🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️🇵🇷I got into the Silmarillion and I created a new blog in order to organize my new hyperfixation. Here's a rundown of my stan list and biases so you know what to expect (@virtual-dragon-almond-bakery is me!) as my blog title says Frodo and Elwing did nothing wrong.
IF YOU ARE GOING TO BE RUDE TO ME, I AM GOING TO BE EVEN RUDER. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. It's okay to disagree with some of my opinions, but do it NICELY. I have been rereading Tolkien, so please don't explain very basic parts of canon to me.
I am a Morwen, Éowyn, Elwing and Fëanorian stan, I love all of them.
Frodo and Sam are my favorites!
I'm very aware that Fëanor has plenty of faults, I am saying he got a shitty deal from life. Also, I don't care that he did all of that, I just think he's enjoyable.
Nienor really didn't do anything wrong though.
I don't really like Thingol and I am now neutral towards Dior, though I do enjoy some of Thingol's funnier moments. The real crime is that Dior only gets ONE funny moment.
Yes, I WILL talk about racism in Tolkien's books displayed by characters.
I multiship!
I AM STARTING A REREAD and watching the movies and Rings of Power to torture myself.
I first read this series in 2022-2023 so my takes are relatively new. I try to search around for very old graphics to reblog.
I tag triggers, so if anyone wants a new one, I'll add it. It can be silly stuff like Sean Bean if that's triggering to you, I'll add it anyways
I am here for funsies, it's not serious, I just use swear words a lot.
if anything the person who “abandoned” Elrond and Elros was Eärendil, but the fandom paints Elwing with the “abandoned their family” narrative moreso than Eärendil. For Some Reason That We May Never Understand
worst part everrrrr of being a girl character enjoyer is trying to find enjoyerposts but then it's all "it's so fucked that no one likes The Character and everyone's stupid and evil cause they overlook her for the popular blokes" and no actual The Character posting. 1. you're killing our girl's PR, if you vocally hate everyone who likes the more popular stuff then you're not gonna persuade any of them and no one will want to touch The Character with a ten foot pole because they think her fanclub wants to beat them with hammers, 2. you're still not actually talking about her I'm going to scream and cry
Back here to post something and it's about Thingol's language ban: I'm going to be frank, I'm not Thingol's biggest fan or something but I don't it was cultural violence or oppression etc. he only targeted his fellow Sindar in the ban 😭
I'm reblogging because I have gotten way too invested in this poll.
So: Túrin. A list of reasons he is doomed by the narrative, in order of how important I think they are:
He is doomed by an in-universe curse, which was set upon him by Morgoth, the root cause of all evil in Tolkien's legendarium;
his death is explicitly mentioned in the foreword to the Silmarillion;
his story was deliberately written to echo the Finnish tragedy of Kullervo while still fitting Tolkien's legendarium (it was originally based on a tragedy, from his very first imaginings!)
the readers know that his story contains elements from three tragedies before even reading it ("Sigurd the Volsung, Oedipus, and the Finnish Kullervo"), in all bar one edition of the Silmarillion;
if he didn't bring tragedy to all around him, the rest of the Silmarillion would simply not occur, as the fall of Nargothrond and Doriath would likely be averted (Doriath only got the Nauglamir as a direct result of Hurin seeing Turin dying in the way he did, for one);
his choices were... not great. He became an outlaw in self-imposed exile from Doriath, which had been his home for years, because he had accidentally killed an elf that made jibes about his family, despite the king of Doriath being his foster-father. And so on. There's definitely some arrogant pride in there, like every good tragic character that dooms themselves.
Supporting quotes below the cut.
1: In-universe curse
In brief,
Then Morgoth cursed Húrin and Morwen and their offspring, and set a doom upon them of darkness and sorrow;
Morwen, daughter of Baragund, was the wife of Húrin, Lord of Dor-lómin; and their son was Túrin,
Both quotes from the Silmarillion. There's more detail in The Children of Hurin, but I don't have a copy. Instead, I direct you to the other reblogs, which have mentioned this quite frequently.
2: Foreword
In this work the concluding chapters (from the death of Túrin Turambar) introduced peculiar difficulties, in that they had remained unchanged for many years, and were in some respects in serious disharmony with more developed conceptions in other parts of the book.
So before we even start the Silmarillion, we are told in the foreword that Túrin is guaranteed to die. There's no other way for the narrative to go.
