Himring by Servia Art

Fingon and Finrod are both terrifyingly competent war bards, but at equal and opposite things. And Maglor, for all his musical genius, is barely competent at this one skill.

Everyone expects Maglor to be the most talented battle singer when they’re figuring this out—including himself. In Aman, in peacetime, he’s widely accepted as the finest singer, harpist, and composer of the Noldor. Even Finrod and Fingon, accomplished musicians by any other standard, don’t question this. Maglor can wring tears from the most stoic master bard with his achingly beautiful voice. But after the first few Orc raids in Beleriand, never mind the Dagor-nuin-Giliath, it’s clear this does not extend to battle. Maglor is best at inspiring sorrow. This is excellent when you need to write the tragic downfall of your people to let them weep for their many losses. It’s less useful for helping allies or slaying Orcs.

Fingon, though, is the best at inspiring hope in his own forces. He never tells anyone so, but he discovers this in the mountains of Thangorodrim by coaxing his lost cousin to sing back to him. Fingon can hum the exhaustion from your limbs and sing the pain from your bruises, and he can give you the strength to push forward for a final charge. What annoys everyone else is how spontaneous and genuine it all is; if Fingon’s sudden battle compositions were contrived, they wouldn’t be half as effective. Maglor was known to grouse about Fingon showing him up when his nonsense refrain for the Dagor Aglareb—Our lances keen with deadly sheen / with ardor fierce, our foes to pierce!—caught on better than Maglor’s own elegant anthem.

Finrod is an unholy terror to enemies on the battlefield, and the Orcs flee before his song. He is a son of Eärwen of Alqualondë, twice as much Lindar as he is Noldor. Finrod’s mother was the finest loremaster of their clan’s ancient chants against the Dark, first crafted at Cuiviénen and perfected on the Great Journey. He learned them from her, and then he did them better. Finrod has lessons from Melian on how an elf can channel the Song’s chords for best effect, and he takes to it with deadly competence. Finrod could sing dread into the enemy’s heart and a tremor into their hands on their weapons. Golden, laughing, kind Finrod never raised his voice in song against another elf—but when he cast away his crown for Beren, they say you could catch the edges of terror from seeing his sharp-toothed smile.

(There are not many who knew Maglor, Fingon, and Finrod all well enough to compare them. But those who can whisper how tragically misplaced these talents were. Perhaps Fingon could have woven a more compelling song of hope against Sauron. Perhaps Finrod’s chants of terror could have driven away even a Balrog better than Fingon’s hope for a false dawn. And it was cruel of Eru to give Maglor a gift for sorrow, when he had eternity to sing of it to the waves, with naught but the wind’s wail for a duet.)

Fingon and Finrod are also sons of the Vanyar, those people most beloved by Súlimo, and of him they received song and poetry; for poetry is the delight of Manwë, and the song of words is his music. While Fëanáro's family traveled far and wide to the borders of Aman, Fingon and Finrod would spend their youth in the Blessed Lands learning from their grandmother, composing and singing to Manwë and Varda under the light of the Trees.

‘You are much better at this,’ said Maglor in disgust. ‘I just make all the orcs burst into floods of tears...’

He looks up to find Fingon and Finrod staring at  him.

‘What?!’

(Sorry, I couldn’t resist!)

Fingon and Finrod are both terrifyingly competent war bards, but at equal and opposite things. And Maglor, for all his musical genius, is barely competent at this one skill.

Everyone expects Maglor to be the most talented battle singer when they’re figuring this out—including himself. In Aman, in peacetime, he’s widely accepted as the finest singer, harpist, and composer of the Noldor. Even Finrod and Fingon, accomplished musicians by any other standard, don’t question this. Maglor can wring tears from the most stoic master bard with his achingly beautiful voice. But after the first few Orc raids in Beleriand, never mind the Dagor-nuin-Giliath, it’s clear this does not extend to battle. Maglor is best at inspiring sorrow. This is excellent when you need to write the tragic downfall of your people to let them weep for their many losses. It’s less useful for helping allies or slaying Orcs.

