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.
Largely focused on Númenor, its fall, and the aftermath, as seen from the perspective of two Mannish scientists, bit players in some ways, but who nonetheless cast their shadows across the history of Middle Earth.
A story of three friends in Númenor, one of whom attracts the attention of the High Priest. What does friendship mean in the shadow of the Black Temple?
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…
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.
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.
Scribbles & Drabbles 2024
A chill Tolkien event, where artists make art, and authors write little stories in response. Begins in June and ends in November.
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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.
This fits so well with Thranduil's personality and the way he's so in tune with nature in The Hobbit, and forms a great bridge between these wild Elves and those of Doriath. I really enjoy your explanations and comparisons here, and Oropher's amusement, and the Nandor"s scheming to keep the Noldor at bay!
Thank you (again)! Yes, the long calm will be rudely interrupted for poor Thranduil, but meanwhile he's having the time of his life. I enjoyed exploring that bridge between the Sindar and their Eastern cousins. Certainly Oropher and company would not just have waltzed in and taken over, whatever Tolkien seems to imply.
This ficlet has kept popping into my mind since I read it, and I would love to make a podfic from it. Are you open to derivative works from your works?
Thank you. The loss of self that can come with displacement is an underlying current for me in Tolkien -- what does it mean to be you in a completely new environment? How do the various characters adapt? This particular intersection is one I am fascinated by...Oropher going off to be King in the Greenwood has so many possible meanings. And I imagine the Nandor looking for the opportunities that the Sindar's arrival might offer. Among them, a way to keep those annoying Westerners out of their hair. Wild they may be, but that does not mean they are not canny!
Yes, poor Thran. Enjoy it while you can, honey. And the Nandor knew a smart trick when it was offered to them. Oropher is some kind of big cheese? Let him deal with those odd, tall, bellicose folk from over the Sea.
holding mastery of steel above a closer kinship with the wild or the gentle guarded balance that the Elves of the forest maintain.
I just LOVED how you chose to describe the Noldor here - and Thranduil, of course. You managed to give him and Oropher a lot of character within a few words. Truly well done!
Thank you! The Noldor make beautiful things, but they also make plenty of war, and the Nandor have good reason to be cautious. I'm glad you enjoyed this. :)
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.