#tolkien discussion

[remusjohnslupin]

@elerrinacrownedwithstars: Your responses are very interesting, and responding to them under another post (with a character limit) is difficult, so I thought I would make a separate post about it to convey my thoughts more thoroughly. I hope you don't mind ❤️ Please don't feel like you have to answer or anything. Following up on your previous message:

Of course, it’s possible I’m wrong, as this is only the impression I’ve gathered from some posts. And yeah, the writers of this show are laughably bad at their job but it doesn’t dismiss the idea that this is their attempt of ‘nuance’. Tolkien is fairly clear about how orcs are his idea of “what if Satan made people”, but even so, it’s notable - and he seemed to realise this too - that it had some problems within his cosmogony. In my bubble, I see discourse about how describing an entire race evil is problematic and I can’t say that I don’t see where they come from. But on the other hand, you’re right to point out that Tolkien wasn’t writing an allegory, and fantasy worlds are allowed to work differently than real worlds. After all, Tolkien is also clear that his Elves and Men can be at the different points of the spectrum of good and evil, whether they are Valinorean or Númenorean etc.

If I can backtrack a little to our previous messages, everything you said earlier about J.R.R Tolkien's observations about war and human nature are 100% accurate. I hope it did not seem like I brushed off your point. However, I would like to underline that just because he uses the word 'orc' or 'orcish' to describe the horrors of war, does not mean that he is directly referencing Orcs™ in his books.

I genuinely think if people are insisting Orcs™ have to be nuanced, otherwise it's racist... that's WILD. Because the point is, orcs are, as you so creatively put in, 'What if Satan made people.' They are not of any particular race like we understand. Any differential groups they might have between them is based on who 'bred' them, so to speak, and where. Unlike humans, they have no cultural and historical differences as we understand it. To copy/paste my previous point directly:

"Tolkien famously HATED allegory and never assigned any of his races to real-life ones. I mean, if there are people out there who think portraying orcs as purely evil is racist, then THEY must have a real-life race/ethnicity in mind when they think of orcs. Which says a lot about THEM, not Tolkien himself or those of us who rightly point out the butchering of the lore and poor writing in the show."

So no, I will never, ever see or agree with the idea that the discourse about orcs and race have validity. Like, no. If I start writing my story and create this bright green, goo-like race of blobs who are all evil and their entire agenda is to latch on to humans and feed on them.... and someone just came out and said that was also problematic and racist... how does it make sense?

You know what, this is Tumblr, so someone actually WOULD say that. Nevermind.

But that's what Orcs™ are. They are an extension of the evil (Morgoth) that marred the world even when it was first formed. Nothing more, nothing less.

In your last point, I think you inadvertently addressed part of the problem. This whole discourse about how pure fantasy evil existing is somehow offensive stems from the strange need to make everything relatable. I sincerely believe that people who think this way (including the writers of the Rings of Power) actually have a disdain for the fantasy genre, whether they recognise it or not.

"What if orcs were misunderstood?" ... "What if Galadriel was a cut-out cliche warrior?" .... "What if elven rings were also actually evil because power corrupts anyway even if they are wielded by super wise beings and those Rings were untouched by Sauron?"

They think they are being sophisticated doing these things. And I have no doubt there is some unnecessary political pandering there, too. But instead of elevating the characters and the show, they are hollowing out all the meaning behind Tolkien's themes.

Making orcs misunderstood essentially destroys how Tolkien showed the Marring of the World was permanent and would not be Healed until Dagor Dagorath.

Making Galadriel a copy-paste generic warrior who goes on adventures cheapened her character so much, I can't even. Sauron (when he was Annatar) did not go near Galadriel's kingdom because he was 92837647289% sure that she would recognise him on sight. Because she is probably THE most perceptive elf. She is also described as one of the kindest people alive, sooner moved to pity than anger. But they made her a vengeful asshole on a quest to find Sauron when he was THREE FEET AWAY from her face. But that's empowering because sHE hAS A SworD nOW!

I could go on, and on, and on...

The whole 'sympathetic orcs' debacle, along with the entirety of the Rings of Power, is what you get when you put a few idiots together, have them read Tolkiengateway, and ask 'Okay, so how would YOU write the story?'