Fingon, though, is the best at inspiring hope in his own forces. He never tells anyone so, but he discovers this in the mountains of Thangorodrim by coaxing his lost cousin to sing back to him. Fingon can hum the exhaustion from your limbs and sing the pain from your bruises, and he can give you the strength to push forward for a final charge. What annoys everyone else is how spontaneous and genuine it all is; if Fingon’s sudden battle compositions were contrived, they wouldn’t be half as effective. Maglor was known to grouse about Fingon showing him up when his nonsense refrain for the Dagor Aglareb—Our lances keen with deadly sheen / with ardor fierce, our foes to pierce!—caught on better than Maglor’s own elegant anthem.

Finrod is an unholy terror to enemies on the battlefield, and the Orcs flee before his song. He is a son of Eärwen of Alqualondë, twice as much Lindar as he is Noldor. Finrod’s mother was the finest loremaster of their clan’s ancient chants against the Dark, first crafted at Cuiviénen and perfected on the Great Journey. He learned them from her, and then he did them better. Finrod has lessons from Melian on how an elf can channel the Song’s chords for best effect, and he takes to it with deadly competence. Finrod could sing dread into the enemy’s heart and a tremor into their hands on their weapons. Golden, laughing, kind Finrod never raised his voice in song against another elf—but when he cast away his crown for Beren, they say you could catch the edges of terror from seeing his sharp-toothed smile.

(There are not many who knew Maglor, Fingon, and Finrod all well enough to compare them. But those who can whisper how tragically misplaced these talents were. Perhaps Fingon could have woven a more compelling song of hope against Sauron. Perhaps Finrod’s chants of terror could have driven away even a Balrog better than Fingon’s hope for a false dawn. And it was cruel of Eru to give Maglor a gift for sorrow, when he had eternity to sing of it to the waves, with naught but the wind’s wail for a duet.)

Fingon and Finrod are also sons of the Vanyar, those people most beloved by Súlimo, and of him they received song and poetry; for poetry is the delight of Manwë, and the song of words is his music. While Fëanáro's family traveled far and wide to the borders of Aman, Fingon and Finrod would spend their youth in the Blessed Lands learning from their grandmother, composing and singing to Manwë and Varda under the light of the Trees.

‘You are much better at this,’ said Maglor in disgust. ‘I just make all the orcs burst into floods of tears...’

He looks up to find Fingon and Finrod staring at  him.

‘What?!’

(Sorry, I couldn’t resist!)

Is The Tolkien Estate crazy?

Have you seen FAQ on the new The Tolkien Estate webpage? https://www.tolkienestate.com/frequently-asked-questions-and-links/?fbclid=IwAR3oyGPRKgf1sE3B9D_3e1WtVJaYV0yZHConYXedDJY79tDy8SKmYetqrY4 No fanfiction, no fanzines, no Tolkien music, no Tolkien quotes (without permission), no writing in Tolkien languages (if you intend to post it somewhere), no Tolkien-related events (even charitable and not-for-profit ones - no exceptions), no public readings (without permission), no recordings of reading of Tolkien works (and TE is going to take action against unauthorized audiobooks or readings on social media), no Tolkien photographs. Tell me if it is true, or if someone is joking!

Holy crap, it’s been YEARS since anyone did something as stupid as try and threaten fanfic writers. Those are dark days we talk about as legends! Does anyone know when these policies were published and if any legal actions have actually been taken?

Good lord, reading through this whole thing, this could be the death of the fandom. we may have to go underground, because the level of control they have exerted over this outright stops fans from even interacting with the work. It’s far beyond stopping people from making a bit of cash off of it, it full on threatens any creator who wishes to engage with the material! I’m honestly surprised they didn’t just go all the way and say making fan art is illegal too!

I don’t know the exact day that the new policies came out, but it was within the past two weeks. I haven’t heard that the estate has cracked down on anyone yet. It’s probably too soon still.

