maenefa

[maenefa]

best m/f dynamic is a flamboyant bisexual show-off desperately in love with an extremely practical girl who’s difficult to impress 🤩

[maenefa]

personally? i enjoy being a fan of characters who have done Wrong. i like when a character is not a perfect victim, has hurt people, has transgressed, has done bad things. sometimes its nice to feel the sting yknow? and to recognize that a character is not a flawless perfect victim, but is deserving of understanding and compassion anyway. a lot of people in fandom refuse to let go of moral absolutism and its... rough.

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‘I appreciate the history, Arwen, but this tale is much more beautiful in song.’

‘Then please, I would love to hear it.’

Éowyn and Arwen, having a relaxing evening after a long day of being the coolest people in Middle Earth, yet again. I love the idea of post-war peace, sharing cultures and skills and political acumen together. Learning and navigating the start of the Fourth Age.

I thought this might be day 2 - friendship, for @tolkiengenweek but I think it might come under day 5 - culture, too and much like my decision making, my life is a shambles and I missed day 2, so day 5 it is!

[maenefa]

I don’t agree with this fanon interpretation and won’t tag the meme since the author didn’t ask for opinions. But would Celebrimbor really avoid his Noldorin pride, heritage, and Fëanorian blood? Was he really ashamed of it? Nope. He is so unapologetically himself that he literally carved a giant Fëanorian star on the Doors of Durin.

[maenefa]

atarinkë 🕯️

[maenefa]

Very beautifully put! And this makes me even sadder about Denethor’s “pale smile, like a gleam of cold sun on a winter’s evening.” Tolkien subtly associates Eowyn and Denethor, but of course Denethor is doomed, so the sun is setting on him. His winter will never become spring.

Beyond ice & snow; or, seasonal imagery in Eowyn’s character arc:

It’s been well-acknowledged that Éowyn is frequently paired with snow and ice imagery. There are some excellent and thoughtful analyses of that imagery; yet, most that I’ve seen tend to analyze that imagery in a static way, rather than as part of a dynamic character arc with correspondingly dynamic seasonal imagery. Indeed, most suggest that the snow/ice/pale/cold imagery represents her emotional state (read: her depression, her isolation, her traumatic situation) during the war of the ring; or, her perception by others (read: the male characters) as cold and remote and isolated, perhaps with a tinge of innocence (~*~snow~*~) thrown in there. I think there’s a lot of merit to those analyses, and I’m not trying to counter them. Instead, think of this post as a “yes, and” to those arguments: yes, and, I think that we don’t take our analyses of the snow/ice/winter imagery far enough.

Indeed, I have now convinced myself (and hope to convince you, dear reader!) that the snow and ice imagery is actually part of a greater seasonal arc that Tolkien intended for Éowyn, wherein the culmination of her story is one of a transition from winter (depression, hopelessness) to spring (hope, growth). I think Tolkien intentionally sprinkles the seeds of this seasonal arc throughout her storyline, and taken together with the material events she experiences, we can see that her relationship with Faramir and choice to be a healer is not her “settling” or “compromising her values” at all, but rather a natural transition into a new version of herself; much as winter melts into spring. Thus, I argue that the narrative never completely consigns her to a cold, remote doom; rather her narrative always retained the possibility for her to pass through that winter into a state of flourishing spring.

Are you with me? Alright, then first, let’s talk about the season in which we first meet Éowyn; this perceived state of winter ice:

Before we get into the imagery, I think it’s important to first acknowledge that “winter” in Tolkien can be used as a euphemism for depression and despair (notably, in the Silmarillion, Thingol experiences “winter” after Lúthien’s spirit leaves her body and follows Beren to the halls of Mandos). Given Éowyn’s desperate and isolated situation, I think it is eminently clear that she is experiencing “winter”. Indeed, when we meet Éowyn, she has long been bereft of hope, and she only sees a future of death for herself (which is critical to the decisions she makes in the story). A lot of excellent analysis has been done to unpack her depression, anger, and the danger that she is experiencing when we first meet her, so I won’t belabor that here, but I am happy to provide references if anyone is interested. That said, given that context, I do think the ice and snow imagery that is used for her is meant to emphasize that emotional reality and underscore the hopelessness that she is experiencing. Now lets get into the actual imagery:

One of the first descriptions of her reads:

“Grave and thoughtful was her glance, as she looked on the king with cool pity in her eyes. Very fair was her face, and her long hair was like a river of gold. Slender and tall she was in her white robe girt with silver; but strong she seemed, and stern as steel, a daughter of kings. Thus Aragorn for the first time in the full light of day beheld Éowyn, Lady of Rohan, and thought her fair, fair and cold, like a morning of pale spring that is not yet come to womanhood.” (Lord of the Rings, 515).

