Q: Did Tolkien Elves Rest their Minds by Thinking of Beautiful Things?
As for how the Elves “rest their minds”, this notion seems to be most supported by pointing to The Two Towers, where Legolas stands watch over Aragorn and Gimli while they sleep during their pursuit of the orcs that had taken Merry and Pippin. In one passage Tolkien wrote:
…Only Legolas still stepped as lightly as ever, his feet hardly seeming to press the grass. leaving no footprints as he passed; but in the waybread of the Elves he found all the sustenance that he needed, and he could sleep, if sleep it could be called by Men, resting his mind in the strange paths of elvish dreams, even as he walked open-eyed in the light of this world.
This is better described as the Elvish version of daydreaming, which we often use to rest our minds when we are stressed. Daydreaming is not a form of sleeping but it does help the mind change directions and relax.
In a similar paragraph from the same part of the book Tolkien wrote:
The night grew ever colder. Aragorn and Gimli slept fitfully, and whenever they awoke they saw Legolas standing beside them, or walking to and fro, singing softly to himself in his own tongue, and as he sang the white stars opened in the hard black vault above…
Legolas is clearly not sleeping here; nor is he necessarily “resting his mind”. There is no need to debate the meaning of this passage (for it is quite clear and unambiguous). Instead, we can look further ahead in the story to another point, when Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli make camp on the edge of Fangorn Forest.
With that he fell asleep. Legolas already lay motionless, his fair hands folded upon his breast, his eyes unclosed, blending living night and deep dream, as is the way with Elves. Gimli sat hunched by the fire, running his thumb thoughtfully along the edge of his axe. The tree rustled. There was no other sound.
Here Legolas is clearly sleeping, albeit “in the way of the elves”. As to whether Elves sleep, J.R.R. Tolkien did address the point directly in his correspondence. In a letter dated November 5, 1956 he wrote the following in response to a reader’s letter:
It is plainly suggested that Elves do ‘sleep’, but not in our mode, having a different relation to what we call ‘dreaming’. Nothing very definite is said about it (a) because except at a length destructive of narrative it would be difficult to describe a different mode of consciousness, and (b) for reasons that you so rightly observe: something must be left not fully explained, and only suggested.
So what is “our mode”? To the best of my knowledge Tolkien never attempted to explain this. He left us with sleeping elves who dream but he did not anticipate that people would make up nonsense and use it to instruct each other in the ways of his story-telling.
You may indeed come across Websites that speak of the Elvish mode of sleeping or dreaming, but unless they include citations like those above they won’t be authoritative (and if they try to disprove the citations above, or make the whole matter seem ambiguous, they speak with no authority anyway). J.R.R. Tolkien did not put beds into his Elvish abodes just so that hobbits and men could conveniently get a little comfort when dropping by once every thousand years. Whatever distinctions he may have had in mind for his Elves in the matters of sleep and dreaming, they would have been far less adaptable to game playing than today’s readers may want. After all, he devised Elvish words for dreaming and sleeping (not to mention the names Olorin and Lorien).
As for the nature of Elvish dreams, anything you find on the Internet is purely speculation. And if I seem a little hard-nosed about this, it is because in forum after forum where I come across these discussions, people just get downright rude and obnoxious in presenting their “facts”, telling others to “shut up” and “pay attention while reading TT” and more. Frankly, in my opinion, it’s not worth arguing about but if you have been arguing for years that Elves don’t sleep, don’t dream, or only dream about “beautiful things” you have NOT been paying attention to the Tolkien texts.
Let it rest.
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Given that Legolas could sleep with his eyes open, apparently at least partly aware of the outside world, Elves may have slept like dolphins, and maybe other whales. They have to stay awake, because surfacing to breathe is a conscious act for them. But, like all known mammals, they also have to sleep, so they sleep one side of the brain at a time, while the other side stays awake and alert.
If that’s the case with the Elves, they’d sleep more-or-less immobile, because the motor functions of the sleeping side would be disabled, just as ours are. But both eyes send data to both sides of the brain, and the alert side could wake the sleeping side in an emergency. Even in Men, the ears are still active during sleep, or alarm clocks wouldn’t work. So the Elves would have two fully functional senses while sleeping.
I’m not sure if Tolkien was familiar with the concept of the “waking dream”, which as I understand it is a kind of drifting mind state where your eyes are open. I can sort of slide into that state of mind if I am tired but listening to music on my headphones (sitting at my computer). However, for me this is not a restful state; at least not a physically restful state. Eventually I have to go lay down, although if I am just stressed I can “wake up” feeling refreshed (but this is usually during the day).
I don’t think that is what Tolkien really intends for Legolas’ sleep. Then again, Tolkien did try to extend human experience and magnify it in what I would call a gracious state for the Elves. So maybe Legolas is indeed engaged in “wakeful dreaming”. But I doubt we’ll ever see anything more from Tolkien on this topic.
No, I also don’t think the “waking dream” you describe is what he had in mind. Maybe that was what Legolas was doing while running, but almost every animal ever studied, mammal, bird, reptile or fish, has to truly sleep at some time, and I doubt that Elves were any different. Even the dolphin brain’s sleeping side is truly asleep, with the same brain wave activity as other sleeping animals.
I’m on the other hand interested whether elves ALWAYS sleep with their eyes unclosed or only in certain circumstances? Gandalf, whose condition appears elf-like when it comes to control over body and such things, slept with his eyes half-closed:
”…. Pippin walked softly to where Gandalf lay. He looked down at him. The wizard seemed asleep, but with lids not fully closed: there was a glitter of eyes under his long lashes. …..”
And of course Legolas case: ”Legolas already lay motionless, his fair hands folded upon his breast, his eyes unclosed, blending living night and deep dream, as is the way with Elves.”
On the other hand we have examples of elves getting drunk on strong wine in large quantities and getting drowsy like a normal man would. We also have examples of fainting, losing consciousness and of course Luthien was sleeping when Beren sneaked out, she could put other elves to sleep with her enchantments, and other cases, Elwing too could be considered an elf (though she was of line of Peredhil and so unique blend of traits) and it is written that she peacefully slept by her husbands side though it’s not told about her eyes, as in many other examples. Hmm. What do you think?
Also this sentence ‘as is the elven way’ similarly to the horse riding style without saddle or bridle does not necessarily indicates that all elves do it but that it is in some way associated with elves (we know that some groups or kindreds of elves use saddles and and harness for horses even if they have their elven ”way with all good beasts” seemingly mastering animals with their natural ‘magical’ talents).