As opposed to:

"We made a promise to ourselves at the beginning of the process that we weren’t going to put any of our own politics, our own messages or our own themes into these movies. What we were trying to do was to analyze what was important to Tolkien and to try to honor that. In a way, we were trying to make these films for him, not for ourselves.” — Peter Jackson

[eloquentsisyphianturmoil]

The concept of Jesus in the Silmarillion

Tolkien did not intentionally lace his work with any allegory, but as a catholic mind relevant themes undeniably underpin his work.

It can be argued that the feanorians stand the place of a conceptual Jesus (being god incarnate, sent to die for our sins).

Míriel’s prolonged gestation may be viewed as the working of Eru, thus Fëanáro’s birth likened to the birth of Jesus.

Of more relevance is Jesus’ self-sacrifice and the antagonisation of the feanorians. Fëanáro is responsible for the return of the Noldor to middle earth (the fullfilling of Eru’s plan). The crucial progression of the first and second ages, and many of the greatest acts therein, are direct or indirect reactions to Fëanáro’s choices.

The entirety of the tragedy of the first age can be likewise blamed on Fëanáro, and it is this that echoes Jesus’ dying for our sins. The Noldor* are given a clean slate because of the feanorians’ actions.

Attention may also be drawn to the isolation of Fëanáro’s house. He is fundamentally cloven from the house of Finwë with Míriel’s death— as close to permanence as the Eldar may come— and Finwë’s second marriage. His people are all killed during the first age (given Maitimo released his people from service after Sirion**, some may have later pledged allegiance to other lords. But thence they would not be counted Feanorian). Thus the physical effect of Fëanáro’s line all but disappears, as with Jesus.

*‘the dispossessed shall ye be’: after the time of Maitimo’s abdication, the feanorians can be viewed as apart from the Noldor. In later years to say ‘Noldor’ and even ‘house of Finwë’ is to refer only to those of Finwë’s second marriage.

**This is purely speculation. It is mentioned many of their people turned against the sons of Fëanáro at this time, thus it seems unlikely that they had any trust for obligation and released their people. Those who remained would be loyalists.

P.S. of Tyelperinquar: he is the sole noted descendant of Fëanáro’s house. His existence can be argued rather as a plot device than a true allegorical existence, necessary as a smith of sufficient skill to craft elven rings without Annatar’s help, allowing the action of the third age. He can thus be counted as belonging more to the latter histories than the former.

[tathrin]

Hey, so do you ever stop to think about how the premise of Lord of the Rings being an in-universe book written by some of the characters who lived through that story means that they decided what parts and perspectives to use to tell that story...?

And when our authors weren't there to experience the events themselves, they have to rely on what they're told about them by the characters who were there, right...?

Okay so stop and think about the Glittering Caves.

We never actually go to the caves in the narrative. Tolkien LOVES describing nature and natural beauty, but we don't actually see the caves described "by him" the way we do other places. Obviously Gimli's words are Tolkien's, yes; but we only see the caves filtered through his words about them, after the fact.

When Gimli and Éomer and the other Rohirrim take refuge there, the narrative doesn't follow them. Obviously from a narrative standpoint this is to keep the focus narrow, and not to interrupt the battle-sequence with a long ode to the beauty of the caves, and to create tension in the reader who doesn't know if these characters are okay or not. Which all makes sense!

But think about it in terms of the book that was written in Middle-earth by the folk living there. Why DON'T we get to have a direct experience of those caves? Gimli obviously related several other parts of the story that none of the Hobbits were there to witness to them, and which were written into the books as Direct Events Happening In The Narrative (think of the Paths of the Dead scene, for one of the more visceral moments!). So why not the Glittering Caves?

Was it because they wanted to keep that narrative focus and tension, and so they didn't include his perspective on that part of the battle? Perhaps, that's certainly a possibility to consider.

But also consider: when we do hear about the Glittering Caves, what we hear is Gimli telling Legolas about the Glittering Caves. THAT is the part of that event that is considered of importance to include in the book: not Gimli's actual experience when he was in them, but rather the part where he relates that experience TO Legolas.

And I kind of just THOUGHT about that today.

And went HUH.

[nycteris-g]

You want examples of anti-Manicheanism in Tolkien?

