Columns:
Men with a Mission: Inspire greatness
 
 
By: Wouter van de Zandschulp

Sauron's troops are approaching. Orcs destroy innocent people. The entire Middle-Earth soon will be dominated by evilness. Hope seems very small. If Sauron gets the One Ring, all hope will be gone.
"You do not seriously think a hobbit could contempt with the will of Sauron?" Saruman said to Gandalf to show how stupid he was being.
Two hobbits and Smeagol then got all the way to Mount Doom with the Ring. Though not being able to throw the Ring in themselves, their brave actions, among those of countless others, resolved in the rescue of Middle-Earth. Frodo couldn't have done it without Sam. Sam couldn't have done it without Smeagol. None of them would have succeeded without Gandalf the Grey/White. Four simple hobbits from the Shire. A timid gardener who doesn't dare to ask Rosie to dance. Two of them with silly accents, who are called a fool more then once in this epos. And master Frodo. And then great men of Gondor and beyond follow the example of their king and bough before them. And they deserve it.

Our world today. Murder in the streets. People without hope. Bombings, war, stupid people in charge, who above all else desire power. Big time politics seem to be beyond our reach. Yes, so it seems. But in fact, as Sam told, we have to keep fighting when there still are things worth fighting for. All we have to do is do the best with the time that has given to us. We all rule the fate of our world.
We are like those little hobbits. Think about it. And don't give up, believe that a small person can make a difference.

If I took anything away from seeing 'Lord of the Rings - Return of the King', it was that. The Lord of the Rings saga is truly inspiring. It inspires the greatness in all of us. And that's really cool.

It had nice effects too: Legolas killing an elephaunt (that still counts as one), bits with Gandalf and Pippin (yay!) and nice effects. Kind of silly though that we never got to see that Denethor owned a palantir. Now he just seemed to be crazy and desperate and knowing things he normally could not have known. And I missed Saruman, of course.

It had become some sort of tradition for me to be inspired by Lord of the Rings for my last column of the year. I have been writing them for over three years, anyhow. December 2001 I wrote: 'Growing by experience', about the simple little hobbits and the power they gained while returning to the Shire (in the movie they did only need this to gain courage to talk to female hobbits), and in December 2002 I wrote 'Friends between race', inspired by the friendship growing between Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas. And now 'Inspire greatness', inspired by the inspiring of greatness of this third movie.

So next year, I will have to find something else to write about. And there will be other movies in the cinema's. Well, we had fun those three years, while it lasted. Though some things where quite stupid, Peter Jackson did make the best LotR-movies in existence and he did bring Middle-Earth to see before our eyes.

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