Mereth Aderthad 2025

The Silmarillion Writers' Guild Presents Mereth Aderthad 2025 - July 19, 2025, Burlington, VT and online - A celebration of creativity and scholarship inspired by the works of J.R.R. Tolkien

In July 2005, the Silmarillion Writers' Guild came to life as its original moderators, Dawn Felagund and ford_of_bruinen, invited their friends to a new group intended to serve as a writers' workshop for creators of fanfiction based on The Silmarillion.

This coming July marks the twentieth anniversary of the Silmarillion Writers' Guild, a group that has expanded well beyond its modest origins and now hosts all types of fanworks from hundreds of creators and serves as a resource for information and discussion about the complex work that is the "Silmarillion." As we commemorate twenty years, we seek to bring together the creative and research arms of our group's mission with a daylong hybrid event that celebrates the incredible creative and scholarly responses of our members and the broader "Silmarillion" community.

The event will feature presentations of research and scholarship alongside fiction, art, and other creative responses to the topics addressed. Ideally, each topic will have a research work, a poem or story, and a work of art that respond to the topic and dialogue with each other, along with opportunities for attendees to ask questions and converse with the various creators and presenters.

The Basics

Date: July 19, 2025

Location: South Burlington Library Community Room, Burlington, Vermont, United States and online via Zoom

How to Follow This Event:

All Tolkien fans are welcome to join us as presenters, creators, and attendees! You do not need to be a member of the SWG to participate. How do you want to get involved?

Call for Presenters for Meta, Research, and Scholarship 

Download a PDF version of the call for presenters.

The SWG is foremost an organization for fanworks but has also, throughout our twenty-year history, recognized that within the broader Tolkien fanworks fandom, it is almost impossible to separate creative and scholarly works for many creators. Our community has offered space for discussing and better understanding the legendarium, and our archive hosts hundreds of research and scholarly works created by fans.

A component of Mereth Aderthad will therefore be the sharing of meta, research, and scholarly works about Tolkien's legendarium.

  • Presentations will be delivered live, either in-person or virtually.
  • Presentations should be 15 minutes in length.
  • While any topic related to Tolkien's works is acceptable, priority will be given to presentations with a significant Silmarillion component.
  • Proposals are due by January 15, 2025.

We explicitly welcome fans, not just academics and scholars, to submit a proposal to present meta, research, or scholarship about the legendarium. We believe that fans offer meaningful contributions to the scholarly and academic conversations around Tolkien's work and furthermore offer perspectives that career academics often miss. In order to encourage fan participation in this component of the event, we will offer support and resources to fans who are interested in presenting but aren't sure where to begin. To learn more about these opportunities, subscribe to the SWG's weekly newsletter, join our Discord server, follow us on Tumblr, or follow us on Dreamwidth.

Presentations of meta, research, and scholarship will be accompanied by fanworks that are crafted around the same topic. In submitting a proposal to present at Mereth Aderthad 2025, you acknowledge and accept that fanworks will be made to accompany your presentation. While presenters and fanworks creators can collaborate if both parties wish to do so, presenters and fanworks creators should understand that they will not be given the opportunity to approve or require changes to the pieces that accompany their presentation.

Proposals should be about 300 words in length and are due no later than January 15, 2025. Click here to submit a proposal. Questions are welcome at moderator@silmarillionwritersguild.org.

Call for Fanworks 

Tolkien wrote eloquently of his desire to create a Secondary World that enticed readers beyond the words he placed on the page and into the "new vistas" that they imagined. Since at least the 1950s, Tolkien fans have been crafting stories, poems, art, music, crafts, and every other type of creative response imaginable as they seek these imaginative vistas. At the same time, fanworks creators have engaged with the deep questions and ideas that Tolkien's works provoke, using creative media instead of traditional scholarship to engage with the legendarium.

We are seeking creators interested in making fanworks for Mereth Aderthad 2025. These fanworks will match the topics and possibly respond to the research and scholarship being presented at the event. Ideally, each topic has a research/scholarly presentation, a story or poem, and a work of art, demonstrating the diverse ways that fans engage with the legendarium and the questions and ideas it poses.

