Books four and five of The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien discuss the corruption and hunt for power through the One Ring, shown by the goals of many characters in this section of the novel. Characters such as Gollum, who were helping the protagonists, show their true intentions of strength and power with the help of the ring. Power in The Lord of the Rings is seized through any means necessary, therefore expressing similar themes of betrayal and corruption when referenced power in Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago.
Book four ends with Frodo, Sam, and Gollum entering a cave, under Gollum’s advice, as a secret entrance to Mordor to be able to destroy the One Ring. They are attacked by a spider-like creature and Frodo is taken by orcs, but Sam escapes and follows him. Book five deals with the other protagonists such as Gandalf and Pippin preparing for and eventually fighting a great battle for the city of Minas Tirith. In chapter nine of book four, right before Frodo is paralyzed by Shelob, the spider creature, Sam is about to yell out a warning but is stopped by Gollum. While Gollum is holding Sam back, he states “At last, my precious, we’ve got him, yes, the nassty hobbit. We takes this one. She’ll get the other. O yes, Shelob will get him, not Smeagol: he promised; he won’t hurt Master at all” (Tolkien 726). This line shows that Gollum was pretending to help the hobbits, and was always after the ring. He has always been corrupted by the ring, and would do anything for the power that he once had when he possessed it.
In chapter three of Part four of The Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn discusses the qualities of a person living in a totalitarian regime when compared with the life of someone living in what he considers a free area. Two of the qualities he mentions are betrayal and corruption. Solzhenitsyn states that “the mildest and at the same time most widespread form of betrayal was not to do anything bad directly, but just not to notice the doomed person next to one…” (323). This occurs constantly throughout The Lord of the Rings, with Gollum and others refusing to help. The scene where Gollum stops Sam from saving Frodo shows both the direct betrayal of his “master” as well as the betrayal of refusing to notice what could happen to Frodo; he could die and the ring could be lost. This specific type of betrayal is also shown in book five, when Denethor, the steward of Gondor, ignores those who need help. He silences Gandalf’s warnings, and when his city is actually invaded, he runs away and locks himself in his tower. Denethor’s greatest want was the ring, and its corruptive powers are shown through his actions, transitioning Denethor from a strong leader to a cowardly fool.