Around the World and Web

British Library: Twenty-First Century Tolkien with Nick Groom and Dimitra Fimi

J.R.R. Tolkien is a colossal figure in fantasy fiction: his visionary creation Middle-Earth and its inhabitants have captured the imagination of millions of people around the world. Its origins were closely interwoven with his own life experience and deep study of language and literature, but went on to be a cultural phenomenon, with adaptations including Peter Jackson’s blockbuster films of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit and more recently the TV series The Rings of Power.

Nick Groom's book Twenty-First-Century; Tolkien What Middle-Earth Means To Us Today is an engaging and radical reinterpretation of the beloved author’s work. He is joined in conversation by Dimitra Fimi, author of Tolkien, Race and Cultural History. They are chaired by Adam Roberts, an award winning novelist, and historian of literature.

The lecture will run on 9 January 2024 at 7:30 PM GMT. You can view the lecture here.

Fellowship of the Fics: January Trope Roulette

We hope everyone had a wonderful holiday! Now that we're in the new year, get ready to see some new changes to the FOTFICs blog that we're so excited to share. One thing that isn't changing, is our love for monthly events to help promote creativity!

Do you recognize this one from last year?

Welcome to January Trope Roulette! 

The goal is very simple - spin the roulette wheel (link below) twice and whatever AU/Trope(s) you get, write something (drabble, one shot, 100k+ novel, etc) featuring the two mashed together (If you get the same one twice, spin again.)

This is to encourage exploration into other tropes/situations that maybe we as writers never considered before, and can work as a great writing exercise to get you going for the day!

Be sure to tag #fotfics so we can see what amazing works you guys come up with!

→ January Trope Roulette Wheel

Bonus: let your followers spin the wheel and send in the fun combinations they get!

Purim Gifts 2024

Purim Gifts is an annual all-fandoms-welcome exchange for fanfic and/or podfic (participant's choice) with a side helping of art, focused on characters who are at least one of: women, Jewish, or persecuted by evil viziers.

Purim Gifts celebrates the Jewish holiday of Purim, which commemorates one smart orphan-girl saving her people from genocide (plotted by the king's vizier) and becoming a queen while she's at it. You totes don't have to be Jewish to participate!

2024 Schedule:

SIGNUPS & NOMINATIONS - Fri-Fri 5-12 Jan (anywhere in the world) DEADLINE - Fri 15 March (anywhere in the world) REVEALS - Sat-Mon 23-25 March

Got more questions? You can:

1. Send us an ask
2. Join our Discord server (fresh link posted weekly until signups end)
3. Email us at purim_gifts@yahoo.com

January 2024 Call for Papers

Centre for Fantasy Literature Studies: Magic System as the Key Element in Fantasy Worldbuilding

This conference is hosted online on 25th –26th January at 11am (+2 GMT) by the Centre for Fantasy Literature Studies at the Taras Shevchenko Institute of Literature, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.

How does one choose a magic system for a fantasy world? How do we employ magic to build a dialogue with reality? Fantasy fiction is brimming with magic systems ranging from ritual magic to elemental, from dominating and manipulative magic to the one that is shaped by a dialogue between equals. A magic system in fantasy literature can be defined as a conglomeration of magic sources, manifestations, practices and implements that interact with one another and the environment and are employed by magic users to produce an impact on the world at various levels or to create an illusion of such an impact in accordance with the in-universe laws. You are invited to participate in a conversation about the principles of magic system modelling and functioning in fantasy fiction. Issues to be discussed include but are not limited to:

• Magic systems in fantasy short stories / novels / series / worlds;
• Magic systems typology within one world or at the metagenre level;
• Magic systems in action: sources, mechanisms, implementations, potentials and limitations;
• Magic systems as a space for creative experiments and collaboration between
• the author and the reader. Magic systems and fandoms;
• Magic system analysis through the prism of poetics, genre, narrative theory, etc;
• Correlation of fantasy magic systems with contemporary social, psychological, political concerns (gender, postcolonial, environmental studies, etc.).

Proposals are accepted till 10th January 2024.

To submit a proposal, please fill in the form.

Languages: English and Ukrainian

25-minute presentations will be followed by 5-minute discussions

Tolkien at UVM 2023: The Psychologies of Middle-earth

This hybrid conference will be held 13 April 2024 at the University of Vermont.

This is our 20th annual conference. The theme is The Psychologies of Middle-earth. We are excited to have Dr Sara Brown as our keynote!

Please submit abstracts (150 words) to Dr. Chris Vaccaro (at cvaccaro@uvm.edu) by the deadline of January 15th 2024. The registration fee is $25 and covers breakfast and lunch and helps to pay for our tech support for the virtual modality.

