Forests in Middle-earth
Forests in Tolkien's Middle-earth fiction / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Forests appear repeatedly in J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy world of Middle-earth. In The Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins and party have adventures in the Trollshaws and in Mirkwood. In The Lord of the Rings, Frodo Baggins and his companions travel through woods in The Shire, and are pursued by Black Riders; to evade them, the party enters the feared Old Forest, where they encounter other hazards. Later the Fellowship comes to the Elvish forest realm of Lothlórien; and after the Fellowship has split up, Frodo and Sam Gamgee travel through Ithilien with its Mediterranean vegetation, while Merry Brandybuck and Pippin Took enter the ancient forest of Fangorn. The Riders of Rohan, on their way to war, are allowed to travel on a secret road through another ancient forest, that of the Drúedain or woses. The Silmarillion, too, features several forests, both in Beleriand which is home to places like the Elvish forest realm of Doriath, protected by the magic of Melian the Maia, and in the south of Valinor, where the Valar liked to hunt in the woods of Oromë.
Critics note that Middle-earth was set in the distant past, when primeval forests still existed. Forests play varying roles in his books. In The Hobbit, Mirkwood is the dark forbidding forest of fairy tale. In The Lord of the Rings, scholars suggest that the forests symbolise nature as opposed to industrialisation, but also embody links to fairy tale and folklore, and carry a psychological message.