Who is Tom Bombadil

[Devil's Advocate]

An article I stumbled upon on some website recently, debating the nature of Tom Bombadil in the The Lord of the Rings, got me thinking about it, too. Who the heck IS Bombadil? For some reason, this question never occurred to me when I read the books, but it is interesting.

On the one hand, he has seemingly no relevance whatsoever to the events in LotR. Yet, Tolkien dedicated something like 100 or whatever pages to him in Fellowship (can't remember exactly; it's been a while since I read it), so clearly he is someone of 'some' importance in his world, even if not to the War of the Ring.

He does not do anything to help the mission, yet he clearly has immense power; notice his control of the trees in the Old Forest; and how the One Ring seems to have no effect on him at all. Also, when Frodo puts on the ring, Bombadil can still see him, even though he is invisible to everyone else. To him, the Ring is just another ring.

He proclaims himself to be the 'Eldest', and even Gandalf and Elrond refer to him in somewhat reverential (or atleast respectful) tones. At the end, after the Ring was unmade, Gandalf states that he will visit Bombadil so they can sit down and have a 'long chat', or something to that effect.

What do you guys think? Who - or even what - was Tom Bombadil?


P.S. I tried to post the link to the article, but I was informed that I can't until I reach the 15 Post mark. If you're interested, just Google "who is tom bombadil", and it's the first result you get.

 

[jojajihisc]

His omission was one of the only things I was disappointed with in the film. I guess Peter Jackson had the same question you do.

 

[j d worthington]

You may find the discussions in this thread of interest:

http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/24299-tom-bombadil.html

As for the essay you mention, it might also add to the discussion, so...

Who is Tom Bombadil?

 

[Grimward]

(Haven't read the article, but....)

More like 28 pages (not counting subsequent discussions, such as the the Council of Elrond you reference above) between the ends of The Old Forest and Fog on the Barrow-Downs chapters, but I get your point and that part of the book does seem to read as though longer than it really is.

Tolkien himself described Iarwain as an "intentional enigma" in Letters, adding that even Mythical Ages have to have some such. I've always kind of thought of him as a sort of "Father Nature", although we clearly see that his concern is mostly for his small realm in Fellowship. Tolkien went on to say that Bombadil was "...a spirit that desires knowledge of other things...." but was "...entirely unconcerned with 'doing' anything with the knowledge." As a character, one can also see Tom as a catalyst in Frodo's character development, and his absence in the movies is a primary reason why Frodo's character was sluggish to emerge in the movies (ie, the aforementioned chapters are not in the film).

EDIT: Hmmm, this should prove to be a popular thread, as there weren't ANY responses when I started mine!

 

[Pyan]

He does not do anything to help the mission, yet he clearly has immense power;

Um - without Tom, the mission would have lost Merry and Pippin in the Old Forest, suffocated in Old Man Willow, and ground to a complete end on the Barrow-downs with the death of Frodo and Sam at the hands of the Barrow-wight...

 

[Grimward]

Leaving Gandalf with no choice but to invade the barrow himself to retrieve the ring, then make use of Air Landroval, etc. as you've suggested elsewhere, your greenness!

Overlooking this "minor" point, though, am interested in your thoughts on Bombadil....

 

[Pyan]

Leaving Gandalf with no choice but to invade the barrow himself to retrieve the ring, then make use of Air Landroval, etc. as you've suggested elsewhere, your greenness!

How would Gandalf know where the Ring was? And the Nazgul visit the Barrowdowns as well, don't forget...

 

[Devil's Advocate]

His omission was one of the only things I was disappointed with in the film. I guess Peter Jackson had the same question you do.

Well, I wouldn't say his omission can be considered disappointing. The whole sequence with Bombadil and the Old Forest was undoubtedly the slowest and, more importantly, the most ambiguous and strange part of The Fellowship of the Ring. I see no way in which Jackson could have included it in the movie and managed to hold the viewers' interest.

I love Tolkien's universe, and since I created this thread, I obviously am interested in the Bombadil mystery, too. But I fully support Jackson's decision not to put Tom Bombadil in the film. It's not a scene that translates well into live-action.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Um - without Tom, the mission would have lost Merry and Pippin in the Old Forest, suffocated in Old Man Willow, and ground to a complete end on the Barrow-downs with the death of Frodo and Sam at the hands of the Barrow-wight...

Well, but that's my point. That whole scene was included purely as a means to introduce Tom Bombadil. If there was no Bombadil, it's safe to assume that entire sequence wouldn't have taken place.

So, no, Bombadil did not help the mission.

 

[Grimward]

How would Gandalf know where the Ring was? And the Nazgul visit the Barrowdowns as well, don't forget...

