Oxonmoot 2022

Ageing is a thematic undercurrent throughout Middle-earth’s history due to Tolkien’s preoccupation with death and ageing. Ageing is a key concern in bioethics because of the common medicalisation of the process that takes interventionist tactics to mask its ‘negative’ signs. Tolkien’s treatment of ageing bodies in Middle-earth provides a kaleidoscopic vantage to navigate ethical perspectives on ageing through the multiple ‘species’ exhibiting its consequences through a symbiotic relationship to the environment. The legendarium follows Middle-earth’s inhabitation by multiple long-lived sentient beings, such as Elves and Dwarves, to the gradual degeneration of the environment and their lifespan. These approaches to ageing bodies span from intervention to acceptance; thus, allowing a space to apply a bioethical framework to pursue philosophical queries. Thus, a fundamental question in bioethics and the legendarium is this paper’s central query: what does it mean to age well?