The Beauty and the Sorrow of Tolkien

Tolkien is approaching a new form of the Odyssey here, explaining the problem of pain and this sort of narrative form. The idea is that you cannot actually get things to be as beautiful as they are without mixing them in with this element of tragedy. When Frodo and Sam are on the stairs of Cute at Ungol, they don't want to be there. And yet you take pleasure from reading about them being there and imagining yourself there. So what's that about? There's a lot more that can be said about that, but I want to draw attention to the idea that the beauty and sorrow are always connected.