Tolkien's Fall Mortality and the Machine

For me the overarching core is what he called fall mortality and the machine. By which he means every species if you will in Middle Earth experiences some kind of fall. So Mel Kort is the most obvious example but the elves fall. In the second age it's a lot more subtle. These are particularly for the Noldor, who have not gone back to Valinor or whatever reason. But they are trying to preserve Middle Earth as a sort of an echo of Valinorwhich is to go against the national order of things. And this is what's going to lead them into the temptation of making rings of healing and preservation. Clinging possessiveness was one of the nine themes

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