Perhaps I should have just posted this exercise in speculation on a Tolkien website, but the Doper LOTR fans are all such a witty and classy bunch.
So - how could it have gone had the good Professor killed off his main character?
(He sure was loathe to bump off any of our heroes wasn’t he?)
Could Sam have finished the quest? Most of the trek to Mount Doom is written from his point of view; in some ways Frodo is gone from the narrative. Would the Scouring or Grey Havens have as much/any meaning with Frodo dead?
Would killing off a main character have been a good idea from a purely literary, or Creative Writing class, point of view?
I’ll play.
Sam would have taken over carrying the ring, as before, but would have ultimately claimed it for his own for the following reasons:
- He would have killed Gollum at the first opportunity, so the final fight at the Crack of Doom would not happen.
- By going solo, he would have no steadying influence of his companion.
- He would not have had to struggle and fight the ring’s slowly increasing hold, and would have been overwhelmed quickly
Even having claimed the ring for his own, Sam wouldn’t have a snowball’s chance in Hell of prevailing against Sauron and the Nazgul.
The drafts show that JRRT was pretty much plotting as he went, so it’s hard to say that a dead Frodo scenario would gut the heart of JRRT’s overarching grand plan. But I’ll still say it–dead Frodo would gut the theme.
As someone on another messge board recently pointed out, the whole thing works because Frodo keeps trying even though he’s run out of resources, strength and hope. Psychologically, I think that at some point in the trek Frodo realized he couldn’t give up the ring–continuing his task took him closer and closer to his betrayal of everything he loved and himself too. (He had no assurance of any reprieve. Frodo was also, I think, rather relieved when he woke up in the Tower without the ring–if it was irretrievably lost, he would not have to face the final choice of taking or destroying the ring that he by then knew he would fail.) It is this obedience that allows what gets labeled as “grace” to resolve the crisis.
OTOH, I never liked Sam better than when he took the ring when he thought Frodo was dead. I think Gollum could live to the end because he knows Sam would kill him and would therefore stay out of range.
As we all know, Sam would kill him if he tries anything…
Something to keep in mind here would be that if had Shelob killed Frodo, would Sam have been able to recover the Ring, or would it have been lost in Cirith Ungol?
I think that the assumption is that events happened exactly as they did in the book except for the fact that when the Orcs find Frodo on the path it turns out that Sam’s assumption was right and Frodo was killed. So, Sam still stabs Shelob who runs back to her lair, Sam takes the ring, etc etc.
Well, that’s no fun. I’d rather see that last child of Ungoliant claim the ring for her own and trouble the unhappy world a little while longer.
It’s not at all clear to me that Sam couldn’t have completed the quest. I grant you, he would have killed Gollum, but he didn’t need the ring’s influence for that. In the books, when he did wear the ring, he had a vision,
So, there are two forces that enable him to resist the ring: his love of Frodo and his plain hobbit-sense. If Frodo were dead, he might be angered to revenge and so more susceptible to the ring; but his hobbit sense might prevail.
Frodo succumbs to the ring because he has been carrying it for a long time, he’s worn it several times, he’s defended it against Nazgul and Boromir, etc. Sam only needs to carry it from Shelob’s Lair to Mount Doom, I’m not sure that it would have that long to work on him. So, I’m not convinced that Sam wouldn’t be able to complete the quest.
I think Sam could have made it just like C K Dexter Haven outlined. But then the theme of pity is lost, because I don’t think Sam would hesitate to kill Gollum, and I think he could have.
How hard a model is that to follow though? It does not say to the reader do what you can and look to your own path and let others follow their own. The theme becomes Just Do It. If Sam killed Gollum, and destroyed the Ring, then the message is also one encouraging judging others and punish them if they are found wanting. Since these new themes go completely against the set up, I can’t imagine it adding to the book artistically. It certainly would not be my favorite.
I think whether or not Sam would succeed depends on how one imagines the rest of the scenario playing out after he decides to carry on the quest in Frodo’s place.
