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In the chapter "The Grey Havens", we have:

And the ship went out into the High Sea and passed on into the West, until at last on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise.

So I was wondering whether this scene could have been recorded in the Red Book (or any other record of Middle-earth), since I am not aware of any people or information travel from Valinor back to Middle-earth after the end of the Third Age.

Eugene Styer
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5 Answers5

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The book does not claim to have recorded this. Before leaving, Frodo gives the book to Sam, inviting him to write the ending -

"I have quite finished, Sam," said Frodo. "The last pages are for you." - Book 6, Ch 9, The Grey Havens

I think we can assume that the ending was written not as a witnessed record, but rather the way Sam — who loved Frodo and legends — believed Frodo's story should end.

Buzz
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Misha R
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    Well done for an in-universe supposition. – CGCampbell Sep 24 '19 at 13:12
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    @CGCampbell Also possible in-universe is that Aragorn, who possessed a palantír, and loved Frodo, Bilbo, Gandalf, Elrond, and Galadriel, watched from afar as the ship from the Havens passed into the West, and that the end of Frodo's journey was actually recorded as an in-universe fact which was subsequently passed along to the remaining hobbit members of the Fellowship. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 17:00
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    @Lexible: You should probably make that an actual answer, instead of just adding comments to the existing answers. – Ilmari Karonen Sep 24 '19 at 18:09
  • @Lexible "Possible in-universe" is also that Frodo sailed back, added a post scriptum, then went back to Valinor again. Or sent a letter with an eagle. Or a message in a bottle. All which falls into the category of speculation. – Amarth Sep 24 '19 at 18:40
  • @Amarth Yes. Speculation: just like every answer to this question. Literary flourish by Tolkien: speculation. Literary flourish by Gamgee: speculation. Actual recording of Frodo's fate: speculation. However, I disagree that a ship could have returned; the seas were bent, and there is only a straight path to the West laid out by the grace of the Valar; not a straight path to Middle Earth from Valinor (i.e. I think the Istari's journey was a one-off). – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 18:45
  • the only answer that isn't speculation is the this one - that Sam finished it. Sam was at the Grey Havens and watch Frodo leave, Sam was told he should finish the book. Also - Sam later went on to the Undying Lands himself since he was also a Ring bearer – NKCampbell Sep 24 '19 at 18:55
  • @NKCampbell I do not dispute that Sam Gamgee finished it. I dispute that he could not have finished it as a reliably informed reporter. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 21:36
  • but that's not the question @Lexible – NKCampbell Sep 24 '19 at 21:44
  • @NKCampbell I disagree. The OP wrote "I am not aware of any people or information travel from Valinor back to Middle-earth after the end of the Third Age." And I specifically gave a method of information travel back to Middle Earth with support from Unfinished Tales. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 22:04
  • @Lexible I agree that what you are saying may be plausible in the technical sense, but I do think that we should stick to the syntax of the question - which is how this was recorded. Potential ways they could have managed it is a slightly different question. You could probably come up with more - maybe one of the Eagles got the Valar's permission to check in on them before they made landfall, for instance. But to do that is to actively add content to the story. As far as we know, their last communication was in the Gray Havens. – Misha R Sep 25 '19 at 01:00
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    @MishaR that's fair. I just find the "I am not aware of any people or information travel from Valinor back to Middle-earth after the end of the Third Age." portion of the OP's question interesting. :) – Lexible Sep 25 '19 at 01:01
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    @Lexible No disagreement on that. Plus, according to both Tolkein Gateway and The One Wiki, one of the Palantiri (Stone of Elostirion / Elendil Stone) was on the ship that carried Frodo and the rest. Your proposed method stretches the story a lot less than any I can think of. Might want to add that to your answer, actually. – Misha R Sep 25 '19 at 01:18
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    @Lexible ...Although I see you've addressed that in your answer's comments. – Misha R Sep 25 '19 at 01:27
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    A return ship isn't necessary. The seventh Palantari still looks west, and it's known that messages go back and forth by some means, so it's probably that one. – Joshua Sep 25 '19 at 02:06
  • -1 I think this is a thoughtful answer to a question other than the one the OP asked: "So I was wondering whether this scene could have been recorded in the Red Book (or any other record of Middle-earth), since I am not aware of any people or information travel from Valinor back to Middle-earth after the end of the Third Age." [Emphasis added] – Lexible Sep 27 '19 at 16:18
  • @Lexible I disagree. The question asks for an explanation of how Frodo's arrival in Valinor was recorded, rather than only a proposition of how it could have been recorded. While the part of the question that you quoted supports your interpretation, I don't think it makes sense to ignore the question title. And, while the OP accepted your interpretation of the question, I believe that my answer is reasonable, and that it more accurately reflects the actual intended narrative. – Misha R Sep 27 '19 at 22:04
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It’s not eyewitness testimony, it's a literary flourish

The most likely perpetrators of this are either Samwise Gamgee, its original author, or J.R.R. Tolkien its translator into English. However, it is possible that this flourish was added during the transcription from the Red Book to the Thain's book or in the final transcription back to the manuscript stored in Great Smials that served as Tolkien's reference. If anyone has access to this manuscript and can speak Westron (I can't), they will be able to tell you if the flourish is in that document.

I lean towards Tolkien; it has been argued1 that Tolkien's translations of Beowulf were a work of metafiction rather than a mechanical translation (insofar as anything beyond Google translate can be a mechanical translation). In the case of both the Red Book and Beowulf, while both purport to be a history of real events, from this distance both are legendary which is to say it impossible to determine how much if any is factual and how much is the author recording myth and legend as fact.2

1Vladimir Brljak. "The Books of Lost Tales: Tolkien as Metafictionist." Tolkien Studies 7 (2010): 1-34. https://doi.org/10.1353/tks.0.0079 (accessed September 23, 2019).

