Q: Why Did Frodo Wait 17 Years to Leave the Shire?
ANSWER: This is one of those questions that arises from the conflict between the Peter Jackson movies and J.R.R. Tolkien’s book. It has been asked both ways: “What happened to the seventeen year gap between the Farewell Party and Frodo’s departure from the Shire (in the movie)?”
In other words, why did Peter Jackson not tell the same story as J.R.R. Tolkien? I don’t know. We might as well ask why Rhett and Scarlett only had one child in the film version of “Gone with the Wind”. But we should try to clear up a misperception as best we can.
Frodo did NOT wait seventeen years to leave the Shire. Not in the book, at any rate.
There is no doubt that Peter Jackson’s version of events leaves out a seventeen year gap between Bilbo’s departure and Gandalf’s conversation with Frodo. But in the book Frodo waited several months before leaving the Shire after Gandalf explained the history of the Ring to him.
Frodo possessed the One Ring as part of his inheritance from Bilbo for seventeen years (in the book) without knowing what it was or that anyone was searching for it. Gandalf only suspects there is something significant about the Ring during those years. We have only scanty information about Gandalf’s timeline during the 17 years:
- T.A. 3001 (Bilbo’s party). Gandalf calls upon Aragorn to help him look for Gollum
- 3004-8 Gandalf visits Frodo occasionally in the Shire (obviously not looking for Gollum)
- 3009-17 Gandalf and Aragorn search high and low for Gollum. Gandalf then visits Minas Tirith and finds Isildur’s scroll. Aragorn captures Gollum.
What Peter Jackson leaves out is Gandalf’s search for Gollum. But he also dismisses Frodo’s unnerving preservation through those years: he appears to have not aged at all, just like Bilbo. That was a clear sign of the Ring’s power but in the book it is not immediately apparent to the reader what is going on. You have to know what the Ring is to understand what the foreshadowing means.
So apologists for the films might argue that there was simply no point in showing the 17 year gap as it did not advance the story, and the cinematic adaptation had to cut out a lot of things to maximize screen time for those elements of the story that Peter and his team felt were most important. But only Peter Jackson can defend this point, and some people might feel he does not defend it well (if at all). The power of the Ring is very hard to explain without a lot of exposition and exposition rarely does well in film (e.g., the “Unexpected Party” in “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”, which I alone seem to have loved for its faithfulness to Tolkien).
On the other hand, the narrative of Gandalf’s search for Gollum has to wait in the book until everyone has gathered at Rivendell. The movies don’t share all the cool and interesting details of Elrond’s council, using that time instead to create tension between the characters (including between Boromir and everyone else). So without an opportunity to explain Gandalf’s long absence further into the story, I can see why it might seem better to leave out the 17-year gap. Otherwise, Gandalf just inexplicably vanishes for 17 years and Frodo has to forget all about the Ring (or not).
The book can take liberties that the films lack time for. But the disparity between film and book does appear to have created some confusion on the point of why Frodo stayed in the Shire all those years. He stayed there because he was not yet in danger. He only learned that he was in danger after Gandalf discovered Isildur’s scroll (and that was included in the movie) and returned to the Shire to explain the whole convoluted mess to Frodo.
From that point forward both the book and the movie create a sense of urgency. Of course, the film shows the Nazgul issuing forth from Mordor whereas the book leaves them in the history lesson until the first Black Rider shows up. In this case Peter Jackson’s foreshadowing is less oblique than Tolkien’s, and not really setting up a mystery for the audience so much as a confrontation.
As for Frodo’s delay in the book, that was intentional because neither he nor Gandalf felt he should leave right away. That would stir up interest in his intentions and activities. And so Frodo proposed in April 3018 that he leave Bag End on his fiftieth birthday in September. Gandalf agreed because that would give Frodo time to make arrangements, arrangements which proved to be significant in the book but not in the movie.
Hence, in the movies Frodo does not sell Bag End to the Sackville-Bagginses; nor does he return to help cleanse the Shire of Sharkey and his men. All of that was cut from the films, made possible by Saruman’s early death at Isengard. Many people were indeed upset at the loss of “The Scouring of the Shire” in the movies, but what’s done is done. Frodo was thus able to leave the Shire very quickly after learning the Ring’s true nature in the movie.
And so I think the proper answer to all these questions is simply that the movies tell a different story from that told in the book. Whether it was a justifiable departure will be debated for years, maybe centuries. But at the very least those who care about the books should be glad to know that Frodo did not simply hang around waiting for the bad guys to nearly catch him. He lived quietly and peacefully until it was time to go, and then things started to become dramatic, in both the movies and the book.
See also …
- What Happened to Gimli After He Sailed Over Sea?
- Is Valinor Heaven?
- Why Did Frodo Leave Middle-earth and the Shire?
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Have you read our other Tolkien and Middle-earth Questions and Answers articles?
One thing that both, Jackson and Bakshi did wrong is to show an old Bilbo: on “a long expected party” it is said very clearly that Bilbo was “unchanged”, presenting the same aspect he had at 50.
Those 17 years help to make the Ring effect more clear, and of course they are lost on both movies…
Cheers,
Ricardo
The movie never states, but implies the passage of…what looks like some months between Gandalf’s visits to the Shire. It might even be a year (it is summer on both occasions), but hard to see it being more, given how Jackson emphasizes haste in Gandalf’s movement in those scenes. (Bilbo’s rapid aging in Rivendell is not explained, and viewers are left to assume that the loss of the Ring works a lot faster on the former bearer.) It is a defensible compression, I think. Jackson had already launched with an extensive, placid exposition and introduction – he has to start picking up the narrative pace at some point, and he has a lot of story left to tell.
In the book, it is not the 17 year period (when neither Frodo or Gandalf realize what the Ring is) that has bothered me. It is the lack of haste on either’s part in getting Frodo out of the Shire once they DO realize it. We understand that they do not want to draw undue attention to Frodo’s movements, but in the end, that happens anyway – it is a 90 day’s wonder that Frodo is leaving Bag End. It’s true that Gandalf does not know that the Nine are abroad – if he had, he would have fled with Frodo at once – but should that really be necessary? Is it not enough that he has confirmed that Sauron knows WHO has the Ring (“Baggins”) and the land where he LIVES (“Shire”)? The stakes he is playing for could not be higher. It would have been just as well for Frodo to let out that he is taking a long summer holiday in Buckland, and be done with it. Tolkien wants Frodo to escape, repeatedly, by the skin of his teeth, so it serves his narrative to not have Frodo leave immediately. But it does impose an air implausibility on the character decisions at this stage of the story.
Hello! Wasn’t there a bit of information Tolkien mentions about Radagast not telling Gandalf of the Wraiths? ATK
Actually, Radagast told Gandalf that the Nazgul had crossed the river and were looking for a land with the “uncouth name” of “Shire”. See “The Council of Elrond” for Gandalf’s narrative about his meeting with Gandalf.