Well, if you want to be that way about it, why should we think that Frodo and Sam would even escape the Withywindle valley, much less make it halfway across the Barrow Downs? After all, upon parting didn't Bombadil and Goldberry give them a vision of what their heading should be for crossing the Downs, too? Just one example of how TB helped the mission, DA....

Come now Mr. Pyan, I know there's all sorts of Bombadil insights hiding behind those tentacles...

 

[Pyan]

That whole scene was included purely as a means to introduce Tom Bombadil

I find it very difficult to believe that JRRT went to all the trouble of getting the hobbits into the Old Forest in the first place, getting them lost (twice!), and devoting most of two chapters, with all the concommitant writing, editing, re-writing, working out of the moon's phases, etc, etc, just to introduce a non-important character. Why go to all that effort, when he could have brought them to the East Road over the Brandywine bridge?

Personally, I incline to the theory that TB is a Maia on "special duties", much like Gandalf - except G. is the mover, and TB is an observer.There are hundreds of theories - a simple Google of "What is Tom Bombadil?" brings up 155,000 hits. But one thing that I'm pretty sure of - he's not irrelevant to the story, as JRRT put nothing into LotR that is unnecessary...


BTW, IMHO Mr Jackson did a pretty good job with the films. But he suffers from a common delusion among directors and adapters of books for the screen - he thinks that he knows better than the original author.
TB should have been included, as should The Scouring of the Shire - if he'd kept to the original story and not put in such nonsense as the bits about the creation of Orcs, or Aragorn fighting Warg-riders and falling off cliffs, or Faramir taking Frodo and Sam to Osgiliath, to name three examples among many, he'd have had plenty of screen-time left to do the whole thing properly and not cut it off halfway through the last book...

 

[Omphalos]

His omission was one of the only things I was disappointed with in the film. I guess Peter Jackson had the same question you do.

I'm glad that Jackson cut that part out. That whole section where they are wandering through the woods, eating every chance they get, up through the encounter with Bombadil is the one section of the entire trilogy of books that I have never been able to finish. If the Bombadil section had been put into the first movie, I probably would have been bored witless. Ive never read anything else by the author except for The Hobbit, but I figured that the Bombadil character was fleshed out more in some other writing. Still, I thought that whole section was just boring and pointless. "Why is this even here?" I always ask myself.

 

[Clansman]

I find it very difficult to believe that JRRT went to all the trouble of getting the hobbits into the Old Forest in the first place, getting them lost (twice!), and devoting most of two chapters, with all the concommitant writing, editing, re-writing, working out of the moon's phases, etc, etc, just to introduce a non-important character. Why go to all that effort, when he could have brought them to the East Road over the Brandywine bridge?

Personally, I incline to the theory that TB is a Maia on "special duties", much like Gandalf - except G. is the mover, and TB is an observer.There are hundreds of theories - a simple Google of "What is Tom Bombadil?" brings up 155,000 hits. But one thing that I'm pretty sure of - he's not irrelevant to the story, as JRRT put nothing into LotR that is unnecessary...


BTW, IMHO Mr Jackson did a pretty good job with the films. But he suffers from a common delusion among directors and adapters of books for the screen - he thinks that he knows better than the original author.
TB should have been included, as should The Scouring of the Shire - if he'd kept to the original story and not put in such nonsense as the bits about the creation of Orcs, or Aragorn fighting Warg-riders and falling off cliffs, or Faramir taking Frodo and Sam to Osgiliath, to name three examples among many, he'd have had plenty of screen-time left to do the whole thing properly and not cut it off halfway through the last book...

Hear, hear! The omission of TB I expected, as the radio series cut him out too, and it is something of a, well, side-story, although important (imo). The Scouring of the Shire was a huge, giant massive omission, that was a terrible mistake. The point of that chapter was to show that the Shire did not escape from the War of the Ring unscathed (the last battle of the War was fought, after all, in the Shire), and in fact, suffered pretty badly (though not as bad as Gondor, Rohan or Dale, or, for that matter, the nations of the East and South).

PJ did do a good job on the movies, and I respect that they are an interpretation. However, for some parts of interpreting, it was like PJ was interpreting a book he didn't read, namely: Aragorn, Faramir, Elrond, and Frodo. He got some things bang on: Boromir (Sean Bean deserves a lot of the credit, though), Merry and Pippin, Sam, Galadriel, and, of course Gandalf (Ian McKellen was fabulous).

 

[Clansman]

I'm glad that Jackson cut that part out. That whole section where they are wandering through the woods, eating every chance they get, up through the encounter with Bombadil is the one section of the entire trilogy of books that I have never been able to finish. If the Bombadil section had been put into the first movie, I probably would have been bored witless. Ive never read anything else by the author except for The Hobbit, but I figured that the Bombadil character was fleshed out more in some other writing. Still, I thought that whole section was just boring and pointless. "Why is this even here?" I always ask myself.

