It's another aspect of the way that these stories explore Minas Tirith from the point of view of an ordinary person- not just one who does an ordinary job, but one of what must be the majority in Gondor- who Tolkien seems to have not been so interested in- who have no psychic abilities whatsoever. (Not that he didn't write characters who merely had ordinary good sense, it was just that I think most of them were hobbits.)
It is a bit odd when the supernatural does come into these stories- but of course, it has to, doesn't it?
Hee, I had that exact feeling with this story: "Hey, I think I remember this one!"
Well of course lots of people are of the opinion that your ordinary characters just aren't interesting. Granted, without main characters who have somewhat extraordinary lives, there's no drama, but still. That doesn't mean regular people don't have interesting stories!
Weirdly, I never think of it as "psychic abilities". When it didn't concern wizards ]or, to a point, elves], Tolkien kind of underplayed that type of thing - in LOTR proper, at least.
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It's another aspect of the way that these stories explore Minas Tirith from the point of view of an ordinary person- not just one who does an ordinary job, but one of what must be the majority in Gondor- who Tolkien seems to have not been so interested in- who have no psychic abilities whatsoever. (Not that he didn't write characters who merely had ordinary good sense, it was just that I think most of them were hobbits.)
It is a bit odd when the supernatural does come into these stories- but of course, it has to, doesn't it?
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Well of course lots of people are of the opinion that your ordinary characters just aren't interesting. Granted, without main characters who have somewhat extraordinary lives, there's no drama, but still. That doesn't mean regular people don't have interesting stories!
Weirdly, I never think of it as "psychic abilities". When it didn't concern wizards ]or, to a point, elves], Tolkien kind of underplayed that type of thing - in LOTR proper, at least.
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