(no subject)
I often find myself considering sexuality. It's got a lot to do with myself - as I grow older, I grow more and more familiar with it. But it's also got a lot to do with fandom, as a large portion of it is obsessed with sex. When asked to justify that obsession, the usual response is - "it's human nature, what else should we write about?" I've been known to give that response myself. But watching the Lord of the Rings movies and and re-reading the books has made me realize that there's a hell of a lot else to write about.
Tolkien wrote what is, in my opinion, the greatest story ever told. And he did it without recoursing once to sex. Over a thousand pages devoted to the story of the ring, a thousand more to the general story of Middle Earth, and there is not a single sex scene. Sexuality itself is virtually non-existent.
But there are oh so many wonderful love stories.
I don't refer just to Aragorn and Arwen, and Eowyn and Faramir, although I have great fondness for both pairings. But theirs are not the great, unforgettable love stories of Lord of the Rings. When we think of the tale, our minds don't linger on Eowyn and Faramir convalescing together, or Arwen sewing her banner. We think of Legolas and Gimli forging friendship out of hatred, we think of Aragorn weeping for Gandalf, and above all, we think of Frodo and Sam, clinging to eachother at the end of the world.
These are love stories, in the truest sense of the word, although sex probably never crossed Tolkien's mind as he wrote them.
What's brilliant about LotR is that it also has war and poetry and politics and the sorrowful passage of time and questions of good and evil, mercy and redemption. As well as love. But before I distract myself with praise of LotR, I want to draw some conclusions. Some things I learned about real life from Tolkien.
Sex is, in the end, not really all that important. What's important is love, and while sex can be an act of love, it is in the end irrelevant to it. I realized this when, after we watched the movie together, my sister turned to me and said, "I never saw before what a cute couple Merry and Pippin would make." I merely nodded (I had to rush to the bathroom - damn three hour movie!) but my first response would have been, "What do you mean, 'would make'? Of course they're a couple." And by that I don't mean, as I might once have meant, that the two were obviously shagging when Tolkien wasn't looking. I meant that they quite clearly mean more to eachother than anyone else ever could. They would die for eachother, they miss one another dearly when they are apart, they are a couple, in every meaningful sense of the word. Whether or not they're doing it is irrelevant.
This idea was driven home to me as I considered Sam and Frodo. Whereas one could actually canonically argue for Merry/Pippin, there really isn't a chance of a sexual relationship between Sam and Frodo. Sam marries Rosie. They have lots of babies. Case closed. But at the same time, Sam's love for Frodo is the most powerful love in the entire book. It quite literally saves the world. Who the hell cares whether or not they're having sex along the road to Mordor?
Let's return to sex as an act of love. An act of love, not love itself. When my mother cooks my father's favorite meal, that is an act of love. Just because my father can't cook worth a damn doesn't mean he loves my mother any less. When Sam has sex with Rosie, that is an act of love. Just because he doesn't sexually desire Frodo doesn't mean he loves him any less. There are many, many acts of love, but it is the love itself that is important.
We aren't raised to think this way. Marriage, and all its attendent cultural values, try to force upon us the idea that sex is something special, something inherently, inescapably meaningful. There's a moral forced upon us - if we have sex with someone, our relationship with them is therefore superior to any other. But that can be an utter lie. For instance, my parents sexually desire eachother, but they also love me and my sister, in a non-sexual way that is in no way inferior to their love for eachother. Our culture admits that parental love can be as powerful and meaningful as romantic-sexual love (two different things in my mind, but one and the same in the current culture). But it hesitates to concede the same for the great, consuming love of friend for friend.
I once saw homoeroticism in every page that Tolkien wrote. But now I no longer see a need to eroticize his work. Sure, I like sex as much as the next person. I like reading about it, I like writing it, and I plan to engage in a heck of a lot of it myself. Hopefully, it will be as an act of love, as well as just fun, casual sex. And by no means is there anything *wrong* with the picture of Merry and Pippin renting themselves a room in one of the shadier parts of Bree. Slashers - I have no answer when you ask "Why not?" But do you have an answer for "Why?"