Mental illness in Middle-earth

The appearance of mental illness in Middle-earth has been discussed by scholars of literature and by psychiatrists. Middle-earth is the fantasy world created by J. R. R. Tolkien. His novels The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are both set in Middle-earth, and peopled with realistically-drawn characters who experience life much as people do in the real world. Characters as diverse as Denethor, Théoden, Beorn, Gollum, and Frodo have been seen as exemplifying conditions including paranoia, bipolar depression, schizoid personality disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Tolkien fans have discussed what kind of mental illness Gollum might have on over 1300 websites. A supervised study by medical students stated that Gollum met many of the criteria for schizoid personality disorder. In a celebrated[1] scene, Peter Jackson's 2002 film The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers depicts Gollum/Sméagol talking to himself, using the device of shot/reverse shot to switch between the two personalities.

Context[edit]

Middle-earth[edit]

Further information: J. R. R. Tolkien and Middle-earth

J. R. R. Tolkien (1892–1973) was an English Roman Catholic writer, poet, philologist, and academic, best known as the author of the high fantasy works The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, both set in his subcreated world of Middle-earth.[2]

Scholarly and psychiatric insights[edit]

Further information: Tolkien's prose style

The scholar of English Steve Walker states that Tolkien has rooted every element of Middle-earth naturally, using descriptions of Earthlike weather, landforms, peoples, cultures, flora and fauna.[3] He comments that

The psychological authentication of Tolkien's fiction approaches Freudian levels of subtlety. That psychiatric insight can get almost clinical, as with the representation of Denethor's aberrant behavior in terms of paranoia, the motivation of Théoden's passivity as bipolar depression, and the causally rich implications of the parallels between Beorn's werebear transformations and symptoms of epileptic seizure."[4]

Other Tolkien scholars and psychiatrists have broadly agreed, suggesting in addition Gollum's schizoid personality disorder[5] and the resemblance of Frodo's increasingly disturbed mental state to post-traumatic stress disorder.[6][7] The medievalist Alke Haarsma-Wisselink, who had experienced psychotic episodes, remarks that both Bilbo and Thorin in The Hobbit have symptoms of psychosis.[8] The Tolkien scholar James T. Williamson describes how Éowyn responds to her "perceived rejection" by Aragorn with "a madness" seen as her eyes change "from gray to 'on fire'";[9] other scholars have named Éowyn as suffering from depression.[10][11]

The psychiatrists Landon van Dell and colleagues write that The Lord of the Rings offers useful and "very tangible" lessons for mental health by helping readers to envisage and empathise with the situations of other people.[12]

Tolkien's interest in the subject[edit]

Wartime experience[edit]

Further information: The Great War and Middle-earth
Tolkien experienced trench warfare with the Lancashire Fusiliers (pictured), on the Western Front in 1916.[13]

Tolkien's depiction of Frodo's mental suffering may owe something to his own wartime experience.[14] The Tolkien scholar Karyn Milos comments that "recurring pain and intrusive memory, often triggered by significant dates or other reminders of the traumatic event, is a central characteristic of post-traumatic stress."[7] Janet Brennan Croft adds that "Frodo's experience of the war" resembles "modern war in its unrelieved stress". As in the static trenches of the First World War, in which Tolkien had fought, Frodo had to stay in cover on his quest to Mordor, constantly threatened by a watchful enemy he could not see.[14]

Jungian psychology[edit]

Further information: Psychological journeys of Middle-earth

The Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung coined the term analytical psychology for his approach to the psyche.[15][16] His theory included archetypes, the collective unconscious, individuation, the Self, and the shadow.[17] Tolkien and his friend C. S. Lewis were members of The Inklings literary club. Lewis was interested in Jungian psychology, "enchanted" by the idea of the collective unconscious, and probably shared these ideas with Tolkien.[18] The scholar Verlyn Flieger states that Tolkien's incomplete novel The Lost Road was based on the collective unconscious.[18][19] Flieger comments that in The Lost Road, Tolkien uses the "recognised psychological phenomenon" of sudden flashbacks "as a psychic gateway into locked-off areas of the soul".[20] The clinical psychologist Nancy Bunting writes that Tolkien expressed a Jungian view in several places, such as in a letter to Christopher Tolkien which in her words "sounds the Jungian refrain of linking native soil, race, and language".[18] Dorothy Matthews and others have identified numerous Jungian archetypes, such as the "Wise Old Man", in The Lord of the Rings.[21]

