Skald’s recent thread got me thinking about this again: in the books, it is Faramir who has multiple dreams of a voice saying:
Boromir has the same dream, but only once. Boromir insists on being the one to journey to Imladris to seek answers. If he had stayed behind and Faramir had been the one to go to Elrond, how would the story have been altered?
I am not a Tolkien expert, so I may be wrong.
Basically, wouldn’t the fellowship have stayed together? I mean, Faramir seemed unaffected/tempted by the ring. If that had been the case, they would not have split up when they did. They may have split later for strategy reasons, but it would have been because they intended too.
The circumstance might have been a little different, but simply because Faramir was more cautious and didn’t want the Ring doesn’t mean that he was immune to temptation. Boromir no doubt could have grabbed it many times and didn’t; it was only after was coming closer to Morder and had months to work on him (and the rest of the Fellowship) that he started to succumb. Faramir was around it for only a fraction of that time.
Likewise, Faramir could easily have been killed just like Boromir. They were ambushed when already split up looking for Frodo, and one man would have been killed as easily as another in that case. Boromir was, if anything, an even greater warrior than Faramir - but he couldn’t fight off forty or fifty orcs at once.
The Fellowship may have stayed together longer, but that may have led to failure. Aragorn was torn about where to go from that point. If they had chosen to stay together and continued toward Gondor, it probably would have been disastrous in the long run. If they tried to head to Mordor as a larger group, it’s unlikely they would have been successful.
I think Frodo had already decided to take off on his own - the confrontation with Boromir gave him an extra push right at that moment, but the attack might have done the same thing.
Of course, the attack might have taken place at the water’s edge rather than in the woods and might have ended very differently, with more of the Fellowship killed & captured. The orcs drew off once they had Merry & Pippin but if they had seen all four hobbits they may have fought harder and longer to capture all three. Faramir was probably not as good a fighter as Boromir and they had backs to the water. Not a good strategic position.
Had he really decided to leave? What’s the book say to indicate that. I’m interested, not doubting you.
If the character of Faramir is treated consistently in the book, shouldn’t he easily avoid temptation? I mean, I though it was a bit of a plot inconsistency that he so easily brushes off the ring(so much so, the movie changed it). Ultimately, isn’t Faramir the “better person”, so to speak?
May Eru Ilúvatar have helped them if they had sent Denethor directly.
Despite what I wrote in the other thread, I don’t think Faramir would have been immune to the ring just because he had a different sort of ambition than Boromir, or even because he would have walked into the situation with more knowledge about it. If one can be unfair to a character in a story, then it’s unfair to think that Boromir was less noble than his brother, But the Ring had weeks to work on him, not just a few hours.
Also, I think the Ring worked on Boromir as much through his nobility as anything else. He was being quite honest when he said that he worried about the harm Frodo was suffering because of his burden. He genuinely wanted to spare Frodo pain, and he believed (just as Frodo did) that win or lose the quest was going to end with Frodo dying.That was the opening through which the Ring wormed its way in; I don’t see that Faramir would have done any better.
And, for that matter, I think Aragorn would eventually have fallen too. The Breaking of the Fellowship was a blessing in disguise.
yep Skald, Aragorn would have been lost to the temptation of the ring too. One of the most important reasons why he didn’t follow Frodo and Sam when the Fellowship was broken.
Faramir was only around the Ring briefly, as I wrote upthread. And as I should have added then, he had the advantage of having a legitimate, non-dishonorable reason to separate himself from Frodo, and of knowing what had happened to Boromir. (At least, I think book-Frodo tells him directly.) It’s the combination of less time and more information that saves him.
I agree with Skald. Boromir was noble in his intentions.
Or at least he thought he was.
The Ring was rather powerful when it came to bending wills.
Book-Frodo didn’t know what happened to Boromir - he was killed after Frodo had run away. Faramir had the half of his horn that washed up on the riverbank after the funeral (which he’d also had a dream about.) Frodo dodged the question of why he’d run away, but Faramir was bright enough to connect the dots, especially after Sam stuck his foot in his mouth.
Yes, at the end not even Frodo can resist claiming the ring. However, I think Faramir might be expected to resist it’s lure better than Aragorn. It’s contrary to his nature to desire it, while Aragorn is a king in waiting.
Take your facts back to Wales where they belong.