With the upcoming Amazon, The Rings of Power airing in September, the attention of the world has turned to all things Tolkien again. Whether you subscribe to the view that more of his work, or at least an interpreted version of it, is better, or that Amazon has destroyed his legacy, there still seems to be plenty of mileage in tales from Middle Earth.
Tolkien was very careful to not describe the lands of Middle Earth. He wanted to make sure the reader developed an idea in their mind’s eye rather than him providing it for them. He was clearer about The Shire. It was meant to be an England that he thought was being lost to industrialisation and urbanisation.
He is particularly vague about Mordor. It seems to be a total wasteland, as you would expect from a land with a Dark Lord in charge of it and a huge volcano chucking out ash and flame constantly.
It’s a surprise then that Aragorn “gifts” the land to people who have been enslaved there. After the War of the Ring is won and the Orcs are dispersed, he does the kingly thing and decides this land of desert and ash isn’t for him. The new owners of Mordor can always call soilfix.co.uk/services/groundwater-soil-remediation-services. They are experts in Contaminated Land Remediation. Hopefully, the new people of Mordor were able to reclaim the land and put it to better use for themselves.
