#celegorm: *narrating* so this might have been a bad idea

[armenelols]

I am not normal about Dior. My man grew up around someone who made Morgoth sleep and Mandos cry and around sassy shit Beren I-have-silmaril-in-my-hand *shows stump* Erchamion. He was 30 and went against idk how old but at least thousand-something Celegorm who trained under Oromë and was, like, the best hunter around? And WON. I mean, Dior himself dying notwithstanding, he actually killed Celegorm. He was 30? Give or take. My man was a BABY for a half-elf, this man had to be absolutely FERAL to achieve that. I bet he bites.

[galadhremmin]

We have derived Caranthir liking the Dwarves (and vice versa) because apparently, Finrod succeeds in every field Caranthir fails, and at this point it's clear this derives from the in-universe writer of the Silm and his own biases. Think about it: "Dark Finwë" , a grumpy, prejudiced lordling, and "Hair Champion", most handsome, noble king, have met with the same people!! Yet the king of the first secret kingdom is everyone's friend, but the prince that trades with them regularly is not... seems sus.

Hence, Caranthir is friends with the Dwarves. (But that is just an interpretation, so you're free to think what you wish, I just have several opinions on in-universe prejudice and the almighty narrative.)

I think that 'we' might actually have been Dawn Felagund years ago. Maybe this reading existed even before that, but I doubt that-- she's been very influential in silm fandom and was long before tumblr was much of a thing. https://dawnfelagund.com/caranthir-the-slandered

I wouldn't say it's 'clear' that what amounts to Caranthir's entire documented personality derives from the bias of the in-universe narrator, though as you can see from Dawn's writing it's a reading you can argue for. There are a number of different approaches you can take to the Silm and its biases anyway. One of the few times when it's absolutely clear the text isn't telling the entire story is when it talks about the Easterlings. I've posted about this before but the recorded names are, uhh.... the ones to betray the elves are unlikely to actually have been named things like 'ugly lord' and 'ugly beard.' 'Dark Finwe' on the other hand is a documented reference to his haircolour being dark like Finwe's own; hardly a negative judgement!

I personally think Caranthir can be exactly as ill-tempered and prejudiced as the Silm paints him without becoming an unsympathetic character. If a writer cannot make a moody, deeply prejudiced man an interesting character that is a failure as a writer; there are after all enough books who manage exactly that. That is not to say choosing not to write him that way is a failure (obviously not), but it's not necessary in order to make a reader feel for him at all.

Just going by the text, I think it actually might make for a more interesting narrative to explore in fic to me. Because he does change his mind about something, and at a very specific moment; when he meets the Haladin. That is much less dramatic if he secretly been as nice and popular as Finrod, and got along with everyone all the time already. He's been raised by Fëanor, who said things like 'No other race shall oust us!' and rallied the Noldor not motivated enough by vengeance for Finwë alone by playing on their deep-seated fear of being replaced by the Secondborn. Very unlikely that had no impact. At best it has made him uninterested in humans in his area (while they're not much of a threat to ruling instead of the elves anyway). The text says they paid them no heed.

And yet! Caranthir sees how brave Haleth and her people are. He 'does her great honour.' He changes his mind and offers them lands. His tragedy to me is not that of a slandered figure, but of this deeply, deeply prejudiced person raised to distrust the motivations of human beings -- who overcomes those beliefs, offers friendship, is rejected! then extends that same trust to the Easterlings anyway... and it's those specific Easterlings, not the ones who ally with his brothers-- who betray them all. And cause the disastrous ending of the Nirnaeth. It's the 'to evil end shall all things turn that they begin well' part of the curse hitting him in the least fair way possible. Someone finally changes for the better, and the outcome is treason and destruction.

That is a very good character arc to me, actually. His aesthetics-based scorn for the Dwarves is reprehensible but strikes me as deeply Elvish, and part of his prejudices. Naugrim is too unflattering a name for them for it not to be common. His temper-- well why can't he have one? Sure there's only one recorded instance -- but that's imo because there are hardly any conversations in the Silm! Anyway I like some people with tempers well enough. Personally I think people are missing out on opiniated grouches.

Obviously the biased anti-Feanorian Pengolodh reading is a nice one, and I have enjoyed a lot of stories written based it. But it's not at all a reading that is necessary for me to read Caranthir as a flawed but sympathetic character. He can have serious faults and still, ultimately, be someone I feel for.

