Gollum

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Gollum

Gollum is a fictional character from J. R. R. Tolkien's universe of Middle-earth. Originally known as Sméagol, he was later named Gollum after the disgusting gurgling noise he made in his throat. He is estimated to have been born in the year 2430 of the Third Age. He died on March 25, 3019. His life was extended far beyond its natural limits by the effects of possessing the One Ring. At the time of his death, Gollum was about 589 years old, a remarkable age for a creature who was once a Hobbit, but had been deformed and twisted in both body and mind by the corruption of the Ring. His one desire was to possess the Ring which had enslaved him, and he pursued it for seventy-six years after he lost it.

Also see: Timeline of Arda.

Story

Once a Stoorish Hobbit, Sméagol spent the early years of his life with his extended family under a matriarch, his grandmother. In 2463 T.A., Sméagol became the fourth Bearer of the One Ring, after Sauron, Isildur, and Déagol. Déagol was his relative, and on Sméagol's 33rd birthday they went fishing in the Gladden Fields north of Lothlórien. It was there that Déagol found a gold ring, after being pulled into the water by a large fish. Sméagol demanded the ring as a birthday present and strangled Deágol when he refused. Sméagol was quickly corrupted by the Ring and, banished by his people, was forced to find a home in a cave in the Misty Mountains. The Ring's malignant influence twisted his Hobbit body and mind and prolonged his life far beyond its natural limits. He called it his "precious" or his "birthday present," the latter as a justification for killing Déagol, a crime that haunted Gollum for the rest of his life.

He lived in the Misty Mountains for over four hundred years, living on raw fish, which he caught from his small boat, and juvenile Orcs who strayed too far. In later years he found Elven food repulsive. The power of the Ring mutated and de-evolved him over the many years spent in the cave, slowly transforming him into a wraith. His eyes adapted to the dark; Tolkien describes them as lamp-like, shining with a sickly pale light, yellow when calm, green when agitated. During his centuries under the Ring's influence, he developed a sort of split personality: Sméagol, his "good" personality, still vaguely remembered things like friendship and love, while Gollum, his "bad" personality, was a slave to the Ring and would kill anyone who tried to take it. Years later, Samwise Gamgee would name the good personality "Slinker" (for his fawning, eager-to-please demeanour), and the bad personality "Stinker" (for obvious reasons.) The two personalities often quarrelled when Gollum talked to himself (as Tolkien put it, "through never having anyone else to speak to") and had a love/hate relationship, mirroring Gollum's love and hatred for the Ring and for himself.

The Hobbit

In July, 2941 T.A, during the Quest of Erebor, the Hobbit Bilbo Baggins stumbled upon the subterranean lake on which Gollum lived and found the Ring. Gollum had lost the Ring in the network of caves leading to the lake, although in fact it is more appropriate to say that the Ring abandoned him, for it was known to have a will of its own; as Gandalf says later, it looks after itself, trying to get back to Sauron. After the famous Riddle Game, during which Gollum was unaware of his loss, he refused to show Bilbo the promised way out and plotted to murder him. When he went to get his "birthday present," however, he found that it was gone. He suddenly realised the answer to Bilbo's last riddle — "What have I got in my pocket?" — and flew into a rage. Bilbo inadvertently stumbled across the Ring's power of invisibility as he ran, allowing him to follow Gollum to the entrance of the cave. There, Bilbo at first thought to kill Gollum, but was overcome with pity, so he jumped over him to escape. As Bilbo ran, Gollum cried out, "Thief! Thief, Baggins! We hates it, we hates it, we hates it forever!" In the first edition of The Hobbit, Gollum did not appear quite as wretched or as bound to the Ring. Tolkien revised this characterisation to fit the concept of the Ruling Ring developed during the writing of The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien then explained the version given in the first edition as a lie that Bilbo made up to tell the Dwarves and Gandalf.

The Lord of the Rings

Gollum left the Mountains and pursued Bilbo a few years later, but the trail was cold. He made his way into Mordor, where he met the monstrous spider Shelob and became her spy, worshipping her and bringing her food. He was eventually captured by Sauron's forces and forced to reveal what he knew about the Ring; the information he provided alerted the Dark Lord of Mordor to the existence of Hobbits, the Shire, and the Baggins family. Gollum was then freed, but caught by Aragorn, who, along with Gandalf, interrogated him about the Ring and placed him in the care of the Silvan Elves living in Thranduil's kingdom in Mirkwood. He then escaped into Moria.

