Around the World and Web includes announcements and items of interest from beyond the SWG.
Tolkien Reverse Summer Bang (TRSB) Sign-Ups Open!
Calling all creators of Middle-earth magic! Whether you wield a pen, stylus, or keyboard, it’s time to return to Middle-earth for another epic journey.
What is it? The Tolkien Reserve Summer Bang is a collaborative fan event celebrating the works and adaptations of J.R.R. Tolkien. Writers and artists will team up to bring new stories to life—from the Shire to the far reaches of Valinor (and everything in between).
Sign-ups are officially OPEN! Whether you're a seasoned loremaster or a first-time adventurer, we’d love to have you join us. Writers, artists, beta readers, cheerleaders, treat makers, and pinch hitters—all are welcome!
*While artist and author sign-ups have a time limit, sign-ups for the other roles will remain open for the event.
Art Suggestion Spreadsheet for inspiration
FAQs: Answers to all our frequently asked questions
Sign-up deadlines: Artists: May 3rd
Authors: May 17th
Everybody Else: Duration of the Event
Spread the word, gather your fellowship, and let’s make some magic this summer!
April Challenge at tolkienshortfanworks
The tolkienshortfanworks challenge for April has been posted to the Dreamwidth community.
The thematic challenge for this month is: Wood.
This could be in the sense of "forest" or in the sense of the material.
It could also be "wood" as an element in compounds or names.
The formal challenge this time is: linnod.
This is the traditional verse form used by Gilraen in the Tale of Aragorn and Arwen (LOTR Appendix A).
We only have that one canonical example with translation:
Ónen i-Estel Edain, ú-chebin estel anim.
"I gave Hope to the Dúnedain, I have kept no hope for myself."
The name of the form probably means "chant-seven".
Our Sindarin example seems to show two times seven syllables, although there may be other ways to interpret the form.
Imitate the Sindarin original or its English translation in any way you like.
Alternatively, your piece could include someone using a short response in verse in the way Gilraen does, without your imitating the form of the linnod itself.
These prompts can be filled separately and freely combined with other challenges and prompts that allow this. New participants welcome.
More detals on the challenges at the linked post and at the Dreamwidth community.
Tolkien Ekphrasis Week 2025
Material culture and art add vibrancy to our lives, and it seems that there are so many options in Middle Earth ripe for interpretation! A poem on Nerdanel's statues, a tapestry capturing Nessa's dance, a prose fic describing the impact of seeing Númenor's frescoes, a painting exploring the beautiful quotidian architecture of a Hobbit hole…
This is a Tolkien-fandom-wide event dedicated to the art of ekphrasis in Tolkien's worlds. Its goal is to illuminate the artistic surroundings of the places, people, and stories we love, in as many media as possible. As such, fanworks are welcome to take almost any form: see the FAQ for the full list!
The prompts are multi-part. The first part of the prompt is mandatory, describing the kind of art to be interpreted. The subsequent parts are optional thematic, formal, or visual add-ons that people may choose to incorporate or not.
In short, the timeline is:
- Read prompts starting March 17.
- Create!
- Post tagged work to AO3 before June 9 deadline.
- Enjoy daily reveals between June 10 and June 16.
- Amnesty day June 17 for late posters.
Inclusion
Tolkien Ekphrasis Week is open to all characters, genres, and ratings, and all Tolkien canons. This includes books, movies both live-action and animated, fan-made films like Born of Hope, TV shows, and game canons such as Lord of the Rings Online. It also includes Tolkien's non-Arda fictional works, such as Roverandom. Crossovers between two or more Tolkien canons are welcome.
Tolkien Ekphrasis Week wants to be as inclusive as possible. As such:
- All canons and versions of canon are equally welcome and encouraged to participate.
- Fan creators of all levels of experience should feel more than welcome to join in the fun.
- All languages are welcomed, and works in languages other than English are actively encouraged.
- All styles of art and all types of fic are permitted. Apart from following the Art Form content prompt for each day, there are no restrictions on genre, style, rating, or ship. There are two exceptions: first, no character bashing; second, no AI-generated writing or art.
Above all, this event is supposed to get us thinking and feeling about art, which is for everyone. With this in mind, TEW asks participants to be respectful and inclusive at all times. In particular, TEW values its queer and trans participants and participants of color and will moderate as necessary to ensure that this event remains a welcoming space.
Please see the FAQ for all rules and full instructions on how to post and tag.
