[zeplin]

a couple of people have already answered it in, i think, the best way possible given what i can spot from the book...
arwen, has given up her place (to frodo) within the group that is planned to leave middle earth right after the battle/chase/flood scene with the ring wraiths in the fellowship. she does this to save frodos life. whether she does this through some elven power, or through a simple word of bond, i'm not entirly sure??

shortly after, she gives up her immortality or "elf being" to a certain extent (something i'm also not entirly clear about) upon choosing to live her life with a human (or somewhat human/elf=dunedain).

these are the reasons i can best come up with as to why she does not depart when gimli and legolas do. there's only so much from what is said in the book. i'm probably wrong though. i love the LOTR trilogy (both book and movie), but i don't love them THAT much

 

[BoyElroy]

But if Legolas stayed for those 100+ years until until Aragorn died, why couldn't Arwen do the same thing and go with the damn elf and dwarf at the end? Why did she "give up" her immortality when it wasn't necessary? What a dopey thing to do!!!

Also, with regard to Frodo, the book says that she gave up her place on the ship to the hairy one, but not necessarily her place in the land of happy eleves. Again, if Legolas could stay and hang out until Aragorn died, why couldn't Arwen have cut the same deal?

 

[taylor]

Arwen didn't give up her immortality when Aragorn died, she had to give it up in order to marry him.

By the way, did anyone else notice that Arwen is Aragorns great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-aunt? Yep, Elronds brother was the first king of Numeror and Aragorn is the heir of the Numerorian kings.

 

[zeplin]

boyelroy,
what you're asking does raise concern, and perhaps there just isn't enough info in the books, but i would say Arwen and Legolas are from two very different relms of elves who probably have different ways and codes of living. to the best of my knowledge, Legolas never gave up anything, plus he was part of the fellowship meaning that in certain instances, the rules were bent for those in the fellowhip.

but i dunno???
sometimes, fantacy stories don't make sense and have certain plot holes just for the sake of maintaining a storyline.

to those that know everything there is to know about LOTR, please chime in!

 

[Ticky]

Quote:

Originally posted by taylor Arwen didn't give up her immortality when Aragorn died, she had to give it up in order to marry him. By the way, did anyone else notice that Arwen is Aragorns great-great- [***] aunt? Yep, Elronds brother was the first king of Numeror and Aragorn is the heir of the Numerorian kings.

I guess if the blood relation is a "few" thousand years removed, its a okay. Pretty fly for a great-plus-plus-aunt.

Who knows why Arwen didn't leave. Perhaps she didn't want to abandon the mortal lands where her children and grandchildren lived.

 

[vtny]

Ok, I know I am an ubergeek so no laughing. The story of Aragorn and Arawen is a parallel of the story of Beren and Luthien from the Silmarillion.

Beren is the human that recaptures one of the Silmarils from Morgoth (the ultimate evil and Sauron's master). Luthien is his wife and a elvish princess. She brings Beren back from the dead with a song and helps him to ultimately escape the hands of Morgoth. When Beren finnaly dies she pleads with the Valar and is given the choice to return to Valinor or to continue "Beyond the Circles of the World" with her husband, she choses the later. This is a place that even the Valar do not understand and cannot travel to since it was created for humans by the Creator. Arawen's love for Aragorn is so great that she is also given this choice so that she may avoid a deathless life without her love. It's all kinda romantic in a tragic way

.

So to answer the question. No Legolas and Gimil did not leave Arawen behind. She actually travels to a place that neither one of them are allowed to go.

vtny,
Ok so I really am a Tolkin Geek.

 

[Ticky]

Quote:

Originally posted by vtny Ok, I know I am an ubergeek so no laughing.

Blah, worry not. In a century or so, LOTR would probably achieve the status equivalent to the great English classics - i.e., those boring ones that we were forced to read in highschool. By that point, Tolkien die hard fans will stopped being "geeks" and will be called "literature scholars" instead.

 

[taylor]

Quote:

Originally posted by zeplin boyelroy, what you're asking does raise concern, and perhaps there just isn't enough info in the books, but i would say Arwen and Legolas are from two very different relms of elves who probably have different ways and codes of living. to the best of my knowledge, Legolas never gave up anything, plus he was part of the fellowship meaning that in certain instances, the rules were bent for those in the fellowhip.

yes, Legolas was one of the Wood-Elves of Mirkwood. Back before the First Age when the Elves travelled from Middle-Earth to Valinor, some elves stayed behind, later becoming the wood elves. In LOTR, it is told that Legolas was a wood elf. In The Hobbit, it is said of the wood elves that "they did not go to Faerie in the West" which I assume to mean Valinor. See, you didn't even need to open The Silmarillion.

Arwen was one of the Noldor, who left Valinor to travel to Middle Earth.

 

[00940]

Vtny : you're not a ubergeek ... otherwise I'd be one too.

Boyelroy : one of the most significant sentence of the appendix about this is (rough translation from the french, I don't have the appendix in English, only the main text) : "after the death of Aragorn, the light disappearad of the eyes of Arwen".

This is not romantism, it's tragedy. The LOTR, as well as the Silmarillion, has for dynamic the different fates of the Elves and humans (and dwarfs). Arwen as an elve loves Aragorn in such a way that her life on earth doesn't mean anything anymore. She sacrified eternity for a life at the side of Aragorn, why would she want to stay in Middle Earth once he's gone ? Even worse would be the stay in Valinor, a place of joy and peace. Do you imagine her slowly consummed by affliction till death among the eternal beauty of the country of the West ?

 

[dSquared]

Quote:

Originally posted by BoyElroy But if Legolas stayed for those 100+ years until until Aragorn died, why couldn't Arwen do the same thing and go with the damn elf and dwarf at the end? Why did she "give up" her immortality when it wasn't necessary? What a dopey thing to do!!! Also, with regard to Frodo, the book says that she gave up her place on the ship to the hairy one, but not necessarily her place in the land of happy eleves. Again, if Legolas could stay and hang out until Aragorn died, why couldn't Arwen have cut the same deal?

Setting aside the bit where Arwen had a deadline (she had to choose before her father left), if she had decided to stay immortal and go to the West when Aragorn died, then she would have been separated from Aragorn forever *including* the afterlife (after "the breaking of this world"), which is why they make such a fuss about the choice to be human. She's not only choosing to be with Aragorn during their mortal lives, but also to go to the same "heaven" (for lack of the LOTR term) as Aragorn does.

 

[BoyElroy]

Thanks guys, I think you've cleared up a few things for me. Alas, I would've still kept my options open, if I were her. Talk about bad risk management....

 

[daycart1]

We've driften a little away from the main "theological" point here.

Elves and humans are both "immortal" in Tolkien's world, but as was pointed out, Elves are tied to "this world" while humans go "out of the world".

All those descended from Earendil (Elrond, his brother Elros and their descendents) are genetically half Elf/half Human and must "choose" their eternal fate. Elrond chose the elven fate and Elros the human.

Arwen choses the human fate to be with Aragorn eternally. Tolkien makes it pretty clear that neither fate is "better" than the other (though it is hinted that humans are better off because their afterlife is with Iluvatar = God).

I think it was mostly poetry on Arwen's part to "give Frodo her place" over the sea. Sam and probably even Gimli got places as well simply by "decree" of the powers.

I'm drawing on both the -Silmarillion- and the appendix for this info.