Help Me Remember This Scene In Return of the King (the book, not the movie)

[Your_Great_Darsh_Face]

“O hai Aragorn! You can marry my daughter, but first you have to kill Sauron and reunite the kingdoms of Arnor and Gondor. Here’s a broken sword. Good luck.”

[Chronos]

Where are those two quotes from, muldoonthief? I’ve been looking for them again for a while now.

[Lemur866]

They’re from the appendixes.

[muldoonthief]

It’s part of Appendix A of ROTK. “The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen.”

[Chronos]

Of course, the place so obvious that I never even thought to look there. That explains why I couldn’t find it in any of the more obscure sources. :smack:

[muldoonthief]

The funny part is that “officially” the story was written by Faramir’s grandson Barahir. So who told Barahir about it? Did King Aragorn keep pulling him aside and telling him all the crap he had to go through just to get Arwen in the sack?

[Jonathan_Chance]

“Shut up, brat. You’ve got it made with all this trim here in town. Lemme tell you what I had to do to score way back when…”

[Slow_Moving_Vehicle]

@Chronos

I’m sure I read once, somewhere, that when Elrond found out that Aragorn was wooing his daughter, he told him that he would not only not have his daughter, but no woman at all, until he wore the Crown and wielded the Scepter of both kingdoms.

Elves are really good at that whole “you’re not good enough for my daughter” thing.

This was written up in the Red Book of Westmarch as “The Tale of Aragorn and the Cock-Block of Doom”.

[Chronos]

Can you imagine if Barahir was asking Aragorn for romantic advice?
“How do I impress that girl I like?”
“Well, kid, it’s easy. First, you’ve got to become the greatest hero of the age. Then you’ve got to spend a few decades in the wilderness, hunting disgusting creatures. Make everyone think you’re dangerous and untrustworthy, to the point that everyone leaves your corner of the inn. Presto, by the time you’re 80, everything will work out just fine.”

[muldoonthief]

@Chronos

Can you imagine if Barahir was asking Aragorn for romantic advice?
“How do I impress that girl I like?”
“Well, kid, it’s easy. First, you’ve got to become the greatest hero of the age. Then you’ve got to spend a few decades in the wilderness, hunting disgusting creatures. Make everyone think you’re dangerous and untrustworthy, to the point that everyone leaves your corner of the inn. Presto, by the time you’re 80, everything will work out just fine.”

Better than the advice he got from his own grandpa - “Be the rebound guy.”

[kaylasdad99]

^^^ Thread win. ^^^

[Mtgman]

@Aspidistra

I believe there’s a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it reference to Aragorn and Arwen in the Lothlorien chapters. At one point Frodo is standing with Aragorn on a hill somewhere and he sees a kind of vision of a younger Aragorn courting a beautiful elf-maiden - clearly Arwen, but only if you already know the story for another reason.

Then Aragorn makes a speech ‘…this is the heart of Elvendom on earth. And here my heart rests also…’ and the passage ends with ‘and then he left that place, and never returned as a mortal man’

The blink-and-you’ll-miss-it bit also included Galadriel’s testing of Aragorn to see if he could withstand the lure of the ring. She looked at each member of the fellowship and each experienced her seemingly offering them their heart’s desire(because she knew the ring would do so as well). Boromir flinched away from her gaze, but Aragorn withstood it. Afterward he said something like “You have long known my heart’s desire, indeed you had it in your keeping for many years. I will not be turned from it by the lure of the ring.” It is only well after this that we learn it was Arwen he was referring to.

Enjoy,
Steven