that they can come back. I'm a cock-eyed optimist, and I just don't believe there is anyone who is irredeemable. However long the evil has existed, or difficult the reparations may be, I truly believe that evil is simply against the flow of nature, and that it can be replaced by that which is natural and good.

Sauron gave the rings to human kings as 'gifts of friendship', which Tolkien says were bound to the One Ring without their knowledge. So, I would say they were tricked and deceived. That they became so totally enslaved was, of course, the result of their own greed and lust for power. But if one gorges enough on sweets, one gets sick to one's stomach eventually, and throws up. Likewise with certain beverages! So, while they are superb villains, (I don't know of any other villains in literature who can hold a candle to them! Except, perhaps, Iago in Shakespeare's 'Othello') I still can't see them as totally irredeemable... Destroyed in the physical, yes: I could see that. But an immortal soul can't be destroyed completely, whatever may happen to the vessel that contains it. I'd hate to have their karma, though...