I was re-reading the last couple of chapters of the return of the king yesterday. The hobbits are mainly refered to as just their first names, except for in more professional settings. But there’s this one time that stood out to me, where the narrator refers to Frodo as ’Mr. Frodo’. It’s not in on special occasion, theyre just talking about how he’s wearing Arwen’s jewel.
And I was like ”haha it’s almost like Sam wrote it, and forgot that he had to stick with just calling him Frodo.” And then. I just. Yeah. That’s probably exactly what happened. Later in the chapter, when Frodo gives Sam the Red Book, Sam notices that everything, except for the very last few pages of Chapter 80, is unfinished. And LO AND BEHOLD the gray havens chapter is Chapter 80 of the Red Book (the red book of westmarch contains both The Hobbit and the Lord Of The Rings)
So, i was blown away by this obviously. I felt like the Champion Of Lotr Lore for figuring all of this out by myself. But I wanted to make sure I was right, so I googled it. And someone on Reddit had noticed it too!
So yeah, I’m like 99% sure we can pinpoint exactly where Frodo stops writing, and Sam starts. Right down to the sentence. And I think that’s really cool.