February 21, 2002

Balrogs Got Wings!
John R.

Admittedly, the book does state that the Balrog's shadow spread out "like" wings. It doesn't state that they were in fact wings.

But this may just have been Tolkien's way of introducing magic and magical creatures to his audience.

If you look at other passages in the book, Tolkien describes some other acts of magic in the same indirect way. For instance, when Gandalf comes to rescue Faramir from the Nazgul in front of Minas Tirith, a white light seems to shoot upward from his hand, at least to Pippin's eyes. The book doesn't actually state that a beam of light shot upward, but this passage left me no doubt that there was in fact a beam of light.

Another possible explanation is that the books were supposedly written from the viewpoint of Hobbits, who are respectable, generally boring people, who don't seem to believe much in magic, much less swimming in water. Hobbits may have had trouble processing the fact that they were in the presence of magic, and so would wonder whether they were imagining things.