There is a contentious debate among fans and critics of J.R.R Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, over whether or not the ‘sheildmaiden’, Éowyn, is a feminist symbol or not. Éowyn is often used as a defense of Tolkien when critics call his work ‘sexist’ or ‘misogynistic’ because Éowyn is a strong female character. She asserts strength and independence when she dresses as a man, rides into battle, and kills the Witch-king. Opponents of this defense argue she only fought out of anguish after Aragorn rejected her love. In other words, her actions were a desperate suicide mission, not a feminist flex. Additionally, she never fights again after she kills the Witch-king, instead vowing to become a ‘healer’, which critics argue is a dated female stereotype that Tolkien is pushing on one of the few female characters who seems to have countered the status quo for women in Middle Earth.
In truth, Éowyn is not a feminist character at all. She is the manifestation of one of Tolkien’s most important and deeply Christian lessons within The Lord of the Rings. Éowyn’s story is about changing for the better and understanding the value of life. True leaders are healers not killers, and war is good only when it is just and waged for the right reasons. Those who fight out of love and duty, like the hobbits, are the real heroes.
Théoden, Éowyn’s uncle and the King of Rohan, planned to ride into battle against Mordor, and he appointed Éowyn to be the leader of Rohan and watch over the people. Éowyn, feeling pained, rejected, and angry because her romantic feelings toward Aragorn were not reciprocated, abandoned her post. She disguised herself as a man, and rode to Minas Tirith. In battle, she challenged the Witch-King, who boasted that "no living man may hinder me". She famously removed her helmet, exposing her long blond hair, and declared, "No living man am I! You look upon a woman! Éowyn I am, Éomund's daughter. Begone if you be not deathless!" To my knowledge, these are the most assertive words to come from a woman in all of the legendarium. After her declaration, Éowyn stabbed her sword through the Witch-king's head, killing him. This was to be her last battle.
In the House of Healing she meets Faramir, who helps her to realize how she truly felt about Aragorn, “You desired to have the love of the Lord Aragorn. Because he was high and puissant, and you wished to have renown and glory and to be lifted far above the mean things that crawl on the earth.” Faramir articulates the internal battle within Éowyn that possessed her to disobey Théoden and ride off into war. Éowyn was infatuated with Aragron. She did not love him; she loved what he represented: glory, bravery, and freedom. After Faramir helps her understand herself, she trades her idealism of death and war and replaces it with love and respect for herself and the value of life. Faramir says, “Here is the Lady Éowyn of Rohan, and now she is healed.” Ewoyn herself resolves to be a healer, “I want to be a healer, and love all things that grow and are not barren.” Glory, war, bloodshed, and pride do not make someone leader. She recognizes that being a healer makes someone a true leader.
Does Éowyn’s shift from shieldmaiden to healer represent an archaic trope that women are ‘gentle’ healers? Does the shift within Éowyn mean she is learning to be a ‘real’ woman who now understands that her feminine role is to nurture life and not to ride off bravely into battle? The answer is no. Healer is not exclusively Éowyn’s role. The king in Lord of the Rings, Aragorn, who is the rightful heir of Isildur, is very infrequently shown in battle. Instead, Aragorn is shown from the very beginning of the story to have an ability to heal and renew through his skill and knowledge of herbs. When he heals Éowyn, Faramir, and Merry, Old Wife Ioreth proclaims to everyone, “The hands of the King are the hands of a healer!” Éowyn isn’t asserting a feminist trope by being a sheildmaiden. Tolkien maintains gender equality in Middle Earth by not making Éowyn’s story about feminism. Both men and women have the ability to kill, to engage in battle, and to seek out glory. The question is not can she, it is should she. Should anyone fight for the sake of fighting? Additionally the role of leader is not exclusive to men. A leader is a healer and both Aragron and Éowyn, male and female, are healers.
Of course, this is not to say that war is always wrong. The Catholic Church teaches that although we should avoid war, there is such a thing as a ‘just war’. A war is just once all attempts of peace have been exhausted. Just wars are never waged for the sake of glory. They are only utilized when one's community and/or nation is in great danger and one is trying to eliminate a grave evil. Tolkien understood the horror of war, having served in World War I and having had several friends die in it. He also understood that while war is horrific, it can be necessary. Faramir said in The Two Towers,“War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.”