Shakespeare's King Lear[edit]

Further information: Denethor and Shakespeare's influence on Tolkien

Denethor's madness and despair have been compared to that of Shakespeare's King Lear. Both men are first outraged when their children (Faramir and Cordelia, respectively) refuse to aid them, but then grieve upon their children's death – or apparent death, in the case of Faramir. Both Denethor and Lear have been described as despairing of God's mercy, something extremely dangerous in a leader who has to defend a realm.[22] The Tolkien scholar Michael Drout writes that while Tolkien's professed dislike of Shakespeare is well-known, his use of King Lear for "issues of kingship, madness, and succession" was hardly surprising.[23]

Psychiatric conditions[edit]

Schizoid personality disorder[edit]

Further information: Gollum
Gollum and Sméagol debate

 Gollum was talking to himself. Sméagol was holding a debate with some other thought that used the same voice but made it squeak and hiss. A pale light and a green light alternated in his eyes as he spoke...
   'But Sméagol said he would be very very good. Nice hobbit! He took cruel rope off Sméagol's leg. He speaks nicely to me.'
   'Very very good, eh, my precious? Let's be good, good as fish, sweet one, but to ourselfs. Not hurt the nice hobbit, of course, no, no.'
   'But the Precious holds the promise,' the voice of Sméagol objected.
   'Then take it,' said the other, 'and let's hold it ourselfs! Then we shall be master, gollum! Make the other hobbit, the nasty suspicious hobbit, make him crawl, yes, gollum!'

The Lord of the Rings, book 4, ch. 2 "The Passage of the Marshes"[T 1]

The monster Gollum talks to himself in two different personalities, the good Sméagol and the evil Gollum.[5] Tolkien fans have extensively discussed what mental illness this might represent.[24] A 2004 paper in the British Medical Journal by supervised students at University College London (UCL) noted that the diagnosis for Gollum's mental illness is analysed on more than 1300 websites.[5] Nomenclature has varied over the years, and fans have applied labels more or less loosely; a common description is dissociative identity disorder, also known as "multiple personality disorder".[25] The UCL students argued that Gollum meets seven of the nine diagnostic criteria for schizoid personality disorder.[5]

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers depicts the apparent multiple personality disorder of Gollum/Sméagol talking to himself using the shot/reverse shot device in "perhaps the most celebrated scene in the entire film".[1]
Differential diagnosis of Gollum's mental illness by UCL students[5]
Diagnoses considered Points in favour Points against Conclusion
Schizophrenia Superficially looks reasonable; 25 of 30 students surveyed thought it likely Does not have "false, unshakeable beliefs"; power of the One Ring is real in Middle-earth; other ring-bearers have same symptoms Criteria ICD-10 for schizophrenia not met
Multiple personality disorder (broad category of mental conditions) Looks possible, second most common diagnosis in student survey (3 of 30 thought it likely); "pervasive maladaptive behaviour" since childhood "with a persistent disease course"; "odd interests", "spiteful behaviour" making friendships difficult, causing "distress to others" — Meets 7 of 9 criteria of (ICD-10) F60.1 for schizoid personality disorder

Peter Jackson's 2002 film The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers depicts Gollum/Sméagol talking to himself in "perhaps the most celebrated scene in the entire film". The scene uses the device of shot/reverse shot to switch between the two personalities, who are represented as two different CGI characters. The scholar of film Kristin Thompson writes that Jackson and Fran Walsh, who directed the scene, suggest the mental conflict using a "subtle combination of framing, camera movement, editing, and character glances."[1] Thompson comments that the scene's ability to make the viewer "apparently see two characters arguing with each other when only one is actually present creates an eerie, even astonishing moment that transcends the presentation in the book".[1]

Post-traumatic stress disorder[edit]

Further information: Frodo Baggins
Frodo relives the trauma of the quest

In early March ... Frodo had been ill. On the thirteenth of that month Farmer Cotton found Frodo lying on his bed; he was clutching a white gem that hung on a chain about his neck and he seemed half in a dream. 'It is gone for ever', he said, 'and now all is dark and empty'. But the fit passed, and when Sam got back on the twenty-fifth, Frodo had recovered, and he said nothing about himself.