So yes, in this description we get color imagery- white, silver, gold, and we get a comparison to metal to convey her sternness. We even get an overt reference to temperature in terms of her pity being cool. All of this comes together to give a picture of someone beautiful, but sad and stern, remote, and icy, frozen in her despair. Yet, even in this initial description, Éowyn is already poised for a change. She isn’t even directly likened to the season of winter, the way other depressed/doomed actors in the legendarium are (e.g. the winter of Thingol (Silm 221); the “springless autumn” Faramir describes for Gondor (LOTR 677)).

Instead, Éowyn, at the outset, is described in terms of “pale spring”, and as someone “that is not yet” come to the fullness of their arc. Already the narrative instills in us a sense of possible growth for Éowyn; though she does not yet see hope or change in her future, that possibility remains; much as the cold days of early spring seem distant from the warmth and life that is due to come with the fullness of that season.

We get a little more seasonal imagery insight into this moment when Aragorn reflects on it in the Houses of Healing:

“When I first looked on her and perceived her unhappiness, it seemed to me that I saw a white flower standing straight and proud, shapely as a lily, and yet knew that it was hard, as if wrought by elf-wrights out of steel. Or was it, maybe, a frost that had turned its sap to ice, and so it stood, bitter-sweet, still fair to see, but stricken, soon to fall and die?” (LOTR, 866)

When combined with the passage above, I think the imagery here gives a sense that in early March 3019, Éowyn is wavering on the edge of spring. This is underscored by Aragorn’s use of “maybe”; she may be doomed to fall to a late frost, as many of spring’s first flowers do, but, critically, that doom is not a foregone conclusion. She may also yet survive, and her hardness may not be due to frost at all; she may rather be a flower carved of metal – strong and enduring. It remains to be seen what lies beneath, what her fate will be. The possibility for her spring is always there; what is uncertain is whether she will be able to progress through the fullness of her arc, or whether she will meet a premature end, like a flower that has bloomed too early.

This theme of “wavering on the edge” continues throughout the scene where Éowyn wakes. Aragorn tells Éomer that he can heal her in body, but if she wakes to despair then “she will die”(LOTR, 867). A few moments later, when she wakes, Gandalf is a little presumptious and tries to put words in Éowyn’s mouth by telling her that he’s glad to see her awakened to hope. She immediately corrects him and tells him “to hope? I do not know”(LOTR 868). Thus, the uncertainty of Éowyn’s fate remains; she herself does not even know whether she has cause to hope. She remains wavering on the edge of spring.

I wrote previously about the significance that I see in the sensory imagery that accompanies the athelas used to awaken Éowyn (and Faramir and Merry). I think that imagery has some significance here too, because it further develops the “spring” imagery used for Éowyn.

“…the sweet influence of the herb stole about the chamber it seemed to those who stood by that a keen wind blew through the window, and it bore no scent, but was an air wholly fresh and clean and young, as if it had not before been breathed by any living thing and came new-made from snowy mountains high beneath a dome of stars” (LOTR 868).

Yes, we get “snowy mountains” here, but the overwhelming seasonal sense is not one of winter, but of spring “sweet influence” “keen wind” “fresh and clean and young” all evoke a sense of the new life, awakening, and renewal that comes with spring. Though Éowyn’s fate remains uncertain in this scene, I think that the scent of the athelas gives us a hint that something is about to shift in her character arc, and that she may indeed move past her personal winter.

