Notation and Improvisation by ArizonaPoppy

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Fanwork Notes

Fanwork Information

Summary:

Dorthaniel's college professor gives her class a seemingly impossible homework assignment: turn a fragment of strange music from the Second Age into a modern score, and then explain its origins. Well, her guess is as good as anyone's!

Major Characters: Original Female Character(s), Tar-Ancalimë

Major Relationships:

Genre: Alternate Universe, Fluff, General

Challenges: Notion Club Revival

Rating: General

Warnings:

Chapters: 2 Word Count: 3, 177
Posted on 14 September 2019 Updated on 17 April 2020

This fanwork is a work in progress.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Dorthaniel

In which we meet one of our protagonists, Dorthaniel the average Gondorian college student.

Chapter 2: Out of Bounds

But the women [of Erendis's household] were chary of their speech to the child, fearing their mistress; and there was little enough of laughter for Ancalimë in the white house in Emerië. It was hushed and without music, as if one had died there not long since; for in Númenor in those days it was the part of men to play upon instruments, and the music that Ancalimë heard in childhood was the singing of women at work, out of doors, and away from the hearing of the White Lady of Emerië. --- Unfinished Tales, Part 2, Ch 2, Aldarion and Erendis, pg. 194

Comments

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This is so imaginative. I am humbled. Loved the set-up, the professor and the students.

century-old photos of the excavations of the “lost” island of Númenor, with the obligatory men in pith helmets and women in quaint divided skirts and giant hats with mosquito veils posed on the stubs of the cyclopean masonry. The famous Golden Cache popped into view next: “I have gazed on the face of Tar-Meneldur and found it beautiful,” her lips murmured the old quote of their own accord. 

It reminded me of Schliemann's famous quote: "I have gazed on the face of Agamemnon." Wonder if that inspired you or something else.

Loved the last paragraph also. If you add to this I will certainly want to read it. If you don't, it is a perfect vignette as-is.

Oh completely! The Schliemann reference is totally on purpose, and there's another easter egg too. It is all a thinly-veiled sendup of all my college seminars (especially in Classics and Music). The plot bunny is still grazing on my front lawn with a vengeance for when I get time to write more. Thank you for your comment, and I'm glad you liked it!