#like I get that lotr is a metaphor* for the world wars and they represent the Asian and Middle Eastern aspect of the Axis powers but. oof

[2soft2sensitive]

the racism/colorism of lord of the rings has got me thinking a lot about how it is important to critique the things we love, but it is also important to remember that we can still love them despite their problematic nature- and that everyone that carries on about how anyone that enjoys whatever piece of problematic media are horrible, irredeemable people, always has a piece of media they enjoy that is just as problematic, but because they are convinced that consumption is a moral act (and god forbid you imply they aren’t morally pure), can’t accept it and will make endless excuses as to why it isn’t the same. the only thing that really matters is being able to see what is wrong with the media, engage critically with it, and accept that it is what it is- and that some people will always be uncomfortable with it, and rather than making excuses, you have to own up to the thing you like being kinda shitty

[purpledemonlilyposting]

I get home from work, wash off, and have to give Lily Orchard a dissertation on what metaphor and allegory is.

[Lily's Post]

My response under the cut.

Lily it's a metaphor because in real life people can't fuse into a singular being that is the embodiment of who they are together.

Maybe Lily has been watching my videos. I'm surprised she now knows Anthy has more going on than "helpless brown girl slave with no will of her own".

But yeah Lily... the rose imagery in Steven Universe was inspired by Utena. That doesn't mean they share the same meaning as symbols across both shows. She always does this. It's like how she keeps insisting that because Ryoko Kui likes Baldur's Gate, among other CRPGs, then she must have based all of Dungeon Meshi on Baldur's Gate 2 and Lily's favorite blorbo Imoen specifically. Maybe because she herself is so uncreative she only knows how to copy her influences?

Both Pink and Rose are represented by flowers, a hibiscus and a rose specifically. Rose can also, you know, be the past tense of "rise"? Pink as Rose rose up again the other Diamonds? The establishment of her society? Started a rebellion? At any rate, the hibiscus and rose are symbols in Steven Universe, not metaphors.

Whereas in Utena we see Anthy cultivate roses that are the colors of the duelists. She grows them for the duels. And color theory plays a big, big role in Utena that I usually don't cover cause I can't remember it all myself. Roses are also fleeting things that are coveted for their beauty but will wilt and die upon being plucked. Wonder if THAT correlates to any themes in Utena, huh?

Yeah actually Lily Tolkein despised allegory cause he was sick and tired of people speculating that Lord of the Rings was an allegory for World War 1 or World War 2. Dude seriously just wanted to write a fictional history for the languages he spent time inventing.

His aim with LOTR was to write something that felt between ancient myth and a historical account so he got annoyed when people tried to superimpose then modern issues onto it. That's it. You have no idea what you're talking about as usual. Who the fuck is out there saying LOTR has no themes?

[stregoniconiconii]

preface: i hate r*nance, and do like vickie and robin/vickie in theory. my one issue with the vickie = rosie comparison is that in lotr, people knew about the quest. like, bilbo and frodo both wrote about it. but in stranger things, everything has to be kept secret, which i imagine would be incredibly difficult in a long term relationship. im hoping that now that the “earthquake” has happened, the whole town (or at least the relevant minor characters) will be learning about the upside down. like, i don’t think that vickie needs to get involved in fighting the upside down, but i think she needs to know about it, just so she understands where robin’s trauma comes from?? (tho in canon only like. three characters are allowed to have any sort of lasting trauma, so maybe the duffer brothers will just pretend that robin doesn’t have trauma)

the quest = the war, which can be as big as a world war or a personal war. just because the war robin has been part of is a secret war doesn't erase what a vickie as Rosie could represent. Rosie represents the home and the hearth, she's the promise of a future after the destruction of war. she represents hope! Steve says that he still has hope that he and robin can find love somehow and for robin that's with vickie. I think that's why we see vickie again at the volunteer centre, she's a big part of the rebuilding process for a devastated town, she's a hopeful future for robin

nowww that's speaking pretty metaphorically and within the context of the story. it's somewhat limited to just s4 bc I dont know what s5 will bring, besides some thoughts and predictions. the duffers could make some writing choices that completely change what vickie's place in the story is. I do agree that the small circle that knows about the upside down will have to expand in s5 bc I genuinely can't see how else it can go so I think vickie will likely know about the upside down. but that doesn't mean she necessarily is part of the action, you know, as you said.

