my friends…you bow to no one

I reread the scenes at Henneth Annûn a few days ago and have been rotating them in my brain ever since. first. i will say. Faramir and Frodo have undeniable chemistry. their dialogue consists entirely of not quite parallel lines intersecting and deflecting as they are naturally drawn into mutual sympathy and yet their interests are not fully aligned. lots of withholding of total transparency while still each being as truthful as they can within their respective lines of duty, while both fully recognising and respecting this tactic in the other. they just are extraordinarily well matched in conversation, in wisdom, subtlety, courtesy and circumspection, and clearly hold each other in very high regard. very sexy ngl.

setting the shipping goggles aside. i had totally forgotten that Faramir tells Frodo of the vision he'd had of Boromir floating down the Anduin in his funeral boat; Boromir's body had looked radiant, noble, "more beautiful than in life", indicating to Faramir that he had died well.

It's in the course of this conversation that Faramir discerns the shadow of Boromir's fall in Frodo's careful account of their parting - Frodo doesn't reveal the betrayal explicitly but Faramir basically pieces it together. He knows Isildur's Bane is some kind of powerful object, he knows the Fellowship was conveying it, he knows his brother would have wanted to use it and was capable of falling to this sort of temptation. Frodo doesn't deny it. Later - the scene with Gollum in the pool. Faramir asks Frodo why he shouldn't just shoot Gollum. Frodo says: have pity, he's afflicted with a hunger. Faramir himself takes this to mean hunger for Isildur's Bane. It's Frodo who then (somewhat coyly, I think) says - well, yes, but actually in this instance I'm talking about fish. But Faramir has already made the connection with the hunger that had afflicted and doomed his brother.

Tuor arrives Gondolin

What if Boromir could have lived if Aragorn had accepted his lineage by Parth Galen? He knew how to heal, yes, but knowing how to heal and being a healer feel like two different things in the lotr universe. Elrond, for example, is a healer, while Ioreth in Minas Tirith in the Houses of Healing simply knows how to heal. Aragon may have learned under Elrond's tutelage, but having spent so long denying his heritage, was he a healer at that point, or did he just know how?

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