I’ve been checking some of the other large Tolkien fan communities (theonering.net, Tolkien Society, Silmarillion Writers’ Guild) to see if anyone has released a statement about the new policies, but I haven’t seen anything yet; nearly all discussion so far has been relegated to the site’s new appearance and the new artwork released on it. (Although there is this hilarious Reddit discussion about the new policies.)

I’m not sure how many Tolkien fanfic sites are left since I only use AO3, but this makes me wonder what could happen to the fanfic sites that haven’t yet moved their archives onto AO3 and don’t have the protection of AO3′s lawyers, should the estate decide to crack down on Tolkien fanfic sites. This could really deal a blow to some of those communities if the estate firmly enforces the new policies.

I’m astonished, though, that relatively no large Tolkien communities (that I’ve seen) are talking about the changes, except for on here, and that even the conversation about it here is pretty limited. I don’t know how seriously the Tolkien Estate will enforce this, but it’s a major shift in tone from the estate nonetheless.

that link has Facebook tracky nonsense in the URL, here’s a clean one:

and emyn-arnens’s “within the last two weeks” is as of 2022 March 5

To clarify a point: The wording they use for fan fiction seems to be designed to rule out fan art, too. You should probably ask a lawyer (which I am not) for details, but the wording there is not limited to literary fan material, it seems to cover everything a fan might want to create.

they’re also including in this ban such things as quotations for the purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship, or research that the Tolkien estate won’t like—I know this because the only thing they’re saying about quotations is “here’s where to ask for permission” and having to ask implies the possibility the answer will be no—and criticism, comment, scholarship, or research that the copyright holder won’t like are so unambiguously the sort of thing that US copyright law protects as fair use that I’m quoting those purposes from Section 107.

which, even setting aside all the discussions about the legality of fanfiction and composing songs in Elvish and etc, tells me the Tolkien estate didn’t consult an IP lawyer.

This is a hoot, they have said very seriously that you cannot use the trademark TOLKIEN name for anything without permission, examples given are things like: naming a park. I am fascinated by the implication that fanfic, academic works and rogue municipal park-namers are some of the key menacing threats to intellectual property

And yet, they signed off on the Amazon Game of Thrones rip-off/cash grab? Legal hilariousness aside, they have zero moral authority here either.

I’m laughing so hard. NONE of this is enforceable. NONE of it. If they did consult a lawyer that lawyer should be fired.

 … so like: IANAL. However, my previous job was actually as copyright assistant for a college, I did a crapload of courses on it, and so on, and the thing I think I would like to point out to everyone is: this actually does not mark any kind of legal change. 

This is not like a website’s terms of service, where them having changed it actually does have a before-and-after related effect on users. The only change that this possibly indicates on the part of the Estate is an increased willingness to attempt DMCA harassment (ie: run around sending takedown notices and threatening letters to sites that host different kinds of conent); otherwise literally nothing has changed, legally, from last year. 

This declaration on their part does not give them any more right to sue you than they had this time last year. This isn’t a TOS, it doesn’t change anyone’s legal relationship with the works. They don’t have that ability. People’s right to interact with Tolkien’s works, legally, are exactly the same as they were this time last year. 

And while IANAL, long experience/etc tells me that the vast majority of these are unenforceable. The name thing particularly as you cannot trademark given names*. Similar, in Canada and the US and I believe the UK (I cannot speak to other jurisdictions) your right to use of the text in criticism, journalism, pastiche, parody and so on are backed up by various forms of law, as well as precedent; and similarly the legal status of not-for-profit artworks (ie fanfic etc that are not being profited from) are also very well protected and have quite a bit of precedent. 

The Estate might not like any of that, but it doesn’t actually matter, and however threatening they want to make their new FAQ that doesn’t change legal status. The Tolkien estate does not control what is and isn’t legal for you to do with these artistic works: copyright law in your country does. End of story.

