#(don't ask how there's more elves with inflicting idk)

[book-lover85]

Sophie as an inflicting mentor and she exclusively refers to Bronte as "old man"

he knows and hates it

[elfroot-and-laurels-moved]

never gonna pass up a request to infodump about my lotro blorbo hehe. I feel like you probably already know a bit about Ethedis' backstory, but idk how much lol (I never posted a proper bio for her on tumblr but I keep meaning to do that)

Anyway Ethedis is the daughter of everyone's favorite Elf Who Dies In The First 5 Minutes Of The Game, Talagan Silvertongue!

She was just a baby when he died in the fall of Edhelion, (making her just around 350 years old in present time. baby.) and years after that her mother became too consumed by grief and had to sail while Ethedis was still very young. Elrond took her under his wing after that, and under his guidance she became a loremaster. Her story follows the epic line pretty closely after that point, and she gets embroiled in The War very quickly while trying to avenge her father (idk how much more I should say on that front, I'm trying to avoid too many spoilers for any new players who might see this)

Anyway she's generally very bright and cheerful (canonically being one of the tra-la-la-lally elves from The Hobbit), but the epic line inflicts some Big Trauma™ on her pretty quickly, and it only gets worse from there. Soon enough her sunshine-y demeanor becomes less of a natural expression, and more of a mask she has to maintain to keep herself and her allies from falling into despair. She's told that she has an ability to inspire hope in those around her, which becomes a great burden to bear. She gets it into her head that, because fear and despair are weapons of the Enemy, openly expressing her doubts is something she Absolutely Cannot Do. She's told that she is a light in the darkness, a warmth amidst the cold, and she feels that she's not allowed to be anything else.

She has to eventually learn to open up to her friends about her feelings, learn that she's allowed to be sad around them and that her sorrow isn't some malevolent force that will drag down everyone around her, that she's allowed to need help too, and her friends want to help her. Also she's best friends with my other PC and Traumatized Ranger, Tossdir! (thought about sending in his backstory, but I don't know if you've played Before the Shadow yet and his backstory like, entirely consists of spoilers for that lmao)

And some Miscellaneous Facts about her:

She was friends with Corunir before he went to Angmar and the assumed dead, pestering him with questions about Dunedain history and generally dragging him into her shenanigans whenever he was in Rivendell. it was... not very pleasant for her to hear the other Rangers eventually start referring to him in the past-tense whenever she asked about him.

her in-game surname, Silverspring, comes from both of her parents' names (Silver from "Silvertongue" and spring from her mother's name Ethuilas, "spring leaf")

Will Not Stop Befriending Rangers (even though they keep dying and breaking her heart)

she's not a half-elf or anyone who would otherwise be granted Luthien's Choice™. Despite this, I'm going to find some way for her to get into the human afterlife. She and her best friend Tossdir are a set, you see, I cannot separate them. the Power of Friendship can break the rules, as a treat.

She's also friends with Arwen! There's uh, a lot of internal angst with her about that. Wishing she had the same choice Arwen has, then guilt over that jealously, sorrow at the prospect of losing another friend to a mortal fate, all that fun stuff. (because for most of her story she doesn't believe she can achieve a mortality, and only gets that option after Tossdir and Corunir are dead)

consequently, the knowledge that her friends will eventually die is slowly eating her alive <3 (I promised to give her story a happy ending, never said I'd be nice with how I got there)

Ethedis I care you 🩵

[child-of-hurin]

I'm going to weight in with my two cents if you don't mind!

I tend to think of three points here: the non-banality of violence, the notion that some people might simply refuse Mandos's summons and become ghosts or something else, even more lost, and MY FAVORITE, which is that this is all belief. IDK if anyone has actually met a reincarnated elf. The Silm says Finrod walks with his father beneath the trees of Valinor, but has anyone seen this?

I think fandom really underplays just how much of the Cosmology presented in the Silm is the Noldorin translation of what their parents, and their parents' parents, were able to parse from their Valinorian interactions (plus the fact the Valar themselves don't actually know everything to minute detail and are themselves parsing it, even according to these Valinorian sources). To understand the Silm on a deeper level like this I think it's essential to look at it from the angle of the second and third ages.. That's just my opinion though ofc!

Besides, I do think that, in the elf perspective of the elf existence, they're not meant to die. This is where you can close your eyes and try to approach a different existence; supposing maybe elf biology itself lends them a different way of being in the world than that of mortals (I am aware of how problematic this approach might be depending on where you go with it, but I also think it's something the text offers, idk). It is a fact that in the Silm, we are to understand that death is something extremely grave and unnatural for an elf, like you said. Míriel's suicide is a huge taboo in Valinor; the Kinslaying is the inflicting of death on others. It just seems like Noldorin culture takes that pretty hard: death, especially inflicted by another elf, is the center taboo of their culture (it's what it seems to me tbh, especially looking at elves in the second and third age)

Regarding humans... My understanding is that the Silm is elf, specifically Noldorin, cosmology, so to me it makes perfect sense that it doesn't care as much for Dwarven and Mortal cosmology or culture...I don't know a lot about Dwarves, sadly, so I can't offer an input here (and I just realize most Dwarf lovers I knew aren't around on tumblr anymore so I can't ask them :'( except @misbehavingmaiar if u have any thoughts...?)

