The Scouring of the Shire

rdf:langString The Scouring of the Shire

rdf:langString "The Scouring of the Shire" is the penultimate chapter of J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy The Lord of the Rings. The Fellowship hobbits, Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin, return home to the Shire to find that it is under the brutal control of ruffians and their leader "Sharkey", revealed to be the Wizard Saruman. The ruffians have despoiled the Shire, cutting down trees and destroying old houses, as well as replacing the old mill with a larger one full of machinery which pollutes the air and the water. The hobbits rouse the Shire to rebellion, lead their fellow-hobbits to victory in the Battle of Bywater, and end Saruman's rule. Critics have considered "The Scouring of the Shire" the most important chapter in The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien denied that the chapter was an allegory of the state of Britain during the aftermath of World War II. Commentators and critics have however seen it as applicable to that period, with clear contemporary political references, which in their opinions include a satire of socialism; echoes of Nazism; allusions to the shortages in postwar Britain; and a strand of environmentalism. The idea of such a chapter was, as Tolkien stated, planned from the outset, as part of the overall formal structure of The Lord of the Rings, though its details were not worked out until much later. The book's central theme is going out on the physical quest to destroy the One Ring, to be balanced by a chapter on returning home on the moral quest to purify the Shire and to take responsibility for oneself. However, the actual addition of Saruman to this part of the story, as the reason why the Shire should need to be scoured, came very late in Tolkien's composition; he considered other identities for the wicked Sharkey before settling on Saruman. The chapter, which has been called one of the most famous anticlimaxes in literature, has been left out of all film adaptations of the novel, except, in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, as a brief flash-forward when Frodo looks into the crystal ball-like Mirror of Galadriel, and for the death of Saruman, which is transposed to Isengard.