Tolkien's Raft-elves in The Hobbit: A Glimpse of a Lovely Life
Recently I was talking with a smial friend about how even a line or two in Tolkien's works opens invaluable vistas into the richness of Middle-earth. Such is certainly the case with the Raft-elves in The Hobbit. These are some of Thranduil's folk who have huts along the river to steward the famous barrels on their way to Lake-town.
Of course, you cannot see Bilbo in this new painting, because he has the Ring on, and the dwarves are tidied away most uncomfortably in their casks, but I hoped it might add to your love of the many sorts of elves to see these lustrous beings depicted...perhaps for the first time?
Carefully based on a close-up view of Tolkien's own inimitable illustration, here you can see the lights of the simple thatched huts reflecting on the river that comes out of Mirkwood, and the broken clouds and stars are also present on the dark surface of the water, as we read about. It is an unusual effect, because running water seldom offers a smooth mirror of the sky, but in looking at the way in which the Forest River goes into a little bay here, perhaps the current slowed enough to be at least a little reflective of the heavens.
I have dressed the Raft-elves more simply than many I've painted. They are in working clothes - tunics and hose in the greens and browns the Wood-elves favor, and there are loops of rope visible at the belt of the foremost figure; useful for lashing the barrels together. These are far from the highest kinds of elves we meet, but nevertheless, the moonrise-like glow about their feet immediately announces the kindred to which they belong. I think their lifestyle looks quite lovely, don't you? I hope you can smell the cool water and the fragrance of pines and other trees along the banks.
The longer I paint from Professor Tolkien's works, the more I feel I am understanding one of the things that made him a literary giant: his boundless powers of observation and sub-creation. Even when he only had time to give us a scant reference to something, it's like a narrow trail opening up before us in long grass that we wish we could explore more fully. Think of the tiny glimpse of Galadriel and her weavers, and what it tells us about the life of the Galadhrim. Or the remarks about hobbits having multiple pantries and how this clues us in to the priorities of their society. Or the fox that visits the hobbits in the Woody End and what this signals about the sentience of creatures in Middle-earth. In so few words, Tolkien indicates for us the extraordinary variety and diversity of life in Arda.
We don't get to have a long visit with the Raft-elves, but we are enriched by knowing they exist just outside the Elvenking's great halls. Instead of living inside rock beneath a great hill, they have chosen a life along the river and under the stars. I can just imagine them singing and making merry and relishing their riparian sylvan existence, can't you? I hope it's a pleasure to see them, and that you will enjoy spending a few moments with them in this video short.
