# Feanor as Hamlet



## Turgon (May 5, 2002)

I'm curious as to how the members of this forum view the works of Tolkien from a literary perspective, do you think Tolkien holds his own in the Field of Great Writers or do you feel that he is a mere lightweight, telling a good tale?
Personally I think Tolkien was a great writer - some of his characters are as deep and complexed as any you would find in Shakespeare. Feanor for example...
The character of Feanor is in my opinion, one of the most important characters in all Tolkien's work. Actually I would say that Feanor is Tolkien's Hamlet... he shares the same complexities, must come to grips with similar problems - their's is the story of a murdered father and each has to deal with the issue of revenge - and at the end of it all, the decisions of both character bring tragedy on their own houses and destroy what they both hold dear, before finally destroying themselves. 
Of course the characters of Hamlet and Feanor are at opposite ends of the moral spectrum. Hamlet's problems come from his thinking too precisely upon the event - Feanor's through not thinking enough. Hamlet always retains his humanity, whereas Feanor has no qualms about doing what he must to accomlish his revenge - 'From now on let my thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth...' or 'Rightly to be great is not to stir without great arguement, but to find quarrel in a straw when honour's at the stake... How stand I then, that have a father killed...'. This could be Feanor himself speaking... I won't bore you all with a lot of quotes - anybody who is familiar with Hamlet will, perhaps, be able to see where I'm coming from with this - rightly or wrongly... just interested to know what you think.


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## Rangerdave (May 5, 2002)

Excellent topic Turgon!

I have always felt that Hamlet was a little uncertain as to the proper course of action, whereas Feanor is doubtless and quick tempered. I think a better analogy to Shakespeare would be to MacBeth, with some subtle shades of Lear.

RD


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## Turgon (May 5, 2002)

There are more difference between Hamlet and Feanor than there are similarities - Hamlet is a thinker and Feanor a man of action... But I chose Hamlet because to me Feanor is Tolkien's greatest (literary) character - like Hamlet is for Shakespeare - and, of course, because they do face a very similar problem (I could say that Claudius 'stealing' Hamlet's mother is very like Melkor stealing the Silmarils... but that's stretching the point a little... ) but I think that they are both very modern characters - eternal if you like; they seem to symbolise something ongoing inside the human psyche - The stuggle of greatness with the workaday world...


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## Lorien (May 6, 2002)

Very interesting topic Turgon. This thought has struck me before but I thought along Rangerdave's lines, Feanor was like Macbeth with Lear overtures, but Hamlet WAS one of Shakespeare's most complex characters. And whenever I read about Feanor's/Hamlet's problems I find myself comparing him to Lestat/Louis (from the Vampire Chronicles). In many ways, Louis who was considered a very humane vampire (in the terms that he usually thought before he acted) reminds me of Hamlet sometimes and Feanor definitely reminds me of Lestat, who tries to regain some of his humanity after losing it (for a while atleast).


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## Turgon (May 6, 2002)

Glad you find this topic interesting guys - What is more interesting is that the two of you both made a Macbeth/Lear connection... I'd be quite interested to hear your reasoning behind it.
I still hold to my Hamlet theory - too stubborn to give it up so easily... It's a more abstract connection to make - but it's the darker side of Hamlet's personality I'm thinking of when I make it. The 'Now could I drink hot blood and do such bitter business that the day would quake to look on' side. In many respects Hamlet and Feanor are negative images of one another - light and darkness, darkness and light...
Hehehe! Not done with my Shakespeare parallels yet - I've got Caliban and Gollum, Fangorn and Birnam Forest and my personal favourite - Bombur as Falstaff... just kidding... or am I?


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## chrysophalax (May 6, 2002)

Wonderful, Turgon!

I have always thought of Tolkien's works as Shakespeareanesque and it's great to someone bring it up at last! Love the Caliban/Gollum connection!


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## Lorien (May 7, 2002)

Hamlet and Feanor though both very complex characters don't match each other.Hamlet plotted and thought his 'revenge' but Feanor just leaped ahead without a second thought. Macbeth/Lear just seems to fit Feanor better. Macbeth or Lear alone can't compare to Feanor but combining their characteristics I think we get a character close to Tolkien's Feanor.


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## Turgon (May 7, 2002)

Okay, looks like I'm getting nowhere with the whole 'Feanor as Hamlet' thing. Damn - never got around to my Fingolfin as Laertes argumement. Mmm... maybe I should write a ten page essay which will prove my theory beyond any doubt. (hehehe - 'cause the more I think about it the more I'm convinced...) 
How about this from one of Tolkien's letters:


> 'Their part in the story (the Ents) is due, I think, to my bitter disappointment and disgust from schooldays with the shabby use made in Shakespeare of the coming of 'Great Birnam wood to high Dusinane hill': I longed to devise a setting in which the trees might really march to war.'


 Any thoughts?


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## Rangerdave (May 7, 2002)

Hey now that would be cool. You could probably even get that one published somewhere.

But one question remains.



Who is Ophelia?

RD


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## Turgon (May 15, 2002)

Just thought of this one (for my essay )... the feelings of Feanor regarding his Father's second marriage to Indis - are similar in many respects to Hamlet's feelings when his Mother marries Claudius - the marriage strikes a deep chord of discontent into both Feanor and Hamlet's hearts - in fact these feelings are at the root of each character's discontent with the world around them - funny how I never thought of it before - as I find it quite striking in view of all the other similarities I mentioned in previous my posts...