In The Lord of the Rings, Gollum met and started following the Fellowship of the Ring in Moria, and was spotted and heard by Frodo Baggins (cousin and heir of the hated Bilbo) on several occasions. On January 15, 3019 T.A., the Fellowship was divided when Gandalf disappeared while fighting a Balrog. Gollum continued trailing the remaining members. It is unknown how he crossed the Bridge of Khazad-dûm, but he came with them to Lórien without their knowing. Gollum followed their boats down Anduin (floating on a log) to Rauros, and pursued Frodo and Sam across the Emyn Muil when they struck out on their own towards Mordor. Gollum followed them, but after a confrontation in which he bit and nearly strangled Sam, Frodo subdued him. Frodo tied an Elvish rope around Gollum's ankle for a leash, but the mere touch of the rope pained him. Taking pity on the wretched creature, Frodo made Gollum swear to help them. Agreeing to the oath, Gollum swore by the "precious" itself, and Frodo released him. The unlikely company, guided by Gollum, made their way to the Black Gate, the entrance to Mordor.

Frodo's kindness brought out the "Sméagol" personality, and he made at least some effort to keep his promise. The two formed a strange sort of bond from both having been Ringbearers; in Gollum, Frodo saw his possible future, and wanted to save him so he could save himself.

When they reached the Black Gate and found it to be well-guarded, Gollum told them not to go that way, convincing them that they would be caught. Gollum said he would lead them south, where he knew of another entrance into Mordor.

Frodo and Sam were apprehended by Faramir, and Gollum followed them. When Frodo allowed Faramir to briefly take Gollum prisoner, however, Gollum felt betrayed, allowing his bad personality to take control. Faramir found out that the place Gollum was taking them was called Cirith Ungol, and warned Frodo and Sam of the evil of that place, as well as the treachery he sensed in Gollum.

Frodo, Sam, and Gollum left Faramir and began crossing the pass of Cirith Ungol in the border-mountains of the Ephel Duath. Gollum visited Shelob, planning to betray the Hobbits to her and then get the Ring for himself. When he returned the Hobbits were asleep, and the sight of Frodo sleeping nearly moved Gollum to repent. However, Sam woke up and spoke harshly to him, and all hope of redemption was lost. Gollum followed through with his plan and led Frodo and Sam into Shelob's lair.

Just as Frodo warned him, Gollum's betrayal of his oath ultimately led to his undoing, for Frodo and Sam escaped from Shelob's lair and came against all odds to the volcano Orodruin, or Mount Doom. Gollum followed them all the way, seeking a chance to surprise them and take the Ring. When Frodo and Sam had almost reached their destination, he attacked, but failed to get the Ring. Sam, who had hated Gollum on sight, tried to bring himself to kill him, but relented out of pity and sheer disgust, turning his back on the beaten (but still wily) creature.

Moments later, Frodo was standing on the edge of the Crack of Doom, but, unwilling to destroy the Ring, claimed it for himself and put it on. Then Gollum attacked again. The two fought while Frodo was invisible and finally Gollum bit off Frodo's finger and seized the Ring.

It was then that fate played its part, and Bilbo and Frodo's kindness in sparing Gollum's life was rewarded; After seizing the Ring, Gollum teetered on the edge of the great pit, lost his balance and fell in, taking the Ring and finger with him with a last cry of "Preciouss!" Thus, the Ring was destroyed and Sauron was utterly defeated. Had Gollum not lived to play this final part, there would have been a good chance that Sauron would have regained the Ring, as he knew where Frodo was as soon as he put the Ring on. And for his part, Gollum got at least the chance to die in ecstatic happiness, having regained his "precious".

Appearance

Tolkien usually describes Gollum as dark, but also bone-white or sallow (pale yellow), pale or white being more biologically correct for a cave creature. These inconsistencies may just be continuity errors, or they may be due to the settings of the scenes. He was also very thin and mostly bald, and only had six teeth ("Teeth! teeth! my preciousss; but we has only six!" — The Hobbit, "The Hobbit#Chapter V: Riddles in the Dark") Being a degraded Hobbit himself, he was probably of typical Hobbit-height.

Portrayal in adaptations

Film

In Ralph Bakshi's animated film of The Lord of the Rings (1978) the voice of Gollum was supplied by Peter Woodthorpe.

In the Rankin/Bass animated versions of The Hobbit (1977) and The Return of the King (1980), Gollum is voiced by comedian "Brother" Theodore Gottleib.

In the Peter Jackson film trilogy, Gollum is a CGI creature voiced by actor Andy Serkis, who also provided the voices of some of the Nazgûl and Orcs. Barely glimpsed in The Fellowship of the Ring (film) (2001), he becomes a central character in The Two Towers (film) (2002) and The Return of the King (film) (2003). The groundbreaking CGI character was built around Serkis' voice and acting choices. Using a sophisticated digital puppet created by Jason Schleifer and Bay Raitt at Weta Digital, animators created Gollum's performance using a mixture of motion capture data recorded from Serkis and a process called keyframing. The laborious process of digitally "painting out" Serkis' image and replacing it with the digital Gollum's required large numbers of digital artists. Including all the lighting, composition and rendering, each frame of Gollum's performance took four hours to compute. A minor controversy arose when Serkis was judged ineligible to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Serkis' supporters claimed that since he performed both the voice and the presence of the character through motion capture, he should be eligible of a nomination. They compared Serkis' work behind the "mask" of CGI to John Hurt's Oscar-nominated performance under heavy makeup in The Elephant Man. The last two films, especially The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, emphasize the friction between Sméagol and Gollum; the screenwriters give them new, markedly different lines in a scene based on a conversation the two personalities have in the original The Two Towers.

