I know he will kill one or two other,but give me names of his victims!

Lalaith:We want names!

Goose1:Names!

Goose2:Names!

Niniel:Names!

Names...

You... you did read the Silmarillion, didn't you, Urwen?:confused:

I know, but couldn't he have killed Maeglin and Uldor instead of Nienor and Gorlim?:(

??? What do you mean?

I mean couldn't he have killed Maeglin,which would remove any stain on soul of my namesake's cousin.Or Uldor for that matter-two damn traitors!

But nooo.He had to kill Lalaith,Nienor and Gorlim.It's true that Gorlim is a traitor too,and that Nienor committed sin,but lo and behold! Gorlim and Nienor both did it for LOVE! And Morgoth just had to kill those three innocent souls instead of two REAL traitors,which are Maeglin and Uldor! I mean,only psycho could do such a thing!:p

So you're saying you don't think Morgoth was all that nice?

Other way round: only a psycho would kill people who worked for him rather than his enemies, don't you think?

Let's stop the wild theories and rebuttals for a moment and examine this thing logically. If you do, I believe you will come to the same conclusion that I did about this.

Maedhros literally killed Lalaith. Not indirectly, but with his own flesh.

Follow me through some points here-
1) Morgoth's plague was a specific response to the growing power of Maedhros.
2) Morgoth was seriously evil. If some sort of evil plan occurs to me, it's a given it occurred to him.
3) The plague was not conjured from nothing. Melkor could not create life or matter. He could only take existing things and corrupt them.
4) The plague had to have some sort of source- i.e. a biological "patient zero". Some animal or bit of flesh had to be Morgoth's test tube, which he then placed somewhere in the north and the sickness spread from it.

Given those facts, does any diabolical idea spring to mind?

No?

Well, perhaps you're not as sick and twisted as I am by nature, so I'll make this easy for you. Given that it was the power of Maedhros that Melkor was striking against, wouldn't it be absolutely perfect to use Maedhros as the engine of destruction?

"But Phantom- Morgoth couldn't get to Maedhros, and Tolkien never said he was sick!"

Ah, but you're forgetting that not every bit of Maedhros was accounted for. What about the hand he left behind hanging upon the cliffs of Morgoth's fortress!!

Given the facts, you can't tell me that Morgoth didn't have this idea. The hand was infected and Morgoth had his servants plant it near some populated area around Hithlum and boom- horrible death brought about by Maedhros's own flesh! He brought doom upon Lalaith, literally with his own hand.

Bravo! Nice conclusion!

You would think so, wouldn't you?:rolleyes:

...So we're still not finished with the lizard. Like I said, why is it okay for Lalaith to annoy Morgoth?

Urwen? Got an answer for that one?

Indeed. First you're angry Maedhros failed to put the welfare of a single child (whom he probably didn't know existed) ahead of all else. Now you're shocked that the main villain prefers to kill off the good guys rather than people on his own side.

Forgive me for saying this, Urwen, but you do appear to have a rather curious approach to reading fiction. It seems like you expect all the characters in the book– no matter their roles– to have exactly the same sympathies that you do. :confused:

Ingenious and elegant solution, phantom! The only (very minor) problem I can see with it is the explicit statement in the Narn that the plague was spread by "an ill wind from the North", which seems to indicate that the germ was transported from Morgoth's domain either by the air itself or by some intermediate airborne carrier.

Could it be that Lalaith's famous pet geese* played a fatal role here? It was in autumn that the plague came, the time when birds migrate south. Would it be too far fetched to suppose that the geese caught the disease in the far North and brought it to Dor-lomin on their way south? And remember that late autumn/early winter is also the time when geese are butchered and eaten (against the fervent protests of Lalaith, I'm sure; and what tragic irony that she fell victim herself to the plague that could have been avoided if her protests had been heeded...:(**)! Presumably, Húrin's people didn't understand the connection between consumption of goose meat and infection and thus mistakenly attributed the epidemy to the wind itself rather than the birds who sailed on it.