3: Based on a tragedy
I don't have a copy of The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, but the summary on Tolkien Gateway of Letter 257 tells us that Túrin's story was originally based on the Finnish Kalevala character Kullervo, and the ending remained unchanged.
The germ of his writing his own legends fitted to his private languages was the tragic tale of hapless Kullervo in the Finish Kalevala. It was the basis for The Children of Húrin although all had changed except for the tragic ending.
I'm taking 'all had changed' to mean that the setting, characters, etc. were dramatically altered, because some aspects of the story remain the exact same. Both Kullervo and Túrin are separated from their families at a young age, have an unknowingly incestous relationship with their sister (who drowns herself upon realising who her brother is) and commit suicide on their magical talking sword.
4: Contains elements from 3 tragedies
In the excerpt of Letter 131 included before the main body of the Silmarillion,
There is the Children of Húrin, the tragic tale of Túrin Turambar and his sister Níniel – of which Túrin is the hero: a figure that might be said (by people who like that sort of thing, though it is not very useful) to be derived from elements in Sigurd the Volsung, Oedipus, and the Finnish Kullervo.
This appears in every edition of the Silmarillion, as far as I can tell, except possibly the first.
5: Rest of Silmarillion would not exist
Or at the very least, be changed significantly. Húrin says the following to Thingol in the Silmarillion, so it is clear he is bringing the Nauglamír as a direct result of his family's sorrows and hardships:
‘Receive thou thy fee,’ he cried, ‘for thy fair keeping of my children and my wife! For this is the Nauglamír, whose name is known to many among Elves and Men; and I bring it to thee out of the darkness of Nargothrond, where Finrod thy kinsman left it behind him when he set forth with Beren son of Barahir to fulfil the errand of Thingol of Doriath!’
Without the Nauglamír being in Thingol's possession, I think it's safe to say the Sons of Fëanor might not have attacked Doriath in search of a Silmaril, for example, which would change the course of Beleriand significantly. And as for Nargothrond, I think Túrin's counsel definitely had an impact on Nargothrond being revealed as early as it was:
When it became known to Orodreth that the Mormegil was in truth the son of Húrin Thalion he gave him great honour, and Túrin became mighty among the people of Nargothrond. But he had no liking for their manner of warfare, of ambush and stealth and secret arrow, and he yearned for brave strokes and battle in the open; and his counsels weighed with the King ever the longer the more. In those days the Elves of Nargothrond forsook their secrecy and went openly to battle, and great store of weapons were made; and by the counsel of Túrin the Noldor built a mighty bridge over the Narog from the Doors of Felagund, for the swifter passage of their arms. Then the servants of Angband were driven out of all the land between Narog and Sirion eastward, and westward to the Nenning and the desolate Falas; and though Gwindor spoke ever against Túrin in the council of the King, holding it an ill policy, he fell into dishonour and none heeded him, for his strength was small and he was no longer forward in arms. Thus Nargothrond was revealed to the wrath and hatred of Morgoth; but still at Túrin’s prayer his true name was not spoken, and though the fame of his deeds came into Doriath and to the ears of Thingol, rumour spoke only of the Black Sword of Nargothrond.
6: Bad choices
Look, I don't want to quote the whole chapter about Túrin in the Silmarillion at you. Or even worse, all the excerpts of The Children of Hurin that I can find. Instead, I direct you to a summary, nicely provided by Wikipedia. Please peruse it to your heart's desire.
If you don’t like a ship or character, that’s totally fine, but putting the tag for that ship or character in a hate post is unnecessary and just makes you look like an asshole tbh. Tags are meant for people who enjoy that content to find and share it and interact with other fans, I guarantee that you’re not changing anyone’s mind about it by ambushing them with negativity in their space. It’s one thing to vent on your own blog or in untagged spaces, but putting hate in the tags just pushes your opinion into a community that didn’t ask for it. You can curate your experience without ruining someone else’s😃
Nah you guys don’t get it. For all that Gandalf complained about Pippin, he better than anyone else knew that Pippin was absolutely crucial. Pippin accomplishes a very impressive feat: not only does he manage to see something in the palantír (most hobbits would perceive nothing, as these stones were designed for use by high elves), but he manages to close his mind against Sauron. That is a seriously impressive feat of ósanwë given Pippin’s youth and almost total inexperience. The only clue Sauron manages to glean from the meeting with Pippin is that he is in Meduseld: which Pippin probably did not even directly give to him. Pippin did not tell Sauron his name, so Sauron is led to believe that Pippin is Frodo. I remind you, in the books, the Good Guys manage to trick Sauron, by making him believe that Aragorn has claimed the One Ring. They can only do that because of Pippin’s ridiculous feat of ósanwë. Far from sabotaging the mission, he is the one who allows it to succeed (albeit, not on purpose). This is why Sauron doesn’t think anything is fishy when Aragorn wins the Battle of the Pelennor Fields by controlling ghosts: that would be consistent with the idea that he is using the One Ring. Which Sauron believes that Pippin brought to him. This is why Sauron pulls out his old “play nice and weak” card from his Númenor days. He first of all believes that Aragorn is a lot more powerful than he actually is, and secondly thinks that the Ring is beginning to affect him.