Abstracts can cover various applications of psychology including myth, religion, art, sexuality, world building, race and ethnicity, feminism, queer theory, class consciousness, ideology, PTSD, trauma, desire, disability, and much more.

Proposals Due: January 15, 2024

Note that SWG members often attend this conference! Message Dawn if you are thinking of attending and want to meet up.

Tolkien Society Seminar: Tolkien's Romantic Resonances

We are now calling for papers for the Tolkien Society 2024 seminar, on the theme Tolkien’s Romantic Resonances, which will be a hybrid event held online and in-person at the Hilton Hotel, Leeds on 6th July 2024.

This seminar seeks fresh and innovative readings of Tolkien’s Romantic Resonances that are in dialogue with modern scholarship on Romanticisms, Romantic aesthetics and Romantic-period histories. The seminar understands ‘Romanticism’ and the ‘Romantic’ as complex, nuanced terms that elude simplification, traditional historical markers, and solely Anglocentric readings. We welcome proposals that address the broader application of the terms.

Proposals should be no more than 300 words and biographies no more than 100 words. An additional box has been provided for proposed bibliographies if you wish to include one. The deadline for the call for papers is end of day Thursday 29th February 2024. Paper proposals should be submitted here.

Find the full call for papers here.

German Tolkien Society Seminar: Tolkien and His Editors

Tolkien, in paratextual parts of his main work The Lord of the Rings, introduced himself as the editor and translator of the Red Book of Westmarch. A similar conjecture can be found in Farmer Giles of Ham, which comes with a scholarly preface and purports to be the translation of a medieval manuscript. These rather playful examples should be set alongside the real-world editors of Tolkien’s works. In his will, Tolkien made his youngest son Christopher (1924-2020) his ‘literary executor’ with “full power to publish edit alter rewrite or complete any work of mine which may be unpublished at my death or to destroy the whole or any part or parts of any such unpublished works as he in his absolute discretion may think fit and subject thereto” (official copy of Tolkien’s will, 23 July, 1973). Until his death (16 January 2020), Christopher actively fulfilled his role as ‘literary executor’ and edited and made available to a wide audience countless texts from Tolkien’s estate – and thus strongly influenced the perception and understanding of the works already published during Tolkien’s lifetime. Above all, The Silmarillion (1977), which he edited and, as was established in retrospect (Kane 2009), was heavily modified by him, had a major influence on Tolkien research.

In addition to the central figure of Christopher Tolkien, who could have celebrated his 100th birthday in 2024, the roles of the editors Stanley and Rayner Unwin, the biographer Humphrey Carpenter (Biography; Letters), the student and later colleague Alan Bliss (Hengest and Finn), the daughter-in-law Baillie Tolkien (The Father Christmas Letters) or the Elvish Linguistic Fellowship should also be examined.

The aim of this seminar is to bring together researchers from different disciplines to explore the various questions and problems posed by the publication of Tolkien’s work.

Possible starting points for presentations would be:

• Christopher Tolkien (1924-2020) as ‘co-author’ of Tolkien’s work
• Censorship and restriction: the search for the ‘true’ Tolkien biography
• Tolkien’s posthumous academic work
• The publication of the works on the Elvish (and other) languages
• Access to and handling of Tolkien’s manuscripts and notes in the Bodleian and the Marquette

The 20th Seminar of the German Tolkien Society is supported by Walking Tree Publishers and will take place in a hybrid format at the RWTH Aachen from 11-13 October 2024. 

Interested applicants are requested to send a short synopsis (no longer than one page) and a short biography as well as their preference (attendance in person or online presentation) to Thomas Fornet-Ponse by 31 May 2024: hither-shore@tolkiengesellschaft.de

See the full call for papers here.

Mythmoot X: Homeward Bound

This hybrid conference will be held 22-25 June 2024 at the National Conference Center in Leesburg, Virginia.

Mythmoot annual conference brings together students, fans, staff, and friends of Signum University, the Mythgard Institute, Signum SPACE, and Signum Academy. Our online and in-person completely hybrid event combines the best of scholarship and friendship in four glorious days.

The call for papers for this conference has not been posted yet. The conference webpage is here.

Signum University Regional Moots

These small, regional conferences are held at various dates and locations. See the Regional Moots page for more details.

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Many thanks to Robin Anne Reid and her Online Conference Project for handily compiling this information on a regular basis!

Teitho January/February Contest: Looking Back

Our prompt for Jan/Feb is Looking Back.

What memories exist from the road behind? Are there people or places thoughts linger on?

Or are there situations to look back on warmly or perhaps with regret?