What I was asking though was if I overlooked any canon evidence of Caranthir being particularly, personally fond of the Dwarves; and it seems I did not. Also; there is room for Caranthir growing to like the Dwarves over centuries without an anti-Feanorian bias reading this strong, there is simply no evidence for friendship in the rather barebones narrative (I'm not interested atm because it's wildly overdone to me & I like variety).

That said, in my opinion making Caranthir the hidden, slandered Feanorian Finrod equivalent with a dash of Curufin's Dwarf affection is not as enjoyable as simply working with what little canon character is actually there. Because there is one (and it's not the greedy tax collector of some fanon depictions either imo)

1. To start with, wrt Caranthir as the anti-Finrod, I don't think it works that well. Sure sure dark/light, open/prejudiced, repressed/shouty, but different motivations, different locations, plus they meet very different peoples even if both are Edain-- besides, Caranthir's own older brothers do successfully ally with the Easterlings without betrayal, while Curufin (much more so than Finrod! no Khuzdul for Finrod!) is the Dwarves' Friend(tm). Also, a flawed Finrod already exists. That's just the regular edition. He has his own faults and (very different) tragic arc.

If Finrod never seems to have strong prejudices to overcome, and if he's not confrontational (which... look he's a diplomat. Make of that what you will. Pretty awkward there in Doriath, buddy!) he does have trouble facing his own complicity (he wanted to sail those ships despite the murders) until Sauron beats him to death with it. He leaves Valinor with the idea of ruling but he has to give up the crown. He's ambitious, he seems emotionally repressed, he's.. possibly paying the greater Dwarves to drive the Petty Dwarves out of their ancestral home to build a city? Oops. Depending on the version you go with in that case, of course; there's also ones where he's free of the blame of that one. Not of wanting to sail those ships and being uneasy with the guilt wrt wanting to do so despite their being stolen and murdered for though. No he doesn't kill; but he wants to use the result of it anyway, and to make it worse he is actually half Telerin.

There's also (to be fair, only for sure after the disaster of the Sudden Flame because that's the recorded instance) his guards killing random innocent trespassers to keep his kingdom hidden -- yes, that's right there in Silm, yes he's still King at the time. Beren has to wave that ring. People just seem to miss that he'd be killed without it somehow.

I think it's just too easy to reduce him to the golden perfect opposite of Caranthir. Yes he's described more positively; he's also just mentioned more because unlike Caranthir he rules an actual kingdom, the greatest and richest in Beleriand in fact; and does things that have a lot of very longterm effects, like helping B&L steal a Silmaril. They don't 'meet the same people' anyway -- the Haladin have a different culture from the Beorians which contributes to their reaction to Caranthir (and iirc their later fate).

Sidenote: Dawn's essay attributes the Green Elves helping the Feanorians at Amon Ereb to Caranthir's diplomatic skills; but why not to those of Amras or Amrod? This is the quote; 'Caranthir fled and joined the remnant of his people to the scattered folk of the hunters, Amrod and Amras, and they retreated and passed Ramdal in the south. Upon Amon Ereb they maintained a watch and some strength of war, and they had aid of the Green-elves' -- nothing here indicates it was Caranthir who got them that aid. In fact A&A are the hunters, i.e. more likely to have roamed in various forests where they would have encountered Green Elves, imo.

There's also the very desperate times to consider in which this aid takes place. This is just post Sudden Flame, and even if the Green Elves didn't like Caranthir they probably liked him better than Morgoth. Also, speaking of cosmopolitans, Maedhros allies with, yes, Dwarves (Azaghal), Grey elves, Easterlings (and you might say: Fingolfinians); even part of the remaining people of Dorthonion rally to Himring post sudden flame (that means Edain and Arafinwean followers in Himring, at least for a time), and he manages to be friendly with Felagund despite calling him a badger. ;)

Finrod is not the only other leader to forge diverse alliances, and though B&L ends happily his people mostly do not. Caranthir's not much like Finrod in any way. Not in motivations, temperament, tragic arc. That's fine. No hidden kingdom for a dragon to eat either. Finrod could probably do with being a little less like Finrod sometimes, though he's well-intentioned and likable. Caranthir loves to shout and isn't sneaky. Good for him.

2. Curufin also already exists. His love for Dwarves is one of his defining and redeeming characteristics and boy does he need them. He's daddy's favourite, a sneaky overambitious bitchy bastard who is also a talented smith and linguist, and truly considered a Dwarf friend, which is apparently exceptional. He's quite flawed; tries to help Celegorm force a political marriage, laughs with a bruised mouth, seeming to lose his mind while attempting and failing murder after first losing his own stronghold and then the city he tried to take from his cousin. He's just... a personality. Mostly a bad one! You can feel for him though, because he seems like an utter mess. Many 'i would love to study you' feelings on my part. Would hate for him to be real but also I'd pay to be his therapist.