We are seeking:

  • Artwork
  • Short stories that can be read in under ten minutes or excerpts from longer stories
  • Poems
  • Other fanworks that can be presented at an event like Mereth Aderthad 2025

Fanworks will be presented at the event. Creators do not need to present their own works. Writers who do not wish to present live can record their story or poem, we will arrange to have the story or poem read or recorded by someone else for the event.

All fanworks should be created for the event. We appreciate if fanworks are not posted prior to the event but hope you share them widely after they are presented on July 19!

When the call for presenters of research and scholarship closes, we will open the call for fanworks creators. At that time, writers, artists, and other creators will be matched with a researcher working on topic of interest to that creator. The research and various creators can collaborate as little or as much as they would like. Follow us using one of the methods above or check this page for updates.

Attending Mereth Aderthad 2025 

Registration for the event will open once a draft schedule is available. In-person and virtual attendance options will be available. While we may solicit donations to help cover costs, we will turn no one away who wants to attend on the basis of their ability to donate. Follow us using one of the methods above or check this page for updates.

Mereth Aderthad 2025 will also include community meals and outings the weekend of the event for people able to attend in-person. More information will become available as the event approaches!

Volunteer for Mereth Aderthad 2025 

We are seeking volunteers to both help plan Mereth Aderthad 2025 and help on the day of event, both in-person and remotely. If you are interested in volunteering, we recommend that you join our Discord and watch the #announcements channel for more information on how to get involved. You can also email the moderators or contact us via any of our social media platforms for more information.

Commitment to Inclusivity 

We highly value the diverse membership base that has made the SWG the group it is today. We want the SWG to be a place that not only welcomes but celebrates diversity and the various perspectives different fans bring both to reading Tolkien and the creation of Tolkien-based fanworks.

That said, we also recognize that Tolkien fandom has been both explicitly and structurally hostile and dismissive of fans from marginalized groups, especially fans who are Black, indigenous, and people of color; LGBTQIA+ fans; and fans with disabilities. As the SWG is part of the fandom and has benefited as an organization from the status quo, we therefore strongly feel that the SWG must be part of the solution, including governing events such that all participants not only feel safe but encouraged to participate.

  • Use people's stated names and pronouns.
  • Avoid discriminatory and biased language.
  • Avoid making assumptions about other participants' identities.
  • Create space for everyone to speak and be heard. We especially ask fans who come from typically privileged groups to be aware of not monopolizing conversations.

Being more inclusive is a learning process for all of us. Any space where we discuss ideas around popular culture, literature, and art has the potential to become uncomfortable for some participants. We ask that participants manage their comfort at the event by opting out of presentations and discussions that they find upsetting. At the same time, all participants are expected to:

  • Give people space and pause communications if they ask for it. Do not follow, attempt to open conversations, or otherwise seek to engage with people who indicate that they do not want to engage. Unwanted, hostile, or threatening actions towards others is harassment and will not be tolerated.
  • Respond to feedback from organizers around language or behaviors that are not acceptable for the event by refraining from that language or behavior going forward.

The organizers reserve the right to remove participants from the event who we believe are acting with intention to create a hostile environment for other participants or who do not demonstrate that they are willing to learn and change their behavior based on feedback from organizers.

Commitment to Sustainability and Social Responsibility

The SWG is a small organization, and a core philosophy of our organization is the value of community-powered spaces, especially in the shadow of ever-growing large social and fandom platforms. With this comes a commitment to a sustainable and just world, where people have the capacity and empowerment to participate in critical and creative endeavors. In order that the SWG and Mereth Aderthad work to bolster the existence of small communities, environmental and economic sustainability, and social responsibility, we commit to the following:

  • We will use locally sourced products and services whenever possible.
  • When choosing products and services related to Mereth Aderthad, we will give priority to purchases that support businesses and individuals committed to environmental sustainability.
  • Likewise, we will seek products and services from businesses and individuals that reflect social responsibility such as fair trade and fair labor practices.
  • Recognizing that making sustainable or responsible choices is not necessarily straightforward, we will be intentional in our choices around these objectives and invite input from all members of the relevant committee before making a decision.