He should perhaps have remembered that Aragorn is named for Fingolfin. Fingolfin’s mother-name, Arakáno, would properly be translated to Sindarin as “Aragorn”. Most people would not show up to an enemy fortress with an army they knew was far too small, and start a battle they knew they would lose. But Fingolfin famously did exactly that.
When you read the line “fool of a Took!” It is important to understand that in the context of Gandalf calling himself a fool on several occasions. Galadriel too sees beyond the veneer of foolish naivety in Pippin. She gives him and Merry belts that almost definitely were once her brothers’. A golden flower on a gift from Galadriel can only be a golden lily, the sigil of the House of Finarfin. Galadriel, while all hell was breaking loose in Tirion, raided her brothers’ rooms and took their belts from when they were little kiddos, hauled them across the Helcaraxë, and then held onto them for three Ages before giving them to two hobbits she just met. Merry, of course, is comparable to Angrod and Aegnor: his great deed is done in a moment of beserk rage, and it is a feat of strength. This then implies that she is comparing Pippin to Finrod. That’s one hell of a complement coming from Galadriel: but as I just pointed out, entirely warranted. Pippin manages to reproduce Finrod’s feat of radio silence, in the face of torture by Sauron. Which again, is extremely impressive given that Pippin is far younger and less experienced than Finrod was.
honestly, i think it's pretty much a given in context that for beren, the silmaril quest is not really about being able to be with luthien. he already is with her, and they do have other options aside from asking for thingol's blessing. as has been pointed out, they could have easily run away together. but beren doesn't want that life for luthien. he doesn't want her to, even willingly, give up her home, her family and friends, everything she's known, and live with all the dangers that he's been experiencing since he was a teenager, just to be with him. as far as he's concerned, he'd rather tackle a perilous and seemingly impossible quest for thingol's blessing as best as he can, than ever put luthien in that kind of danger. he knows. he knows how disheartening it is to live every day in fear and uncertainty. he loves her too much to ever give up on their relationship, but he also loves her too much to ever ask her to choose him over safety, security, family, and home. she would, as their story shows on no uncertain terms -- but he would never ask her to. he would rather die trying to let her have both than take either away from her
Aight I’ve had a few people ask me for this in response to this post so:
Many times in Tolkien’s works, armies, leaders, heroes, etcetera, launch an attack on The Dread Fortress. This is a very Campbellian behavior, obviously, and usually ends with the hero either dying, or surviving but at a horrible price. Some examples:
Fingolfin: Goes after Morgoth (enemy), manages to wound him, but dies, not only losing his life but forcing a leadership change among the Noldor that arguably contributed to the fall of Beleriand.
Beren: went after the Silmaril (object); though it was for the cause of love, he was still going after an object, a prize, and he failed to achieve his goal (lost the Silmaril, and lost his hand).
Gwindor: Went to Angband for revenge for his brother, wound up captured, tortured, and maimed.
Frodo: Went to Mount Doom to throw the ring into the flame, lost his reason (temporarily) and his finger (permanently) and fortunately, the ring (accidentally).
Finrod Felagund: Went to the Tol-in-Gauroth to fulfill his oath (NO OATHS!), lost his life and a rap battle.
Notably, all of these are presented as ostensibly good, right, or at the very least understandable and morally neutral choices and behaviors. None of these are villains. These are protagonists, heroes, rightful kings, or tragic figures.
BUT
If you go into the Dread Fortress specifically seeking a PERSON you love, things go differently.
Sam: Goes into the tower of Cirith Ungol seeking Frodo. Sings a song. Emerges with Frodo. Loses nothing. Later, escapes another dread fortress with the Eagles.