2Yes, I know that the LotR is Tolkien's original work but it's more fun to pretend it isn't just like Tolkien did.

Dale M
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    Do we have a question that explains the multiple books you mentioned here? Most people just assume that Tolkien is the original creator of the LotR storyline, but are you saying that there is an entire metafictional universe between Frodo's story and the books as we know them today? – Nzall Sep 24 '19 at 10:01
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    @Nzall yes, https://scifi.stackexchange.com/a/102633. – rchard2scout Sep 24 '19 at 10:38
  • @NZall, I also have a plot of it at the bottom of my answer here, which was taken from here. – Edlothiad Sep 24 '19 at 16:06
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It is possible that Frodo's arrival in Valinor is an accurate recording of factual events in-universe

While, as far as we understand, there are no more immigrants from Valinor (only those heading to Valinor) who could bear tale of Frodo's arrival, there is at least one way for this to be an accurate factual account in Middle Earth.

Aragorn, who at the start of the Fourth Age possesses a palantír, both loved Frodo (friend, companion, hero), Bilbo (old friend), Gandalf (old friend, advisor, leader), Elrond (father in-law, father-like figure), and Galadriel (grandmother in-law, revered Noldo), and had motivation, values, capacity, and right to see visions of the undying lands, may have watched from afar as the ship from the Havens passed into the West. (In Unfinished Tales a note describes one of the stones as being specifically 'oriented' so that it always gazed to "Eressëa in the vanished West," implying that other stones might be directed that way also.) So the end of Frodo's journey may thus actually have been recorded as an in-universe fact which was subsequently passed along to the remaining hobbit members of the Fellowship, for example, when King Elessar visited the Shire, as recorded in the Appendices in Return of the King.

Lexible
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    Waiddaminute here... are you saying righteous Dunedain could use the Palantiri to see the undying lands? Wikipedia says "The Master Stone was kept in the tower of Avallónë on Tol Eressëa, but no record is made of successful communication from any palantír of Middle-earth to this one." – einpoklum Sep 24 '19 at 19:11
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    It is not known whether any chieftan of the Dunedain ever looked into the Emyn Beraid stone (Unfinished Tales, The Palantiri, note 16). It is known that the Emyn Beraid stone was taken from Middle Earth on the same ship that carried Frodo (LoTR appendix A, footnote 24). – Ian Thompson Sep 24 '19 at 20:15
  • @IanThompson The Emyn Beriad stone was oriented towards the 'Master Stone' on Tol Eressëa, but that does not mean, as far as I can tell, that the other stones could not be directed thither. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 21:27
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    @einpoklum I do not take Wikipedia as an authoritative source. Unfinished Tales certainly says that the Emyn Beriad stone was oriented towards the 'Master Stone', which to me implies that any of the stones which could be directed (note RotK w/r/t the Minas Anor stone oriented towards Denethor's burning hands, unless the viewer were strong of will) might also be directed that way. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 21:29
  • @Lexible: Fair enough, but - wouldn't that imply the Dunedain had a constantly-open channel of communications with Valinor? That would be a really big deal. – einpoklum Sep 24 '19 at 21:32
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    @einpoklum To me that is precisely why the palantíri are a big deal. Yes, yes they provide short term tactical advantage for wartime communication, but most time is not war time: most of the time they provide a material spiritual connection for the descendants of Luthien, Beren, etc.—the Numenorian kings and their relatives, perhaps others—to their distant and holy kin. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 21:34
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    @Lexible: But if that connection existed, it's extremely unlikely (IMHO) that history would have progressed as it did. And it doesn't make sense for these kinds of conversations not to have been described anywhere. – einpoklum Sep 24 '19 at 21:36
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    @einpoklum Well... I am less certain about communication as in thought transference, but am much more confident about witnessing. The Akalabeth is clear that the heights of the Meneltarma in Numenor permited the far-sighted to glimpse Tol Eressëa: that's not happenstance; that is a geographic manifestation of the spiritual distance and also relationship between the Numenoreans and the easternmost of the Undying Lands. The palantíri strike me similarly. And the witnessing is, as I wrote above strongly implied by the description of the Emyn Beriad stone's orientation. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 21:40
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    @Lexible --- The Emyn Beraid stone has 'special properties' (The Palantiri, note 2), and is quite different to the others. The most obvious reading (to me at least) is that it is special because it can look back to Tol Eressea, whereas the others cannot. Moreover, The Palantiri gives a detailed description of the capabilities of the six 'ordinary' stones, and nowhere does it suggest that they can see Eressea. – Ian Thompson Sep 24 '19 at 22:15
  • @IanThompson "Special properties" is in the context of "looking only to the sea." Nowehere does it say the other stones cannot also look that way. We disagree about "obvious readings." My interpretation of this you can follow in my comments to einpokum. – Lexible Sep 24 '19 at 22:17
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    @Lexible --- I would say that's a rather odd interpretation of the word 'special'. If the lesser stones can do what the Emyn Beraid stone does and a lot more besides, then surely the Emyn Beraid stone is 'limited', not 'special'. I don't think there is an absolute proof anywhere, though. – Ian Thompson Sep 24 '19 at 22:31
  • @IanThompson That's totally fair (and I did use the word "possible" :). – Lexible Sep 25 '19 at 01:02
  • subsequently passed along to the remaining hobbit members of the Fellowship* Would that have been passed along when the King Elessar visited the Shire , as told in the Appendices? That might be worth adding to this already good answer.
    • – KorvinStarmast Sep 25 '19 at 15:42
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    @KorvinStarmast That is precisely what I was thinking. Of course a courier may have delivered a letter also. :) – Lexible Sep 25 '19 at 15:58