In The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Serkis himself appears in a flashback scene as Sméagol before his degeneration into Gollum. This scene was originally earmarked for The Two Towers, but was held back because it was felt that audiences would relate better to the original Sméagol once they were more familiar with who he became. The decision to include this scene meant that Raitt and Jamie Beswarick had to redesign Gollum's face for the second and third movies so that it would more closely resemble Serkis'. (The brief glimpses in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring are of an earlier model of Gollum.)

These adaptations have varied in how they depicted Gollum visually. In Bakshi's film, Gollum is dark, bald and gangrel. The Jackson films depicted Gollum as quite similar, though pale. In contrast, in the Rankin/Bass adaptations, he is a pale green, frog-like creature with huge, pupil-less eyes.

Stage

In Canada, Gollum was portrayed by Michael Therriault in the 3-hour Toronto production of The Lord of the Rings, which opened in 2006.

In the United States, Gollum was portrayed by Aretta Baumgartner in the Cincinnati productions of The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), The Two Towers (2002), and The Return of the King (2003) for Clear Stage Cincinnati. Baumgartner received a 2002 Cincinnati Entertainment Award for her portrayal of Gollum in The Two Towers. At Chicago's Lifeline Theatre, Gollum was played by Phil Timberlake in The Two Towers (1999) and Robert Kauzlaric in The Return of the King (2001).

Radio

In BBC's 1981 radio serial, Peter Woodthorpe reprised his role as Gollum.

Games

In Sierra Entertainment's War of the Ring, a real-time strategy game based solely on the book, Gollum is a playable hero unit for the Minions of Sauron. He also appears in Electronic Arts' Tolkien games based on the Jackson films. In the real-time strategy game The Battle for Middle-earth, Gollum is a playable hero unit for Mordor. In its sequel, The Battle for Middle-earth II he is not playable. Instead, he walks around the map cloaked, carrying the One Ring. When killed, he drops the Ring for a player to claim. When the Ring is returned to the player's fortress, they may summon a special "Ring Hero" - Galadriel for good factions and Sauron for evil. He also appears in the action game based on The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, accompanying Frodo and the player as the game progresses, but becomes a boss at Mount Doom, whom the player must throw into the Crack of Doom.

Pronunciation

In the 1981 BBC radio adaptation, Ralph Bakshi's 1978 animated film and in the Peter Jackson movies, Sméagol is pronounced as /'smiː.gɒl/, although the placement of the acute accent suggests that the correct pronunciation is /'smeɪ.ʊg.ɒl/. On the other hand, in Tolkien's recordings of The Lord of the Rings he also pronounced it /'smiː.gɒl/ or /smiː.ægɒl/, suggesting that éa should either be pronounced as /iː/ or as a diphthong /ɪæ/, and not as two distinct vowels /i/ and /æ/. Tolkien had a habit in his writing to put diacritics in varying places, as can also be seen in the name Eärendil, which also occurs spelt Ëarendil. It should also be noted that "Sméagol" bears strong resemblance to Old English smēaġan, a verb meaning "to ponder". If this was Tolkien's intention, then the acute may have been meant to substitute for the macron. In any case, when trying to pronounce Sméagol, it should be kept in mind that the pronunciation rules given in the Appendices for The Lord of the Rings are for the Elvish languages, and not for (old) English representing Westron and related languages.

Sméagol's "real" Westron name was Trahald, of the meaning "burrowing, worming in" or "apt to creep into a hole". In both Westron and Old English, Sméagol's name is related to Smaug's: Smaug's name in "true Dalish" was Trâgu, and the Trah- stem in Trahald and Trâgu is thus a cognate of the Germanic stem present in both Sméagol and Smaug (with a meaning of squeezing through a hole.)

Trivia

It is said in The Hobbit that other beings took to calling him Gollum on account of the horrible retching sound he made as he swallowed.

As stated above, in the books Gollum only had six teeth. In Peter Jackson's film adaptation, Gollum has eight teeth.

In the Peter Jackson films, the pupils of Gollum's eyes change size as he switches personalities, instead of his eyes changing color as in the books.

In the South Park episode Conjoined Fetus Lady, a nurse with a facial deformity, "Nurse Gollum," is presumably named after the character.

NBA player Sam Cassell was nicknamed Gollum by Charles Barkley.

The flashback in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King was originally shot to be in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.

Gollum's eyelashes actually disappear in the movie when it goes from Serkis' prosthetics to the digital Gollum.

Andy Serkis and Gollum appeared on the 2003 MTV Movie Awards, when Gollum won "Best Virtual Performance" and went on to deliver an abuse-laden acceptance speech. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0orO6fPi-w&search=gollum%20mtv%20awards (both links contain strong language)

External links

Notes

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