Between the Times

Denethor and Faramir

Has our enemy come to Rath Dinen?

There they found Faramir, still dreaming in his fever, lying upon the table. Wood was piled under it, and high all about it, and all was drenched with oil, even the garments of Faramir and the coverlets; but as yet no fire had been set to the fuel.

The city of Gondor is under siege. Darkness has settled on the land, and the men of the city bear up as best they can in a midday that is as dark as night. The weapons of the enemy are hunger and fire but also despair. This is not an honorable fight. The orcs have dug trenches that will be filled with fire that will slowly strangle Gondor, with the intent that its residents will starve. As bodies are found from the previous battles, the heads of the dead men are flung over the wall. Casting decapitated heads over the wall of a city under siege has only one intent: psychological warfare. The heads are

grim to look on; for though some were crushed and shapeless, and some had been cruelly hewn, yet many had features that could be told, and it seemed that they had died in pain… But marred and dishonoured as they were, it often chanced that thus a man would see again the face of someone that he had known, who had walked proudly once in arms, or tilled the fields, or ridden in upon a holiday from the green vales in the hills.[1]

The residents of Gondor must constantly fight against a retreat into the memories of a brighter past. Nostalgia is a persistent danger for them- not because good memories are themselves evil, but because one cannot live in a memory. Nostalgia brings with it the twin dangers of regret and quietism, the first an attempt to control the past and the second a resistance of the future and the change it may bring. (This book demands its own eschatology, which I hope we will get to in time).

Sauron’s strategy of despair is startlingly successful: “soon there were few left in Minas Tirith who had the heart to stand up and defy the hosts of Mordor”. The bleakness of the day was due not simply to the scale of the destruction, but to the quavering of the hearts of the men who were to defend the city:

At length even the stout-hearted would fling themselves to the ground as the hidden menace passed over them, or they would stand letting their weapons fall from nerveless hands while into their minds a blackness came, and they thought no more of war but only of hiding and of crawling, and of death.[2]

It is clear that Gondor will not outlast the siege. But clearer still is how dreadful the defeat will be. It is a defeat of the hearts of once great men that trumps even the downfall of the city. For great men can be defeated and remain great. But this is not to be for Gondor.

What is it that makes the heart of a man great? For Tolkien one answer is clear. A great man is one who fights a losing battle with a quiet fortitude and a song in his heart. The song is one of better days, yes, but it is not nostalgia that is the fuel. It is the past and its beauty that emblazons the heart with courage to fight the long defeat. The good that we have known may embolden a man for acts of great courage, or it may sink him inside himself, resisting life itself if the past cannot be regained.

Denethor is the Steward of Gondor. He is Steward and not King—his responsibility is noted in this distinction. It is to protect and provide life for those in his care, not to hoard power or abdicate responsibility. Gandalf is called by an anxious Pippin, for Denethor is not acting as steward. It seems Denethor is set not only on ending Faramir’s life but his own as well.

Denethor’s son Faramir went to battle after the death of Boromir, his brother. He returns gravely wounded and feverish with the poison of a deadly arrow in his veins. His father, Denethor, now must face the death not of one but of both of his sons.

And Faramir is gravely wounded- death indeed is close at hand. Denethor cannot bear such a loss. He cannot live into the future without the promise of an heir while facing also the loss of his city.

Denethor has seen the promise of a long defeat and it has sent him into despair. He cannot submit to his task as steward. The only way he knows to fight is to take his own life and that of his son as well, for his fealty is to his own will.

Pippin- dear Pippin, the Hobbit with a song in his heart- runs to alert Gandalf of the tragedy at hand. The exchange between Gandalf and Denethor is chilling.

“Where is your son, Faramir?”, Gandalf asks.

Denethor cries “[Faramir] lies within, burning, already burning. They have set a fire in his flesh. But soon all shall be burned. The West has failed. It shall all go up in a great fire, and all shall be ended. Ash! Ash and smoke blown away on the wind.”[3]

The fire that threatens the city of Gondor is burning within Faramir; fire will consume both of them.

“Battle is vain!” Denethor replies, “Why should we not go to death side by side?”