3. And then finally there's Canon Caranthir. A difficult, prejudiced person who despite that (which doesn't at all have to mean there is no despite, the despite is what makes it juicy)

- seems to be responsible for re-establishing (large scale?) trade with the Dwarves, whatever he might think of them (and they of him) to their mutual benefit. I don't think he's greedy either. It seems like a mutually profitable situation. Access to Dwarvish goods seems pretty vital to Beleriand, and facilitating trade is a real service.

As someone pointed out in the replies, the Silm does mention Dwarvish companies travelling east to Nan Elmoth and menegroth various times, but quote wrt Caranthir says 'Caranthir’s people came upon the Dwarves, who after the onslaught of Morgoth and the coming of the Noldor had ceased their traffic into Beleriand' and 'when the Dwarves began again to journey into Beleriand.'

They stopped at some point and Caranthir's people made it happen again.

- which means he's practical. He seems like he's good at organising, and setting his own feelings aside if necessary despite his prejudice and temper (which is an achievement it wouldn't be without his, hm, everything). Also he and his people as well as the Dwarves work together well because ''either people loved skill and were eager to learn,' despite their (initial?) mutual dislike. Those aren't bad characteristics; seems like it was an exchange of skill as well as goods and possibly providing safe travel opportunities.

I don't like the 'greedy Caranthir' fanon and don't think it is even that easy support entirely with canon. 'They had of it great profit,' the text says-- both Caranthir and the Dwarves. They exchanged skills and knowledge and Caranthir seems to have helped them start trading in Beleriand again. That's hardly Scrooge Mcduck.

- Another thing we can say about canonthir (lol) is that he apparently attaches a lot of value to aesthetics (was he a visual artist? is a he a sculptor like Nerdanel? WORSE: AN ART CRITIC?! Feanorian art critic is truly nightmare fuel) and that's why he dislikes Dwarves (of all things...). Either way points to 'aesthetics' as something apparently important to Caranthir. Which makes sense given who his parents are. What is interesting to me is that this apparently DOESN'T matter to Curufin, who is a lot like Feanor in most things. That's interesting!

I've never, never seen this but I think it would be very funny to attribute his aesthetic prejudices to Nerdanel. I love her; but why should her opinions be perfect? I know she wasn't considered beautiful herself, but she's an artist. She's got to have had some strong opinions on aesthetics anyway. I doubt it's the beards; Mahtan had one as well. And 'stunted'...at least some of this comes down to the Elvish obsession with height yet again. Hm.

- eventually Caranthir overcomes what have to be some very deeply held beliefs about human beings and their place in the world, and offers what for all intents and purposes looks like real friendship, not the ruling over Men Feanor seems to have had in mind at best. He's capable of real change!

Anyway his character works just fine to me from canon, and what he achieves and the ways in which he fails are more interesting that way rather-- neither slandered Feanorian Finrod 2.0 nor Curufin 'Dwarf Fan' Feanorion without the sneakiness and murder attempts pack the same punch as a stupidly prejudiced grouchy man doing his best anyway for centuries in this stupid ugly cursed land, eventually changing for the better, opening up-- and being brutally punished for it by the Doom.

Dammit. I hope there's therapy in the Everlasting Darkness.

hm a bit long but that's what I get for trying to gather my thoughts wrt why after considering it a bit transferring Curufin's love for Dwarves to Caranthir is a bit boring to me personally. Though there are still stories that still do it very well.

[atariince]

I read your opinion on Luthien and I was intrigued about what you considered the selfish side of her. Would you mind elaborate ? I say this because the tale of Beren and Luthien Is the most unispiring tale -at least for me- sacrifying lives for the sake of two lovers

Hello, and thanks for your message and question!

First things first: You, I, we don’t have to feel ecstatic about every characters and every storylines, and you don’t have to justify your preferences. That character doesn’t appeal to you? All right, then! There are plenty of other characters to focus on! (just, you know, don’t shit on people who actually like the characters you’re not fond of). ;) 

I do have a very complicated and ambivalent relationship to the story of Beren and Lúthien; I really can’t say I dislike it, not at all, but it tends to upset me. You ask about my mention of the “selfishness” of Lúthien… [To be honest, I don’t really remember what I said in the post you mention (which is probably a rather old one???) so I can only hope that I’ll be coherent and not too repetitive (generally speaking, my opinion hasn’t changed over the years, but it mighthave evolved)] -  I can understand that my opinion might seem confusing, but in fact, you answered the question yourself: The sacrifice of many for the sake of one couple… (that’s a schematic presentation, yes). But it’s a bit more complicated than that. I actually like the character of Lúthien per se. I like her as a strong, a bit creepy, dog-eared lady who remains blind to a lot of things. I like her being prideful and I like her being FLAWED. You know why? Because I can relate. I’m not perfect, far from it. Nobody is. And if I cannot see my own flaws in a character, I’ll have a hard time being interested in them.