Take Maedhros - he who performed "deeds of surpassing valor" and stood against the darkness and armies of Morgoth for centuries. He who swore a blasphemous oath, condemning himself to damnation. He who murdered his kin not once, not twice, but four times. And he who, finally holding the very object that symbolized his damnation, realizes the futility of all the evil he committed and throws himself into the fire.

Is he bad? Is he good? He swore a blasphemous oath - by Tolkien's standards, that alone would make him 'bad.' And then, of course, there are, you know, the murders. But is he absolutely evil? Born to be a murderous thing? Beyond any redemption or pity? How can someone who so fearlessly resisted The Evil be an entirely lost case? Can absolute evil even recognize the horror of its own deeds?

Tolkien, far more insightful than those who try to divide humankind into simple categories of good and bad, masterfully depicted the complexity of human nature (the Children of Ilúvatar). Humanity is not inherently evil, nor is it doomed to fall - yet it does, and still holds the potential to rise again: to see, to believe, to choose to do good.

[spookyjarchivist]

while i do have a soft spot for “hobbits age slower than humans so 33 for them is our physical 18” i rlly dont think that’s how it is bc they get to about the same age as humans before death by old age, i also really dont think we appreciate enough a few things about what this means narratively and thematically

tolkien really said no child soldiers, no 20-something year old soldiers, they’re not really adults yet, they barely know anything of the world we’re sending them to die for it and that’s not okay, not when there are other options

he also addresses this with the hobbits specifically, frodo and bilbo are 50 when they go on their journeys, FIFTY, and we can see that they handle them differently than the others. while bilbo changes afterwards, it’s not in a coming of age like we would see if 50 really was the equivalent of ~27, he just accepts a part of himself he’s been suppressing for years, for him it’s accepting that getting older and being an adult doesn’t restrict you from the excitement and opportunities of youth. similarly frodo doesn’t change much either outside of his ptsd, all of his change is trauma, not maturity

now sam and merry are both past the age of majority, but they still grow into themselves in a way bilbo and frodo do not, they mature

but pippin, sweet beautiful pippin grows the most out of all of them. he’s the most childish, always running after his cousins and you can tell he’s not even 30, this is HIS coming of age story, before this journey he’s known nothing of true responsibilities, but by the end he’s ready for when he eventually has to take over as thain of the shire

and i think that this is a really beautiful way of saying something that has started to get really popular in the last few years

instead of being terrified of that big 30, we should be excited for it, we should embrace it wholeheartedly, because it’s the time when we’ve finally started ironing out the last of the kinks in being an adult, we’re growing into our responsibilities and and we can start learning how to cultivate that balance of responsibility and excitement and FUN that makes life living instead of surviving

[musingsinmiddleearth]

On the matter of the victimhood of Sauron the Deceiver my most ardent disagreer, @jainaandjacensolo, has hinted at some possible foundational differences of belief on whether or not a being such as Sauron (who has indisputably done evil with forethought and ill intent) is at all worthy of any kind of redemption in canon context. What do you think?

In the event more than one reasoning feels applicable please choose the one that is most agreeable to you. Elaborations and discourse very welcome in reblogs and comments.

[silvantransthranduiltrash]

Faramir, elf enthusiest: so, Legolas! I have some questions about elven culture if i can ask them!

Legolas, silvan (dark elf), has a vague idea of how the noldor/sindar (light elf) realms in middle earth function but not really that knowledgeable about it, which is presumably what faramir does know. Also, certified little shit: sure, lay it on me.

——————————————————————-

Idk, i hink it’s be funny if faramir was fanboying about being able to ask an actual elven prince about elven things, only for legolas to have like 5% knowledge of the elven realms under noldor/sindar rule, which is what faramir has learned about. And then deciding to mess with him anyway.

Don’t worry, legolas eventually tells the truth and offers faramir volumes worth of knowledge about the silvan and avari elves that have faramir vibrating with excitement.

[glorfindel-of-imladris]

"Why are you always bringing Glorfindel and Erestor together, it makes no sense" yeah, well, the gamers are doing it, too 💁🏻‍♀️

[spinnenpfote6]

I need someone to discuss with me WHAT exactly hobbits are, if they can breed with humans and when the species first showed up AND how different they'd genetically be from humans

Ya get it

[cantsayidont]

Something that bugs me a little about the reactions to LORD OF THE RINGS is the way that fans pointedly overlook the sometimes uneasy class politics that are involved in the relationship between Frodo and Sam.

