This is a question I’ve had ever since I read LOTR way back in high school.
Why don’t Galadriel and Celeborn get to go over the sea together when they leave Middle Earth, even though they’re both elves? Why are they separated?
I’m sure the answer’s right out there being obvious, but I recently reread the trilogy, and I still couldn’t figure it out. And I checked in a few LOTR guides, and I still couldn’t figure it out. But I’m betting someone here can just answer off the top of their head. Thanks.
Off the top of my head or not, there’s no good answer. Galadriel sails with the other ring-bearers, and Tolkien doesn’t really say what happens to Celeborn. It’s assumed that he sailed, eventually.
(I think that their marriage was pretty well shot by the end of the Second Age–he had issues with the fact that she had seen the light of the Two Trees and he hadn’t, and never let him forget it-- and they stayed together for the sake of the children.)
I’ve always wondered about this myself. At the end of ROK, when Aragorn takes leave of Celeborn and Galadriel, Celeborn says, “Kinsman, farewell! May your doom be other than mine, and your treasure remain with you to the end!”
The clear implication here is that Galadriel is going back to the West but the Celeborn is staying in middle earth forever. There must be some bit of the backstory here that we don’t know. Why wouldn’t Celeborn eventually sail West and get back with Galadriel? Did her parents not approve of her marrying a boy from the wrong side of the ocean or something?