Tidbits of Curiosity

[Urwen]

Originally Posted by Andsigil

Cirdan the Shipwright.

I keep hoping that someone uncovers an old shipping trunk, under some clutter in an overgrown garden shed in Tolkien's old home, and finds an original, 300 page manuscript by JRR, entitled, The Adventures of Cirdan.

I am also hoping to receive more tales about my favorites - specifically Lalaith and Maeglin. They are barely mentioned at all, and then they were both killed off. This injustice needs to be fixed ASAP!


(It'd probably never happen, though, and so I will turn to fanfiction....)

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Urwen

I am also hoping to receive more tales about my favorites - specifically Lalaith and Maeglin. They are barely mentioned at all, and then they were both killed off. This injustice needs to be fixed ASAP!


(It'd probably never happen, though, and so I will turn to fanfiction....)

I'm not sure there is much more to tell about Lalaith - she is supposed to represent all that is lost in the family with her death: joy, innocence, childhood, purity. Sure, we could get some stories showing more of that, but her character would still be known better in the aftermath of her death than in whatever we know about her life.

Maeglin, though, is a much more complex character while living, and I agree that he could be more fleshed out.

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Urwen

I just had a stray thought: what if Gurthang/Anguirely were truly evil? I mean, their maker and all three of their subsequent owners met tragic ends....

How literally do we take Melian? She claims that there is malice in Anglachel, and that "the dark heart of the smith still dwells in it" (way to talk about your husband's cousin!). That's similar to how Gandalf describes the One Ring: "the treasure of the Enemy, fraught with all his malice; and in it lies a great part of his strength of old." If Melian is telling the truth, Anglachel is basically a One Ring Lite, so yeah, it's kind of evil.

The question is, does Anguirel share this trait? That depends on whether putting malice and his heart into the swords was intentional. There's nothing to indicate that Anglachel was forged with the intent of paying it to Thingol, so it might well be similar to its mate, yes.

Speaking of paired swords... does anyone have any thoughts on what this concept of mated pairs of weapons actually... means? You've got Anglachel and Anguirel, and then Glamdring and Orcrist... is it just a super fancy way of saying they were forged together? Or is there something more to it?

Originally Posted by Andsigil

Cirdan the Shipwright.

I keep hoping that someone uncovers an old shipping trunk, under some clutter in an overgrown garden shed in Tolkien's old home, and finds an original, 300 page manuscript by JRR, entitled, The Adventures of Cirdan.

Oh, come on, I didn't even know I needed this! For preference, I'd like it tucked into the Master Family Tree (like the master map/s), which will finally answer such questions as how many generations there were between the Awakening and the Great March (not to mention naming the Lords of Andunie and Princes of Dol Amroth, Cardolan, and Rhudaur!).

Originally Posted by Urwen

I am also hoping to receive more tales about my favorites - specifically Lalaith and Maeglin. They are barely mentioned at all, and then they were both killed off. This injustice needs to be fixed ASAP!

(It'd probably never happen, though, and so I will turn to fanfiction....)

^_^ And this is why Middle-earth fanfic is the best fanfic: because Tolkien laid down so much material to work from, but also left lots of gaps that we just itch to fill. Obviously it's not as good as getting actual new Tolkien material, but unless you're really into outdated linguistic snippets, that well apparently ran dry with The Children of Hurin, twelve years ago.

hS

[Urwen]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

How literally do we take Melian? She claims that there is malice in Anglachel, and that "the dark heart of the smith still dwells in it" (way to talk about your husband's cousin!). That's similar to how Gandalf describes the One Ring: "the treasure of the Enemy, fraught with all his malice; and in it lies a great part of his strength of old." If Melian is telling the truth, Anglachel is basically a One Ring Lite, so yeah, it's kind of evil.

The question is, does Anguirel share this trait? That depends on whether putting malice and his heart into the swords was intentional. There's nothing to indicate that Anglachel was forged with the intent of paying it to Thingol, so it might well be similar to its mate, yes.

Speaking of paired swords... does anyone have any thoughts on what this concept of mated pairs of weapons actually... means? You've got Anglachel and Anguirel, and then Glamdring and Orcrist... is it just a super fancy way of saying they were forged together? Or is there something more to it?



Oh, come on, I didn't even know I needed this! For preference, I'd like it tucked into the Master Family Tree (like the master map/s), which will finally answer such questions as how many generations there were between the Awakening and the Great March (not to mention naming the Lords of Andunie and Princes of Dol Amroth, Cardolan, and Rhudaur!).



^_^ And this is why Middle-earth fanfic is the best fanfic: because Tolkien laid down so much material to work from, but also left lots of gaps that we just itch to fill. Obviously it's not as good as getting actual new Tolkien material, but unless you're really into outdated linguistic snippets, that well apparently ran dry with The Children of Hurin, twelve years ago.

hS

Not necessarily. Like I said, Fall of Gondolin book came out.

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Urwen

Not necessarily. Like I said, Fall of Gondolin book came out.

Yeah... unfortunately there's not really new material in there. It's possible that the 'evolution of the story' section has some, but the bulk of it is just the versions told in the Book of Lost Tales, 1930s Silmarillion, and Unfinished Tales.

Oh, but you said you've not read HoME, so yes! The Fall contains quite a lot of M[a]eglin, along with a heck of a lot of details about Gondolin itself. You'll like it.

hS

[Urwen]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

Yeah... unfortunately there's not really new material in there. It's possible that the 'evolution of the story' section has some, but the bulk of it is just the versions told in the Book of Lost Tales, 1930s Silmarillion, and Unfinished Tales.

Oh, but you said you've not read HoME, so yes! The Fall contains quite a lot of M[a]eglin, along with a heck of a lot of details about Gondolin itself. You'll like it.

hS

Of course there would be. He is the main reason it happened.



And that's what I'm counting on. It would probably be a while before it's translated into my language, though.

[Urwen]

If Idril is the big good of FoG, does that make M[a]eglin big bad? Or does that 'honor' still fall to Morgoth?