The Fellowship of The Threes

Today's post is an essay on writing with examples from Tolkien's Lord of The Rings. Why post this today? Well, this Hamlette of The Edge Of The Precipice is hosting her 11th annual Tolkien Party for Hobbit Week, and I've been looking forward to this all year! Tomorrow's post is my answers to the annual blog tag, and then Thursday's post is on Pippin and I'll finish on Friday with a post about a character usually looked over due to his absence from the film adaptation (any guesses on who it is?)

As writers, we often think rules are made to be broken. Sometimes, telling is better than showing, clichés work best, and writing about topics without personal experience can stimulate growth. But, some of these “guidelines” exist with good reason. Some examples of these would be what the author likes to think of as the Three Rules of Three. This article will break down these three rules with case studies for each one.

The first of the Three Rules of Three is when foreshadowing, do so at least three times. Something that is foreshadowed once will feel like lazy writing to the readers, and foreshadowing twice feels like a cheap way to not have lazy writing. After at least three occurrences of foreshadowing, readers trust the author and appreciate the time and thought poured into the story. When they foreshadow three times, we’ll follow them to the ends of the earth.

Using “The Lord of the Rings” as a case study, in the second chapter of “The Fellowship of The Ring”, Gandalf mentions Gollum may still have a part to play before the end comes about. Later, Frodo hears Gollum following them in Moria, and Sam sees a “log with eyes” as they travel down the Anduin.

The second of the Three Rules of Three has to do with major events. Characters shouldn’t win the war in one fight, and they shouldn’t win it on their second try. At least three tries are best for authentic character development. 

Again using “The Lord of the Rings”, the three hunters fight a battle in Rohan, Gondor, and Mordor. These three battles are strategic. If there had been two battles, we would think their victory came too easily, but with four battles, we would stop believing in the story's stakes since the characters could just keep trying again.

The third and final rule of the Rules of Three is to use the spectrum to manipulate the readers’ perspective of the characters. Suppose three characters are placed on a spectrum line with one character representing one extreme and a second character representing a different extreme. In that case, the middle character is going to be a balanced mixture of those extremes and will be the one we gravitate towards.

One place we see this spectrum is with the wizards. On one end of the spectrum is Saruman with his great wisdom. He is his own master, serving no one but himself, keeping to himself and thinking hard and deep. On the other side of the spectrum is Radagast. There is no evidence that he ever thought long, hard, or deep. He is a servant, doing everything Saruman and Gandalf tell him to. If ever, Radagast is seldom counted as among the wise. That sets the stage for Gandalf in the middle of the spectrum. He cares for the peoples of Middle Earth as much as Radagast cares for his birds, but his care for them is balanced with his wisdom. Gandalf is the ultimate wizard, and we know this because Radagast and Saruman certainly aren’t.

One last example would be Frodo, Sam, and Gollum. Frodo is gentle, and Gollum is harsh. They form the two extremes with Sam in the middle. Sam is usually thought of as a gentle soul. He values “food and cheer and song” and is loyal to the end. But, Sam is extremely harsh on Gollum. Whenever they are together, there is tension between them, and readers gravitate toward Sam. Sam reacts more like the readers would, and that makes him easier to connect to.

And, there are other ways of arranging them, so we can never truly be against any of these characters, even when we wish we could.

Denethor and Faramir with Boromir in the center; Arwen and Eowyn with Galadriel in the center; Thranduil and Galadriel with Elrond in the center. There are many more case studies to explore, but for now, hopefully, this has been helpful and shown a little glimpse behind the curtain of so many great stories.