This is in no way denying that it's a homoerotic relationship, which is something that comes through vividly even in the weird, truncated Rankin-Bass RETURN OF THE KING animated adaptation from 1980. However, it's important to understand that until the last few pages of the novel, Sam is literally Frodo's servant.

Tolkien is quick to stress, as stories from class-conscious societies often do, that Sam is happy and eager to serve Frodo, and willingly does so even when there's nothing in it for him, but the story emphasizes throughout that Sam is not the social equal of Frodo, Merry, Pippin, or Bilbo. When Sam calls Frodo "Master," it's not a D/S thing; Sam is Frodo's household employee (and in a sense his batman, which Tolkien said was the inspiration for their interactions), having essentially inherited that role from his father, who was Bilbo's employee. When, in the final chapter, Frodo tells Sam to marry Rosie Cotton and movie her into Bag End, he isn't proposing a menage à trois, he is offering to hire Rosie so that Sam can combine his marriage with his full-time duties. It isn't until Frodo tells Sam, on the way to the Grey Havens, that he has made Sam his heir that Sam becomes Frodo's social equal and the master of Bag End rather than the head of its staff. (Tolkien implies elsewhere that this caused Sam some legal trouble, since there was no indication that Frodo was dead or permanently gone — and if Merry and Pippin hadn't been there to witness Frodo's departure, people would have wondered if Sam did away with his master to try to steal his estate.)

Moreover, Tolkien expressly links Sam's perseverance, loyalty, and ability to resist the power of the Ring to his knowing his place. Toward the beginning, Sam's father recalls telling him:

‘Elves and Dragons! I says to him. Cabbages and potatoes are better for me and you. Don’t go getting mixed up in the business of your betters, or you’ll land in trouble too big for you, I says to him. And I might say it to others,’ he added with a look at the stranger and the miller.

Later (in "The Tower of Cirith Ungol"), Sam is tempted by the Ring, which shows him wild fantasies of his overthrowing Sauron and building a garden in the vale of Gorgoroth. However:

In that hour of trial it was the love of his master that helped most to hold him firm; but also deep down in him lived still unconquered his plain hobbit-sense: he knew in the core of his heart that he was not large enough to bear such a burden, even if such visions were not a mere cheat to betray him. The one small garden of a free gardener was all his need and due, not a garden swollen to a realm; his own hands to use, not the hands of others to command.

The word "free" is doing a lot of work here, since Sam is, back in the safety of Hobbiton, quite literally a hand for others to command; he tends Frodo's garden, not his own. But the point is that he recognizes his humble, inferior position in society and accepts it "freely," and that that choice gives Sam what Gandalf might have called the strength and good purpose to heroically resist a temptation that more noble and lordly types like Boromir could not.

My point is not that Sam doesn't love Frodo, which obviously he does, or the reverse, which the narrative makes plain. However, if you are not so reflexively comforted by classist fantasies of this kind, it's hard not to periodically stop and wonder, "Is this sexual harassment?"

[caenith]

But now the rumour ran among the scattered Elves of Beleriand that Dior Thingol’s heir wore the Nauglamír, and they said: ‘A Silmaril of Fëanor burns again in the woods of Doriath’; and the oath of the sons of Fëanor was waked again from sleep. For while Lúthien wore the Necklace of the Dwarves no Elf would dare to assail her;

Feanor: dies while Naruto-running towards Angband

The Feanorians: this girl is scary :<

[queenlucythevaliant]

Northern Lights

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I heard a voice that cried, “Balder the Beautiful is dead, is dead!” 

.

Who knows what to call the lonely exhilaration of gazing out into a bright Northern sky? Who can name it? 

Jill could.

It was the same feeling that came to her at the teetering edge of a cliff at the end of the world. The same feeling as when she said her goodbyes to Puddleglum and Scrubb before they freed the prince. It was the same feeling that engulfed her now, sitting in the professor’s library with a volume of poetry before her. 