Fond thoughts on times past or people we have met—which will you choose?

Or is Looking Back more immediate for you—a danger lurking behind or a need for vigilance on the road?

Will we be looking back at Tirion? Gondolin? The Shire? Those left behind? The road that brought us to where we are now?

We look forward to your stories for this challenge!! Please submit to teitho.contest@gmail.com by Feb 29, 2024.

Also! Don’t forget our current challenge SNOW, which runs through Jan 31, 2024!

More on the Teitho Contest and its rules can be found here.

January Challenge at tolkienshortfanworks on Dreamwidth

The tolkienshortfanworks challenge for January has been posted at the tolkienshortfanworks community on  Dreamwidth.

The thematic challenge is: building.
This could be a completed building (and any of the buildings in Tolkien's works) or the process of building or any of the senses and uses of "to build", including those that do not involve stones, bricks or mortar.

The formal challenge is to write something cumulative, a form that builds up and keeps getting longer!
Examples of this are the song "Old MacDonald Had a Farm" or the nursery rhyme "This is the House that Jack built".
Your version need not be a song or poem, it can also be prose.
Some further examples (from different languages and cultures) are discussed and linked on these two Wikipedia pages: cumulative tales and songs.

As usual, these can be filled separately and freely combined with SWG and other challenges. New participants welcome.

More details on the challenge at the linked post.

AO3 Demographics Survey

This project is an independent survey (not affiliated with AO3) which seeks to research the demographics and behaviours of AO3 users. The survey will take about 10-15 minutes to complete, will be open until 1 February, and can be found at https://forms.gle/2kt5J17ipzcAbnFY9

We are hoping to survey as large a group of users as possible, so we really appreciate anyone who shares the survey, whether by reblogging this post or sharing posts on other social media.

If you have any questions for us, we have FAQs on Tumblr or on AO3 which will be updated as the project progresses. And of course, you can follow us on Tumblr or AO3 if you want to see the survey results!

Fandom Snowflake Challenge 2024

The Fandom Snowflake Challenge will be happening again in January. We are very excited about hosting another round! The challenge posting schedule we’ve used the last few rounds seemed to work well, so we’re going to stick with every other day. To that end challenges will be posted on odd days: 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19, 21, 23, 25, 27 & 29 with the friending meme on the 31st. On posting days, there will be prompt about fandom participation that you can respond to if you want to ... or not! This is a very low-key, low-stress challenge that has been running since 2012.

The Fandom Snowflake Challenge can be found on

• Tumblr: snowflakechallenge
• Twitter: snowflakeDW
• Pillowfort: Snowflake Challenge
• Mastodon: Snowflake Challenge

Screw Yule 2024

You are cordially invited to participate in this year's Screw Yule, a celebration of Elves, smut, and a New Year's Resolution to toss Laws and Customs right out the window (or, at least, ignore whatever is necessary to appease your muses.)

Screw Yule is a way to kick off the new year with Elf smut, and lots of it. There are a variety of challenge options, and infinite combinations between these different options. You can even completely disregard the challenges and just submit whatever Elf smuttiness you like, as long as it hasn't been written previously for something else and there's an Elf in it somewhere. The only rules are to have fun, and be dirty [We used to only allow ratings of R or NC- 17/ adult-oriented fics, but if you want to only put one foot in the gutter and not jump in completely, go for it. We just really encourage being totally in the gutter!] This event was previously held in the magical place that was Little Balrog, but following the shutdown of Yahoo Groups in the form that allowed for that, stories will now be shared on AO3. The AO3 collection can be found here.

Just Leave a Comment Fest 2024

Just Leave a Comment fest will run from December 26-30. Each day will have a theme, but the idea is to leave comments, whether you follow the theme or not!

Full guidelines and FAQ are here!

Prompts

December 26 - First Fandom: Go back to your firt fandom! See what's changed, see what's good, read some fics, and leave them comments.

December 27 - Bookmark Day: You kept bookmarking those fics all year, saying you would leave comments. Today is the day to make good on those promises.

December 28 - Old Favorites: You've been reading that same fic twice a month for years, but you only commented back in 2015. It's time to let the author know how much the fic means to you!! Comment on all those old favorites!!!

December 29 - Fandom Curiosity: You've been seeing a bunch of mutuals post fics, fanart, and gifsets of something you've never heard of, never experienced for yourself. Find out if their new obsession could also be yours through reading those fics and leaving some comments.

December 30 - Rec a Fic! Pay it forward and help and friend find something new! Comment on any fic of your choosing and rec that fic to a friend or a mutual! Comment on all the fics you are recommended and keep the chain going!

On the 31st, post comment totals from the rest of the fest!