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## Confusticated (Apr 28, 2003)

1) Hamlet's father's death - death of Miriel

2) Hamlet's mother remarried - Finwe remarried

3) Learned of father's murder - Finwe's death and silmarili theft

2) In both cases there was a dishonor to the dead parent which lead to a loss of faith in general when both of these guys questioned the reasons for the remarriage. Feanor was jealous of his brothers and resented his father's marriage. I think this making Feanor a distrustful guy in general, which set him up to question the the Valar and eventually decide that he didn't need Valinor, and that folks might take his jewels.

3) Distrust of the Valar and fear of loss of silmarils shows to have been more warranted that previously might have been thought, and the means by which these were taken shows to have been worse than even Feanor himself might have feared, and likewise the marriage of Hamelet's mothers shows to have been an even worse thing than previously thought since he knows she was taken by his father's murder. In both cases there is now clearly a villian. The loss of Hamlet's father is now a much worse thing has he was clearly taken by malice rather than accidental death and so how this death becomes like that of Finwe.

As has been said, Hamlet did a lot more thinking here than did Feanor, but I think Feanor did all of his thinking earlier on, before the death of his father. I think Feanor was driven one point beyond that which Hamlet reached. Hamlet was close to going over the edge, and if we went there, we may well have seen him drinking that blood and doing ugly things in the night.

So the differences I have are the likening of Miriel's death rather than Finwe's to Hamlet's; saying that it was Hamlet learning of the murder that made it like Finwe's, and saying that Feanor and Hamlet did not go through the same thing and handle it in different ways but rather Feanor just reached a further point.


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## FoolOfATook (Apr 28, 2003)

The Caliban-Gollum comparison came to me the other day, as I read Robert Browning's poem _Caliban Upon Setebos_. And Shakespeare's characters are so universal, that I'd be surprised if we couldn't come up with comparisons between all of Tolkien's truly great characters and Shakespeare's. 

As I recall, Shippey had a wonderful chapter about the connections between Shakespeare and Tolkien in _The Road to Middle-earth_, I'd re-read it, but I have to borrow it from another state university, and it's a real hassle.


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## Sarah (Apr 28, 2003)

My english teacher would love you.

But what do you all think of the theory of Hamlet loving his mother a little too much?


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## FoolOfATook (Apr 28, 2003)

> But what do you all think of the theory of Hamlet loving his mother a little too much?



I think it was Lionel Barrymore, who was asked if Hamlet slept with Gertrude. He responded "Only in the Chicago cast."


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## Gil-Galad (Apr 30, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Turgon _
> *.
> Of course the characters of Hamlet and Feanor are at opposite ends of the moral spectrum. Hamlet's problems come from his thinking too precisely upon the event - Feanor's through not thinking enough.. *


I agree with you.The only thing I would change if I were you,is to say that Feanor do not come from not thinking enough,but from his impulsiveness.


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## 24framesasecond (May 8, 2003)

*Feanor and Hamlet*

Well, thinking about the time and what Shakespeare was (a Protestant) i would say that Hamlet's flaw shows when he believes a ghost. Yes, we think it to be his father just as he does. But in Shakes time, this was a big 'no-no'. To go even further, Hamlet uses his own honor and malice as a reason for beleiveing the ghost. Yes, i agree with him, and his Uncle's reactions at the play add for evidence, but then again we are talking about a young, fiery, scathed with indignation type guy here.
Also, as Foolofatook has pointed out to me on several occasions, Tolkien wasn't that impressed with Shakes like most people have been. He disagreed with Shakes portrayal of the 'wallking woods' in Macbeth, this being the reason for thinking, walking trees in the LOR and Sil mythos.
I've only read Feanor's history once though, and haven't even touched the LOR. So on that end, I can't say much. But maybe some of you guys and gals can bounce off of my own limited knowledge and dig deep on this.
Tolkien was a masterful theif and writer. I think that's why he identified so well with the ultimate thieves (in mind of The Hobbit).
Maybe i am completely wrong though.


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## jallan (May 9, 2003)

But Hamlet doesn’t believe the ghost.

That is the point of having the players present that play. Hamlet wants independant _natural_ evidence.

Fëanor is a very different person in any case, his flaw is partly that he is so superior in so many ways that he can’t conceive that he might be wrong.

He created the Silmarils, something which even the Valar, it seems, could not have done.

He amost single-handedly invented linguistics and what became the standard writing system of the Elves.

He created the _palantír’s_.

Fëanor had a cunning and piercing and passionate intelligence that achieved so much that he could not understand that he might be blind to some things, might be misled on occasion, that he could badly err.

(I wonder if Tolkien might have known some brilliant and proud scholar or other who got caught up in academic feuding.)


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## Elfarmari (May 27, 2003)

sorry, random comment: At the end of Hamlet, pretty much everyone is dead except Horatio. At the end of Feanor's story, Feanor, all his sons, and pretty much everyone else is dead too.  I've noticed that many books in our high school english curriculum end that way; maybe we should read the Silmarillion!


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