The Book of Short Tales by Lyra

B2MEM '11 - March 5th - Introspection

Written for the B2MeM challenge for Menegroth: Write a story or poem or create artwork that will illustrate the consequences of isolation.

Nerdanel finds a moment to ponder different forms of isolation - and its lack. A ficlet in six consecutive drabbles (as counted by Open Office Writer).

Thank you, Himring, for the nomination!
And a huge thank you to everyone who read and reviewed.
Awesome banner base by Esteliel.

Introspection

She is happy enough, as long as she has work to do. Luckily, sculpture has never gone out of fashion. Even when, for a decade or two, the Remnant collectively banished all jewellery from their throats and hands and brows, to convince themselves that they had never supported that one particular jewel-smith – when all scholars who expressed a strong opinion on some linguistic issue had to fear for their reputations, their friendships, their positions – sculpture remained popular. She has students to teach and commissions to fulfill, so many that there is hardly time left for her own leisureable creations.

For she cannot work forever. One has to be careful these days, and nobody more careful than she. Oh, she is wholly accepted by society; she is held blameless. She has been invited to Alqualondë, to help the reconstructions and to speak to the survivors. She is welcome in the king's house in Tirion at any time, and indeed expected to attend all formal dinners there, still a member of the royal family. She is invited to balls and parties. She is asked to lecture at the craftswomen's guilds. She is asked for her judgement in contests. She is busy.

All these kindly offers are obligations as well. Being invited, she has to attend. She has to be seen in public. Everybody does. For is it not agreed that it was the self-absorbed focus on work, the locked doors and unsocial isolation in the forge, that allowed the unthinkable to grow in the mind of Fëanáro? Do not the Valar remember how Melkor's introspective journeys made him deviate from Ilúvatar's theme, perceiving thoughts unlike his obedient brethren? Is not the wife of Fëanáro in danger of falling into that same trap – are not all Noldor? Solitude is clearly dangerous.

So she had to say farewell to the day-long, week-long projects, learned to divide the ideas that demand undivided attention into small portions. Farewell also to the extended excursions into the uninhabited wilds that she used to love – for now nobody but groups and parties with a purpose, such as hunting or getting timber or quarry, can go into the wild without arousing suspicion. Welcome, instead, to entire afternoons wasted on tea and gossip and fashion; welcome to witnessing uninspired recitals of poetry by the dozen; welcome to the inanity of enforced society. Such is the price of stability.

There are no news from the Other Shore. She knows that her husband is dead: She felt the sundering of their bond long before a messenger came from Mandos, to inform her that she was free to re-marry.
Of her sons, of the others who went to Middle-earth, the Valar give no information. By now she is used to being ignorant. She tells herself that it may be better not to know, that ignorance may be a mercy. She takes solace from the fact that she is not alone. She does not despair. She is happy enough. They all are.

They are happy, but they have lost themselves. The great creations of the Noldor were based on self-absorbed efforts, on introspective minds. Without introspection, there are no strokes of genius. Poets now reproduce previous thinkers' works in other words, pretty and empty. Craftsmen deliver good, solid work, but no longer surprise with stunning new ideas. There are no soaring dreams of greatness now. There is no passion.
It may be better that way, Nerdanel reflects. Isolated from the world beyond the Pelóri, locked in unnatural peace, there is no use for passion. Passion is unreliable, shifting, dangerous.
How she misses it.

Chapter End Notes

The idea expressed in the final paragraphs, concerning the necessity of isolation and introspection for independent artistic or philosophical thought, I owe to Walter J. Ong's Orality and Literacy, which I highly recommend to anyone interested in language, language history and the transmission and development of knowledge.