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The wild northern wastes were well named: utterly wild, perfectly desolate, and terribly Northern. 

It was lonely there and often cold, but the sky was an endless whorl of gales and gray clouds. The stones were indigo under the pale winter sunlight, and at sunset they glowed a soft gold, as though lit from within. The gorges and moors lay before her, and Jill loved them for their vastness and their distance. Little grew in that country, but that which did was full of vigor. The grass was short and coarse. Every tree was victorious. 

On a still, deep breathing winter night, Jill lay on her back beneath a covering sky. It seemed beautiful to her, rich and strong and glorious. Her eyes drank in the breadth of it until her tears began to blind her. Yet even then, she still couldn’t look away.

She felt bigger here in the wastes, like the landscape. Stronger, wider. The further she walked, the more she felt herself stretch out. One of these days, maybe, she would catch hold of herself at the edge and tug, and Jill Pole would open up clear as the Northern sky. 

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And through the misty air passed the mournful cry of sunward sailing cranes.

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The thing that surprised Jill most about the battle with the serpent was this: there wasn’t any yelling. Always, it seemed, whenever she read stories about people fighting with swords, the combatants would let loose some guttural yell before their blows fell. They would scream and writhe in pain as they died. They would shout instructions to their fellows, “Look out!” or “Hit him there!” But the whole affair with the serpent passed with very little noise. 

The poison-green coil constricted around the prince; he raised his arms and got clear, struck the serpent hard, and then Scrubb and Puddleglum dispatched the creature with heavy, hacking blows. The monster died writhing, but not screaming. And then it was over. 

The thing that surprised Jill most about the moments before battle was, of course, the noise. She could hear her own heartbeat in her ears. She couldn’t stop listening to her own breathing. Every footstep rang out like a gong, and any words exchanged rang with a kind of finality that made them sound louder than anything. 

“You are of high courage,” Rilian told her when it was over. 

Yet the thing in Jill’s chest just then didn’t feel like courage. It was a deep breath, a plunge, and a release. It was loud and quiet all at once, till she was standing, blinking in the night air as snowballs whizzed round her, and maybe that was something like courage after all. 

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And now, there was a stirring in her chest as she reread the words on the page. Sing no more / O ye bards of the North / Of Vikings and of Jarls! / Of the days of the Eld / preserve the freedom only / nor the deeds of blood! 

She thought of grief. Of freedom. 

The lonely ache in her belly grew stronger. She felt herself uplifted into the huge regions of sky that were just beyond those cliffs, weightless as the breath beneath her buoyed her up, further, further…

.

When she saw Caspian up close, Jill thought that he looked like the sort of person who was meant to live in a castle. A silly thought, perhaps, since she knew he was a king– only she wasn’t thinking of Cair Paravel. No, Jill was picturing the ruins of an old British castle she’d visited once on holiday. She still remembered how the stonework had loomed over her, all towering arches and crumbling walls. That was where Caspian seemed to belong. He had an air of ancient tragedy about him. 

When Rilian disappeared, all things had wept but one. The serpent coiled beneath the earth and flicked its forked tongue, spewing poison. 

Now, the king half rose to bless his son. He whispered a few words as he caressed Rilian’s cheek, words meant only for those beloved ears. Jill saw Caspian’s lips move and wondered what a man like that could possibly say, when time ran so short. 

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They laid him in his ship, with horse and harness, as on a funeral pyre. Odin placed a ring upon his finger, and whispered in his ear.

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Jill furtively took Myths of the Northmen and held it up to the professor with a question in her eyes. She was still shy around him and Miss Plummer, though she wished she wasn’t. 

“Would you like to take that with you?”

“...Please.”

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It takes a certain kind of person to be exhilarated by the heights. You’ve got to love vastness more than you fear falling. 

.

They walked to the train station with an autumn wind blowing hard, and though Jill couldn’t fathom why, she turned and saw Lucy grinning, fierce and joyful– grinning and reaching a hand out towards her friend.

Jill reached back and grabbed it. “What will you do, once we’re back in Narnia?” she asked. 

The wind blew harder. The feeling of anticipation grew and grew, until it felt so big that she couldn’t dream of containing it. And there was Lucy, holding Jill’s hand and laughing like it was easy.

