shores of Middle-earth. Some followed them, some stayed in ME. Among those that went West, a great conflict began later, and Feanor (very important Elf, but I can't repeat the whole Silmarillion here ) and his sons were banned and went back to ME with their supporters. Galadriel is one of those, I believe the only Elf in LOTR who was alive at that time. (Legolas on the other hand is a descendant of those Elves that stayed in ME).

These Elves want to go back to the West, but also those who never went there in the first place. Not because of Sauron though. Elves don't like change, yet they can't stop the world around them from changing. Men in particular are getting more and more influence. For the wielders of the three Elven Rings, add the fact that however Frodo's quest ends, their Rings will lose their power. E.g. anything "magical" about Lorien (you don't learn much about that in the books) will slowly disappear. So they are leaving Middle-earth and sailing west, where no men are and no evil or anything else that causes rapid change. And finally, Elves seem to be called by the sea - I wonder if they keep that Legolas bit in ROTK.

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Originally posted by Marian Schedenig:
In short (as far as possible), the Elves first appeared in Middle-earth. The Valar (the gods in the west) invited them to live with them in the Undying Lands, west of the shores of Middle-earth. Some followed them, some stayed in ME. Among those that went West, a great conflict began later, and Feanor (very important Elf, but I can't repeat the whole Silmarillion here ) and his sons were banned and went back to ME with their supporters. Galadriel is one of those, I believe the only Elf in LOTR who was alive at that time. (Legolas on the other hand is a descendant of those Elves that stayed in ME).

These Elves want to go back to the West, but also those who never went there in the first place. Not because of Sauron though. Elves don't like change, yet they can't stop the world around them from changing. Men in particular are getting more and more influence. For the wielders of the three Elven Rings, add the fact that however Frodo's quest ends, their Rings will lose their power. E.g. anything "magical" about Lorien (you don't learn much about that in the books) will slowly disappear. So they are leaving Middle-earth and sailing west, where no men are and no evil or anything else that causes rapid change. And finally, Elves seem to be called by the sea - I wonder if they keep that Legolas bit in ROTK.

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Originally posted by joan hue:
Are they so sure that Evil will reign, and the ring will triumph? If that is why,
then why do they send Elves to help fight the war at Rohan when they are so sure that
Middle Earth will be destroyed anyway? I’m sure I’m missing something here.
Appreciate any insights.

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Well you see in the book they didn't actually go to Rohan so Tolkien doesn't have to explain that. There are Elves, such as Legolas' father Thranduil, and the remnants of Lorien, who don't travel to the West. One might surmise that they were never as bothered as other Elves by the passing of time, and it didn't necessarily imply that they were putting their faith in the forces opposing Sauron.

Certainly that some Elves stayed until Sauron was defeated, and I'm thinking particularly of Elrond here, may have reflected an obligation to undo the consequences of the forging of the rings by the Elven Smiths, for it was from those Elves (and particularly one called Celebrimbor) that Sauron learned the craft of ring-making. Perhaps the same reasoning applies to Cirdain and Glorfindel (although some of Tolkien's last writings suggest there was a lot more to that character than met the eye). Galadriel can't be considered in the same way - for her role in the Elvish rebellion years before she could not return to the West. That judgement was repealed (and she knew it immediately) when she resisted the temptation to take the Ring from Frodo.

I've always wondered if there was a hint of revenge in it for Elrond as well - his brother was the founder of Numenor, the great island kingdom of men that Sauron brought low with deceit. His desire to remove Sauron from the world and restore the Numenorean bloodline to the throne of Gondor must have been one of the stronger considerations in his decision to stay as long as he did.

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franz, I've never liked fantasy much, but I enjoy the Rings series. My students used to ask me to read Tolkien, but I didn't. ALL of those students were males. Actually, none of my female students expressed an interest. Interesting. While I enjoyed Book II, I sensed it would attract more males than females, so we have one gender missing out. Silly women!

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Originally posted by Marian Schedenig:
Some followed them, some stayed in ME.
...

and his sons were banned and went back to ME with their supporters.
...

(Legolas on the other hand is a descendant of those Elves that stayed in ME).

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You had Elves in you?!

D'oh, I forgot to comment about the Elves at Helm's Deep. While I'm thankful for that bit insofar as it gave us some great music, I'm still not convinced they'd really do that. The Elrond/Galadriel conversation helps, but I feel it doesn't explain it well enough. Would be nice to see that bit slightly expanded in the EE.

Interesting idea about Elrond's revenge. And I agree about the Bakshi Star Wars relation. I first watched SW when I was 16 or so, after I had already heard the Williams music. But several years earlier (though not as early as you), I used to watch the Bakshi movie over and over again, even before I read the novel for the first time. A good reason to be most excited about the ROTK movie, actually, since that's the one I've never seen as a film at all.

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Originally posted by joan hue:
Thanks Marion for the information.

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Aww, and after all these years, I thought you'd know how to spell my name. But seriously, don't worry. Most people probably don't even know I'm male.

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I'm most worried about Frodo because of the statements by Galadriel. She keeps saying he won't survive. Maybe I'll be surprised by who will and who won't surive.

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Ok, just wanted to be sure. I'm looking forward to hearing what you'll have to say after watching the movie.

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Originally posted by Marian Schedenig:
A good reason to be most excited about the ROTK movie, actually, since that's the one I've never seen as a film at all.

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What? You've never seen the classic BBC Return of the King musical (seriously) featuring pointy-nosed Gandalf and the classic songs:
-"Frodo of the (Spoiler excised) and the Ring of Doom!"
-"Where there's a whip, there's a will!" (Orc marching song)
-"Win the battle, lose the war!" (Black Gate song)
-"The (spoiler excised) of the Ring, the return of the king!" (Cormallen victory song)

Where there's a whip, >>whip crack<<
there's a way.
Where there's a whip, >>whip crack<<
there's a way...(cont.)

We don't wanna go to work today--
But the lord of the lash says "Nay nay nay"
We're gonna march all day, all day, all day...
'Cause where there's a whip there's a way.
(left, right, left, right...)

The crack on the back says we're gonna fight--
We're gonna march all day and night--
and more--
'Cause we are the slaves of the dark lord's horde...

I'm amused that I remember that verbatim.
The musical elements are entertaining, and not entirely unappropriate--certainly no more so than Led Zeppelin or Rick Wakeman performing their musical impressions of Tolkien. Being much easier after the fact to point back and laugh, I suppose it was one of those "you had to grow up with it" moments. (The songs featured in "The Hobbit" were taken from songs that Tolkien wrote in the book, whereas the "King" songs were original numbers.)

Naturally the films have been repackaged for redistribution after the success of Jackson's films, and I think that's where the company's gone wrong, featuring two of the original 13 dwarves behind Frodo and Sam. (For some sense of symmetry in the picture, maybe? Whatever the intent, the picture was clearly assembled by someone who had never seen the film, nor taken any close interest in the story itself. Don't judge the film by the cover, however.)

I'm definitely defending the 'shame in the history of animation position', since I did grow up with it and didn't even like it back then. Still, the animated films are a lot better than the Ewok spinoffs from the Star Wars trilogy!

NP Sleepy Hollow (Danny Elfman)

One score aching for a legitmate release is REVOLUTION (1985), the Hugh Hudson film with Al Pacino and Donald Sutherland about the American Revolution. The score won the Anthony Asquith award from the BAFTA for Best Score. Somehow, a 43 minute cd-r is floating around for sale out there.