Calendar
June 9, 2025: Submit all works to the AO3 Collection by this date
June 10-16, 2025: Reveals
- June 10 - AO3 collection reveals begin with Day 1 Prompt (Dance)
- June 11 - Day 2 Prompt (Leathercraft)
- June 12 - Day 3 Prompt (Painting)
- June 13 - Day 4 Prompt (Tattooing, Piercing & Body Art)
- June 14 - Day 5 Prompt (Culinary Arts)
- June 15 - Day 6 Prompt (Textiles & Fashion)
- June 16 - Day 7 Prompt (Lapidary & Hardstone Carving)
- June 17 - Amnesty Day and Free-for-all posting
March 17, 2026: 2025 AO3 Collection and DW community close to posting.
Housekeeping
The DW site is the primary home of Tolkien Ekphrasis Week: that is where to check first for dates, news, FAQs, links, and prompts!
Prompts will also be posted here on Tumblr. The Tumblr blog will be used for event promotion ahead of the event, answering questions via the ask function, and reblogging your creations, if they are posted and tagged on Tumblr.
This event does not and will not exist on any other form of social media other than Tumblr and DW, though I encourage you to spread the word in your other online communities.
If you have any questions, you can get in touch with the mod, @chestnut_pod, via Tumblr ask or comments on the Dreamwidth community's equivalent post.
Links
Teitho March/April Challenge: Mothers
Exploring the idea of mothers in Tolkien lets us go behind the scenes. We have quite a few mothers directly in the narrative, primarily in the Silmarillion—where we see Miriel, Nerdanel, Morwen, Idril, Aredhel, Luthien, Elwing, and even have mentions of Anaire and Earwen.
In The Lord of the Rings we read of Galadriel being Celebrian’s mother and Arwen’s grandmother. Aragorn’s mother Gilraen, Faramir and Boromir’s mother Finduilas, and Rosie Cotton—Sam’s wife—are all mentioned in the narrative. The Hobbit gives us a memory of Belladonna Took, Bilbo’s mother, and mentions of Thorin’s sister Dis—the mother of Fili and Kili. The stories of any of these characters would make for fascinating fic! Or art!
There are many who remain unmentioned and unnamed—Legolas’s mother, Gimli’s, the mothers of generations of Dunedain, of Gondorians, of the Rohirrim, of the Shire. And consider Ungoliant, mother of Shelob! And mothers among the ranks of orcs.
We are excited to see where this prompt takes you and which character gives you inspiration! Please submit your fic or art by April 30 to teitho.contest@gmail.com
Around the World and Web Archive
Events listed here are no longer active but are listed on the site for historical purposes.
The Inaugural Gates of Summer Exchange
We are so pleased to welcome you to Gates of Summer, a fandom-wide digital gift exchange.
We, the mods of @officialtolkiensecretsanta, have had five years of wonderful fun and success running our winter exchange. As we wrapped up last year’s event and contemplated its next iteration, we decided that we would love to bring the energy and enthusiasm of the community into the middle of the year as well.
Thus, Gates of Summer was born. Inspired by the Gondolin holiday of the same name, it exists as a shorter gift exchange running around the same time as many other wonderful fandom events like the @tolkienrsb. Gates of Summer will run from 28th April to 21st June - please check our event guide for the full schedule.
The mechanics of the exchange are similar to the Secret Santa: you fill out a form, and we match you by hand to an anonymous gift-giver who will prepare a digital gift specially for you. The main difference is that there is no anonymous posting for this summer event - you post your gift and tag your giftee on 21st June, the day of reveals!
Running concurrently alongside the gift exchange will be a series of weekly prompts, posted to our blog starting May 24th. You are welcome to complete prompts as and when you like during the exchange period. You don’t have to participate in the exchange itself to fill out the prompts. Just be sure to read the guide to make sure you tag your work correctly so we can reblog it to our blog!
The sign-up form will go live on 28th April. Do follow this blog to stay up to date with us and so you can sign up as soon as the form is open!
Unconventional Fanworks Exchange
Unconventional Fanworks Exchange is a gift exchange for fanwork besides traditional fic and art, including (but not limited to): meta, in-universe documents, vids, podfic, audio not!fic, chatfic, and multimedia fanwork.
Important Links:
AO3 Collection
Medium Tagset
Fandom + Character Tagset
Mod Contact: flowersforgravesfics @ gmail (dot) com, or Dreamwidth private messages. I do not answer mod questions via Discord.
Schedule:
All times, unless otherwise specified, will be 12:59 AM (00:59) UTC.
Nominations: April 24 - May 8 (countdown to close)
Signups: May 15 - May 29 (countdown to close)
Assignments Out: on or before June 1
Assignments Due: July 9 (countdown)
Works Revealed: July 16
Creators Revealed: July 23
See the Unconventional Fanworks Exchange community on Dreamwdith for complete guidelines.
