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Hello-I recently shared this goodbye letter with my fantasy literature class. I thought I'd share it with you also in case it's of interest. I very much enjoyed reading with your seniors this semester, and I wish them all the best.
--Ashish Patwardhan


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"A mortal... who keeps one of the Great Rings, does not die, but he does not grow or obtain more life, he merely continues, until at last every minute is a weariness...and if he often uses the Ring...he fades... sooner or later the dark power will devour him." [The Fellowship of the Ring, said by Gandalf]

"The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater." [The Fellowship of the Ring, said by an elf named Haldir to the fellowship as they enter Lothlorien after losing Gandalf in Moria.]
"...The agnostic, if he stays true to his reasonable self, if he stays beholden to dry, yeastless factuality, might try to explain the warm light bathing him by saying "Possibly a f-f-failing oxygenation of the b-b-brain," and, to the very end, lack imagination and miss the better story." [Life of Pi, said by Pi]
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Dear Students,
I began writing this letter year a few years ago as my way of saying goodbye. I've added a bit each year. I would like to share with you one of the reasons I believe fantasy is worth reading.
In Pan's Labyrinth, Ofelia's mother says to her "You're getting older, and you'll see that life isn't like your fairy tales. The world is a cruel place." Looking at our own world, sometimes it is hard to doubt these words. One of the things, though, that fantasy is able to do is help us endure the suffering in our world: Fantasy confers dignity to our suffering and ennobles our struggles with day-to-day trials. Afflicted with injustice, disease, heart-break, depression, or other misfortunes that come with being human, we can see ourselves as merely the tormented playthings of fate, or we can be like Aragorn engaged in a worthy battle, our swords gleaming with courage and defiance, their metal forged and tested by our ancestors. When my grandfather was told, in 1924 British-ruled India, to remove his khadhi homespun cap by the British medical school exam proctors, he refused. My grandfather had been a poor orphan since he was eight years old, and becoming a doctor was his dream, but he remained committed to Gandhi's freedom movement. Even though he did not march with Gandhi like his brothers, he showed his solidarity by wearing homespun cloth to support Gandhi's boycott of English imports. My grandfather's refusal to remove his cap led to his expulsion from medical school, and his dream of becoming a doctor was dissolved. Instead, he pursued a PhD in zoology. I think of him, at that moment in his life, in the exam hall, like Gandalf standing on the bridge of Khazad-Dûm, facing a Balrog, a terrible monster whose fiery sword threatens his life's dream and whose malicious whip assails his dignity. As my grandfather defiantly proclaims to his Balrog "You shall not pass!", I hear a tragic irony in his bold words, the double-edged stroke of that gesture. It would not be his fate to pass that exam into another life, the heroic orphan-turned-M.D. that he had once dreamed for himself. He fell. This story was conveyed to me after his death by his friend who had known him since 1923; his friend was in that class with him and he did go on to become a doctor.
I'm not sure what to make of this story, of the stand my grandfather took. I marvel at his courage but mourn the death of his dream. The dark powers at work in his world-his poverty, his parents' deaths, his sister's dying of tuberculosis at 13, living under an oppressive British rule-were remarkable, even epic in some ways. When I think of what it must have felt like to have his dream cut down, the image of Frodo on Weathertop flies to mind. The perniciously narrow blade of the witch-king's dagger pierced and slew the self my grandfather had dreamed of becoming. "A shrill cry rang out in the night; and he felt a pain like a dart of poisoned ice..."
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about my grandfather was the way he never allowed the poisoned fragment to work into his heart-he remained a loving and generous man who raised four educated children who all immigrated to America, fulfilling another of his dreams. The way he endured his wound, which I am sure he never forgot and probably pained him every now and then, seems to me perhaps more heroic than his decision to refuse the British exam administrator. To echo Haldir's words, though his world was indeed full of peril, and in it there were many dark places, still there was much that was fair, and though in all lands love was mingled with grief, it grew the greater. This is one of the reasons I admire Sam Gamgee, because he also has the remarkable gift of growing love in places where it really has no business surviving-you would think a gardener would appreciate the futility of planting in the wrong places. Mordor is definitely the worst climate zone for love or hope. And yet, Sam is no ordinary gardener: his devoted cultivation surpasses Elven craft and even Gandalf's magic in this regard.
One of my favorite moments in The Lord of the Rings occurs at the end of The Two Towers, on page 696. Frodo and Sam have been trudging for miles and miles, having narrowly escaped with their lives many times. They have survived attacks from flying Ringwraiths, orcs, trolls, a harrowing journey through the super-creepy Mere of Dead Faces and the Dead Marshes, they have been before the massive Black Gate of Mordor and they will, soon afterwards, be attacked by a humongous spider. The moment I quote here occurs when they are in one of the most feared and wicked places in Middle Earth: Minas Morgul, the lair of the Lord of the Nazgûl, the witch-king of Angmar. Here they take a break to rest and share a conversation. Frodo, who has had to endure all the previous hardships while, in addition, bearing the great burden of carrying the ring, begins by observing how dismal things are.