“Authority is not given to you, Steward, to order the hour of your death!”… There is much that you can yet do.”

But Denethor cannot see the valor in defeat.

“I will not have life diminished… It is time for all to depart who would not be slaves”

This is Denethor’s choosing- to die at his own hand and not face the defeat of Gondor. Gandalf asks Denethor what he would choose, if he could choose to live. Denethor’s remark is heartbreaking:

“I would have things as they were in all the days of my life, and in the days of my longfathers before me: to be the Lord of this city in peace, and leave my chair to a son after me, who would be his own master and no wizard’s pupil. But if doom denies this to me, then I will have naught: neither life diminished, now love halved, nor honor abated.”

And who among us would not choose a day long past, that we might live there in peace? Denethor would rather die than have a future that is dimmer than his remembered past. It requires great courage to live in the present, knowing what has passed and knowing, too, what might be lost. Denethor is willing to sacrifice his son on the altar of his own nostalgia. He cannot submit to a future that he did not choose.

There is no tidy bow to tie up the dilemma that faces Denethor here. It would take not simply courage, but a willingness to live with sorrow for Denethor to fight for Gondor. He has lost so much already and has so much still yet to lose. The fact that what he has might be taken from him devastates him because it removes from him the only way he understands his honor. For Denethor, honor is his fealty to himself and to his ability to choose his own end. The decision to set himself aflame is a defiant rejection of the truth that his future is not in his own hands.

Denethor’s nostalgia for a time where he could choose an end he desired was what killed him- even if it was never true that his prosperous life was due to his own strength.

He was always but a steward. He was to guard the city and provide for the protection of his residents, but he did this on behalf of another. Remembering that the city was given to him at a moment in time, for a particular purpose, would require he remember his history and honor this commitment. But memory has played cruel tricks on Denethor. He can remember only what has been lost. Memory has become his master and not his servant.

What is the role that memory plays for Denethor? It tricks him into thinking that the best of his life is behind him, and that perhaps he was responsible for those good things he enjoyed. It tells him the only choice he has is to reject a future that is not as lovely as his remembered past. Memory for Denethor betrays hope and weakens courage. It betrays hope, because memory is the louder insistent voice that drowns out what might be with what has been. It weakens courage, which requires a fealty to goods beyond one’s own enjoyment.

To hope against the despair of nostalgia requires an imagination cultivated by something better than what has been. This is a tricky proposition, because it does not mean matching what might be with what has been. It does not mean imagining that you will love tomorrow’s life as much as you loved yesterdays, or that the institution of tomorrow was as strong as of yesteryear. We can quickly fall into delusion here when we try to borrow nostalgia’s memory to fuel today’s courage. For memory is faulty, often giving us only the good and not the hard. It is also not the case that tomorrow will always necessarily be as “good” or “enjoyable” or “prosperous” as yesterday. This is a faulty belief of the modern intellect that I attribute to our technological imaginary, which suggests to us that all things are improvable and scaleable. Biological life suggests otherwise- decay is universal, decline is possible, and extinction for some is inevitable.

How, then, are hope and nostalgia properly related? Or what would it require for Denethor to live to see the long defeat? Trapped in his imagination, Denethor cannot imagine a good greater than his featly to himself. He would need to accept that being a steward meant that he cannot always control the outcome of his labor. And he would need to do this while living between the times. He knows what has been lost, and what might yet be lost, but he would need to live in the middle, hoping amid the signs of doom.

What Gandalf and the Hobbits have is not only memory- of the Shire, which they sing of often in their songs- but fealty to their task. They must complete their mission, even if they perish. Their sense of duty is stronger than their increasing doom, and they are marked not by optimism or nostalgia but by a plodding quiet hope.

The Hobbits do entertain good memories. They recount their memories of the Shire. They do not deny their longings for a better day. But they also are not led to despair by what they have lost. Instead, their love for the Shire forges in them a quiet persistence that allows them to see what might be lost and yet not give up. Living in this space between what has been lost and what might still be lost without a fight is the character the Hobbits possess and that Denethor has lost. Failure is likely, perhaps even inevitable- unless the king shall come again. Such is the time between the times.

---

[1] 805.

[2] 805.

[3] 834.