the thing with trauma is that. of course robin has trauma. and ur right that the duffers dont do a very good job at acknowledging that trauma. but you don't have to know everything about a person's trauma in order to support them. we have a right to privacy even in our closest relationships. we also ofc have the right to be upset or feel shut out when our partners don't tell us things. but it's not fair to be try to be everything for your partner, it's a lot of pressure and just bc you love someone it doesn't mean that you are equipped to deal with what they have gone through and are currently going through. a somewhat rough comparison would be an addict seeking comfort from their non-addict partner vs from their sponsor. the non-addict has a relationship with the addict's sobriety and their relapses but they themselves are not an addict and it colours the type of support that they can provide. there's a reason why peer support groups are so effective!

now im a big fan of codependent stobin it's not a secret. I like thinking about how that sort of relationship can affect the rest of their relationships. it usually means that the rest of their relationships suffer... I like robin/vickie and im very confident in them being endgame. but that's in the context of the story the duffers are writing. realistically, im not sure about robin/vickie lasting a long time. partially bc it's a high school relationship and there's so much life after high school and they might grow apart. such is life! it doesn't mean that they never loved each other, it's just part of the reality of getting into a relationship: it will eventually end somehow. sorry if it's pessimistic? I also think it's hopeful in a way just bc I think one relationship ending doesn't mean you can't find love again... the other side of it is that if robin and Steve are as codependent/unhealthy as I tend to head canon... then vickie might decide that being in a relationship with robin isn't worth the emotional turmoil of all that. which would be a fair thing to decide in this context

anyway this is where we're playing around with fanon bc we can write stories where robin and vickie have a long lasting romantic relationship, where they break up and maybe get back together. where Steve and robin are codependent or they're normal or they learn to be normal about each other. where all three of them figure out a way to balance robin's romantic relationship and her platonic one without minimising one or the other. im pretty open to many interpretations so im hoping once the fandom has actually embraced vickie we will get to explore it in many different ways

[gaolcrowofmandos]

Elfstone discourse? (Is this a thing?)

So I was re-reading The War of the Jewels the other day, when I came across two life-changing scribbles of Tolkien's, right in the thick of the commentary on ‘The Later Quenta Silmarillion’ (p. 176-7 of my paperback):

“He [Fëanor] gives the Green Stone to Maidros.”

This line was admittedly, “not in fact to be inserted,” but then this proceeds it:

“‘At the top of this page [in the QS manuscript] my father penciled: ‘The Green Stone of Fëanor given by Maidros to Fingon.’”

Wait, what Green Stone?

Thanks, Christopher, for the confirmation:

“This can hardly be other than a reference to the Elessar that came in the end to Aragorn…”

Folks.

In this older draft, Fëanor makes the Elessar. It comes to Maedhros (whether by deathbed gift or simple inheritance). After Thangorodrim Maedhros gives it to Fingon. and Fingon later gives it away like he does a certain Helm

CT suggests that this idea was replaced by the essays found in 'The History of Galadriel and Celeborn,' but y’all: no one will take this away from me.

Here’s why:

(Buckle up and get ready for Draft Hell under this cut.)

So we’ve got three different origins stories for the Elessar in UT, and no clear indicator that Tolkien ultimately chose one or the other. To me, that makes the slightly older ‘Maidros gives the Green Stone to Fingon’ version, which is never explicitly overwritten, an equal contender.

Those three alternate versions run pretty simply as follows:

V1: Enerdhil (more on him shortly) makes the Elessar in Gondolin. Eärendil of course sails with it. Olórin brings it back to Middle-earth and gives it to Galadriel.