Teitho April/May Challenge: One True Pairing
For our April/May challenge we have the prompt OTP–One True Pairing.
Choose whichever characters you consider your one true pairing and tell us a story about them. These can be canon pairings like Luthien and Beren, Aragorn and Arwen, Celeborn and Galadriel, but they can also be pairings that perhaps didn't get their chance to be together–like Aegnor and Andreth, or Nimrodel and Amroth.
Perhaps you want to write more about Turgon and Elenwë, Idril and Tuor, or how Earendil and Elwing met?
Or choose an AU setting and let your favorite characters have their happy ever after!
You don't have to limit yourself to canon pairings for this challenge–if there is a non-canon or rare-pair that speaks to you, give us their story.
We know Curufin had a wife – how did they meet, fall in love, grow apart?
It does not have to be a love story or a happy ever after. The choice is yours. Give us love or loss, happy ever afters or angsty twists to the tales of "what if."
This is your chance to explore any and all relationships between characters you love! We look forward to reading your stories!
Please submit your stories to teitho.contest@gmail.com by May 31.
BBC Ways of Being: Tom Shakespeare on J.R.R. Tolkien
Ways of Being is a BBC series where artists, writers and thinkers tell us about the ways they have been shaped by their ‘ways of being’, their individual bodies—what freedoms they allow, and their sensitivities or limits. Tom Shakespeare is a writer, social scientist, bioethicist, and a regular broadcaster for BBC Radio. Tom is the fifth essayist to let us into their particular 'way of being' and into their relationship with a cultural touchstone. In this essay, Tom considers the character of J.R.R. Tolkien's hobbits, and his experience of reading about them as a child with restricted growth—a child who adored books.
Academia Lunare Call for Papers: Religion in Fantasy and Science Fiction
Academia Lunare is an award-winning annual edited volume from Luna Press Publishing. They explicitly welcome submissions from writers with all levels of experience. The theme of the annual Call for Papers 2022 is Religion, including those created specifically for a fictional work.
Religions, and the social and cultural structures related to them, have played a fundamental part in human history – for better or worse, as witnessed in reality or in fictional worlds.
On a mental level, they can influence a person’s perception of the world and the values they hold or discard; they influence the individual’s identity, regardless of whether they consider themselves to be religious or not. On a social level, they provide purpose, hope, belonging and a support network, but also chains and oppression.
Writers are invited to explore the concept of religion in all its forms and presentations, from an angle of their choosing, and its development in SFF literature, games, movies and TV.
Proposals are due by 30 September 2022 for consideration. For more information on the publication and submission requirements, as well as a list of possible approaches to the topic, see the full call for papers.
2022 Tolkien Collector's Guide Recording of Tolkien Reading Day Available
Tolkien Reading Day is celebrated worldwide on March 25th in honor of the destruction of the One Ring. Listen to our guests and panels talk about their love and friendships around Tolkien and his books.
Chapters:
00:00 - start of the livestream
05:13 - Artists Panel - Jenny Dolfen, Emily Austin, Anke Eissmann, Donato Giancola, Ted Nasmith
1:05:00 - The Tolkien Experience Podcast - Dr. Luke Shelton, Dr. Sara Brown, Sarah Westvik
1:36:45 - More Podcasting - Shawn Marchese and Alan Sisto (The Prancing Pony Podcast), Marcel Aubron-Bülles (SmallTolk Podcast), Chad Bornholdt and Chad High (The Texas Tolkien Talk Podcast)
2:04:00 - Digital Humanities and Education - Elise Trudel Cedeño and James Tauber
2:37:30 - Video and Media - Matt Graf (Nerd of the Rings) - Note that Clifford "Quickbeam" Broadway (TheOneRing.net) was unavoidably delayed and appears later in the event instead
3:10:00 - Guides to Middle-earth - Dick Plotz (Founder of the Tolkien Society of America, 1965) and Robert "Bob" Foster (author of The Guide to Middle-earth and The Complete Guide to Middle-earth)
3:36:50 - Audio and Audiobooks - Jordan Rannells
4:16:20 - Open Mic! Joined by Clifford Broadway (TheOneRing.net), Pieter Collier (The Tolkien Library) and many more
Sign-Ups Open for the Silmarillion Remix Challenge 2022
What is a remix?
A remix is a retelling of an existing work. The idea is to retain the spirit of the story, while creating a new work of your own in a different manner or style.