Now lets talk about that shift to spring:

Instead of dying, as she intends when she rides to war, Éowyn wakes in the Houses of Healing and ends up meeting Faramir, who (I won't go into this in detail in this post, but there is plenty of textual evidence for it) has experienced a number of parallel traumas as she. The two of them grow close, and that relationship, combined with the very key fact that Sauron is, in fact, defeated allows her to begin to see a different path for her future. The realization of that different path culminates in the "suddenly her winter passed" line. However, I don't think the change is a actually sudden one: at that point she has been in the Houses for several weeks, and I think that realization builds for that entire time. Tolkien alludes to the slowness of this transition in his continued use of winter/spring imagery throughout this arc, for example:

“She did not answer, but as he looked at her it seemed to him that something in her softened, as though a bitter frost were yielding at the first faint presage of spring”. (pg. 960, when she first speaks with Faramir) “A tear sprang in her eye and fell down her cheek, like a glistening rain-drop” (960)

Faramir immediately notices the season of spring within Éowyn, and through his POV, we now see spring as not a possibility, but rather something concrete: the frost is yielding to spring; this is a “presage”, a sign that something is happening, no longer just a “maybe”. Rain-drops, of course, are intrinsic to spring; we no longer get imagery of ice and frost but of living flowing water, again a sign of Éowyn’s active progression out of winter. Furthering the spring imagery, Faramir even compares her to a “flower” a few lines later, one of the most quintessential symbols of that season. Over the next few weeks, in story, we get more signs of spring for Éowyn: she and Faramir walk in the gardens, beneath “green trees”, they sit on “grass”, they are literally in “gardens”; all of these evoke a sense of growth and new life. Then we get to the climactic moment, where:

“Then the heart of Éowyn changed, or at last she understood it. And suddenly her winter passed, and the sun shone on her.” (964)

This line doesn’t require much analysis because it’s quite clear: Éowyn’s winter passes. She transitions out of that season. The imagery in the paragraphs that follow reinforce this: she declares that she will love things that “grow and are not barren”; she and Faramir will go to Ithilien and “make a garden” where “all things will grow with joy” (965); they stand under the “sunlit sky” and a “light [shines] about them”. All of these pieces of imagery come together to reinforce the literal statement that Tolkien has just made: Éowyn’s winter has fallen away, and she is now fully in a season of growth, joy, abundance, and light. What was always a possibility has now become Éowyn’s reality.

Moreover, just as the passing of one season into another does not represent a stark shift, but rather a natural process; in making the transition out of her "winter", I don't think Éowyn abandons her previous self; but rather, she evolves-- ("I will be a shieldmaiden no longer, nor vie with the great Riders, nor take joy only in the songs of slaying"). Tolkien's inclusion of "only" here feels very poignant: he's not saying that she will never again take joy in songs of slaying, but that she will find joy in other places also. I interpret this to mean that she now sees a path for herself where she can still be her innate self, but also find joy in things that she had not previously had access to. Now that war has ceased, she is able to aspire to more than death, and she sees new ways in which she might be happy and fulfilled.

Altogether, I don't think she abandons her values (as some have tried to argue), but instead steps into a new version of herself, where she retains her values ( I imagine her life with Faramir in the 4th age to still be filled with plenty of excitement and adventure; I don't see her suddenly becoming a homebody housewife); yet, she also sees the ways in which her previous expression of those values was built in depression, hopelessness, and isolation (“winter���). She chooses a new path forward for herself where she is more fulfilled, and is allowed to blossom into a fuller version of herself with someone who accepts her for exactly who she is.

Éowyn's arc at the end of ROTK is thus one of the transition from winter to spring. We see Tolkien plant the seeds of that arc throughout the story. Though we meet her in an icy and frozen state, the imagery associated with her reveals that, even at the outset, she is not necessarily doomed to stay there. Instead, the possibility of spring lies ever before her. Yet, it is only through the events of the story, and the imagery that Tolkien pairs with them, that we see this possibility blossom into Éowyn’s reality.

[maenefa]

Sam is cooking

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The Passing of Elves

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“War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.”

[maenefa]

A week later, and "aure entuluva bitches" is still swimming in my head rent-free

dude, same.

Húrin, ready to take some heads:

[maenefa]

Hey girl Did you know that um The musical leitmotif you hear after Gandalf's death actually appears three (3) times throughout the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Its first and most famous appearance is after Gandalf's death in Moria in FOTR, where it's sung by a lone vocalist. (While most of the vocal bits in the soundtrack are in Elvish/dwarvish, this one bit of the soundtrack is entirely wordless, conveying the idea of "suffering beyond words"-- like that moment later on where Legolas is unable to translate elven singing because "the grief is too near.)