Meanwhile, if you’ve been selling fanfic or fanart or anything else (and that includes via things like patreon), or if you’ve been publicly publishing readings etc of the entirety (ie more than defined by fair use), you’ve been in tricky legal waters and liable to be sued forever; that’s not new. 

Now this may signal as noted that the Estate (or possibly Amazon on their behalf - this is often the kind of thing that happens after a Big Asshole Company gets ahold of some associated IP) is about to start being a massive dickwad over attempting to abuse the DMCA process/harass people based on claims they are asserting but which they do not in fact legally have; this is certainly a thing that has happened before. 

But your legal rights and legal relationship with the text and the legal holder of IP do not change just because they assert they do. That’s not how things work. 

[*this is why WB can only stick tm on the specific stylised drawing OFFICIAL “Harry Potter” name - the one with the lightning bolts - and cannot actually enforce on just the name “Harry Potter”; similarly you cannot tm words or sentences in the common language and WB got smacked over this just a couple years ago]

Popular people problems! I will write the same stories or meta I always did and the same narrow self-selection of Silmarillion nerds will read them! The Tolkien estate is not about to go after me.

STARBUCKS WORKERS HAVE UNIONIZED!!!!!!!!!!!

shelley's ozymandias but it's about lost websites & broken links from bygone days of internet history

Inktober Day 11-15

Sour

Stuck

Roof

Tick

Helmet

I’ve been thinking about how Tolkien in general is just a high fantasy within a high fantasy and that is unique. It contains legends and myths within itself that we see reflected through the other characters. For instance, many hobbits are told of the city of Rivendell but are not even sure it exists. When Bilbo first sees it he is enamored because his fairy tales are coming to life before him. The same can be said about Gandalf—he is a legend in himself to the shire—though the hobbits do not know his true identity, he is like a fairy tale to them which is why he is loved so much by the young hobbits. Next, we see things like the light of Earendil. When elves look up at the sky and see the moon, their legends for tale that is the light of Earendil. Many may not have been around during the first age, and many may not know him. So to an extent, looking at the moon in the sky and seeing the light is like a fairy tale or legend to them.

We can even talk about how the Valar—Vardas skies, Yavanna’s forests, etc., are all a legend and fairy tale to many of those in Arda, some elves included.

Galadriel herself, with all her power and glory and the legends foretold of her is a living legend among the elves, dwarves, the hobbits and the people of Middle Earth.

Even the dwarves—whom to me are the biggest examples of fairy tales and legends because after the third age, they go in their mountains and never come out. We don’t know what happened to them, and within arda, there are only stories of them and their existence during the 1st – 3rd age.

And even the Ents??

Tolkien has generations of legends, fairy tales and high fantasies within itself. And it’s interesting seeing how characters interact with these types of structures, some characters being part of those legends.

This is so well said, and reminds me of one of my favorite scenes from TTT:

if we lived in a world where u had to do the career u were first interested in as a child what would u be doing, id be a firefighter

Tuor, Gelmir and Arminas by Ted Nasmith

#that little bat has no clue that it is embodying halloween right now #because it does not understand what holidays are #it does however #understand what pumpkins are #as it can eat those #it cannot eat halloween #bats

I needed your tags I’m sorry.

it cannot eat halloween…

Sometimes I like to think about generations of my ancestors all thinking LOOK at how COMFORTABLE her bed is! In bed terms, I am the culmination of evolution. All the way from crawling from the sea on little legs to here, safe and warm in my excellent bed.

I feel the same way! My new bed is a wonder.

Window on the world, Joshua K. Jackson

bro not to start again on names but u ever think abt how some names have been used for centuries, millenniums even...like how many times has the earth heard a mother calling, 'alexander!'...how many times have the stars caught a lover whispering, 'freyja'...how many times has the ground we've walked on and continue to walk on felt vibrations of a friend excitedly yelling, 'mary!'

Alex graduated from Middle-school yesterday! He made through the Pandemic lockdown and homeschooling! (I adore ageless names.)

fuck it, colorful home libraries

Want to do this someday in my house.

My favorite decor consists of books.