We don't get a lot of Edain cosmology, but to me, from what little we get in Númenor + the super obscure tale of Adanel buried somewhere in HoME, it feels like their idea of Fall/their formative cultural memory event is linchpinned by slavery rather than murder itself. Which is why it's so fundamental when it happens again in the Akallabêth. I might be wrong, but it is my understanding that slavery (and sacrifice) are the thresholds/taboos/traumatic event of Edainic culture in the legendarium, even if fear of death is what takes them there. So, as I personally understand it, just like the Kinslaying, meaning elf inflicting death on another elf, is the traumatic event that keeps happening in the time of the Noldor, slavery and sacrifice is that for the Edain.

Ok so something that’s always bothered me about the legendarium is like. If you’re an elf and you get murdered, you’re basically fine. Mandos spits you up back in Valinor you get a tearful reunion—if your name is Glorfindel you might even get to go back to middle earth

But the thing is no one really acts like that’s the case?? Like people avenge each other and they mourn—and things like Elwing leaping to her death is very clearly not being treated like her just like closing out to the new character creation screen. It’s clearly supposed to be a suicide but that concept doesn’t mean anything if she can’t actually die. What is maglor lamenting about if everyone’s fine. Like I guess his families kinda fucked but like you know

And then of course the kinslayings are treated as a much bigger deal than human murder, which is significantly less reversible, so like—

[linguisticparadox]

@bronweathanharthad I'm answering this as a new post because tumblr's ask-answering format is shit on mobile

So for Sam (presumably Gamgee :3):

Headcanon A:  realistic

Sam is autistic, or at least has some form of learning disability. He's once described as having a "slow but shrewd mind." And he's canonically clumsy, and super into Elves. Like. Come on.

Headcanon B: while it may not be realistic it is hilarious

Man how can I improve on actual canon? Sam is the most wholesomely funny character I've ever seen in my life.

Headcanon C: heart-crushing and awful, but fun to inflict on friends

Ok I know we all love the Gaffer and we love that Sam loves the Gaffer but...I mean I wouldn't go so far as to say he's abusive...but he really seems to have fucked up Sam's sense of self-worth with all the "nowt but a ninnyhammer" talk. I guess it came from a place of "tough love", like the Gaffer was like "Okay Sam you are not exactly bright and you were born into the working class so I need to make sure you do okay in life and that means getting in good with the Bagginses."

Which is probably a big part of what made Sam so fiercely protective and lbr fiercely servile towards Frodo. The movies glossed over the latter and that I think has affected the wider fanon interpretations (possibly for the better tbh), but in the book we have stuff like Sam begging to wait on Frodo at the feast in Rivendell. But also, Tolkien said in one letter that Sam was "deep-down very conceited" but this was transformed by his love for Frodo.

So it's like...I think the Gaffer got it ingrained in Sam that "all you're good for is to serve your betters" so Sam was like "fuck yeah I'm gonna serve the SHIT out of Mr. Frodo, I'm gonna be the best servant EVER" but then fortunately Frodo (like Bilbo before him) was a genuinely good person (remember when Sam fell asleep on watch I think and Frodo told him not to think of any of his Gaffer's hard names?) and so it became less "I'm gonna be the best servant because I'm awesome and so my dad will be proud of me" and more "I'm gonna be the best servant because Mr. Frodo is wonderful and deserves to be cared for and protected."

Uh this got a little off-track but basically I don't think Sam's relationship with the Gaffer was all that healthy and it gave him kind of a Complex and thank Eru for Frodo honestly.

Headcanon D: unrealistic, but I will disregard canon about it because I reject canon reality and substitute my own.

My own headcanon for FrodoxSam is that over the course of the Quest they grow into a qpr, probably by the time of the beautiful little "I love him whether or no" scene, because I get a vibe from Sam there that's like "Idk what exactly I'm feeling rn but it's definitely some kind of love and that's good enough for me." Also I hc Frodo as aroace, for a lot of different reasons including but not limited to "it's a free country and I wanna see the a-spec side of me in a hero I love." ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

But I also think it's more than reasonable to think Sam had a huge hero-worship blush-inducing ridiculous crush on Frodo at the beginning of the book, before they got closer during the Quest and their feelings for each other shifted and synced up into qpr territory. Merry (I think?) says something like "Sam would jump down a dragon's throat to save you, Frodo, if he didn't trip over his own feet," and that's when they're still in the Shire (and that goes well beyond just being a good servant honestly, whatever excuse Sam himself might give)!

So even if Frodo is aroace and even if their relationship ended up as a qpr I do think Sam is bi or pan (even leaving aside alterous attraction). Idk about split-attraction model specifics like demiromantic or asexual but Sam is definitely into women (Rosie mostly) and into men (unless Frodo's nb which is a hc I toy with sometimes, but regardless Sam's into multiple genders).

Ofc if Sam and Frodo are romantically (and/or sexually) involved then I quite like the idea of poly Frodo/Sam/Rosie, with or without anything going on between Frodo and Rosie. Sam/Rosie is too adorable and pure to write off as a cover-up and Sam has 2 hands.

Of course the main reason this all falls under Unrealistic is because I have no idea how Tolkien would have felt about all this Queer Nonsense. Given he was a Catholic I'm not too hopeful for a more positive reaction than "wow well that sure is a theory and you have every right to it even though it's not what I was really going for." I've heard he apparently knew queer people and thought highly of some queer literature, but there's a difference between that and actually writing queer characters or accepting queer interpretations of your own characters.

I'm actually really curious what might come out over the years, as Tolkien's immediate relatives die off and his writings are left in the hands of more distant relatives and scholars. God knows Christopher Tolkien seems to have been keen on publishing and thoroughly analyzing every scrap of his father's writing, but who knows what he might have held back, or what his father might have hidden away from him (eg extra chapters with lots of smooches)? So, I'm hopeful, but not really expecting too much.