To me…Tom represents those who are, by geography, completely unaffected and probably not too terribly aware of the great wars that consume the so-called ‘civilized’ nations.
What do Tahitians know of the Somme? What does an Afghani family know of Stalingrad?
Given that as a French possession Tahiti sent troops to fight in France in WW1 - in common with many other Pacific islands, including Niue and the Cook Islands - probably rather more than they wish to. There was a WW1 in the Pacific, and that one of the earliest actions of the entire war was the seizing of German Samoa by New Zealand forces.
Mostly what the Soviet invaders told them back during the terrible war the USSR fought in Afghanistan.
Per the book – by my understanding – the hobbits become aware that Tom is pretty well au fait with the great matters and conflicts in Middle-Earth (and also with the affairs of the Shire), past and present. His interest therein, though, is that of a detached observer: he chooses basically to stay within the bounds of his small and out-of-the-way realm, and essentially does not concern himself much with the wider world.
… and this is because he’s an all-powerful being older than the current world who could solve the plot with a hey and a ha and a hey-nonny-nonny or whatever magic he used. Tolkien desperately wanted him in the story, but he knew the plot couldn’t stand him, so he stays off in his out-of-the-way slice of paradise, blissfully unconcerned with a conflict he could step in to resolve at any moment.
If anything, it’s the exact opposite of what the OP said: Tom Bombadil is a First World country which is aware of but uninterested in the problems of the poorer regions of the world, and so can watch those conflicts play out from a position of utter safety and indifference.
Tom is the mystery that even the wise don’t know much about. Is he a stray Maia or some other order of spirit that was not spoken about or perhaps a Vala in disguise? Maybe even Eru himself?
I choose to think Tom is a nature spirit, a different order then the Maiar & Valar and not numbered among people of Middle-Earth, be they Elves, Humans, Dwarves, Ents or Hobbits. I feel Goldberry is also a nature spirit, in this case someone closer to a Naiad.
But then, what is Goldberry?
The thing is, other characters (a) talk smack about Tom Bombadil, and (b) readily admit that they’ve never met the guy and don’t know much about him.
But whenever we actually see Tom, he’s pretty much the most practical and interested guy this side of Superman: he shows up to save our heroes, and then tells them how to summon him if they need him again – which they do, at which point he of course shows up again to get the job done – and he asks them relevant questions when he’s not busy giving them useful equipment and magic weapons.
And so I figure it’s a Who-Are-You-Going-To-Believe-Me-Or-Your-Lying-Eyes thing.
Personally, I think that categorizing Bombadil is easy: He’s in the category of “beings who are Tom Bombadil”. As Goldberry replied when asked who Bombadil is, “He is.”.
Goldberry, however, does not appear to be unique in the same way, though her type of being is only sparsely represented in the final narrative. She appears to be what Tolkien called a fey, which is distinct from his notion of elves, and which show up a lot in earlier drafts: Basically, a nature spirit, like What Exit? describes. They’re as old as the World, but inherently part of it, not pre-existing it like the Ainur did. Other examples would probably include Ungoliant (the great spider of darkness that was dam to Shelob) and the spirit of Caradhas (the mountain which Gandalf suspected of sending the storm).
It might even be that Tom created Goldberry – maybe unconsciously.
“He is” is wonderfully blasphemous!
Tolkien (said he) hated allegories, but the truth is he used them just as frequently as other writers. (Saruman’s defeat by Gandalf used substantial Satanic imagery…and c’mon “Leaf by Niggle” is allegory in its rawest form.)
That said, I don’t think Tom is really an allegory of anything specific. He isn’t really a re-telling of the neutral angels in the war in heaven, for instance, although there is a minor resemblance. He isn’t a metaphor for an alcoholic parent, but again, there is a (very minor) resemblance.
Leaf by Niggle is his work of allegory. But you’ll need to explain and support “substantial Satanic imagery” statement for me to by it as allegory. I don’t see it.
