The Revived Tolkien Trivia

[Boaz]

TLotR, Book Five, Chapter Four, The Siege of Gondor.

Denethor, Faramir, Gandalf, and Pippin are meeting...

"...I hope that I have not done ill?" He looked at his father.
"Ill?" cried Denethor, and his eyes flashed suddenly. "Why do you ask? The men were under your command. Or do you ask for my judgement on all your deeds? Your bearing is lowly in my presence, yet it is long now since you turned from you own way at my counsel. See, you have spoken skilfully, as ever; but I, have I not seen you eye fixed on Mithrandir, seeking whether you said well or too much? He has long had your heart in his keeping.
My son, your father is old but not yet dotard. I can see and hear, as was my wont; and little of what you have half said or left unsaid is now hidden from me. I know the answer to many riddles. Alas, alas for Boromir!"
"If what I have done displeases you, my father," said Framir quietly. "I wish I had known your counsel before the burden of so weighty a judgement was thrust upon me."
"Would that have availed to change your judgement? said Denethor. "You would still have done just so....."

 

[HareBrain]

Alas, alas for Boromir!

OK, I've got it, but it's a bit of a cheat -- I only got it because Boaz's answer triggered something.

So I'm going to defer for a day or so. (Boaz, the well-known group of four is well known outside of Tolkien. It's something like the Four Tops, the four points of the compass, etc.)

 

[farntfar]

No. I'm afraid that's not it, Boaz.
HB was closer, I think.

The groups of four are far more defined than that.
One group is named as such in the book, although a bit later that this. (If memory serves.)
The other group is well known even in real life.

 

[HareBrain]

One group is named as such in the book, although a bit later that this. (If memory serves.)

Are you sure that isn't a group of three? That's what confused me a while back.

 

[farntfar]

Spit!
You are correct, HB. Silly me.

The original question stands though; with one of a group of four rarely consulted in Gondor.
But it is one of a group of three who doesn't speak of it in the follow up clue.

 

[HareBrain]

OK then, my answer is the East Wind. From LOTR, The Departure of Boromir:

'You left the East Wind to me,' said Gimli, 'but I will say naught of it.'
'That is as it should be,' said Aragorn. 'In Minas Tirith they endure the East Wind, but they do not ask it for tidings.'


I think part of the reason this episode stuck in my mind (though not in enough detail to recall it until Boaz's mention of Boromir) is two things that occurred to me when reading it before. One is, Gimli says that Aragorn and Legolas left the East Wind to him, but the order of the sung verses so far has been: Aragorn West, Legolas South, Aragorn North. If Aragorn was intending Gimli to sing, he would have left the North for him, surely, rather than take a second go himself? My interpretation is that Aragorn knows Gimli has a terrible singing voice, and seeks to prevent the dwarf taking a turn; and Gimli then says the thing about the East Wind to make it seem he hasn't been snubbed.

Second, if those of Minas Tirith had any military sense, they'd be interrogating the East Wind like crazy for tidings, given that it might know the enemy's plans and the disposition of his forces.

 

[farntfar]

That's the one HB.
I'd also forgotten that Aragorn sang 2 winds, which is what made me foolishly think of the four walkers, rather than the three walkers. (As named later by Eomer I think.)

A set of wind chimes to you, and the next question.

 

[HareBrain]

Cheers, farntfar.

The next question is ... drumroll

Who finds him/herself placed on a shelf, first metaphorically, then very soon after, literally?

Two quotes please, or reasonably detailed paraphrasing.

 

[Boaz]

I had an answer all researched and typed about Faramir's loss of standing with Denethor and then being put upon a funeral pyre... but right before I decided to post, I remembered this:

The Lord of the Rings, Book Three, Chapter Four, Treebeard...

High up, almost level with the tops of forest-trees, there was a shelf under a cliff...
They climbed and scrambled up the rock... They came at last to the edge of the shelf...
"...Let us leave this - dd you say what you call it?"
"Hill?" suggested Pippin. "Shelf? Step?" suggested Merry.

"This is an ent-house," he said, "and there are no seats, I fear. But you may sit on the table." Picking up the hobbits he set them on the great stone slab...

 

[HareBrain]

Sorry, Boaz, good effort but that's not it. (Nor would the one about Faramir have been.)

It is the right kind of shelf, though, i.e. not one put up on a wall. (For the second, non-metaphorical one.)

 

[Boaz]

I don't have The Hobbit or The Silmarillion with me tonight... but I think that someone big or strong enough, to put another person on a shelf, would be an Ent, an Eagle, a Troll or a Vala. I'm thinking of Eagles... but I don't have the books tonight.

 

[farntfar]

Boaz, I was thinking of Sam on the stairs of Cirith Ungol, but I couldn't get the 1st/ metaphoric bit.

But with your ideas I thought of Gandalf being picked up by Gwaihir on the Zirak Zigil and before that being left on the shelf, or half the bridge after crying "Fly fools!"

But if this is the case then I think you should get the bell, having basicaally done the work.

 

[HareBrain]

Boaz might have done some of the work, farntfar, but your suggestion is wrong, sorry.

 

[Pyan]

After much cogitation...

It's Bilbo Baggins, being saved from Wargs and Goblins by the Eagles, from the slopes of the Misty Mountains.

After he's plucked out a burning tree, Bilbo says: “Now I know what a piece of bacon feels like when it is suddenly picked out of the pan on a fork and put back on the shelf!"

And on the next page (in my edition): "Very soon, Bilbo was laid down, trembling with fear, on a wide shelf of rock on the mountain-side."

The Hobbit, Ch. 6, "Out of the Frying-Pan into the Fire"

 

[Hugh]

Impressive.

I'd got stuck last night with Eowyn's goodbye to Aragorn in The Passing of the Grey Company thinking that she was referring to herself as being left on a metaphorical shelf, but my edition does not contain the episode immediately afterwards where Treebeard pops by with a message for Aragorn and picks Eowyn up and puts her on a shelf.

 

[farntfar]

Good one Py.

 

[HareBrain]

Well done, Py! A dusty, long-unused bell for you, and the responsibility for the next question.

 

[Pyan]

"Ding" koff koff, koff...

Where would I find gammers and greybeards?

 

[HareBrain]

"Ding" koff koff, koff...

There was so much dust from it being on the shelf, it muffled the clapper thingy. You see, I was creatively trying to keep with the theme of the question! No one understands my art!! sob

Where would I find gammers and greybeards?

Great, another quote I vaguely recognise but have no idea as to its source. More sleepless agonies await.

 

[Hugh]

Yes, the quote is so familiar....

but, frustratingly, all checks so far have been totally fruitless