Although Tolkien’s tales of Middle-Earth are often consumed for their brilliant and “harmless” imagination, they actually constitute a romanticized colonial fantasy, perpetuating the West’s traditional self-concept as a righteous bastion against the forces of an evil and diametrically different “other.” The story-arch of the Lord of the Rings is the primary medium through which the trilogy’s Orientalist sentiment becomes apparent. Superficially, the concept that a coalition of elves and men unite to save the free world from impending evil-driven doom is rather tasteful and outwardly moral. The danger in this plot, however, lies in its dependency on a nefarious “other” for existence. Said differently, the righteousness, purity, and heroism of the plot and its central heroes would quickly dissolve without provocation from an evil force. Thus, the main character’s virtues do not exist in a vacuum; rather, they congeal as an ideological response to the “evil” present in their world. This phenomenon is eerily similar to the mindset of European colonizers who, upon encountering the “lazy[ness], sensual[ity], and despotism” [1] of new foreign cultures, proclaimed themselves to be custodians of civilized morality. The entire self-image of the colonial west relied on its difference and self-proclaimed moral superiority in comparison to other cultures, exactly how the Lord of the Rings paints the world in binary, with the protagonists fighting for moral “good” against servants of moral “evil”. Just as Tolkein’s “men of the west” are righteous because they fight against evil incarnate, the colonial west’s struggle against barbarism inherently makes it an “anti-barbaric” force defined by what is is not (rather than substance/what it is). The Lord of the Rings further expands on Orientalism's creation of the “other” (as defined by Edward Said) [1] by incorporating racial tension into the trilogy’s plot. As a general rule, Tolkien celebrates the genocide of orcs and orcish culture, commemorating it as a cleansing of the Earth. He morally rationalizes this stance by placing orcs into a seperate species and contrasting the appearances of humans with that of orcs, relating the latter to be “squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, with wide mouths and slant eyes” [2]. This ghastly description evokes hate, disgust, and fear from the readers (and imposes them onto the orcs) in order to justify the protagonists’ slaughter of these creatures. Tolkien effectively links the moral depravity of orcs with their physical image, suggesting their wickedness to be a biological fact (rather than a malleable intellectual decision or ailment). In much the same way, Belgian King Leopold II vindicated his malicious exploitation of the Congolese on racial boundaries, suggesting that Africans were biologically less capable of civilization. Joseph Conrad offers readers insight into this historical pattern in his novel Heart of Darkness, relating the moral state of the native Congolese with their physical condition: “they were nothing earthly now -- nothing but black shadows of disease and starvation” [3]. Regrettably, Tolkien’s depiction of the orc is laced with similar racist diction that creates an immovable, biological barrier between western morality, beauty, and civilization, and “savage, cruel, and barbaric” cultures. References: [1] Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient, by Dr. Edward W. Said [2] http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Racism_in_Tolkien's_Works [3] Heart Of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad, page 11