The second time we hear the leitmotif is in Return of the King, when Mount Doom erupts and Gandalf thinks Frodo is dead. But now the meaning is reversed; it's Gandalf who believes Frodo is dead. [3:00 of the first video, and the beginning of the second.]

The last time is at the Grey Havens, when Gandalf says a final farewell to all of the hobbits.

One thing I haven't seen discussed very often is that this motif is tied to Frodo and Gandalf specifically--- and the way it develops mirrors the way their dynamic changes.

In FOTR, Gandalf dies sacrificing himself to protect the Fellowship, and Frodo is overwhelmed with guilt and grief. In ROTK, it appears that Frodo sacrifices himself to defend Middle Earth, as Gandalf is overwhelmed with guilt and grief.

In FOTR, Frodo is forced to confront that the even his powerful 'mentor figures' are still human, fallible, and able to be taken away from him; in ROTK, Gandalf witness the aftermath of Frodo destroying the Ring, proving that even this small unassuming hobbit can have this unimaginable capacity for strength and self-sacrifice.

Finally, the two of them journey into the Grey Havens together, because neither of them really survived.

In a way-- Frodo died in Mount Doom, as Gandalf died in Moria.

They've returned to life, they were called back. Gandalf was called back by forces "beyond thought and time," Frodo was called back by Sam's refusal to let go of him. But despite being recalled to life, they're permanently changed, transformed in a way that means they no longer belong in Middle Earth. They have to go across the sea.

The use of this leitmotif is so excellent because it captures that thematic beat perfectly. The motif becomes a goodbye that both of them say to the Fellowship.

[maenefa]

"...and Eärendil took her to his bosom; but in the morning with marvelling eyes he beheld his wife in her own form beside him with her hair upon his face, and she slept."

[maenefa]

Elrond as viewed by Númenoreans is hilarious. Aristocracy is one thing, and their long kept histories and direct descent from the elves.

But someone lowborn - still educated, still familiar with the stories. Faithful or not. Lifespan lower than the upper class, but longer than other humans - but that doesn't matter - thousands of years is a long time. The Roman Empire was more recent than this guy.

Because imagine the founder of your nation and its first king, who was told to have been born as the son of a bird and a star, lived to be 500, and who died 2000 years ago. Just. Has a sibling. Who is still running around. You can go visit him. You can! He's very friendly. He wrote the medical book your healers study from. He updates it religiously every other decade. You don't hear from him often because he lives fairly secluded from society and seems to prefer a quiet life but every few hundred years something batshit insane happens and he's right there. At the center of things. Pretending to be a background character, as if Sauron didn't look warily at him expecting him to turn into another Lúthien incident. Maybe he's shy?

You are a sailor. You meet him on one of your journeys to Middle Earth.

He's not shy. He's just crown-phobic. He looks like every single painting of Tar-Minyatur you've seen. He glitters under starlight. Literally. His parents are a bird and a star and you keep forgetting that's not a metaphor. Everyone is in love with him. He sings to the birds. He has had a slowburn one-sided romance going on for the past 1000 years. His crush has yet to find out but the king is running a betting pool.

[maenefa]

have you seen boromir the tall by moon or starlight?

[maenefa]

Gandalf and Pippin, one of my favourite friendships in Middle Earth (and one of the things they got the most wrong in the Peter Jackson films). I love their banter, I love the way Pippin looks to Gandalf for answers, I love how soft and personal Gandalf can be when he sees that Pippin needs it.

This illustration is a scene from this incredible fic, written by my amazing partner @rosemary-andtime. The films may have got Gandalf and Pippin wrong, but she got them exactly right. (Warning, it WILL shred your heart into little beautiful tear-stained pieces in the best of ways).

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Melian wip

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house of the stewards everyone lives!modernAU! road trip concept:

boromir in the front seat pointing out interesting landmarks and billboards

denethor in the back seat alternating between pondering his palantir and proffering grumpy commentary

findiulas driving because she’s by far the most composed and competent

faramir in the back seat checked out with a history book