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
Holiday Party
No matter if you're in the Northern or Southern hemisphere, it's a time of year to think about holidays. Whether you're bundling up in blankets or slipping a swimsuit into your suitcase, we invite you to an SWG holiday party! 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.
:( Maeglin is so sweet, and quickly comes up with a solution to the problem. And poor Salgant, trying to keep his resolution and just needing a little help that no one besides Maeglin cares to do.I love this chapter, Himring. :D
And then, of course, Morgoth. I mean, obviously Maeglin probably wouldn't exist if Morgoth didn't, but if someone managed to kill him shortly after Aredhel's death, maybe Gondolin wouldn't have been closed off and he (and Salgant) would have been free to leave and go live somewhere else and things could have been happier.
Thank you very much, Brooke! I'm glad this works for you!
I think of Salgant as someone who keeps trying to amuse people as a way of making them not look at him too closely, if that makes sense.
Maeglin looks past that, sees what is going on and decides to do something about it.
Morgoth being defeated shortly after Aredhel's death would have made a great many people a lot happier! I think if Maeglin had been free to come and go, it would have certainly relieved some of the pressure.
Poor Maeglin. :( He just wants things to turn out nicely for himself, which really is to be expected with his childhood.
I agree with you that he probably wasn't thinking of it as Edain do - the only way I could see that happening is if he borrowed it from the dwarves his father talked to, and even then, I think Eol had enough contact with Thingol's people that he'd realize the difference.
I guess I tend to underrate a bit the amount of information and impressions Maeglin may have picked up from the Dwarves!
But I think, in this case, he would realize the difference. Apart from contact with Thingol's people, there are also Eol's servants, which I've always imagined as Elves.
You're making both Salgant and Maeglin so relatable here. Salgant's silent struggle with the lemon tart was perfectly written, half funny and half sad. I was surprised and delighted when Maeglin revealed that he was paying a lot more attention than Salgant realised! Their conversation in the second chapter was heartbreaking. Maeglin's observations about his invention of Gondolin vs. the reality of it rang very true, and when he asked Salgant to keep talking while he tried to figure it out made me feel really sad for the future that's looming ahead of them. Meanwhile, their friendship, even if it was born from their shared outsider status rather than true inclination, is lovely to read about. I love the title also!
In some ways, Maeglin might make a good Batman, but I think Tolkien might have been offended at the idea of Gondolin being compared to Gotham in any way!
Thank you, yes, still writing. In fact, I've written another couple of drabbles in this sequence for prompts on Livejournal and you've reminded me I should upload them here!
Anguirel doesn't get mentioned again in canon, after Maeglin steals it, as far as I know.
But apart from the sheer scariness of its sister sword, I feel that story logic would also suggest Anguirel would somehow get tied up in Eol's curse on his son. Maybe Tolkien intended to do this and never got around to developing the idea?
I love the implication that Maeglin actually is on the verge of breaking down over the death of Fingon, if he didn't actively keep himself in check and thinking cold thoughts! The beginning suggests how much Maeglin longs for someone to love him and to be happy simply to see him. Makes my heart hurt!
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.