Boring? Okay, the Hobbits almost get eaten by a tree, they get lost in mysterious fog, captured by the barrow wight, and get some nifty Numenorean swords. As Grim said above: 28 pages, with that level of activity. How can that be boring? 28 pages unreadable?

 

[j d worthington]

While I can see where some are coming from, I am in agreement with Pyan that "JRRT put nothing into LotR that is unnecessary" -- take a look at the books of The History of Middle-earth, and you'll see just how carefully he worked on this one, and how much he left out because he felt it wasn't necessary, however good it may have been. Bombadil, on the other hand, adds several things to the story:

As such a mysterious, enigmatic figure, he is in some ways the embodiment of Middle-earth itself, given a voice. He is the natural world, the "unfallen" man who is content to learn and observe, but not (save where his own safety and well-being are concerned, and even there in a limited fashion) to rule. We get a better insight into their world (as do the hobbits) by our encounter with him.

The encounter of the hobbits with Bombadil is the first stage, as it were, in their "growing up", their maturation and re-entry into the world itself, from which their kind have been almost entirely sequestered. It is also our first real introduction into just how deep, strange, mysterious, and beautiful (not to mention dangerous) this world can be; and how little it is concerned with the doings of the hobbits, wizards, or even Sauron. Bombadil gives a different perspective on all the "doings" involved in the book, as well as a glimpse into an older world.

On that last point, there is also the insight Tom brings into the past, making certain ancient things live again for us, the readers, as well as for the hobbits. To them (as to us), all this ancient history is mere stories told to entertain. Through Bombadil, both they and we are made to catch some fleeting glimpse of the people, the human aspect, and to feel the presence of the past in the presence. For instance: following their rescue from the Barrow, as Tom disperses the treasure from within, we have the following:

[Tom] chose for himself from the pile a brooch set with blue stones, many-shaded like flax-flowers or the wings of blue butterflies. He looked long at it, as if stirred by some memory, shaking his head, and saying at last:

'Here is a pretty toy for Tom and for his lady! Fair was she who long ago wore this on her shoulder. Goldberry shall wear it now, and we will not forget her!'

For each of the hobbits he chose a dagger, long, leaf-shaped, and keen, of marvellous workmanship, damasked with serpent-forms in red and gold.[...]

'Old knives are long enough as swords for hobbit-people,' he said. 'Sharp blades are good to have, if Shire-folk go walking, east, south, or faar away into dark and danger.' Then he told them that these blades were forged many years ago by Men of Westernesse: they were foes of the Dark Lord, but they were overcome by gthe evil king of Carn Dûm in the Land of Angmar.

'Few now remember them,' Tom murmured, 'yet still some go wandering, sons of forgotten kings walking in loneliness, guarding from evil things folk that are heedless.'

The hobbits did not understand his words, but as he spoke they had a vision as it were of a great expanse of years behind them, like a vast shadowy plain over which there strode shapes of Men, tall and grim with bright swords, and last came one with a star on his brow. Then his voice faded, and they were back in the sunlit world.

Here we have our first real foreshadowing of the importance of the Rangers, of Aragorn, and of their encounter with him; as well as the sudden glimpse of a quite staggering feeling of history like some vast shadow just behind them, yet which has set in motion all the events of the present. With such light touches throughout the novel, rather than "infodump", Tolkien brings both his hobbits (our POV characters -- recall the "by the hobbits" of the title page) and us to a realization of the historical depth of the story we are in. Tom is an admirable character for doing this, for he is an observer, one who has seen the entire history (at least, so it is hinted), yet remained uninvolved save in the small things of his own domain, thus allowing him to be the perfect vehicle for bringing these things to life.

These are only a few of the points I could make about why Bombadil is anything but extraneous to the story. As Pyan and others have noted, he plays a very important part in the hobbits' journey itself, as well as in their growth and maturation.

As for my understanding where some are coming from... when I first read the tale (at the age of 14) I, too, found the passage with Tom to be a bit of a digression (though enjoyable). On subsequent readings, I have come to see it quite differently, as an integral part of the tale not only of the Quest, but of Middle-earth itself (certainly one of the primary characters of the tale), and it has in fact become one of my favorite passages, with its striking contrasts of horror, tension, the comic, and the poignantly beautiful:

"And with that song the hobbits stood upon the threshold, and a golden light was all about them."

That line is a lovely image, and indeed metaphorically it is one of the cruxes of the book itself, for it here that, indeed, the hobbits are on the threshold: of their adventure; of the wide world outside; of an encounter with the continuing song of the Valar; and of the experience of life itself.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Very well put, JD. I admit, I had never quite seen it that way. It's been years since I read LotR; maybe I should re-read it. Perhaps you are right, and Tom is more significant than he initially seems. I will, nonetheless, reiterate my support for Jackson's decision not to include him in the film. Regardless of how big a fan one might be of LotR, or even Bombadil himself, the sequence simply wouldn't work in a film. To borrow a line from Logen Ninefingers - you have to be realistic about these things.