Lúthien: Goes into Angband seeking Beren. Sings a song. Emerges with Beren. Loses nothing. (You can argue that she loses something when she emerges from Mandos with Beren, but it’s still freely traded, and frankly, Mandos is not a Dread Fortress.) Escapes the Dread Fortress with the Eagles.
Fingon: Goes to the Thangorodrim seeking Maedhros. Sings a song. Emerges with Maedhros. Loses nothing. Escapes the Dread Fortress with the Eagles.
In conclusion, if your boyfriend is held prisoner in the Dread Fortress, don’t get mad. Get your harp, and Get Him Back. You’ll probably even get a cool ride home.
“When I speak of Indigenous peoples surviving an apocalypse, I’m not speaking metaphorically. The colonization of the Americas represents the largest genocide in human history. Indigenous populations declined by an estimated 90% in the century following European contact, which was about 1/5 of the world’s population at the time. This over just a one-hundred-year period. Entire civilizations vanished. Languages died. Sacred sites were destroyed. After that culturally genocidal policies were enacted like banning religious ceremonies and children being stolen and forced into boarding schools designed to “kill the Indian, save the child.””
Rambling Morwen thoughts, more in my houseless for exiles tag, sorry for aforementioned rambling
“Rashness, lord! If my son works in the woods hungry if he lingers in bonds, if his body lies unburied, then I would be rash. I would lose no hour to go to seek him.”
-Chapter 14, The Journey of Morwen and Niënor
Everything in this exchange is so important to me, but it’s specifically the if his body lies unburied that really gets to me because I think it speaks a lot about Morwen’s trauma from the Bragollach, and Húrin and Rían’s vanishing
Just have so much of her pride is in twined with her grief so much of her grief is so intertwined with uncertainty, and not knowing.
Her father and uncle, and a lot of her male relatives who died with Barahir, she never got news of their death. If she did, it would’ve been decades after it happened when she finally came to Doriath, if Beren’s full history was known there. Her mother may well have died in the Bragollach too*
And then her cousin, the last of her people there also runs off, and she never gets any news of her, and she never learns at least presumably never learns what happened to Rían’s son**
And of course Húrin! Húrin Rides off for war and never returns, and no tidings from any of his people who fought in the battle come back either. She doesn’t know if he’s dead, or captured, or simply prevented from returning as she says herself.
I have a couple posts in my houseless for exiles tag about this but also leaving Hithlum behind, knowing that she would never see it or its people again, and would likely never know of their fate, is yet another grief. She would have left Aerin and anyone else she was close with, knowing the circumstances they would be in and knowing the parting was a permanent one.
Which leads to my main point
Morwen is willing to drown crossing the Sirion (as she tells Mablung) or be murdered by Morgoth’s most dreadful monster (as she nearly is) trying to get news of Túrin, or save him or even just to bury him! She’s willing to risk that just to make sure he gets proper burial and so she knows what has become of him.
I’m sorry to bring this back into my thoughts about those words and traits that are always associated with Morwen; her pride, her grief (and also her inability to grieve!!,)  and severity and stubbornness and resilience but I think it’s all so fascinatingly connected. She has been denied closure for decades. She’s willing to do pretty much anything to make sure it doesn’t happen again
And that’s part of what makes that last interaction at the grave of her children so heartbreaking
And this should be a post in itself I’ll make later but I also think about how for those who knew Morwen, they suffer this same uncertainty
…but Morwen also was lost. Neither then nor after did any certain news of her fate come to Doriath or to Dor-lómin.
(Also, I love her being able to tell the difference in the members of the party and to be able to tell that there’s one more member that there should be when these thousands of year-old fully trained elven scouts didn’t notice that it’s both awesome and very funny to me! And the part about Morwen refusing to be led back to Doriath by Niënor! It’s the second to last mention of her pride and resolve in the novel and it’s part of the last description of Niënor as Niënor!)
Anyway I love Morwen very much and I will do an entire post on the whence came he! Scene
* Neither the mother of Morwen nor her parents or any other maternal family is mentioned in canon. In The Shaping of Middle Earth, Tolkien originally had the mothers of Morwen and Rían as being of the house of Marach, his original reason for them having survived the Bragollach and ending up in Hithlum. He discarded this however, making Morwen and Rían refugees of the Bragollach but never saying anything more about their mothers.
** kept this part short as I have several post specifically about this aspect of their relationship and their relationship and general, which are very important to me, I’ll link one of the more recent ones just for my own organization here
