oxbridge-scribbles

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Posted in absentia by @/fish

What a delight it was to limp, crawl, gasp, and wheeze across the @tolkienrsb finish line with @thalion71. Please check out her story below!

are we not brave enough? AO3 link

Rating: M Archive Warnings: graphic violence, major character death Category: Gen Relationship: Eärnur & Vóin, Aragorn & Halbarad Characters: Eärnur, Witch-King of Angmar, Calatúr, Orolang, Vóin, Halbarad, Aragorn, Golodir, Radanir, Gorwen Words: 27,216

2050 T.A.: The Witch-king's challenge to Eärnur is renewed. Eärnur rides to Minas Morgul and is lost.

3018 T.A., September 22: The Black Riders reach Sarn Ford at evening; they drive off the guard of Rangers.

3019 T.A., March 15: The Battle of Pelennor Fields.

On chasing friends and kings and fates.

[oxbridge-scribbles]

[oxbridge-scribbles]

“but Elros his brother chose to abide with Men.”——The Silmarillion

(composition taken from The Accolade by Edmund Leighton)

[oxbridge-scribbles]

WOW

[oxbridge-scribbles]

alla mingalёva

[oxbridge-scribbles]

no webcomic will ever be as funny as this strip from oglaf

[oxbridge-scribbles]

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Súplica

Luthien llega finalmente con Mandos… alias Mictlantecuhtli

:P

para el primer día (Valar) del evento “Semana Tolkien en Latam y el caribe” @tolkienlatamandcaribbeanweek

Los dioses prehispanicos tienen un sentido de la moda a tope…

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Day 28 - if his brother is Argon then it makes sense that he's Neon

Disco Turgon for @oxbridge-scribbles , or what if Gondolin's royal colours were fluorescent

[oxbridge-scribbles]

For Innumerable Stars 2022

Prompt by BloodwingBlackbird for the character group "Farmer Maggot's Dogs & Oromë"

Inspired by the Strength card from the Rider–Waite Tarot deck and an abundance of existential terror. More after the jump.

(Fish's note--Noodle didn't quite finish this note before life intervened but says that the gist of it is here. Having listened to endless moaning about this for the past two months, I can confirm.)

----------------------

I probably intermittently screamed for about half an hour when I saw this character group nestled amongst other (ostensibly) more... approachable groups, but I like to suffer, so I sorrowfully set aside my draft of a M*A*S*H* pastiche set in the Houses of Healing and went on a journey through the gurgling bowels of the internet.

Eventually, I somehow stumbled on the Strength card from the Rider-Waite deck:

"Ah," I said to myself sagely after reading precisely half a Wikipedia article, "Yes."

The Strength card depicts a lion and a woman with a lemniscate (infinity symbol) over her head. Some cards place the woman in a more explicit position of power, while others simply have them cuddling and the like.

Wikipedia says that A. E. Waite says that this card is associated with "power, energy, action, courage, magnanimity; also complete success and honours" while, when reversed, it is associated with "despotism, abuse of power, weakness, discord, sometimes even disgrace."

"Tulkas," I mumbled feverishly, "Melkor. Trees."

Sluggishly, I plumbed Google for some inspiration on Farmer Maggot's dogs. I emerged from that dark road with nothing but their names, which I promptly forgot.

"That lion looks like a hairy dog," I said, "And sure, let's make Oromë genderously ambiguous and worry about everything else later."

Oromë, along with most of the Valar, have always felt a little sinister to me, so the initial plan was to draw Oromë smilingly slitting lion-dog's throat, with the corpses of Nahar and the other two dogs lying around in the foreground. When I proposed this to my dog-loving friend, he stopped just short of attempting to execute me, but it was a near thing.

"But dogs," I pleaded, "Hunting. Death."

"No," he replied.

Defeated, I returned to the internet for inspiration. In the pits of delirium, I stumbled upon this Wikipedia article about Sköll, a wolf that supposedly spends its time chasing the sun.

"Wolves are basically dogs, but hairier," I declared.

From there my fate was sealed. I'm not a fan of hair in general, so Oromë was given a skull to wear, and I made some half-hearted attempts at mushrooms.

As the Strength card is the eighth card in the eight card in the Rider-Waite deck, I had the brilliant idea to substitute an eight-rayed sun for the Roman numerals at the top. Suddenly, I had a draft.

Another early idea I'd had was to show Oromë being hunted by the three dogs, but that didn't seem to fit with the general theme of "Oromë, the magnanimous despot" I was going for, so I nixed it. I did want to have some sort of theme of vengeance, however, so the sköll-dog emerged from a blackened tree, which I imagined to be the withered remains of Laurelin (or even just your run-of-the-mill dead tree) to suggest the role of the Valar in the Darkening.

Time passed. Things got more dramatic. Sköll-dog became a limbless dragon-dog. I became geographically confused, found myself in Japan, and then the sun tragically lost both sunglasses and rays. Lion-dog became problematic. I helpfully forgot Nahar existed.

Eventually, I lost my mind, gave lion-dog a mushroom infection, and decided to digitally burn out the ugliest tree I have ever drawn in my life.

I'm going to take a nap now.

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Day 22 - Ecthelion & Glorfindel, perspective practice

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Day 23 - Finding Ecthelion reborn in the gardens of Lórien

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Day 24 - Thistle King

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Day 25

Getting disturbed ✨

[oxbridge-scribbles]

Day 24 - Beans & Baozi <333

@toastedbuckwheat more winter fluff, a warm breakfast on a snowy day :3

[oxbridge-scribbles]

“You are unarmoured,” Glorfindel says, and turns to his captain, “Ready Asfaloth and six spears.”

“Nay,” Ecthelion commands sharply, “Six spears and I alone will ride forth.”

As he draws his sword, his sleeve falls back, and golden flowers bloom sweetly.

Day 26 - toastedbuckwheat vs horses Ecthelion rushing to the Gates, based on What Pride Has Wrought by @oxbridge-scribbles

[oxbridge-scribbles]

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion: At the beginning of the world there were two trees, one silver and one gold, brought forth by the song of Yavanna, Valar of Earth, and the tears of Nienna, Valar of Mercy.

C.S. Lewis, The Magician's Nephew: At the beginning of the world there were two trees, one silver and one gold, because some coins fell out of a guy's pocket lol