Saturday, October 13, 2018
Not just any spider
So, I was just on some nerdy websites because that's what I do with my free time AND I read some interesting stuff about Shelob. I must have missed this when actually reading the books, shame on me. But anyway, she is the daughter of Ungoliant; who is apparently a weird spirit thingy that predates time like Tom Bombadil. Except she is evil and chooses to take the form of a spider. All of the large spiders in Middle Earth are descended from Ungoliant because she would mate with regular spiders and then eat her offspring. Wild
2 comments:
I also had no idea who or what Shelob came from. We did, very briefly (maybe 30 seconds) , discuss Ungoliant and why Tolkien may have picked her to be a woman. The jury is still out regarding why Tolkien decided to have one of the most vicious creatures in his mythology to be a woman. I personally believe that this is an unfair and biased question. Tolkien does represent gender roles for women in fairly traditional roles. For example, Goldberry and Galadriel being homemakers, healers, and incredibly fair and soft. Theres also the Arwen and her very feminine demeanor, and Eowyn, who is forced to remain behind and care for people instead of fighting in battles. However, it is important to note that Goldberry and Galadriel are very sacred creatures, with Galadriel being unbelievably powerful, feared by many men, and being one of the few to be able to deny the power of the One Ring. Arwen is also powerful and wise beyond her long years, and Eowyn does end up defeating the lead ringwraith.
With all of this in mind, I don't believe Tolkien portrayed women unfairly in his works, and would even argue that he gave women more power in his fantasy than they would have had in reality when he wrote the story.
I think it is interesting to see how Tolkien portrayed women throughout his works. I don't particularly have a problem with Ungoliant being a woman, because I agree that Tolkien does a good job of portraying women in other, virtuous positions. I also think it is important to understand the time period in which Tolkien was writing. During this time period, many of the evil characters in fairy stories were female. Consider all of the evil stepmothers and witches, I think it was easy in some ways to make Ungoliant a woman. It also reminded me greatly of Beowulf, in that Grendle is the first monster, but is preceded by his mother, who is the second monster to attack Beowulf.
I like having the extra information on her! It gives more insight into the mythology and the character. Thank you!
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