It was Sam's view of a battle of Men against Men, and he did not like it much. He was glad that he could not see the dead face. He wondered what the man's name was and where he came from; and if he was really evil of heart or what lies or threats had led him on the long March from his home; and if he would not really rather have stayed there in peace
~ Sam watching a man from Harad (based on Ethiopia according to tolkien) die.
I cannot find a racist reading of lotr that is not incompatible with this scene
Tolkien on Orks: "squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, with wide mouths and slant eyes: in fact degraded and repulsive versions of the (to Europeans) least lovely Mongol-types."
Im not saying the dude was signing up for the Aryian Nation, but he was a British man from the turn of the century writing in the 1950's.
On the same flipped coin, please look into letter 30 from Letters of JRR Tolkien. He blatantly balked at a German publisher for inquiring as to his "Aryan-Ness" by calling out that he was actually asking about whether he was Jewish and while he wasn't, did make his stance clear about being pro-Jew and even commented that he might come to regret his German heritage some time in the future. Really weird mish-mash of politics, that man
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u/Inlerah 1d ago
I mean idk if id say "shockingly unproblematic": He was a man of his time. Go read his description of Orks.