The Other Way 'Round - Page 3
© Michael Martinez
Eowyn is a complex character because she seems to require some justification. Tolkien received a letter from a reader in the 1960s who apparently objected to the speed with which Eowyn fell in love with Faramir. In reply, Tolkien said: "...In my experience feelings and decisions ripen very quickly (as measured by mere 'clock-time', which is actually not justly applicable) in periods of great stress, and especially under the expectation of imminent death. And I do not think that persons of high estate and breeding need all the petty fencing and approaches in matters of 'love'. This tale does not deal with a period of 'Courtly Love' and its pretences; but with a culture more primitive (sc. less corrupt) and nobler." (Letter 244)
Well. Tolkien might as well say the Rohirrim are not medieval. But wait. He did say that, in Letter 211: "...The Rohirrim were not 'mediaeval', in our sense." Yadda, yadda, yadda. That citation gets dragged out at the drop of a chain mail reference, and is used on both sides of the fence. But if the Rohirrim were not medieval "in our sense", what were they? Setting aside all comparisons to medieval sources for a moment (which are perfectly applicable in many cases), one can easily find other sources of inspiration Tolkien drew upon. And Eowyn is a perfect example of how Tolkien synthesized elements from both classical and medieval sources.
In fact, Eowyn owes far more to Greek mythology than to the virtually non-existent Anglo-Saxon literary tradition. She is certainly comparable in her rebellious state to some women from Middle English literature. Eowyn seems to challenge the social fabric of Rohan in her dialogue with Aragorn, in which she complains there is no place for women in the coming war. But Eowyn is acknowledged as a shield-maiden by the narrative (and thus, through implication, by her people), a term familiar to the historical Germanic world. And yet her swift passage to glory reflects a much older tradition, a classical one. Eowyn is not concerned with either piety or sexuality, two themes frequently associated with women in medieval English literature. Medieval writers unfortunately decided that women were somehow responsible for sin (even though the Bible claimed that Adam was the source of all our woes). Classical writers gave women more faults than that.
Quintus of Smyrna was a late Classical writer. He lived in the 4th century CE, more than 1,000 years after Homer and the other poets who created the Epic Cycle of Greece. Homer and his fellow Cyclic Poets composed their verses in commemoration of the Trojan War. To them, perhaps, the war was very real, and they were preserving traditions which had been handed down for generations. Homer's "Iliad" covers a period of only 50 days, but the whole ten-year war is supposed to have been recorded in the Cycle's epic poetry. The Cyclic Poets established a Poetic Renaissance in Greece, which had only recently emerged from a centuries-long dark age that had begun soon after Troy fell to its enemies. (Archaeology has revealed that Troy was sacked several times, but Homeric Troy was destroyed just prior to the onset of the Greek Dark Age, circa 1200 BCE.)
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