So what is the REAL story? In the land of middle earth, power has traditionally be wielded by an elite aristocracy. The common people have no power and no voice in the setting of policies and determination of justice. But, there is a movement to depose the kings and lords, and create democratic social institutions. The leader of this movement is Sauron.

Sauron wields one potent weapon in this conflict -- the ring of truth. It confers not the power of command, but the power to persuade. The wearer of this ring speaks and the listeners believe -- but only if the wearer speaks the truth. If you wear the ring of truth, your words will have the ring of truth.

The ring of truth also reveals truths to the wearer, so that he or she can truly judge the words of others, and gain insights about causes and effects and so on. Useful tool for someone trying to develop a new form of government.

Clearly, Sauron is a thorn in the side of the elite rulers of middle earth, and they fight a great war to stop him. In this war Sauron is defeated, and his ring is taken away. Elrond says then that the ring should be destroyed. But Isildur, misunderstanding the nature of the ring, keeps it for his own use. Before he can learn his error, he attempts to use the ring, to disastrous effect. This event occurs when he and a part of his army are ambushed by a remnant of Sauron's forces. Isildur tries to talk his way out of trouble by donning the ring and explaining why Sauron's ideas are wrong and the people will be better off under the protection of the king. But the ring makes his real meaning true to his listeners, and they hear only his desire to preserve his priveledged status, and to continue to exploit the masses who work the land and etc. So they rise up in a mob and he flees. And as in Tolkein's version, he loses the ring while swimming across a river, and eventually flounders and drowns. So the ring is lost.

Years and years pass. The followers of Sauron keep their dreams alive and hope and plan for another chance to achieve justice and freedom. The great king's die out, and only a steward remains. In the north, the kingdom is lost and a kind of loose anarchy arises, in which free holders and back woods men can do more or less what they please. In the years immediately following the war, the propagandists of the kings demonize the rebel forces, casting them as hideous monsters, called orcs and goblins. But as the years past, these tales dim in the minds of the masses, until they are barely remembered and seem more a matter of fable than of true history.

About this time, Gandalf and the other wizards arrive. Gandalf plays the role of minstrel and apologist, wandering the land, perpetuating the tales of the glorious days of the kings of old, warning about the orcs and goblins, and keeping a wary eye out for any sign that republicanism is again rearing its head. That sets the stage for the story of Frodo.

This thread is for the discussion of the main outlines of a story and characters, consistent with the foregoing sketch, and which recount the main events from LOTR but viewed from the other side of the conflict. To get the ball rolling, and give an idea of what kinds of discussions might emerge, here is brief discussion of the gollum character.

Smeagol and Deagol are serfs, who on a rare day off from their toil in the fields of some minor noble, are out fishing. They find the ring, and Deagol puts it on. His head is at once filled with ideas of equality and liberty and what not, and he speaks of these things to Smeagol. Smeagol is of course completely convinced. So they return to town, and Deagol starts to talk about his ideas to some friends. A crowd gathers, and people are drawn to hear his words. But then, he sees that at the edge of the crowd, some of the kings soldiers have started to listen, and he suddenly realizes his danger. He is not strong enough for a direct confrontation with the forces of the nobility. The ring reveals to him his own future, and what he must do. He entrusts the ring to Smeagol, to keep it secret and safe, at all costs. Before long, Deagol is arrested, and carried off. All manner of slanderous tales are told about him. Smeagol finds himself an outcast. Some of his countrymen believe the lies, and think he is evil and shun him. Others, especially those who heard Deagol speak, know the truth, but are afraid to be associated with Deagol. But a few brave and strong willed folk shelter him, and hide him, and help him to escape the soldiers of the duke (or whatever). He at last escapes out of his country, and miserable and alone, climbs up into the mountains to dwell amoung the free people there. Eventually he becomes a hermit, but one who is respected and awed by the mountain dwellers, as we awaits the time to bring forth the ring of truth.

Long years pass. And then a company of Dwarves passes through on a quest of their own. In their company is a hobbit, Bilbo, who so resembles Smeagol that the mountain people arrange for the two to meet. Bilbo pretends to befriend Smeagol. But he is an adventurer and plunderer (dare I say thief) who takes advantage of Smeagol's hospitality. In the night, he rifles Smeagol's things and finding the ring, steals it for its value as a gold ornament. It is only much later that he realizes that this ring has mystical powers.

OK, that is enough for this installment. I invite you others to play along. Spin your own versions of the events and people familiar from LOTR. Who is Boromir? What is his motivation? What role do the dwarfs play? How will the black riders be recast? How about Grima wormtongue? Saruman? What will be the part played by the Palantiri? By Denethor and his sons. etc etc etc.

Somebody pass me a barf bag.

Okay, I'll try to be constructive. You probably shouldn't use a phrase anything like that, lest your readers toss your book into the bin. I would, if the author meant it seriously.

Does this ring prolong your life?

"Sauron" still sounds like a nasty name. Do you want to keep it? IMO, you should seriously consider changing some names. Because, you know, in reality, the winners who wrote the history would have changed names to make the bad guys sound bad.

Also, will this be a tragedy? The triumph of imperialism? Are Gollum and Smeagol the same person? Does Gollum/Smeagol still take the ring into the fire?

How do you explain the sudden turnaround in the war when the ring is destroyed? You might have to rework the entire chain of events.

Also, I have two observations:

1) You'll have to work very, very hard to convince the reader that this isn't just apologist propoganda. Lord of the Rings will be their starting point of reference, and they will believe that what it asserts is truth.

