The Very Wine of Blessedness

“It is sad, as are all the tales of Middle-earth,” says Aragorn to the hobbits on Weathertop of the tale of Tinúviel. And he is certainly correct. A consistent feature of the tales told in verse throughout The Lord of the Rings is a deep melancholy, from the lament Galadriel sings in Lothlórien of her loss of distant Eldamar to Gimli’s chant of the mighty days of Durin long since passed to the ancient poem translated by Aragorn remembering sadly the greatness of Eorl the Young and the Rohirrim. The list goes on. In Middle-earth, lamentations of people, places, and times lost are fundamental to the characterization of the Free Peoples. But if this is such a strong feature of the tales, then it seems rather strange that Aragorn would tell one to the hobbits as they lie in hiding from the servants of the Dark Lord. One would assume that a tale fraught with sadness would be the last thing that they would want to hear in such a situation. But Aragorn believes otherwise, concluding his statement, “and yet it may lift up your hearts.” And it is the complexity of the apparent contradiction raised here that explains the power of Tolkien’s Middle-earth.

The contradiction lies at the very heart of all the stories in the history of Middle-earth, perhaps nowhere more poignantly than in the very tale of which Aragorn tells a small part. For Beren and Lúthien faced many perils and “many sorrows befell” them. And when Lúthien died, the Eldar “lost her whom they most loved” forever. And this tale is tied inextricably with the Fall of Gondolin, which tells of another union of Man and Elf. Gondolin’s fall is one of the greatest points of despair in all the history of the Eldar, as the beautiful work of the Noldor fell once more to ruin because of the pride of Turgon their king. And yet, from these stories of ruin and death arises the most beautiful triumph in all the Elder Days. For from the line of Beren and Lúthien came Elwing, and from that of Tuor and Idril came Eärendil. And when these two were wedded, the perfect union of the Children of Ilúvatar was realized. The Three Houses of Men, the Noldor, and the Sindar were all represented in the marriage of Eärendil and Elwing. And their journey to the West to plead at the feet of the Valar for the forgiveness of the Noldor and the salvation of the Children from the might of Morgoth Bauglir thus surpasses the despair of the tales before it and even the joy of the resulting march of the Valar to Middle-earth. Without the horrors and sorrows inflicted upon the Children in the tales leading up to it, the account of Eärendil’s quest and especially its success loses a great deal of its exquisite potency.

This is the beauty of Tolkien’s idea of eucatastrophe. At the very end of all hope, when the victory of the Darkness over the Light seems surer than ever, the transformation of despair to joy in a sudden moment of ecstasy is beyond words. And for Tolkien, this goes far beyond mere stories; there is a theologically grounded reason for humanity’s yearning for eucatastrophe. In “On Fairy-stories” he writes that “the Birth of Christ is the eucatastrophe of Man’s history” and that His “Resurrection is the eucatastrophe of the story of the Incarnation.” Thus, the story of God’s begotten Son is one that “embraces all the essence of fairy-stories,” which in becoming a part of our real world has raised “the desire and aspiration of sub-creation to the fulfillment of Creation.” We as children of God are embracing a part of our divine connection to the Creator in telling our own sub-created stories of eucatastrophe.

And here we can see also why Tolkien’s stories in particular are so devastatingly attractive in their eucatastrophic elements. He says that if a story can be told that is “primarily” true in its account of history, which at the same time retains its “mythical and allegorical significance,” then that story would elicit a joy that “has the very taste of primary truth.” Tolkien of course believes that the most “pre-eminently high and joyous” version of this story is that of the Great Eucatastrophe in Christ. But he leaves the possibility open to other such stories, which would look forward or backward to the story of Christ. And while it is obviously true that the history of Middle-earth is in fact not “primarily” true, Tolkien’s devotion to the elucidation of details great and minute within his world over the course of nearly six decades resulted in a history that is so consistent and real that it passes for primary truth. Readers can experience his world so completely that when the tale of Eärendil is told, they can without doubt taste the joy that he described.

But even the great power and poignancy of the eucatastrophe of the First Age of Middle-earth falls short of Tolkien’s most resonant account of the complex of emotions that stem from the eucatastrophic tale, which comes at the end of The Lord of the Rings. In a stroke of brilliance, he presents this through the eyes of the humble Sam. Through Sam the humble hobbit of the lowest stature and station, the reader experiences every newly revealed moment of joy with the greatest possible potency. As he walks through the assembled host of the now truly Free Peoples of Middle-earth, the joys build and build, as he sees the guards bow before him, hears the praising song of the gathered men, sees Strider of Bree sitting upon the throne of Gondor. And just when the emotional weight of these moments seems unbearable, Sam’s final wish comes true, as the minstrel sings of Frodo of the Nine Fingers and the Ring of Doom. All of Sam’s hopes have been realized, and he can only weep with joy. And the passage that follows, among the best that Tolkien ever wrote, can only be given in full:

And all the host laughed and wept, and in the midst of their merriment and tears the clear voice of the minstrel rose like silver and gold, and all men were hushed. And he sang to them, now in the elven-tongue, now in the speech of the West, until their hearts, wounded with sweet words, overflowed, and their joy was like swords, and they passed in thought out to regions where pain and delight flow together and tears are the very wine of blessedness.

In these two sentences, Tolkien manages to encapsulate perfectly the impossible beauty of the eucatastrophe, and in this moment, all the despair that has filled the verses of the story to this point are completely justified. The lament of Frodo for Gandalf in Lothlórien, of Aragorn and Legolas for Boromir by the falls of Rauros, of the future Rohirrim for Théoden on the Pelennor, all are made part of the eucatastrophe that culminates in the minstrel’s song.

And thus, with the ending of the War of the Ring, Tolkien achieves the end of sub-creative work in which he so fervently believed.  The Christian, he writes, “may now, perhaps, fairly dare to guess that in Fantasy he may actually assist in the effoliation and multiple enrichment of creation,” knowing that his work will ever be a piece of the Great Eucatastrophe. Tolkien’s stories have stood the test of decades, and will continue to resonate with readers for generations to come, because in them, he succeeded in fulfilling the most fundamental of human yearnings, making his works as timeless as the human condition itself.

   – Andrew Stump