July 18, 2003

Welcome Back, Wisdom and the Return
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First off, welcome back Brett C, it has been too long my old friend and Nazgul. Hope to see you posting again. Danny, without doubt those were two great posts in response to foolishness and wisdom *doffs cap. However... (chuckle) to say that Sauron was foolish is extreme, what exactly did he get wrong? Was he not right that the allure of the Ring was greater than anyone could resist and that in the end no one could willfully destroy or harm it? All that he got wrong, if you can call it that, was to ignore the possibility of badluck; his and Gollums. As for using multitudes of Orcs to defeat a few at Morannon and then losing, Gandalf the fool himself recognised that he would take no chances with the possible new Ringlord, and that he would take "the sting". Gandalf trusted to other forces to do their work, where were these forces earlier? The duel with Sauron (Last Alliance) they could have manuveured the fight up Mt Doom so after Isildur could accidentally fall in with the Ring, thereby saving years of future warfare. Just an example (and admittedly a cumbersome one), there are a million other chances for the forces to avoid bloodshed if only they had bothered earlier to do their work. These forces of good seem very picky as to when and how they chose to intervene, and as such would be very foolish to bank upon.
There were other tactics that could have been used. My favourite is to have Gandalf present the Ring to the Master, Sauron would have recognised Olorin as a loyal friend and brother. Using his position in the "darker shade of pale tower" Gandalf over time could then manueveur Sauron over to the Goodside. As the ex-beetle said, "All ya need is love... da dadadadadah.."
Oh just another thought about the possible use of a ring to counter the One. If such a ring could be made powerfull enough, what could it do? for the ring to be considered Good it must be devoid of all violence and domination. In short the ring could not lay waste to armies, but then, one thing I truly love about Tolkien's Middle-earth is that Magic is subtle, not as brash as other authors (fireballs shooting everywhere etc).
Once upon a time, day dreaming, I wondered what if someone thousands of years after the War of the Ring was to find a nugget of gold, and taking the nugget made a ring. What if this nugget was once upon a time the One Ring. Could I, erm I mean could Sauron return? I guess not, but One loves to daydream One does. The return and rise of the Darklord in the present day world, would anyone notice?!? Apologies, I am getting too serious in my old age. See you all later :) Ash Nazg...