For example, we could have the final scene at the Crack of Doom just the same, but with Sam in Frodo’s place–succumbing to the Ring’s Power, fighting with Gollum, and having his finger bitten off before Gollum goes tumbling into the lava (although I suspect Sam would have pushed him in rather than waiting for him to conveniently fall by accident).
Or, if he runs into Gollum at some point earlier and kills him, the ending could be quite different.
That’s a good point. If the Ringbearer just pushes Gollum into the lava, the only way to end the story is with some sort of montage of events that doesn’t even include the encounter with Saruman on the homeward journey, much less the scouring of the Shire.
I think it’s possible that Sam would have completed the quest. While he didn’t have the pity (and empathy) for Gollum that Frodo had, I believe that Tolkien did show that Sam had some pity for Gollum. ROTK mentions that Sam’s words were harsher than his actions at some point; I think it was during the hobbits’ first encounter with Gollum, when Sam tied him up–but not very tightly. This pity, I feel, remained until the very end, where Sam chooses not to kill Gollum on Mt. Doom.
In Sam’s favor, he would not have carried the ring nearly as long as Frodo, and he was not as weakend physically as Frodo. So I believe that it is possible that Sam would have destroyed the ring. Possible, but not likely. Would Sam have felt as driven as Frodo to complete the quest? Probably not. Sam’s loyalty was to his master, not to the quest. I don’t think Sam, left alone, would have been sufficienty driven to complete the quest. The temptation to give up may have been too great. When Sam left Frodo–believing him to be dead–his one wish was to return to that spot and find his master again. Would Sam have pushed himself all the way to Mount Doom and somehow summoned the strength to destroy the Ring, or would he have given up and returned to Frodo’s side? I think the latter is the more likely possibility. I also don’t believe Frodo would have had a snowball’s chance in Mt. Doom of completing the quest without Sam. Of course, Professor Tolkien doubtless could have written it in such a way and I would have believed it, but I’m glad he didn’t.
Granted that Sam probably could have killed Gollum without the ring. And, in fact, if it weren’t for Frodo stopping him, probably would have. But if Sam had killed while in possession of the Ring, I think that would have finished him. With that opening, the Ring would have quickly conquered him.
And the knowledge that Sam would kill him would not have kept Gollum away. The Ring was all that Gollum was living for. He would have taken the Ring or died trying, and either would have been better than his ringless existance.
I think that whatever way Tolkien decided to go, he would have made it plausible. I remember when I first read LOTR when I was about 14, I really did believe for those few pages in “The Choices of Master Samwise” that Frodo was dead and Sam would carry on the quest alone. If Tolkien had done it that way, I would have bought it. For me, the whole point of the hobbits’ part of the story is that ordinary (“little”) people can do great things beyond anyone’s expectations, even their own, when called to by extreme circumstances; that applies to Sam, Merry and Pippin at least as much as to Frodo, if not moreso.
Would Sam have had the strength to go on alone? Well, that’s the fun of what-ifs. I can see it going any number of ways. I once wrote a story where Sam did succeed in completing the quest by himself; it was his hatred of the Ring for bringing about Frodo’s death that gave him the determination to carry it all the way to Mt. Doom and destroy it (also, he could withstand the temptations it offered because it couldn’t give him the one thing he wanted most–Frodo alive again). On the other hand, I can see him falling into despair and failing. Or, I can see him succumbing to the temptation and using the Ring… and wouldn’t Mordor look just lovely filled with flowers? 
I was mildly skeptical that Frodo would actually be dead during those few pages…but they were a great few pages. Samwise, always the loyal sidekick, no hero at all, suddenly must shoulder the burden. It’s a chance for him to grow out of all the limitations he’s placed on himself. I believed he could do it – Hobbits, being supremely unambitious, are naturally resistant to the ring. I really liked the feeling of “Oh, crap, this wasn’t supposed to happen!”
I was a little disappointed when it turned out Frodo was alive.