Founded in 2005, the Silmarillion Writers' Guild exists for discussions of and creative fanworks based on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion and related texts. We are a positive-focused and open-minded space that welcomes fans from all over the world and with all levels of experience with Tolkien's works. Whether you are picking up Tolkien's books for the first time or have been a fan for decades, we welcome you to join us!
New Challenge: Bollywood This month's challenge offers songs, films, and tropes from Bollywood, the world's largest film industry based out of India, as prompts for fanworks.
Cultus Dispatches: Fandom Chocolate … or Authors Love Comments Tolkien Fanfiction Survey data provides insight into how comments benefit authors and which authors are most impacted by a lack of comments, with a digression on authors' perspectives one-click feedback like kudos.
A Sense of History: Passing Ships As Tolkien's characters in various texts gaze out to the sea, what do they see? What is brought by the ships coming out of the West?
Beta-Reader List Now Available The beta-reader list and profiles have been moved into our new system and are available again.
Nimruzimir, a natural philosopher recently out of his apprenticeship, hardly considers himself very important to anyone, least of all his colleagues. When his strange, prophetic fits bring him to the attention of the High Priest, however, he may find that his existence is less superfluous than…
This is my new poetical attempt to add my own interpretation to Tolkien's Cosmology as to Eru's Creation and the Valar's minds and behind-the-scene providence reasons and mechanisms.. I often review Eä as part of our own world, just in another dimension, this is why I have always seriously…
Current Challenge
Bollywood
Prompts this month are films, songs, and tropes from India's dazzling film industry, Bollywood. Read more ...
Tolkien Fanfiction Survey data shows that authors view comments as driving their motivation to create fanfiction. However, perception of comments by authors is part of a larger shift in fandom around how and how often fans interact with each other.
The arrival and departure of ships across the Great Sea carries mythic significance for the peoples of Middle-earth. The image of ships crossing out of and back into a mysterious West appears as well in Beowulf and is alluded to in Tolkien's tower analogy in his lecture "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics," where the tower allows those who climb it to observe the passage of the ships.
Tolkien Fanfiction Survey data shows that while most authors self-identify as taking their craft seriously, a growing subset of authors may be pushing that norm.
He and Diamond were visiting, though Pippin had been disappearing every afternoon, and taking Frodo and Elanor and most other lads and lasses in the neighborhood with him—though why they couldn’t use Pippin’s own pony, Sam couldn’t imagine.
So gathered they were to Bree, what lieutenants who could be spared, from their scattered watches west and east, for their chieftain had returned from his long sojourn in lands godless and mountains strange.
Aragorn returns from the South to tells his tales. Halbarad listens.
Elrond Week 2024
Elrond Week is a fandom event dedicated to Elrond Peredhel that will run from July 10th to July 16th on Tumblr.
July challenge at tolkienshortfanworks posted
The tolkienshortfanworks challenge for July has been posted to the Dreamwidth community. The thematic challenge is: original character or unnamed canon character; the formal challenge: fixed length of multiple of 50 words. New participants welcome.
Teitho June/July Challenge: Mentor
The June/July prompt for the Teitho challenge is "mentor" and invites fanworks about this relationship in Tolkien's works.
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Comments
The Silmarillion Writers' Guild is more than just an archive--we are a community! If you enjoy a fanwork or enjoy a creator's work, please consider letting them know in a comment.
There is so much to like about this story. I have always liked the idea of Huan a lot, although, strictly speaking, I am not a dog person. I also imagine him as a wolf hound.
Favorite section:
‘I suppose I am lucky, Huan, that you are not permitted to speak. Otherwise, I would be in for a lecture—would I not?—on my lack of true repentance and of proper gratitude?’
Huan opened his snout and yawned, showing an abundance of magnificent teeth and about a foot-length of narrow pink tongue. Then he leaned harder against Maedhros, almost causing him to topple over.
‘That has cut me down to size, hasn’t it? I’m simply not all that interesting.’
Maedhros gave Huan a slight push with his shoulder in order to right himself again. It felt like pushing against a furry rock. He thought: I am truly in a sorry state—I take it personally when a dog yawns at me! Huan may be a Hound of Orome, but he is still a dog. Dogs yawn.
I think I like best the part that shutting down one's sense would be one of the mental and physical responses to dealing with Angband. And that having one's sense of smell curtailed could make one's connection with reality tenuous.
A dog like Huan would be a great comfort I would think under the circumstances.
I'm happy to hear you like it! I'm very much a dog person myself, but try not to go be too obtrusive about it in my writing. However, when I was writing a story about the sense of smell, Huan seemed to be the obvious expert to call in. As for the importance of the sense of smell for one's connection to reality, I've come across articles that claim that we often use our sense of smell far more to orient yourself than we realize, even though it is comparatively poorly developed in humans.
Huan is certainly a wolf hound in the literal sense, a hound that hunts wolves, so I tend to imagine him also looking like an Irish wolf hound, only even larger.
I loved what you created (told you I would, didn't I?). I really liked the addition of Huan (laughed at the dog smell comment), and the idea that Maedhros closed off his senses to protect himself. Everything was painful for Maedhros and it's clear even in the description of Huan: furry rock. Also loved mother hen!Maglor :D
Thank you very much again for suggesting the story! I'm glad you enjoyed the result. I was perhaps a little less detailed in my description of the smells of Mithrim here than I thought I'd be, but my nose isn't nearly as good as Huan's!
Thank you very much! I love dogs myself--and in my experience, because they are mostly so down-to-earth themselves, they are very good at grounding others in moments of crisis. Huan is a special case, of course!
I guess Huan was rather less cuddly than the average therapy dog, but a lot more intelligent! I'm glad you enjoyed the story. Thank you very much for reading and reviewing!
Dog magic is enough to pull Maedhros out of his panic and show the way to recovery! I love all the dog attitudes that you describe in Huan that are so, well, dog: the smell (stink, actually), the twitching nose, the yawning and that basic being there close to you in times of need that makes dogs so marvelous. (dog person review :D)
Well, my dog is many sizes smaller than Huan, but when it comes to dogginess, it's not size that matters, is it? Except, of course, when like Luthien you want a ride--or if you need somebody to fight a huge insane wolf for you!
Can you imagine my joy when I go looking for a Huan and Maedhros bonding story and it actually exists? Haha, this story just made my night! I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought he'd make a good (giant) therapy dog!
I like the way you portray Maedhros, where he's feeling all these things (pain, terror, detached from reality) and pretty much just ignoring them, because he doesn't know what else to do. I also like how Huan subtly gets Maedhros to feel a bit more grounded in reality.
Comments
The Silmarillion Writers' Guild is more than just an archive--we are a community! If you enjoy a fanwork or enjoy a creator's work, please consider letting them know in a comment.