V2: Enerdhil makes the Elessar in Gondolin. Eärendil of course sails with it. In Eregion, Celebrimbor, a random smith of Gondolin, makes a second, lesser Stone for Galadriel.

V3: Random Guy Celebrimbor makes the first Elessar in Gondolin. Eärendil of course sails with it. In Eregion, Celebrimbor makes a second, lesser Stone for Galadriel.

The ‘Green Stone of Fëanor’ scribbles form a much more satisfactory explanation of the Elessar’s origin than any of these (incomplete and textually isolated) stories. Aside from the obvious implications for Mae and Fingon, it makes so much sense from a narrative perspective. I shall explain.

Let’s start off by tackling the first UT version head on, alias Exhibit A: What is an Enerdhil?

No, seriously:

“There was in Gondolin a jewel-smith named Enerdhil, the greatest of that craft among the Noldor after the death of Fëanor.” (p. 248 of my Houghton Mifflin paperback)

Yet somehow he’s literally nobody? Christopher Tolkien makes it clear:

“Enerdhil appears in no other writing...” (p. 251)  

There are next to no Tolkien ‘artifacts’ made by named individuals with no other narrative significance. Let’s take Telchar, who ostensibly exists only to make stuff. But the fact that the same smith made Angrist, the Dragon-helm, and Narsil is narratively significant. Enerdhil the One-Hit Wonder doesn’t jive.

So, it seems this is why Tolkien writes off his existence in favor of Celebrimbor making the Stone:

“...[T]he concluding words of the text show that Celebrimbor was to displace him as the maker of the Elessar in Gondolin.” (p. 251)

Okay, so Enerdhil is out of the picture, but let’s take a look at the latter two versions (the second with both him and Celebrimbor, the third with only Celebrimbor).

In both texts, Celebrimbor is not a Fëanorian:

V2: “[Celebrimbor] was of Gondolin long ago, and a friend of Enerdhil…” (p. 251)

V3: “The Elessar was made in Gondolin by Celebrimbor, and so came to Idril and so to Eärendil.” (p. 251)

Not only do we know Tolkien later overwrote Celebrimbor’s origins (making these drafts less than authoritative), but in these versions, the Stone is strongly attached to Celebrimbor, still maker of the Three Rings, as well as to Gondolin. If we assume that this Rings/Elessar association should be maintained, Celebrimbor's LotR-compliant transposition to the line of Fëanor should imply that the Elfstone goes with him.

Tolkien seems to be getting down with the powers of healing and preservation the Elessar shares with the Three. That metaphorical significance works brilliantly with ‘Green Stone of Fëanor’: The symbolism of the Stone’s transfer from Maedhros to Fingon (and potentially from Fëanor to Maedhros priorly) strongly enhances its meaning later in the legendarium.

So let’s talk healing, which is exactly what we see post-Thangorodrim, albeit of a different kind than we tend to link to the Elessar:

“By this deed [i.e. rescuing Maedhros] Fingon won great renown, and all the Noldor praised him; and the hatred between the houses of Fingolfin and Feanor was assuaged.” (‘Of the Return of the Noldor’)

And Our Favorite from ‘The Grey Annals’:

“Thus he rescued his friend of old from torment, and their love was renewed…” (p. 32)

What gift could dovetail with this moment better than the Elessar:

“For it is said that those who looked through this stone saw things that were withered or burned healed again or as they were in the grace of their youth, and that the hands of one who held it brought to all that they touched healing from hurt.” (UT, 249)

Withered and burned stuff in need of healing? Looking back to youth? I’d say the Elessar is the sparkly symbol for the job. Also, do they use the Elessar to heal Maedhros after his rescue? Hell yeah, they do.

Additionally, if we emphasize the --admittedly discarded -- first note, with Fëanor bequeathing the Stone to Maedhros in his dying moments, as the note’s placement suggests, we catch an enigmatic insight into Fëanor’s view of his eldest. If he’s assigning the task of healing something (the world? the family? his own legacy?) to Maedhros as the flesh is falling burnt off his body, that’s monumentally important... But it’s also a topic for a different post.