"'I don't like anything here at all,' said Frodo, 'step or stone, breath or bone. Earth, air and water seem accursed. But so our path is laid.'
But now watch what Sam will say in response: he's going to agree, but then he will see a bigger picture. He will envision the two of them in the context of a greater-more meaningful and hopeful-reality.
"'Yes, that's so,' said Sam. 'And we shouldn't be here at all, if we'd known more about it before we started. But I suppose it's often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of a sport, as you might say. But that's not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually-their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn't. And if they had, we shouldn't know, because they'd have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on-and not all to a good end, mind you; ...I wonder if we shall ever be put into songs or tales. We're in one, of course; but I mean: put into words you know, told by the fireside, or read out of a great big book with red and black letters, years and years afterwards. And people will say: "let's hear about Frodo and the Ring!" And they'll say: "Yes, that's one of my favourite stories. Frodo was very brave, wasn't he, dad? "Yes, my boy, the famousest of hobbits, and that's saying a lot."
'It's saying a lot too much,' said Frodo and he laughed, a long clear laugh from his heart. Such a sound had not been heard in those places since Sauron came to Middle-earth. 'Why, Sam, he said, 'to hear you somehow makes me as merry as if the story was already written. But you've left out one of the chief characters: Samwise the stouthearted. "I want to hear more about Sam, dad. Why didn't they put in more of his talk, dad? That's what I like, it makes me laugh. And Frodo wouldn't have got far without Sam, would he?"'
Let's marvel at the magic Sam is able to work here: he makes Frodo laugh in one of the darkest and most dangerous places in the world-like Gandalf with his staff in the Mines of Moria, Sam conjures light out of darkness. Even more than making him laugh, Sam inspires Frodo (in Pi's language) to not "lack imagination and miss the better story." If the cruelty of the Ring is to exhaust its wearer into disappearing from his or her own life, Sam's invigorating friendship does the opposite and makes Frodo's life vitally appear, more possible, hopeful and more meaningful than what he himself can see in the blinding gloom of the Ring's dispiriting shadow. The way Sam counters the ring's dark and depleting powers by helping Frodo "obtain more life" through the inspiriting fire of his imagination may serve as an example for us, in our world-that there are times when we can only find our greater existence through the willingness of other people to imagine and realize us. And in turn, we can do the same for them-we can perform no small imaginative service for them by listening to them, understanding them and helping them find "the better story" of their lives. Like Sam, it may be in our power to discover to each other that, even though our road may be so hard that "earth, air and water seem accursed," we are nonetheless involved in "one of those tales that really [matter]." After all, as Frodo acknowledges, he "wouldn't have got far without Sam."
Both Frodo and Ofelia's mother observe how the world is cursed with suffering and, truth be told, their words ring true; but then fantasy can awaken us to the "other powers" at work that Gandalf talks about. There are orcs, balrogs, and the cruelty of Sauron, but there's also the selflessness of Frodo, the pity of Bilbo, the friendship of the Fellowship; the dark shadow of the ring is flouted by Gandalf's fireworks and smoke rings (rings of power in their own right!), the fires of Mount Doom are met with the fires of Farmer Maggot's brave hospitality and Sam's creative imagination, and the daggers of the Nazgûl are crossed by Anduril, Glamdring and Sting. There is much in our world to give us hope.
Tolkien writes in his essay that Fantasy has the power to give us "Recovery," a way to re-enchant the mundane. For example, "Because of Pegasus, horses were ennobled." Fantasy helps us Recover the everyday world, mingled as it is with grief. As you live the rest of your lives beyond Sidwell, I urge you to do your best to Recover as much as you can of the beauty and wonder of being alive, for yourself and for other people. Because life is all-together too brief, it demands that we engage it with all of ourselves, part of which means stepping outside ourselves by trying to imagine the forces at work in the worlds of other people. We will likely find more heroism going on around us than we realized was there. It's strange, isn't it, how our reality should need our imagination to realize it.
I wish I had known my grandfather's story before his death, but it was a story he did not want to share, and none of his children knew it either, until I received a letter from his doctor friend in a response to my inquiry about their friendship. Reading that letter was like crossing into another world, the world of my grandfather, which was also mine, for my life would be shaped by its events. Reading fiction also enables similar crossings. This is how reading can help make us more alive-the imagination we exert in bringing lifeless words to life allows us access to our world in a fresh way. Conjuring the real world is the greatest, most subtle magic that Faerie has to offer us. In a sense, that is what this course, this school, is about: making us aware of our reality and finding ourselves part of a larger story, one that matters even more than ours, alone. But, as Pi says, if we read that story passively, without imagination, we risk succumbing to "dry, yeastless factuality" and missing "the better story." Reading for the better story with you this semester has been a pleasure. Thank you for such an enjoyable time together. I wish you a lifetime filled with good books and good company.
With affection and gratitude,
A. Patwardhan