The Lord of the Rings, book 6, ch. 9 "The Grey Havens"[T 2]

Milos[7] and medical scholars like Bruce D. Leonard[25] have suggested that the ring-bearer Frodo, returning "irreparably wounded" from his quest, could be suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Frodo repeatedly relived the most traumatic experiences "mentally, emotionally, and physically", especially on anniversaries of the quest's events. Leonard quotes Tolkien's description of Frodo's behaviour after the quest: "By the end of the next day the pain and unease had passed, and Frodo was merry again, as merry as if he did not remember the blackness of the day before".[T 3] Leonard comments that this sounds like dissociative amnesia, common alongside flashbacks of traumatic events. He writes that Tolkien's doubting language, "as if", and the amnesia both suggest that Frodo was in a dissociative state on the day that he relived the Witch-king's attack on Weathertop, and then forgot it, did not wish to remember it.[25]

Paranoia[edit]

Frodo sees the Eye watching him

But far more he was troubled by the Eye: so he called it to himself... The Eye: that horrible growing sense of a hostile will that strove with great power to pierce all shadows of cloud, and earth, and flesh, and to see you: to pin you under its deadly gaze, naked, immovable. So thin, so frail and thin, the veils were become that still warded it off. Frodo knew just where the present habitation and heart of that will now was: as certainly as a man can tell the direction of the sun with his eyes shut. He was facing it, and its potency beat upon his brow.

The Lord of the Rings, book 4, ch. 2 "The Passage of the Marshes"[T 4]

Walker suggests that the increasingly "aberrrant behavior" of Denethor, the Steward of Gondor, can be explained as despair and paranoia.[3] Edward Lense, in Mythlore, describes Frodo's continuing experience of seeing the Eye of Sauron wherever he goes as "read[ing] like the record of a paranoiac's delusions".[6]

References[edit]

Primary[edit]

  1. ^ Tolkien 1955, book 4, ch. 2 "The Passage of the Marshes"
  2. ^ Tolkien 1955, book 6, ch. 9 "The Grey Havens"
  3. ^ Tolkien 1955, book 6, ch. 7 "Homeward Bound"
  4. ^ Tolkien 1954, book 4, ch. 2 "The Passage of the Marshes"

