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…
My newly drawn map of Aman, as complete as I could make it.
Current Challenge
Bollywood
Prompts this month are films, songs, and tropes from India's dazzling film industry, Bollywood. Read more ...
Random Challenge
Turgon's Rock Opera
On the anniversary of the publication of "The Silmarillion," we’re reflecting on the importance of music in Arda with prompts that come from rock songs. 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.
Great story, Himring! It is sad and yet undrestandable (of a proud Fëanorean ;) ) not to wish to speak to each other again. I really enjoyed reading this.
Glad you enjoyed it! At one point, I thought I might add a short scene in which Celebrimbor encounters one of the surviving brothers after Curufin's death and permit things to achieve a kind of closure that way, but I couldn't make that work. I guess proud Feanorians aren't all that good at closure! Thank you very much for reading and reviewing!
"He would measure the Doomsman of the Valar with one of his long, somewhat insolent stares and ask: Is that so?—and, without waiting for an answer, unhesitatingly follow Curufin to his doom."
That was my favourite part. The way the brothers sticked together is something I've always been fascinated about.
Thank you! They do stick together, whether it is good for them or not. Mind you, if Celegorm had gone and talked to Celebrimbor and Cirdan, even with the best intentions, he would almost certainly have ended up violently quarrelling with them, which would hardly have improved matters (and Curufin knows that, too).
I definitely love this! Curufin's character always intrigues me to no end, and your delineation here was very convincing. I could sense pride (though of a narrow-minded type) in his blame on Celebrimbor and his mention of their previous reign in Nargothrond. And to notice the empty saddle bags seemed to suggest his pragmatism and a fraction of concern for his son and the refugees. Celegorm here was more emotional, but possessed just as much the insufferable yet fascinating pride of the Feanorians :) You did a wonderful job!
I wonder if I could have your permission to translate it into Chinese? Because I love this fic so much and wish to share this with silmarillion-readers in my home country. Of course, I'll credit the original work to you on top of the translation.
Thank you very much! I am delighted that you should think this piece worth taking the trouble to translate and you certainly have my permission to do so!
I am glad you liked my portrayal of Curufin and Celegorm, thank you for telling me so!
This is the most grounded of your works that I have read so far and I think my favourite. The break-down layout made it much easier to read and understand. I found the progatonists highly relatable and their motives clear. The footnote in Mandos rounds off well, but for me the opening passage was best; I really got a sense of Beleriand in those times seen through Elvish eyes.
Thank you very much! The opening passage was important to me, so I'm glad it worked for you!
I had written about Curufin and Celegorm before, but I had not shown them interacting at any length (with each other, that is, rather than with Maedhros) or at this period, so in that sense it was new ground for me.
This really shows how stubborn the Feanorians can be! As weird as it is, I think the saddest line, for me, was:
"Celegorm shrugs regretfully and looks over his shoulder to whistle for Huan. He catches himself in time and curses under his breath."
I guess because I wasn't expecting it, lol.
Anyway, this was really well written and thought-provoking. You managed to make Celegorm and Curufin seem symapthetic while still hard-headed and harshly practical. Great story!
I somehow missed this story. You are so prolific I can never be sure that there are no things I have not read.
<i>It probably goes without saying that as far as I am concerned the statement that they were pleased is a case of faulty reporting!</i>
I totally agree with you on that. I loved the characterization in this story. Great insight into the differences between the two brothers and, ultimately, how Celegorm allows Curufin to make the final decision. It's heartbreaking for me, because this point, which begain with Nargothrond for those two his hurtling toward the fulfill of their sad fate with the force of rock slide down the side of a mountain. My response to Feanorians, even the worst of them! is always saddness at the loss of so much promise. Fate, doom, and all that tragic inevitability wears on me. Very beautifully handled here--such emotional subtlety and the understatement with which it is expressed makes it more not less moving.
Thank you very much, Oshun! I'm glad you like the characterization of Celegorm and Curufin here! It saddens me, too, that tragic inevitability and the loss of so much promise.
(I'm sorry--it's all those little bits and pieces I write, I know they must be very hard to keep track of! Thank your for reading!)
Never be sorry. It's always a pleasure to stumble across one I have not read. (I wish I could write more short pieces, but they always explode in head into something bigger and then I have a list of WIPs as long as my arm! Makes me look unstable!)
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.