So my problem with the Lay of Leithian has nothing to do with the characters themselves - whether you like them or not, they remain interesting – it has to do with the treatment of the characters, the (frustrating) perspective adopted by the narrator(s), the way the couple seems to be forgiven deeds which would have been considered criminal/terrible/unforgivable if they had been committed by other characters (follow my gaze).

And yes, I can’t deny that I have my own biased reading because of my preference for the Fëanorians, but I try to be as objective as possible (though I can’t be completely objective. I mean, who could?)

So. 

Lúthien is a strong female character, steadfast and fearless, and that’s something I definitely like about her. Now, I’m not fond of the “perfect lady” aura given to the character, you know? This idea that she’s flawless and whatever she does is a good thing. Some sort of a saint (if there were saints in Arda). At no point the narrative voice questions her decisions, she’s always in the light. She is presented as perfect and every other characters seem to agree, no matter what she decides to do. I find all this very irritating, although I guess that’s also what the genre requires (I’ll come back to that point at the end of the post). 

Yet, let’s keep in mind that Lúthien is not like the other Eldar; her mother is an Ainu, and that element is extremely important: she is half divine. It’s crucial because it means that

How could the other Eldar and humans not be, at least, fascinated by her? 

It must be complicated for the Eldar to actually criticise her… I mean, she’s the offspring of demiurgic power!

She must have a specific fate (if Eru allowed her mom to become incarnate and to have a kid with an Elda, He must have some plans)(spoilers : He does)

She must have a different approach of reality, a different way to feel the world, to live in the world, to be concerned with the world and its inhabitants. 

She is powerful and has powers that no other Eldar could ever dream of, which makes her somehow dangerous.

This being said, let’s return the matter at stake:  your question about this self-interest of her, and the sacrifices it implies; not the sacrifice of Beren or Lúthien for one another, but the almost death of thousands of Eldar for them to be together (and I won’t talk of here of Finrod’s choices and his gruesome death because that’s a matter which I’ve already talked about at length – here for instance)

Besides, I mostly agree with Litamande’s interpretation of the Nargothrond episode, so I’ll waste no time repeating it and I advise you to read if that’s not already done. I’ll just point out a few selfish elements to actually elaborate on the “selfish side of Lúthien” (although it doesn’t mean I blame her for being selfish):

1. Lúthien would let a kinslaying happen to be with her lover 

By disobeying her father and by running to Nargothrond, she took the risk of bringing her father’s wrath to Nargothrond.

I know, I know: the texts say that Thingol gets mad because of the Fëanorians' plan to get her married to Celegorm (mind you, I don’t say the Fëanorians don’t have anything to be blamed for, they do, but that’s not the point of this post) but something tells me that, no matter the nature of the Fëanorians' message, Thingol would have been furious - marriage proposal or not, Thingol could have very well played the diplomatic card, discussed the whole thing (or at least  pretended to), got his daughter back and then told the Fëanorians to fuck off. Instead, he prepared his army for an eventual kinslaying. I mean, thanks to the Fëanorians' message, he knows where daughter is, he knows she is relatively “safe” in Nargothrond – and the Fëanorians are just a small impediment which Thingol could get rid of without killing the entire population of Nargothrond…. so I tend to believe that, at this point, Thingol was so offended and upset and panicked in general terms that he would have been mad, not matter who would have said “I found your daughter!”

And I do believe that Lúthien knew it, or at least, considered that it could be a possibility. She’s not stupid. She’s definitely not that naïve.

Likewise, after the Tol Sirion episode, she would rather stay with Beren instead of going back to Doriath, even if that decision leads to a war of elves against elves. It is clearly given in the Lay that Thingol was ready to go to war to get her back, and although I can understand why she wants to stay with her boyfriend, the lives of hundreds of elves are at stake! And coming from the heir of a sovereign, it’s rather… unpolitical, to say the least. And yes, selfish. Now, I’m not saying she shouldn’t be selfish! On the contrary. Please girl, do what you will! 