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Preserve the freedom only, not the deeds of blood!

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The second time Jill went to Narnia, she found herself not at its edge, but at its end. 

The thing about the Norse apocalypse is: it feels believable. It doesn’t reach beyond earth’s horizon to pull down hope beyond hope. It’s only the kind of courage that hopeless humans have: you are going to die, so you might as well die bravely. 

They found the last king of Narnia bound to a tree. His eyes were faintly red from crying, and his wrists and ankles red from the coarseness of his fetters. 

In the Norse myths, Loki broke free of his fetters at the end of the world. He escaped to the helm of a ship made from the fingernails of the dead.

The last king of Narnia fell forward onto the ground when Eustace cut his bonds. Jill crouched down beside him and watched as he rubbed feeling back into his legs. He wasn’t so much older than her, she thought. Jill was sixteen years old; the last king of Narnia could not be older than twenty-two. 

In the myths, the gods were ancient, hewn from the bodies of giants old as the earth. 

Jill put out a hand and helped the last king of Narnia to his feet. Not for the last time, she shivered. Something deep inside her (deeper than her chest, than her heart, than the marrow of her bones, deep as her soul, deeper) was singing an elegy and she didn’t know why, or how, or where it had come from. The king clutching her hand, who could have been her older brother, would have no heir.

Yet when he asked, “Will you come with me?” Jill could only smile. 

“Of course,” she said. “It’s you we’ve come to help.”

.

And the voice forever cried, "Balder the Beautiful is dead, is dead!"

.

“This really is Narnia at last,” murmured Jill. The springtime wood had little in common with the wintry lands she had traveled the last time she was here– but it awakened the same feelings of Northernness in her chest. 

Their party may as well have been the only people in the world, for how isolated their little wooden path seemed. Yet it wasn’t lonely, really, cocooned in all that green with the wind in the leaves and the primroses nodding and blue of the sky peeking through above. 

Jewel told stories about what ordinary life was like when there was peace here. As he spoke, Jill could almost hear the trees' voices speaking out of the living past, whispering, stay, stay. She was caught up to a great height, looking down across a rich, lovely plain full of woods and waters and cornfields, which spread away and away till it got thin and misty from distance. 

“Oh Jewel–” Jill said with a dreamy sigh, “wouldn’t it be lovely if Narnia just went on and on– like what you say it has been?”

She needn’t be a queen, as Susan and Lucy had been, but Jill would’ve liked to stay. She would've liked it all to stay, if it could. She might have been a woodmaid in a place like this: with the turn of the seasons, the swaying trees, swords into plowshares. Oh, if only she could stay!

Ahead, the last king of Narnia was softly singing a marching song. Jill tilted her head back and let warm shafts of sun caress her face. 

.

I saw the pallid corpse of the dead sun borne through the Northern sky.

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“So,” said the last king of Narnia, “Narnia is no more.”

He tried to send them back. Jill shook her head. It was very loud and very quiet. “No, no, no, we won’t. I don’t care what you say. We’re going to stick by you whatever happens, aren’t we Eustace?”

They couldn’t go back anyway. Neither would they flee, not south across the mountains nor North into the great wide wastes. No, they would stay. They slept in a holly grove on the edge of ruin, waiting for the bonfires to light.

Jill slept fitfully, but in between she dreamed. She was high up in the air, buffeted by clouds and pierced by shafts of silver sunlight. 

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They all died, in the myths. Jill knew that. It seemed beautiful and brave when she read it in her book, tucked away safe in the Professor’s library. It was terrifying now– and yet it was beautiful and brave still.

The dogs came bounding up, every one of them, running up to the king and his men with their tails wagging. One of them leapt at Jill and licked her face, tongue roughly lapping up the sweat and tears that had dried on her cheeks. 

“Show us how to help, show us how, how, how!” the dogs were barking, almost ebullient in their enthusiasm. Jill bit back a sob. How lovely, she thought. How terribly beautiful. How dreadfully brave. 

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So perish the old Gods!

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The white rock gleamed like a moon in the darkness when Jill finally reached it. She ran back to it alone, her hands shaking, while her friends stayed forward with their gleaming swords and Jewel’s indigo horn.