Second, PS raises questions about how the alternate history of middle earth will handle various things: does the ring confer long life, are Smeagol and Gollum one and the same, should Sauron’s name be changed, etc. I will not suggest answers to these questions. But these are exactly the sort of question that I hope people will discuss on this thread.

Fact is, I don’t have answers. I don’t have a well thought out coherent rewriting of Tolkein’s story. I don’t even necessarily plan to write such a story. I just think it is fun to play the what if game -- to conceive an alternate reality (well in this case actually an alternate fantasy), and then to try to develop the plot lines and characters consistent therewith.

If anyone else wants to play, feel free. Post your answers to PS’s questions, or raise and answer your own questions. If no one wants to play, that is fine too.

So if they a bore just ignore!

I bet aragorn was a rich little prince. His daddy bought him whatever he wanted: the latest pair of combat boots, The best sword from the best sword maker, the fastest horse in the kingdom. But Aragorn hated his parents. They just didnt love him! He wanted to be free of all the money and power of king and be like his servents in the stables who had cool names and were dirty.(all of which these stable boys made fun of him.)

So he changed his name to Strider and ran away from home. He lived in the woods but barely survived because he didnt listen to the number 1 ranger who his father hired to train Strider. This spoiled rich boy luckily was saved by a bunch of elves. They brought him back to health and then realized thier mistake. Aragorn would shout out "This food sucks! My mom's cooks are way better!" The elves were getting tired of him so they planed to get rid of him. But the old gipper elf said no and beat the crap out of strider. He then told him to man up and he trained him in the arts of Ranger. Begrudgingly at first aragorn went threw the motions. But the old gipper elf kept beating the crap out of him every time he did this. Finally strider had become a man. He left the elf village at the age of 17 going into the woods to seek his adventures.

Maybe Sauron is just a nickname Tolkein used, his real name is John Honesty. Maybe Frodo is the name assumed by Vinnie "Throatcutter" Malchick after he plea-bargained his way into a witness protection program. You could go on all day.

We could, actually, charge the genre and subgenre magazines of racism of a sort. The motorcycle enthusiast magazines must give equal time to ballerinas! The rappers to police! The children's outlets to pedophiles!

And how dare the USA fly its own flag. Pull it down since other cultures might be upset. (And no, we're not talking about in Iraq. This is regularly happening within our borders.)

The racist card is getting tiresome. And for all of the hype and meddling, the situation just gets worse. Let's acknowledge and savor the real-world cultural tapestry instead of trying to inflame it, and enjoy Tolkein's fascinating world and appreciate a story well told.

(I was going to add "Another soapbox. Ah, well. <sigh>" until I read the responses to Hart's article. Apparently this soapbox is a little crowded. )

Oops! Sorry, Survivor. I didn't see that you moved this to it's own topic until after I posted this. *Smacks forehead!*

As for the idea of 'getting it right', I agree completely. But what that means to me in this context is creating an alternate history that permits the original version of LOTR to retain its credibility. In the end, the two works have to be able to stand side by side, as equally plausible partisan tellings of a single underlying reality. So, the issue is not whether Sauron actually was mortal or Maia, but what story hangs together most coherently, most credibly, and with the greatest final congruence with LOTR.

Anyway, I think that you must cast Sauron, and by extension Morgoth/Melkior, as supernatural--literally superior in kind to nature. That would seem to imply--if they are truly defeated (which I suppose you could change) that their enemies are even more powerful, hence I would posit that you must choose between making Sauron an avatar of a somewhat transendental God (Morgoth) with all the other Valar/Ainur and Iluvatar as false (i.e. nonexistent) gods, or having the evil gods outnumber and outclass the good gods.

The latter choice puts you in a bit of a tricky position...unless you are going to have the Ring secretly survive being cast into Orodruin (perhaps Gollum got away, and Frodo was afraid to admit this?). Even in the former scenario, some of Sauron's opponents should be more than ordinary, if not actually equal to him.

There is another choice but I don't see how it can work...you can have the evil gods be real and powerful...but transcendent. Since the only really plausible argument that has ever been advanced for a genuinely powerful but transcendent god is the preservation of human free will...I don't know how it would work out to have your evil gods choosing transcendence. The same goes for Gandalf, of course. If he is evil, then he should play 'no holds barred' with any powers he has.

The tricky position referenced earlier...you might try to brazen it out. Have the evil gods win, finally and completely. In which case...there are additional philosophical problems with that, particularly when you introduce the concept of Truth as a good thing. In short form, if the bad gods really win, then they are--in fact--the good gods (at least by comparison with the former good gods, which aren't really gods in any meaningful sense after being completely defeated in a war they should have known they would lose). If Truth doesn't mean things as they really are, you are in a tricky but not entirely unique position.

My suggestion for the sake of simplicity is that you ought to cast the Valar and Iluvatar as completely made up gods, and Gandalf as a fakir with some powers but not as many as he claims. Saruman could still be about equivalent to Gandalf, or perhaps a bit weaker by his own choice (to allow greater freedom to his Uruk-Hai?).

I don't know. I think it all hinges on whether you think the ring should really be destroyed or just seem to be lost again (and of course by 'you' I meant you...duh!).

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Since the only really plausible argument that has ever been advanced for a genuinely powerful but transcendent god is the preservation of human free will...I don't know how it would work out to have your evil gods choosing transcendence

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