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.
Oh goodness - with the prevalent discussion in the tumblr-based part of fandom being (once again) Tolkien and sexism, "Annoyed" very much hit a nerve for me - giving the erased women their much-deserved voices. It may be breaking the fourth wall more than I'd be strictly comfortable with in other fic, but in this it serves a great purpose, and it's... a very satisfactory drabble on the whole.
On a lighter note, I'm still laughing about the crossover ficlet. It made me giggle during the bingo challenge, and didn't fail to do so again. :D
(Trying this again… I think I hit the wrong button.) It broke the fourth wall more than *I* normally feel comfortable with. (But the Bingo challenge seemed ripe for that sort of thing.) I'm glad you find it satisfying, especially given the Tumblr discussion. (Which I'm honestly glad to be missing.)
This is an interesting bit of world-building. I like the setting and the village and Maglor setting his routine. There are a lot of nice touches--it actually sounds fairly pleasant to me, although it must lonely and lacking in excitement. I don't really know what it would feel like being a Feanorian after all hope has been lost.I haven't tried to write that yet. (I've stuck to the before and much later!)
Thank you! It's meant to be pleasant, actually. I wanted to write a non-angsty (well, minimally angsty) wandering tale for once! I actually don't think it's lonely: Maglor's an introvert who's spent the paste few centuries alone. And he has relatives and friends who won't let him sink back into his shell. Plus, there is a war brewing. (And after everything that happened in Beleriand, a lack of excitement would be a good thing.)
I also don't think it's "after all hope is lost." He *chose* to give up the Silmaril. Not having it or the Oath hanging over his head gives him a chance to start over (once Lill knocked the idea of "shouldn't be here" out of his head, anyway). But this is me and my perpetual love of Maglor wandering stories talking, so I may have a different perspective on the whole thing. :)
I remember several of these from 2012 (particularly the haiku, which I got a kick out of), but I don't seem to recall the Jedi one.
"...their cover story of a traveling duo of singers/songwriters. And all to infiltrate a crime syndicate based on a backwater planet who used the entertainment industry as their cover."
Haha! cracktastic, yet well considered. Rival Jedi musician Elves would need some reason to be on a ship together.
Thank you about the haiku; I was fairly sure it's forgetable, so I'm glad to know it's not.
You actually reviewed it on LJ! (I'm not surprised you forgot, given how busy the comm was. I honestly can't tell you a single fic I reviewed then, though I know I did.) Cracktastic all the way! :D Thank you!
This sounds like a fairly pleasant interlude in Maglor's life, aside from the possibly ominous hints of skirmishes to come. The dog is a lovely touch. I like the inclusion of Maglor living in a cabin as well--that seems very "relevant to your interests," as they say. =)
Awww! Lalwen, how sneaky - but what a lovely idea, since she knew that both Maglor and Nerdanel happened to be on the island.
Of course, now I really wish I could read what happens next! What are they going to talk about? Will Maglor decide to go home with Nerdanel? Will they part, but stay in touch while they can? Where is he going to go next? And what will Lalwen do? So many questions! :D
My Lalwen is very sneaky! I tend to think of her as a bit of a prankster.
I'm going to disappoint you: I ended the story when I did because I couldn't figure out how to write their conversation (writing is hard!) and also because the ending was them parting with her sailing back to Aman and him back to Endor and I wasn't in the mood to write sad. This was supposed to be a much longer story when I came up with the idea a couple of years ago, but the details kept changing and then they leaked out of my head almost entirely.
I can say that the two of them spend rather a lot of time together over the course of the next couple of weeks, that Maglor gets invited to a private dinner with Tar-Elendil and his family (awkward conversations ensue), that there's a small museum of artifacts from the founding, that Lalwen is also around because she's just as interested in what Maglor's been up and maybe repairing a bit of the family relationship. Maybe even Elrond is there, but I tend to think that the Elves in Lindon didn't sail to Númenor, and I like it better with just the Aman Elves.
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.