The while rock gleamed like the moon. Jill’s first shot flew wide and landed in the soft grass. But she had another arrow on her string the next instant. It was speed that mattered, not aim. Speed, and turning aside when she cried, so as not to drip tears on her bowstring.

The white rock gleamed. In the myths, a wolf devoured the moon. Peter’s wolf, slain many thousand years ago in this world, opened his jaw wide and darkness fell over everything.

Her next arrow found its mark. After that, she lost track. She pulled, and she prayed that her hands kept still another minute. 

The unique thing–maybe the appealing thing–about the Norse myths, was that they told men to serve gods who were admittedly fighting with their backs to the wall and would certainly be defeated in the end. Jill let loose another arrow, felt the white rock at her back, and she knew that the clawing fear–beauty–bravery deep in her gut was the same feeling that she felt on the heights. The same feeling, but a different face. You’ve got to love vastness more than you fear falling. 

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“I feel in my bones,” said Poggin, “that we shall all, one by one, pass through that dark door before morning. I can think of a hundred deaths that I would rather have died.”

“It is indeed a grim door,” said Tirian. “It is more like a mouth.” 

“Oh, can’t we do anything to stop it,” said Jill. Better to be dashed to the ground than it was to be devoured. 

“Nay, fair friend,” said Jewel. “It may be for us the door to Aslan’s country and we sup at his table tonight.”

A hand tangled itself in her hair and started to pull. Jill braced herself hard, for a moment, until her strength gave out. She was standing on the edge of a high, Northern cliff. She took another step, and fell.

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Perhaps when the moment comes, our bite will prove better than our howls. If not, we shall have to confess that two millennia of Christianity have not yet brought us to the level of the Stoics and Vikings. For the worst (according to the flesh) that a Christian need face is to die in Christ and rise in Christ; some were content to die, and not to rise, with Father Odin.

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The world inside the stable was beautiful. It made Jill’s chest ache in all the loveliest ways. 

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Build it again, O ye bards, fairer than before!

[sauroff]

I want to bring up something serious here for once, because I joined a new Silmarillion group on FB (I'm old, ok?), and it's a particularly inclusive space BUT, because of that, there is a lot of debates going on. And I wasn't allowed to make this point there because the admins were saturated with risky posts.

I have seen a lot of people say things like "Tolkien wasn't racist/anti semitic because he was against fascism!". And I'm not here to discuss the logic on that, or accuse Tolkien of any of those. I'm here to bring up the fact that Tolkien supported Franco.

I get that to most people (even to me) he is not as well known as Hitler or Mussolini, but still. Tolkien supported him, a fascist and a terrible dictator, because of anti communism and very Catholics views. Franco's opposition burned catholic churches and killed nuns and priests. Now, I don't want to get into detail about the reasons behind that, and how different those actions are viewed depending on your history (For Tolkien, to whom being catholic make him part of a minority, this was very different to what it's for people from actual catholic countries in general and latin Americans in particular, in which the church, as an institution, was always complicit of dictatorships and oppression).

Even Lewis had called Roy Campbell, a poet who fought with Franco, as a sort of catholic fascist. And Tolkien considered that Lewis was just under the influence of red propaganda, believing only the things said against Franco. He couldn't understand Lewis reactions to Campbell's stories about his fight

This is mostly talked about in letter 83 which, I must admit, I haven't read. I have read other people's summaries of it. If anyone knows of some place where I could read it, please reach out and tell me.

My point here is not bashing on Tolkien. I've decided long ago I prefer not to engage too much with his personal history, since my position as a latin american, born so many years after him, raised as a catholic in a catholic country, with a VERY different history around it, makes my personal views very opposed to his in many levels.

My point is to bring awareness on the fact that Tolkien did indeed support one fascist regimen, and this is ignored by most people. I think it's not just that Franco is not as known for some as the other two, it's also that he seems to have a very different weight for those that speak Spanish and those who don't. For starters, this facts it's not included in his English wiki, while it's included on the one in Spanish. For me, that I usually try to read the English sources for English themed things, this meant that I didn't know about this until some days ago, and I learnt it through a meme.

So yeah, I just needed to tell this in case some other people are just as ignorant as me on this. Because the whole "Tolkien was against fascism" is something I have read too many times and never questioned, tbh. But maybe it was just me.