But Bombadil is only isolated from conflict at the time of the War of the Ring (and even then, the nearby Shire was vulnerable). A couple of thousand years earlier, the Old Forest would have been in the thick of things as Arnor was under attack by the Witch-King of Angmar. The Old Forest isn’t protected by geography, but by the fact that Bombadil lives there.
It’s more like Switzerland, in that nobody thinks it’s worth messing with.
And in this sense Bombadil would have been like the US before it entered WW I and II. Unassailable but not concerned with the problems of the rest of the world.
I agree with what you said here, and even before reading it was tempted to quote Tolkien on allegory vs. applicability.
[QUOTE=J.R.R. Tolkien]
I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence. I much prefer history – true or feigned– with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of readers. I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but the one resides in the freedom of the reader, and the other in the purposed domination of the author.
[/QUOTE]
I think that speculations like the OP’s about what Tom Bombadil “represents” are fine if they’re talking about applicability, but much less defensible if they’re a claim that that’s the one thing that the author mean for Bombadil to represent.
Although I’m very fond of Tom Bombadil and Goldberry as characters; I can’t help being amused – for the sheer absurdity and mickey-taking of it – by the theories which some people spin (I think, only tongue-in-cheek) to the effect that the truth about Tom is that he is, not just reprehensibly detached and uninvolved, but seriously and actively EVIL.
There was a thread some eighteen months ago, on which a couple of these flights of fancy were aired, via links. Link to that thread – key posts therein, #17 and #31 – below (my attempt to do direct links to the pieces concerned, failed).
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=758006&highlight=Bombadil
In another recent thread on the Eagles I speculated on what might have happened if Bombadil hadn’t been immune to the Ring and taken it for himself. Would Bombadil as Dark Lord torment his enemies with endless choruses of “Hey-nonny-nonny”?
I recall a comment on another board, from a fervent Bombadil-hater; opining that he personally could imagine no more horrific prospect than Tom Bombadil as tyrannical ruler and overlord – what with compulsory non-stop capering-around and nonsensical jolly carrolling, for all the poor wretches under his sway. This guy considered that life under Sauron’s jackboot, would have been a walk in the park in comparison…
Tom Bombadil represents nothing. He was a cute character developed for a poem based upon a doll that one of his children had flushed down a toilet.
When Tolkien wrote The Hobbit, he didn’t consciously put it in “Middle-Earth”, meaning the world of his elf v Morgoth stories. But certain elements kept getting referenced: Elrond, Gondolin, The Necromancer (Sauron). They were easy go-tos for the story. And, yet, there were other things in The Hobbit we never really see again: giants in the Misty Mountains, for instance, or trolls that dress in clothes and talk in recognizable common-speak. The Eagles (about which we have recently had much discussion in another thread) fall into this category, really.
When Tolkien started writing The Lord of the Rings, he initially intended it as a sequel to The Hobbit, and wanted it to have the same sort of light-hearted whimsical nature. To that end, he inserted Tom Bombadil, who was at that point (1939) a relatively recent invention. The chapters which deal with Bombadil include much that comes from the poem “The Adventures of Tom Bombadil”, including Old Man Willow, the Withywindle, the Barrow-wight, and Goldberry. When the story ended up being much more than a children’s book, he didn’t take Bombadil out, which left a bit of an enigma. As Tolkien himself put it:
As for what he is, exactly, Tolkien was succinct:
So, he doesn’t really represent anything, except the idea of enjoying life for the sake of life. But he does act as a contrast to the entire rest of the story, almost as if to say, “Here, this is what would be ideal. If only we could be like this.”
He described Sauruman as having a beguiling voice, tempting each of the party with his sweet words, fitting his enticements to each. Then he showed personal pride. He seemed like a serpent, loosing its coils…
There’s more; it’s a wonderfully Mephistophelian scene, and I’m sure it was deliberately so.
Imagine a Morris dancer stamping on a human face - forever.