Anyway, it certainly fits to see Maedhros give the Elessar to Fingon in direct conjunction with the healing of the feud. After all, the Stone represents both preservation and restoration

Those same attributes also have a tremendous significance for the Exiles who linger in Middle-earth in the Second Age, and the Elessar’s return (whether as the same stone or a replica) serves as a forerunner of the Three Rings’ powers of preservation.

In V2, Galadriel sees Nenya as having the same function as the Elessar, if in a stronger capacity:

“Wielding the Elessar all things grew fair about Galadriel, until the coming of the Shadow to the Forest, but afterwards when Nenya, chief of the Three, was sent to her by Celebrimbor, she needed it (as she thought) no more, and she gave it to Celebrían her daughter, and so it came to Arwen and to Aragorn who was called the Elessar.” (P. 251)

Suffice to say, the Elessar’s healing properties take on a new connotation when it’s introduced early in the First Age. It becomes a token both political and spiritual - just as it becomes for Aragorn.

In the UT theories, the Stone certainly has a spiritual meaning, but on the brow of Envinyatar the Renewer, it represents a very Silm-esque union of realpolitik and in-universe theology: the reunification of Gondor and Arnor, and more importantly the passing of dominance in Middle-earth from the Eldar to the Atani.

Galadriel’s gift of the Elessar marks (in addition to a wedding gift, per LACE)  both a willing surrender of power as the Three fade and a resignation to fate. Hmm, sounds a bit like the self-Dispossession we see in Maedhros’ abdication - which should also be marked by the transfer of the Stone. While the dooms which Galadriel and Maedhros accept are strikingly different (the forgiveness of the Valar, as opposed to their curse), the same spirit of surrender aligns the two transfers of the Elessar.

So to summarize the theory: Fëanor makes the Elessar, and Maedhros gives it to Fingon because:

1. Enerdhil is a fake. 2. Celebrimbor is a Fëanorian. 3. The Elessar is a symbol.

However, this theory does raise one giant problem: how does it get from Fingon to Eärendil, and then, potentially, from Eärendil to Galadriel?

In V1 above, we see some level of in-universe debate about whether Galadriel's Elessar is even the same as Eärendil's, or if a second one is made in Eregion:

“Some say that the second was indeed only the first returned, by the grace of the Valar; and that Olórin...brought it with him out of the West.” (p. 249)

While I'm all in favor of a return to the Hither Lands á la Glorfindel, the two Elessari-conception also works in a universe where the original is Fëanor's work.

It's no stretch to imagine that the grandson who carves  the Star of Fëanor on the Doors of Durin, and has a damning *ahem* demonstrated passion for healing Arda's hurts and preserving its beauty, might emulate one of Fëanor's early projects as a precursor to the Three. He could then still give it to Galadriel, just like his Gondolin Doppelganger does.

Still, how does the Elessar get from Fingon to the refugees at Sirion? We know it’s canon that it comes to Eärendil. After all, Aragorn has Bilbo include this in his oh-so-cheeky verses about Eärendil:

“In panoply of ancient kings, In chained rings he armored him…. An eagle-plume upon his crest, Upon his breast an emerald.” (‘Many Meetings’)

The chain of transmission isn’t an insurmountable problem. Fingon just has to send or give it (most likely) to a relative in Gondolin, or (less likely) to Círdan (who we know becomes Eärendil’s friend). I have a couple wonky theories, but this post is already way too long. (Any thoughts?)

Okay, wow. This has been a mile-long ramble about why two penciled scribbles are a better headcanon than fully-formed essays.

Moral of the Story: Nobody scribbles marginal notes like Tolkien scribbles marginal notes.

(Quickie Disclaimer: Apologies if someone has already written about this. I haven't found anything in fandom about it, but if something exists, please link me to it - I'd love to see!)