Secondary[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d Thompson, Kristin (2011). "Gollum Talks to Himself: Problems and Solutions in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings". In Bogstad, Janice M.; Kaveny, Philip E. (eds.). Picturing Tolkien: Essays on Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings Film Trilogy. McFarland & Company. pp. 35–36. ISBN 978-0-7864-8473-7. Archived from the original on 13 July 2021. Retrieved 23 August 2020.
  2. ^ Carpenter 1978, pp. 111, 200, 266 and throughout.
  3. ^ a b Walker, Steven C. (1978). "Super Natural Supernatural: Tolkien as Realist". Children's Literature Association Quarterly. 1978 (1). Project MUSE: 100–105. doi:10.1353/chq.1978.0010. S2CID 144132005.
  4. ^ Walker 2009, p. 15.
  5. ^ a b c d e Bashir, Nadia; Ahmed, Nadia; Singh, Anushka; Tang, Yen Zhi; Young, Maria; Abba, Amina; Sampson, Elizabeth L. (2004). "A precious case from Middle Earth". British Medical Journal. 329 (7480): 1435–1436. doi:10.1136/bmj.329.7480.1435. PMC 535969. PMID 15604176.
  6. ^ a b Lense, Edward (1976). "Sauron is Watching You: The Role of the Great Eye in 'The Lord of the Rings'". Mythlore. 4 (1): 1.
  7. ^ a b c Milos, Karyn (1998). "Too Deeply Hurt: Understanding Frodo's Decision to Depart". Mallorn (36): 17–23. JSTOR 45320550.
  8. ^ Haarsma-Wisselink, Alke (6 July 2022). "'Finding out what lies beyond the borders of the Shire': Applying Tolkien's fantastic texts in and to madness, the transgressive experience of psychotic thinking" (PDF). Leeds International Medieval Conference.
  9. ^ Durham, April (2018). "Review: The Body in Tolkien's Legendarium: Essays on Middle-earth Corporeality by Christopher Vaccaro". Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts. 29 (3 (103)): 453–457. JSTOR 26728152.
  10. ^ Maddox, Rachel (2018). "Flawed and Formidable: Galadriel, Éowyn, and Tolkien's Inadvertent Feminism". UReCA: 1–13.
  11. ^ Nash, J. D. (May 2012). "1. The Malice of Saruman". The impact of evil on the psychological and physical landscapes of Middle earth. Tennessee Technological University (Master's Thesis). pp. 4–33. results in a paralyzing depression that allows Wormtongue ...
  12. ^ Van Dell, Landon L.; Nissan, David A.; Collier, Samuel C. (20 September 2023). "Why Psychiatrists Should Read (and Watch) the Lord of the Rings". Psychiatry. 86 (4): 378–383. doi:10.1080/00332747.2023.2253665. ISSN 0033-2747. PMID 37729115. S2CID 262085788.
  13. ^ Carpenter 1978, pp. 88–94.
  14. ^ a b Croft, Janet Brennan (2004). War in the Works of J.R.R. Tolkien. Westport: Praeger. pp. 134–135.
  15. ^ Jung, C. G. (1912). Neue Bahnen in der Psychologie (in German). Zürich: Rascher. (New Pathways in Psychology)
  16. ^ Samuels, Andrew; Shorter, B.; Plaut, F. (1986). A Critical Dictionary of Jungian Analysis. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. ISBN 978-0-415-05910-7.
  17. ^ Fordham, Michael (1978). Jungian Psychotherapy: A Study in Analytical Psychology. London: Wiley & Sons. pp. 1–8. ISBN 0-471-99618-1.
  18. ^ a b c Bunting, Nancy (2016). "Tolkien's Jungian Views on Language". Mallorn (57 (Winter 2016)): 17–20. JSTOR 48614852.
  19. ^ Flieger, Verlyn (2004a). ""Do the Atlantis story and abandon Eriol-Saga"". Tolkien Studies. 1: 43–68. doi:10.1353/tks.2004.0007. S2CID 170744531. Archived from the original on 28 April 2019. Retrieved 25 October 2022.
  20. ^ Flieger, Verlyn (1996). "Tolkien's Experiment with Time: The Lost Road, The Notion Club Papers and J.W. Dunne". Mythlore. 21 (2). Article 9.
  21. ^ Matthews, Dorothy (1975). "The Psychological Journey of Bilbo Baggins". In Lobdell, Jared (ed.). A Tolkien Compass. Open Court Publishing. pp. 27–40. ISBN 978-0-87548-303-0.
  22. ^ Smith, Leigh (2007). "The Influence of King Lear on Lord of the Rings". In Croft, Janet Brennan (ed.). Tolkien and Shakespeare: Essays on Shared Themes and Language. McFarland & Company. p. 140. ISBN 978-0-7864-2827-4.
  23. ^ Drout, Michael D. C. (2004). "Tolkien's Prose Style and its Literary and Rhetorical Effects". Tolkien Studies. 1 (1): 137–163. doi:10.1353/tks.2004.0006. S2CID 170271511.
  24. ^ Manuel, Marisa L. (2022). "Fantastically Real". Pleiades: Literature in Context. 42 (1). Project MUSE: 51–57. doi:10.1353/plc.2022.0044. ISSN 2470-1971. S2CID 248603552.
  25. ^ a b c Leonard, Bruce D. (2023). "The Posttraumatic Stress Disorder of Frodo Baggins". Mythlore. 42 (1). article2.

Sources[edit]

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