If we attempt to reconcile this idea with your theory about Maedhros' hand, we face the problem that geese are vegetarians and wouldn't have touched dead flesh - but ducks would (as I can testify from first-hand observation of the four who keep our garden slug-free); or if they didn't nibble on the hand itself they could have eaten worms which had previously fed on the hand. Maybe Lalaith's geese were actually ducks and were mistranslated by Aelfwine (or possibly Bilbo, depending on which version of the translator conceit you choose to follow) rendering Dírhavel's Sindarin original in his native tongue? After all, both belong to the family Anatidae, and I've met people who couldn't tell one from the other...

* (mentioned only in an obscure textual variant to the Narn which I can't find at the moment, but I suppose Nerwen might be able to help me out...)
**(Alternatively, maybe her protests were heeded after all, but she was the first to catch the disease by cuddling those dratted birds all the time...)

So are you saying that Lalaith came into contact with this nasty rotting hand (:eek:) and what? How did the disease spread? I seriously hope she didn't touch it or eat it...

A-ha! Now you have nailed it. She found it and ate it... eurgh... but, you know, the youngsters and their habits sometimes, improper education and all that... But then, such a disgusting deed just had to be punished. I mean, eating a high Elven Lord's hand? A certain werewolf got killed for less than that.

Once again: DON"T INSULT LALAITH!

Really,how many times must I repeat this?!:(

An interesting point, Pitch. A number of species with "goose" in their common names are actually considered ducks by taxonomists.

The variant to which you're referring is to be found in HoMe, Vol XVI. However, though the geese do appear, note that it represents a radically different version of the text, especially regarding the effects of the disease, so that it's very hard to fit it into the story as we now know it. Nonetheless, it does represent a fascinating curiosity for Tolkien scholars– who would have thought that at one point JRRT intended to have Beleriand overrun by plague-infected cannibal zombies?

But it's so much fun!:D

Fun or not,here I come!

Besides,you like her too,don't ya? Otherwise,you wouldn't have asked question about her in 'Who am I?' thread! Admit it!

Btw,answer to my riddle in 'Who am I(II)' is Aredhel....

You know, this makes a certain amount of sense...

...eeewwww.

Clearly Tolkien was inspired by The Phantom's recent dream...

Well, actually I did that just for you.;)

But sure, I like her– only I'm really not sure if your "Lalaith" is, in fact, Lalaith. Don't recall Tolkien saying anything about Turin's little sister being able to kill dragons with her bare hands...

Hey, Urwen, you've barely given anyone a chance to guess the answer! In fact Pitch is still waiting to be told if his guess (Nienor) was correct or not.

At the risk of invoking Miss Esty's wrath....
 

WHAT THE HECK IS THIS RUBBISH?!?!

This is the tone I'm gleaning from this thread:


Urwen: *offers what I really HOPE is a joking opening post*

Nerwen, Eomer, Phantom (heh), Lottie (hehehehe), etc.: *give serious responses*

Me: *thinks this will be a great opportunity to learn more about the books*

Urwen: *dashes my hopes*

All of the above: *are confused*

Urwen: *is kidding, right?*



Look! I even followed Urwen's 'analytical' posting style! That has to get her back on some sort of sane track, right? Right?!


Will someone explain to me exactly what is going on here? Anyone (except Urwen at this point, because I don't think she knows either)? Please?

1. Oh hush up. :p

2. At the moment, we're working on answering the questions "is Lalaith a Warg?" and "did the Plague come from Maedhros's hand?" and "did Lalaith eat said rotting, plague-infested hand?" and "what are the 'geese', really?"