Picture of the Spanish wiki just for attention

[imakemywings]

“Ah, and yonder, you may view the Fountain of the King,” said Turgon, pointing. His companion went on chewing at his sleeve and did not respond. “You will have passed it many times on your way into the palace, but is it not interesting to see it from a new perspective?”

            Eärendil kicked his feet, which reached just to the edge of the balcony railing. One firm hand on his chest kept him from going anywhere as Turgon point out this and that landmark that could be seen stretching out across Gondolin under the marbled blue sky.

            “You prefer a different one, perhaps? Lord Ecthelion maintains quite a few in the area around his home.” Turgon gestured in the direction of Lord Ecthelion’s estate. “Has Lady Idril taken you to see those as well? If not, we will have to remedy it!”

            At this note of firm enthusiasm in Turgon’s voice, Eärendil chirped, releasing the king’s sleeve from his gummy mouth at last, a wide wet mark left behind.

            “Yes, it may even be a matter of urgency,” Turgon agreed gravely. “We will attend our schedule and see if time allows for a field trip.” He scooped Eärendil up in one arm and brought him inside. Out of the chilly mountain air high up on the balcony, he removed Eärendil’s fur-lined coat to allow him better freedom of movement. None had been sure how Eärendil’s mortal blood might affect him, but thus far, Turgon had not found him overly different from most babies. He smiled, he laughed, he cried, he slept—he kept his parents up at all hours.

            When Idril returned for her son, he was bouncing on the king’s knee at his desk while Turgon penned some intra-city correspondence.

            “What’s this? Adar, I would not have taken you from your work for this,” Idril said. “You might have asked someone else to take him.”

            “Eärendil is assisting me with these letters,” Turgon insisted soberly, finishing his sentence before he looked to the baby and then to his own daughter. “He has proven a most useful discussant for deciding the most efficacious response.”

            Eärendil tipped backwards against Turgon, reaching up for one of the king’s dreadlocks, which he loved to pull, but Turgon gently dissuaded his grasping hand. Idril made a soft sound of amusement.

            “I should have foreseen you would put him to work!” she said, plucking the child from Turgon’s lap to settle him on her hip. “What a taskmaster you are, my lord!”

            “He will be an excellent addition to the king’s council shortly, I’m sure,” said Turgon.

            “I will pass the word on to Tuor,” she said with a wry smile. “Doubtless he will find the occasion worthy of commissioning another new outfit for Eärendil.” She gathered up Eärendil’s things scattered around Turgon’s office, choosing to leave one wooden duck on wheels, just in case Eärendil found himself there unexpectedly.

            “I am sorry I’ve been so busy lately,” Idril began, but Turgon waved a hand.

            “No trouble, Idril,” he said. “Please. It is always a pleasure to spend time with my grandson.” There was a hint of softness in her father’s usually stern face that assured her of his genuineness, and she smiled.

            “I’m very sure it’s mutual,” she said.

            “Ah, one item for you before you depart,” Turgon said, shuffling some parchment on his desk. “Eärendil tells me he hasn’t yet had a tour of Lord Ecthelion’s fountains. This must be remedied as soon as possible.” Idril suppressed a snort.

            “Yes, of course, my lord,” she said. “I will be certain to attend this with the urgency required.” Eärendil cooed and Idril bounced him in her arm.

            “Good. I trust you will.” Father and daughter exchanged matching half-smiles and Idril took her leave. The king gave Eärendil a little wave on his way out.

On AO3

[pandaimitator]

Another breakfast table discussion:

What social media platforms can be represented by which place in Tolkien's universe?

-Husband was adamant that Reddit was Gondor (the last bastion of decency)

-We agreed that Facebook was Murkwood

-Tiktok is the Goblin realm

-Husband claimed instagram was Rohan (albeit ruled by Wormtongue - I didn't quite agree, Rohan is too good for them)

-9gag is Mordor

-4chan is Moria

-Twitter/X is Isengard

And I want to claim that:

-Tumblr is the Shire (petty people showing off their shiny marbles.)

Please discuss this further.

[fluentisonus]

if you think about it gimli could well have seen or even been to the sea any number of times having grown up in the blue mountains. it would have been right there