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.
SWG News
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.
New & Updated Fanworks
[Writing] No Time Have I by Flora-lass
A Silmarillion acrostic.
[Writing] I called it Fate that I should fail by AdmirableMonster
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…
[Writing] All of you by chrissystriped
Elrond and Celebrían celebrate their anniversary with their family.
[Writing] Lament for the Singer by daughterofshadows
A short thing about Maglor, death and grieving.
[Writing] Cosmological Poems of Arda by AaronAzrael
I would like to share my revelations of Tolkien's Universe in the form of narrative and emotional poems.
[Writing] Eä's Redemption by AaronAzrael
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…
[Artwork] Map of Valinor by Aprilertuile
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 ...
New in References
Fandom Chocolate … or Authors Love Comments by Dawn Walls-Thumma
[]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.
Passing Ships by Simon J. Cook
[]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.
Fanfiction and the Serious Business of Writer's Craft by Dawn Walls-Thumma
[]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.
Beyond the Silmarillion
[Writing] Staging a Battle by StarSpray
[]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.
[Writing] From whose bourn no traveller returns by losselen
[]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.
[Writing] Sand Sorcery by StarSpray
[]It is well known that Psamathos does not leave his cove. He does not like to get his feet wet, and prefers to spend his days dozing under the sun.
Around the World and Web
Fellowship of the Fics: Summer Stories 2024
Fellowship of the Fics offers four weeks of summer-themed prompts during the month of July.
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.
July 2024 Call for Papers and Proposals
Conferences and publications that have open calls for papers and proposals in July 2024.
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.
Birds, brothers, and a harp by Aprilertuile
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Birds, brothers and a harp
Makalaurë was enjoying the good weather, the fair sky and lovely light of Laurelin. He was sitting under a tree, leaning against the trunk of the tree, a small harp on his laps. He was playing random bits of music on the harp…
When a small colorful bird perched above him and started to sing… Very loudly and very pointedly at him.
Makalaurë stopped playing and looked at the animal, surprised, and the bird flew away as soon as Makalaurë’s eyes fell on him.
The young elf shrugged and went back to his music, only to be interrupted again a few notes in, by a bigger, darker bird that came to rest nearby and squawked at him.
“Well, that’s new.”
At the sound of his voice, the bird flew away.
“Hm…”
Makalaurë was starting to get vaguely suspicious at what was happening there.
It’s slightly doubtful that he started to play again, only for the two birds to come back, and perch on his harp directly, looking at him straight and singing at him.
But Makalaurë was far from stupid, and when he heard not really discreet giggles a bit farther away, he was not surprised.
He rolled his eyes at that. Tyelkormo was a little pest far too prompt to try and amuse their littlest brothers and he had far better to do than worry about his latest antics.
Only when he looked back at his harp, to resume playing now that he knew where the _annoying_ birds came from, he noticed that at least one of the birds had left scratches on his harp.
“Tyelkormo Turkafinwë !” Called Makalaurë suddenly angry.
The birds flew away in a panic and there was a sudden gasp where there had been only giggles moment before and the sound of little feets hurrying away.
Makalaurë jumped to his feet and ran after his little brother… And stopped running only when they tripped on Nelyafinwë who was sitting near one of the fountains in the garden, focused as he was on his book, and they fell on him, only to be pushed IN the fountain by their annoyed, older and physically stronger elder brother.
“Are you mad, the both of you?!
-I can speak to birds now, Nelyo! And Carni found it fun! Claimed Tyelkormo with a grin.
-Yes, and he had a couple of them mess with my harp.” Makalaurë hissed in annoyance, while trying to squeeze the water out of his hair as much as possible.
Wet hair and wooden harp? Never in dream. Over his dead body. Possibly after he strangled his little brother with said wet hair.
Nelyafinwë sighed at that.
“That’s… Is that those two birds?”
Both Tyelkormo and Makalaurë looked up to see the two birds in question perched in the tree above, looking at them as if they were actually studying them.
“That’s creepy.” Claimed the young musician.
The biggest of the two birds squawked at them and flew away, for good this time and the second settled on another branch, still close enough to see them.
Silly elves…