The true heroes are the hobbits who were thrust into conflict. Hobbits are unexpected protagonists in this epic, magical, and dark world. They are so small that they are mostly unknown, even in the Elves’ records. They live peacefully in the Shire removed from most of Middle Earth. They are not in the great legends of the days of valor. There are no songs sung about them in the great halls of Rohan or Gondor. However, there is no mistake on the part of J.R.R. Tolkien when he made these tiny men the true essence of courage and honor in The Lord of the Rings. The hobbits didn’t seek out power or honor in battle. They are simple halflings - totally loveable, relatable, and unsuspecting. Frodo accepted the ring because no one else would. He knew the risks, but accepted the burden out of the goodness of his heart. Merry, Pippin, and Sam join Frodo out of love for him. Tolkien once said, “We are here surviving because of the courage of small people against impossible odds.”
Even though Tolkien did not make allegories he couldn’t help but reveal greater truths about life and humanity through the prism of his Catholic faith. In letter 131 he writes, “I dislike Allegory – the conscious and intentional.
~Evita
3 comments:
Evita, thank you for your thought-provoking discussion of whether or not Eowyn is a feminist character; I really enjoyed reading it.
However, I was somewhat puzzled by your declaration that Eowyn is not a feminist character, and that “Tolkien maintains gender equality in Middle Earth by not making Éowyn’s story about feminism. Both men and women have the ability to kill, to engage in battle, and to seek out glory.” In fact, I read the same evidence that you’ve cited, that Eowyn can engage with both healing, the art of kings, and war (when righteous) as feminist in and of itself. The fact that Eowyn is not limited to merely cowering, or shoe-horned into being a feminine healer (the age-old gender structuring rooted in a primordial dichotomy of men as hunters and women as gathers) is feminist stance taken by Tolkien. I would argue your second sentence cited above (that in Tolkien’s world, men and women both have similar abilities and aptitudes) is actually a deeply feminist belief as well.
I, as I’m sure anyone, would be hard-pressed to argue that Tolkien fulfills all of the categorical imperatives to be defined as a modern, fourth wave feminist. However, credit where credit is due, in a time when women in novels were oft relegated to pining after loves gone or slowly and romantically succumbing to consumption, he gave us a bad ass shield maiden who learns from her mistakes.
Moreover, I would push you to examine the Hobbits in the context of gender. Sure, we only really have important male Hobbits in the text, but the stereotypical qualities of the Hobbits (enjoying home-life, gardening, not venturing on adventures, etc.) are qualities which other, lesser authors would have readily prescribed to women, not men. We should be reminded that feminism goes both ways: while Tolkien gives us Eowyn, a woman who yearns to fight and then, like kings, to heal, he also gives us Samwise, a male Hobbit with a deep-love of cookery and gardening who spends much of the text nestled in the role of companion. In fact, much of the point of the text is that it is these humble, domestic Hobbits, who possess qualities traditionally ascribed to both men and women, not the over-macho bare-chested pulp novel heroes of Tolkien’s time, who save the day. Isn’t this a feminist message as well?
I am also a bit puzzled by, if open to, your argument that Eowyn isn’t or couldn’t be a feminist character. Perhaps by describing the sort of feminism Eowyn does not partake in would help clarify the argument. Certainly, many feminists would see her as a strong woman on par with her male counterparts, and that would be enough to claim her as a feminist symbol. This, of course, was not likely Tolkien’s express intention in her story arc, but depending on the definition of feminism—for some, simply the expression of gender equality in terms of social capabilities—she could certainly be seen as an example of it, if unintended.
Eowyn, of course, is at least not simply a feminist character, and that is not her raison d’etre. She is a complicated person and a hero, both breaking and fulfilling “traditional” gender roles, as do the men (and as Marco points out, the hobbits.) They are all and none “feminists” in that regard at least. The confusion comes from the confusion about and inherent in the meaning of feminism itself. It is not self-evident that feminism in all its various forms contradicts, say, Christianity. The argument has to be made.
But what I think you are driving at is the conviction that our heroes do not have ideological purposes or ends, and that therefore they should not be considered as such. Eowyn is not fighting a feminist cause. There is something much bigger and more important at stake. The purpose of just war and the lack of pursuit of personal glory could be tied in better with this argument, which I think is a good one. Perhaps we could say that Eowyn (or Tolkien) is not anti-feminist, but nor is she (he) pro-feminist—it just doesn’t really apply…What do you think? -LB
I think you do an excellent job showing how the question of Eowyn's "feminism" is a red herring—asking the wrong question of her as both a warrior and a woman. The problem is how to be a Christian warrior and woman, which Eowyn needs to learn as much as Tolkien's readers. RLFB
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