I’m not done being emotionally compromised by Samwise Gamgee in that scene in Shelob’s lair. He absolutely knows what the Ring has done to Frodo, mentally and spiritually – the thing that finally convinces him that Frodo must be dead is the fact that he doesn’t react to having the Ring taken from him. At some level, Sam knows that nothing but death could separate Frodo and the Ring now; that as long as Frodo lives he can’t willingly give it up.
And that’s a truth that neither of them can possibly afford to articulate to themselves, because what happens when we reach the Fire.
Oh no.
Oh no.
So both of them know that Frodo cannot, while he lives, willingly give up the Ring. Unlike Sam, I think that Frodo, so to speak, knows that he knows this. He knows there’s no hope, but he goes on anyway.
Sam knows it, but he has hope. Frodo is good, Frodo has him, Sam, to help him, something will happen to work everything out.
But even as early as the passage of the Marshes, Frodo says: “If the One goes into the Fire, and we are at hand? I ask you, Sam, are we ever likely to need bread again?” Look at that, look how depersonalized the language is: Frodo can’t even speak about casting the One into the Fire.
He knows he’s going to die.
He knows that’s the best-case scenario.
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konekorambles 