Well, sally, explaining a joke tends to ruin it, but for your peace of mind, this thread has developped more like this:

Urwen: *extends her blood feud with Feanor and his whole kin (established here) to blaming Maedhros for the untimely demise of one of her favourite heroines*

Nerwen, Eomer, Phantom (heh), Lottie (hehehehe), etc.: *give serious responses*

you: *think this will be a great opportunity to learn more about the books*

Urwen: *dashes your hopes*

All of the above: *decide to make the best of the situation and get some entertainment out of it by making fun of Urwen's infatuation with Lalaith*
(It started with the bugs and the butterfly and went over the cliff when Glaurung and the geese entered into the picture)

Esty: *agrees with all of the above and moves the thread to Mirth*

Urwen: *doesn't realise that the pleasure of poking fun at her increases in direct proportion with the irascibility of her responses and adds more fuel to the fire*

morm: *doesn't get the mirthful aspect and re-moves thread to N&N*

the true Lalaith: *is offended*

Nerwen & phantom: *do their damnedest to turn the whole affair into an intellectual challenge*
(starting with Narn i Gwilwileth Luin and culminating in the Maedhros' Hand Theory)

parallel to the above:
Nerwen: *challenges Urwen to make good her outrageous claims on Lalaith's behalf in a way that actually makes sense, leading to a battle of proposed and rejected scenarios (score up to now - Nerwen: arnoediad, Urwen: 0)*

Urwen: *still doesn't get why everybody keeps 'insulting' her precious Lalaith, when we're all actually quite fond of the poor girl whom she's blown up beyond all proportion*

Everything: *gradually ceases to be as much fun as it was for a while*

And that's where we are now.

When daisies flower in Mordor...

Actually Urwen/Lalaith was called back from wherever she had been (I still hold to my theory that she had never died) to rejuvenate the landscape of Mordor after the fall of Sauron.

It is said that daisies sprung up in her footprints, and that goose poop is a better fertilizer than nothing.

So, you see, the phantom really was right to assign her to Mordor.

:D There where daisies in Mordor?!

After Lalaith was through, the Daisy Fields of Gorgoroth were one of the wonders of Middle-earth, second only to the glittering golden sands of the Sea of Urwen (formerly Núrnen).

Mordor went from black bloody lava filled land to daisy fields? Sauron must fell cursed!

Well, I fancy he had other reasons for being less than happy with the state of his fortunes at that point.;)

I can think of another...

Nen Lalaith ran straight by Lalaith's grave.One day,river god decided to take her under his wing.He made her a maia.

And a millenia later she chose a husband-a master of all living things...

There you are-Lalaith is Goldberry!

It's a bit far-fetched to say Goldberry chose Tom... Quite the contrary, it could be argued Tom took her by force (can't post any quotes though since I don't have The Adventures of Tom Bombadil here). Just saying. ;)

What river god? Why is he able to transform dead human children into beings of a completely different order?

Besides, this in no way explains how Lalaith is to achieve any of her goals. Or have you given up on them?

River god is Ulmo.That answers your other question.

And as for her plans...haven't you realised that she transformed her geese into ponies when she got married?

This one?

No, it doesn't. Since when does Ulmo have that power? (Clue: he doesn't.)

And this helped her kill Glaurung, save her brother and sister etc... how?

You are behind the times. They are now giant mutant space ponies.

You know,I think you should know that Ulmo and his bros and sises work for the One. Therefore,they all have power to transform...;)

...dead human kiddies into Maiar? Uh-uh. Doesn't fit into Tolkien's cosmology at all.

This works no better than your endowing Lalaith with superhuman strength: you can't win by just making up abilities for the characters.

Besides, you still haven't said how any of this would have helped Lalaithberry kill Glaurung.

Actually, there is a precedent. Ulmo did turn Elwing into a seagull briefly. Hey, there's a thought! Maybe Lalaith is one of the geese!

Maybe Lalaith is very manipulative and just made Bombadil think he'd chosen her. Or she's quirky. :eek:

Yes, there's a number of precedents for shapeshifting– that's not the same thing.

Well, she was all set to marry Beleg at the age of three...

What in the name of Morgoth is this thread? :confused:

Moderator's note:
 

For skip and all who would echo your question:

The Downs forum is usually quite well sorted - serious topics in the Books forum, funny stuff in Mirth. However, there is a history of threads which started one way and then turned to the other. Those are not as easy to categorize. This thread has taken several turns, and as a result, has been moved more than once. It now resides here for the amusement of those who are posting and reading - enjoy, or ignore if you prefer! :)