What upsets me is that she’s still presented as a flawless saint by the narrator, by the other characters, by the Valar and nobody ever tells her that her decisions almost created a war. How frustrating is that? 

2. L&B let a kinslaying happen to keep the Nauglamir in the family

She and Beren have come back from Mandos, they’re in Tol Galen, they have a lovely kid and they talk to no mortal. And they have a Silmaril because Thingol’s dead and Doriath is in a pretty bad state. We know the Fëanorians dare not attack Lúthien, but she knew the risk of keeping a Silmaril, didn’t she? She knew they would do their best to take it back after her death. And although I understand why the Silmaril is symbolically important to her (they died for it , her dad died for it, etc.) she knows what it means to keep a Silmaril; In some versions (“The Nauglafring”, “the Quenta”… see also “The Tale of Years” in HoME XI), Melian herself warns (wrathfully) her and Beren against it… even if Lúthien stops wearing it in some texts, they never ever think about giving it back to the Fëanorians… You’ll tell me that they are the Dispossessed, they can’t have it back anyway, or there would be no story at all. 

I think what upsets me the most here, is not that she decided to keep it no matter what, but the treatment of it. Again. When anyone else in the texts desires a Silmaril or tries to keep a Silmaril, there’s always a warning somewhere, something implying, “this character is becoming greedy and is making a huge mistake blahblah”. But not here, at no point she’s is given as potentially making a mistake, she’s neither depicted as prideful, nor greedy nor anything  – same thing with Beren when he tries to pick up the second Silmaril from the crown of Melkor ; yes he raises hell with his mistake and paid for it, but no one blames him. In the “Quenta” it is even said that he failed to take all the three jewels because of the “knife of the treacherous dwarves”, as if he had nothing to blame himself for… You see why I’m upset. The narrative perspective is completely unfair.

3. The Mandos episode

It is not about Lúthien’s selfishness but it is a fair example of those prejudices. Lúthien is said to be the only one who managed to bring pity into Námo‘s heart. Yet she’s not the only mourning… the Bragollach had happened roughly a decade before the L&B’s story. There are thousands of people in Middle Earth and in Mandos (and in Valinor) weeping and mourning a sibling, a lover, aparent, a child – Lúthien lost her bf whom she met a couple of years before but “her sorrow [is] deeper than their sorrows”??? She is actually given as the one feeling the greatest grief ever? I just… No.

Well, actually, it is no surprise that Námo is moved by her song : she is divine! Her mom sang during the creation of the world…!

Alright yeah, I’m being cynical, I admit it. But what I’m trying to do is not to tell you what’s good or bad or what you should think of the whole thing. I’m barely trying to offer you another perspective, to point at what is not totally clear, what doesn’t make sense to me, what upsets me, so you can maybe see it from another point of view. It’s always an interesting thing to do, even if in the end you don’t change your mind.

And believe it or not, the Lay of Leithian is one of my favourite texts! And maybe it is precisely because of all those elements that confuse me and/or irritate me! At least it gives me something to think about, some new gaps to fill with my imagination!

Now, and this is VERY important, let’s keep in mind that the first Beren and Lúthien writings go back to Tolkien’s youth, and that what Tolkien wanted to do was to write a “heroic-romance from the realm of Faërie" inspired by medieval literature and ancestral folklore. He obviously knew what he was doing, he knew the codes of that kind of literature, and all those elements which I pointed out were carefully wrought by the author; he was aware of the characteristics of the genre and toyed with them, proof is the parodical commentary of the Lay of Leithian by CS Lewis. And come on, technically speaking, the Lay is a masterpiece, if not a feat!  Besides, we also know how dear this particular love story was to Tolkien, and without making it a metaphor of his own life, we can’t ignore this aspect. Therefore, my criticisms are neither literary, scholarly ones, nor personal ones against the author. They’re barely the reflections of a very subjective feeling (and I strongly emphasize that word) of my own, regarding those events and the way they are rendered within the whole history of Middle Earth, as in intradiegetic vision of them.

And to conclude, if Lúthien had not fought for her love story to be a thing, therewould have been no Dior, no Elwing, no Earendil… it is a part of the whole narrative line, of the whole scheme that lead to the salvation of the people of Middle Earth in the 1st Age. SO yes, her selfishness is somehow rightful, it has a purpose, it is for the GREATER GOOD. And again, what bothers me is not Lúthien herself, it is the fact that her decisions are never questioned, by no one at any point. And I believe that if some readers don’t find this tale inspiring, as you put it, it is precisely because of the treatment of L&B ; they’re perfect, unworldly perfect, how could we easily relate to them?