. This only creates a clearer binary of good and evil in the fellowship’s interactions with them: clearly asserting the Orcs as separate from the heroes. The Orcs have been a threat militarily to the fellowship, but in Moria we are introduced to a ‘subspecies’ called the Uruks of Mordor, that are “large and evil” (Tolkien 338).
The Uruks are described as “man-high”, as having a “broad flat face,” and eyes like “coal” (Tolkien 339). In contrast from the dark features his “tongue is red”. By saying he is “man-high” disassociates the Uruk from the men making him an ‘other,’ and therefore removing any quality that could have granted the Uruks a characteristic a reader could relate to. As a result this pushes the fellowship closer to the ‘Us’ and the Orcs closer to the ‘other’. The physical description of the Orc’s face and eyes give us a demonic depiction and asserts them as “evil” (Tolkien 338). The Orcs are then repeatedly described in the same way Owen encapsulates the physical harm soldiers underwent in trench warfare. Wilfred Owen in “Dulce Et Decorum Est” focuses on the eyes to emphasize the “all blind” and “eyes withering” to illustrate the effects of gas ─ a new industrial, biological weapon introduced in World War I ─ on his fellow soldiers (Lines 6 & 19). The “incurable sores on innocent tongues” of Owen’s poem are seen in the Orcs in Moria through Tolkien directing particular attention to the red tongue (Line 24). The Orcs are the race that experience the physical consequences of violence unlike the fellowship that remain untainted physically from the violence they engage in with the Orcs in Moria.
Dwarf Mines turned World War I Trenches
The fellowship represents the high-class officers’ first experiences with the mutilated sights of trench warfare in their escape from the depths of Moria. “The Rear-Guard” by Siegfried Sassoon is a poem that incorporates the same experiences as those of the fellowship. His poem is from his own experiences in World War I on the Hindenburg Line in April 1917. The narrator of the poem is “groping along the tunnel” trying to navigate his way along the dark trench labyrinth, much like the fellowship does when they are first trapped in the mines after a sea creature entraps them in the mines (Line 1). As the narrator continues on his dark journey he runs into a dead body. This World War I trench experience motif is in the Mines of Moria, in The Fellowship of the Ring when the fellowship comes upon Balin’s tomb after stumbling through the tunnels and discovering the other remains. They are caught by just as much surprise as the narrator in “The Rear-Guard.” As the narrator is in the tunnel he mentions “muttering creatures underground” (Line 21). These “muttering creatures” can be seen in Moria with the sounds the fellowship hears when Pippin makes a ruckus and alerts the Orcs of their presence. A drumming begins and the Orcs make a stir and become the “muttering creatures.” The fear of the “blackening wound” and mutilation of the body felt by the narrator in “The Rear-Guard” when he finds the body in the trenches is then brought to life in Tolkien’s work with the war injured looking Orcs that are inhuman in their appearance (Line 18). The drums emphasize the sound of a heartbeat feeling heavy as fear crawls through a soldier or a member of the fellowship. Having the Orcs making these noises as a warning of their approach, gives living breath to the fears portrayed in “The Rear-Guard.”
By allowing the fellowship to escape the mines and the Orcs being unable to follow them into the daylight of Lorien, Tolkien sends the message that the Orcs have no natural right to leave the hell-like mines for a better place. The Orcs and the upheaval the fellowship leave behind in Moria are similar to the images the narrator in “The Rear-Guard” encounters when he exits the tunnels. They, like the narrator of “The Rear-Guard,” are “unloading hell behind them” (Line 25). Wilfred Owen’s “Dulce Et Decorum Est” shares in this hell description of trench warfare through the image of fire that repeats itself in 