So, you presribe to the 'Tom is Father Nature' kind of theory? What about the theory that he is an Ainur? Some even theorise that he is the manifestation of Eru, himself; the strongest argument in favour of this is Goldberry's rather existential answer to Frodo when he asked about Tom: "He is."

The article I referenced (which you linked to earlier), gives some interesting arguments to support the claim the Tom is a Valar, and in fact none other than Aule the Smith.

What do you think?

 

[j d worthington]

I've never been convinced that he is a Vala. For one thing, I think Tolkien would have said as much in the Letters, if nowhere else. At the very least, I don't see him as Aulë, who was too given to the making of things, whereas Tom is given to learning about things which grow and live.

For similar reasons, I can't accept Tom as Eru, or even an incarnation of Eru. There would be no need for Eru to so incarnate himself, for one thing. There are, I think, other objections to this idea as well.

In the end, I think Tom is meant to remain an enigma, of a particularly cryptic kind; one not meant to be solved lest he be resolved into something simplistic when his nature (and, apparently, history) is actually quite complex.

As for the movie... because of the difference of the "language" and dramatic demands of the two media, I would agree that -- at least in a theatrical film -- the decision to remove Bombadil (and, for that matter, the Barrow-wight) was a wise one. (Things might be different, however, if it were an adaptation on the small screen, where you could have, say, an entire season to do the novel justice. Then you could capture the quiet moments as well as the more "exciting" ones... though the meeting with Bombadil and the Barrow-wight, combined, would certainly have the makings of a great single episode, or perhaps even a two-part piece.) On the big screen, such a thing would be a dreadful break in the pacing of the film, and throw the entire flow off-kilter. And a good film, like music, must have a proper, melodious flow to it, or you risk losing the audience by too abrupt a change of pace and/or style. It jars them out of the film and once more into the theatre, where they will feel the minor discomforts of their seats, the little noises which they have before been able to unconsciously filter out, and all the other distractions which a film must remove from their conscious (and even, to a large degree, unconscious) experience, if it is to keep their attention.

 

[Omphalos]

Boring? Okay, the Hobbits almost get eaten by a tree, they get lost in mysterious fog, captured by the barrow wight, and get some nifty Numenorean swords. As Grim said above: 28 pages, with that level of activity. How can that be boring? 28 pages unreadable?

Its the same way I feel whenever an omnipotent superman pops up and resolves whatever problem the heroes are facing with a wave of the hand. I can never buy that.

Although I read the books within the last five years, its been years since I perused that section. But I think I recall the party walking through woods, stopping frequently to have lunches of sandwiches wrapped in wax paper, or some such. It was just so cutesy I could not stand it. Then Bombadil showed up and proved that the universe is not as complex as Tolkein would otherwise have his readers believe. I just thought it didn't work.

Also, from a literary standpoint I don't feel that the archetype has much significance. You see it in fantasy, kung-fu, and sometimes spy stories, and other types: The aged, mystical recluse who could take over the world, but chooses not to because he's for some reason "beyond it all." I have some trouble swallowing that. Personally I completely buy into the school of thought that thinks literature is an educational tool and a way of examining problems either before they happen, or through a metaphorical lens. So when I read, I look for real-life connections, literal or metaphorical. Personally, I just find no truth in that archetype.

So yea, that section is boring to me because I feel its kind of a waste of time, and because it bears no significance whatsoever later on.

 

[j d worthington]

Um, Omphalos... I kinda pointed out some ways in which it actually does in my post above....

 

[Omphalos]

Um, Omphalos... I kinda pointed out some ways in which it actually does in my post above....

Does what? Have significance? I saw what you said, and I thought you said it really well. Ive probably never considered more than half of what you said there. As for the rest of your post, let me get my Campbell before I get back to you. Anyway, I made my mind up about Tom Bombadil over 25 years ago.

Look, how could he possibly be an "embodiment" of Middle-Earth, and a widow to an earlier period at the same time? It seems to me that if he really was pure and "unfallen," then he really had nothing to do with Middle Earth, because everyone and everything else there was or did fall; he was an anachronism who hailed back to a time that was unreachable, and just happened to live to a time where his existence bore no significance to anyone else who lived in it.

I'm not even sure I need an answer to that question, JD. I'm with you all on part of this; Tolkein was brilliant and more went into these books then Im ever likely to realize. Anyway, I think I already answered what my problems with the passage were. I would have preferred that you respond to all of what I said, instead of just the last paragraph. My gripes are legitimate.