We see this done with art when it comes to the DTIYS challenge (Draw This In Your Style); remixing fic is similar. Remix it in your style! How would you have told that story? Would you have picked a different point of view? Would you have made it more serious, or rather more comical? Would you have included a flashback, or begun the narrative earlier, or later? Would you have arranged the chronology differently? Maybe instead of telling the story over several scenes, you would have chosen only one, and expanded on it, or vice versa? In your hands, keeping the plot the same, how would the story change?
Some ways to remix a story include:
- retelling it from someone else’s point of view
- writing a prequel or sequel
- taking the story and adding or subtracting an element (e.g. magic)
- taking the story and changing its setting, location, or time period
- taking a minor event in the original story and focusing and expanding on it
- taking a minor character in the original story and focusing on them
In this remix challenge, we’re offering the chance to remix someone’s story, and to have one of your own stories remixed. A remix challenge is a great opportunity to flex some creative muscles and celebrate how transformative and collaborative fandom can be!
For this round of the event, only Silmarillion fanfiction is eligible for remixing. We may open up to other Tolkien fandoms and mediums in the future, but this time around it’s Silm fic all the way!
~~~
2022 Schedule:
April 1 - Signups open
April 7 - Signups close
April 10 - Assignments sent out
May 6 - Default deadline
May 15 - Works due at 11:59pm PST
May 21 - Works revealed
May 28 - Creators revealed
~~~
Please read the rules carefully to understand the parameters of this exchange! You can find the rules on our tumblr (mobile // desktop) or our AO3 Collection.
This event is being run by @arofili and @arrivisting! If you have event-related questions, please email us at tolkienremix@gmail.com or send an ask to this blog!
Tolkien Short Fanworks April Prompts Posted
Here is our thematic prompt and formal challenge for April:
The thematic prompt is: a sudden change of the weather.
In the UK and other countries, April is a month traditionally associated with sudden rain showers, but your response does not need to relate to this particular weather pattern.
However, here is a bonus quotation prompt on that theme:
Again the blackbirds sing; the streams
Wake, laughing, from their winter dreams,
And tremble in the April showers
The tassels of the maple flowers.
(John Greenleaf Whittier, from: The Singer)
The formal challenge is: a fixed-length piece of 222 words.
The choice of number is inspired by the year 2022, although that lovely date 22/02/2022 is now some weeks ago already...
As always, you can combine the thematic prompt and the formal challenge, but they can be filled entirely independently.
Usual reminder that although you can fill the prompts any way you like, in order to post the fill to this community or to the related collection on AO3, the fanwork can only have a word count up to 1000 words and must be linked to a Tolkien fandom.
Rec lists and podfics can be posted as fills for thematic prompts, as long as the fanworks concerned meet those conditions.
Also we continue to welcome other pieces unrelated to any challenge, of course, including cross-posts and older stories!
Digital Tolkien Project Launches "Search Tolkien"
Digital Tolkien Project has launched an accessible system to search across Tolkien's works, see the distribution of terms and phrases, look up the citation reference for passages.
The search is case-insensitive and all punctuation and diacritics are stripped. Phrases up to seven words long can be searched for. For copyright reasons, no actual text is displayed. The search currently covers The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings (minus the prologue), The Silmarillion and Letters (just to the letter number).
References for the Citation system on the search page (which is linked).
More details on the Digital Tolkien Project can be found on the Digital Tolkien Project website.
Fëanorian Week 2022
What is it?: Fëanorian Week is a full seven days to celebrate and appreciate some of our fan faves, the Fëanorians, and their parents, Nerdanel and Fëanor. The event runs on Tumblr.
When is it?: March 21-27, 2022
The prompts are as followed:
- Day 1- Maedhros - > Childhood, Kingship, Torture, Adjusting/Coping, Unity, Beauty
- Day 2-Maglor -> Childhood, Music & Songs of Power, Elrond & Elros, Kingship, Maglor’s Gap, Redemption
- Day 3- Celegorm - > Childhood, Hunting, Orome & Huan, Strength & Beauty, Wickedness, Love/Unrequited
- Day 4- Caranthir - > Childhood, Betrayal, Lordship, Dwarves & Humans, Marriage, Appearance
- Day 5- Curufin - > Childhood, Feanor, Forge work, Celebrimbor, Manipulation, Ruling of Nargothrond
- Day 6- Ambarussa - > Childhood, Lordship, Regrets, Twin, Hunting, Nandor
- Day 7- Nerdanel and Feanor-> Mahtan, Marriage, Reunion, Traveling, Creation, Healing
Rules: You are allowed to post anything fanrelated on the days. If the prompts are not to your liking, you can do your own thing. The tracktag is #feanorianweek. Tag your work accordingly! Have fun and be nice to others. Disrespect towards others will not be tolerated.
The ask box is open if you have any questions!
