|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 8 2013, 1:56pm
Views: 2769
Shortcut
|
Thanks everyone - I for one am really enjoying this discussion. What I wanted to do here was to bring together and react to some of the many excellent points made so far. "Shadowing your posts" see?.....OK, the things I do for a on on a chapter title..... Yes, the Valar seem a fairly civilized and dignified lot. We don't seem to have gods for mostly-harmless-wild-abandon (like Pan or Dionysius, say). It's more the College Fellows dining than the student body with their drinking games, pranks and the impromptu invention of the most excellent sports such as "Blindfold Bicycle Jousting" to put a number of them in the Minor Injuries Unit by the end of their evening OK, I'm convinced by the argument that the Valar choose male or female and then are stuck like that - potentially interesting, as perhaps we get an insight into what JRRT feels is naturally masculine or feminine. Similarly, I am looking forward to Ungoliant, to see how JRRT handles a female villain. My intentionally ridiculous comment about "Melkorina" seems to have led us into some interesting territory. I should say that I personally don't think Middle-earth would be improved by being more "pulpy" ("Fifty Shades of Gandalf the Grey?" Noooooooooooooooooo!!!!) But thinking about "pulpy" fiction and imagining the ridiculous B-movie "Melkorina" portrayed as a kind of evil Deja Thoris led me to realize: Tolkien was writing during the same period as Edgar Rice Burroughs (first published 1912) and H P Lovecraft (first published 1917). Quite likely these authors had no influence on Tolkien whatsoever (unless the Tolkien historians here know otherwise?), or whether that leads us anywhere..... Classification mania - yes, Tolkien could have gone a lot further than his list of Valar and descriptions. I'm thinking of various interests of my children over the years; Teletubbies, Thomas the Tank Engine, Power Rangers, Pokemon.... Shows with a cast of discrete characters, each with a distinct and never-to-grow-or-vary personality, associations with an element, colour, favourite object, weapon or attribute. Evidently that kind of thing appeals quite widely (and also must be a great aid to potboiler writing processes). Moving out of the word of modern fiction, one could cite the elaborate list of Christian Saints (with their attributes, feast days, patronages etc.). Instead of something that sounds like it is churned out of a database or Top Trumps game, we do get some nice thumbnail sketches. Made-up words: yes, I think it is a good point that Tolkien was professionally very well equipped to make up feasible-sounding "English" words. As opposed to thinking of something phonic with lots of low-frequency letters in it in a rather lame attempt to be outlandish. Perhaps that reduces the risk that we "catch him out" inventing stuff. As opposed to, say, some of the names of Star Wars characters - some of which are so odd that they give rise to the game that your Official Star Wars name is a combination of a car you've driven and a medicine you've taken (e.g. "Zantac Mondeo"). Moreover, Tolkien was given to puzzling out what his names meant and how a character or thing would "go" with that name. I'm not a Tolkien-philology-scholar (any present, please do speak up with insights into the names in this chapter!) but I wonder whether he was getting the names right for the subconscious mind of his reader- so that subconsciously we get the feeling that "you do know my name, though you don't remember that I belong to it." And so it seems right already and we're not just required to take the author's word for it that "I am Gandalf, and Gandalf means me!" I wonder what Tolkien's works are like to read in translation to a language far away from English and its North European sibling languages: translation into Japanese, Korean or Chinese, say? There, this effect ought to break down (unless you translate the names to restore it). If we should have any multi-lingual readers able to say, I'd be most interested. The sea - does seem to have a special place (once more). It needs two Maiar for it's different characters, and is hated by Melkor because it won't do what he tells it. Going back to an earlier conversation some us had about character alignments, Melkor is all for systems and order - provided they are HIS order. The idea of throwing some big waves at your sea wall just to see if he could get one over the top would appeal to Osse, I think. The sea wall might be demolished as a consequence, and he'd be all "Ooops!" . Whereas Melkor would be inflicting damage out of spite, or as part of a plan. Not too surprising that he didn't take over allegiance of the sea Maiar for long... Artificing and hubris - we're told that Aulë is most like Melkor; they have a joint love of creating things. But (as raised in the Secret Fire) post above, that brings risks of wanting to push your art too far, or get too wedded to what you've made. While we're to understand that Melkor has recruited several Maiar, the only named defector is Sauron, who defects from Aulë. I'm a aware of two places in chapters to come where the temptations and frustrations following from creativity come up big-time. To avoid spoilers, I shall say just "dwarves" and "simarils". We should be sure to give this theme a good discussion in due course, but I suggest we want to wait for a later chapter, when we can bring in more examples without spoilers? Do you see any other themes first surfacing here, which we'll want to not and discuss later? Well, that devoured my lunchtime most pleasurably! Best wishes from cloudy Oxfordshire. No sign of a plume of smoke from the direction of Wolvercote Cemetry; so if the good Professor is turning in his grave in wrath about Melkorina etc., he can't be rotating fast enough for combustion!
|
|
|
Subject
|
User
|
Time
|
The Silmarillion discussion: Valaquenta
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 7 2013, 12:58pm
|
No turning back
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 7 2013, 1:35pm
|
thank you!
|
telain
|
Jan 7 2013, 2:45pm
|
link to our earlier discussion of Ainulindale
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 7 2013, 2:54pm
|
just posted there... and thank you!//
|
telain
|
Jan 8 2013, 6:12pm
|
I look forward to your discussion post...
|
telain
|
Jan 7 2013, 2:43pm
|
Experts definitely not needed!
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 7 2013, 3:24pm
|
A note on book "Arda Reconstructed" by Voronwe the Faithful
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 7 2013, 4:36pm
|
"DO keep up, Samwise Gamgee!" :)- Nah, you've been great//
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 7 2013, 4:39pm
|
I have that book as well.
|
Ardamírë
|
Jan 7 2013, 5:50pm
|
That makes me quite happy!
|
Voronwë_the_Faithful
|
Jan 8 2013, 4:32pm
|
Oops, I seem to have started....
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 7 2013, 5:22pm
|
...and well, one thing led to another... (not for serious readers)
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 7 2013, 5:34pm
|
Great post! ; mnemonic
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 7 2013, 8:16pm
|
An org chart for the Valar
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 7 2013, 9:18pm
|
Ok, this is just me quite at random entering the world of the Reading Room, but..
|
Xanaseb
|
Jan 12 2013, 1:01pm
|
I see what you mean
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 12 2013, 5:23pm
|
Ah! of course. Sorry, thought the lines meant that they came about -by- Eru ;) //
|
Xanaseb
|
Jan 12 2013, 8:58pm
|
every time I see "org chart", I read "orc chart!"//
|
telain
|
Jan 13 2013, 11:42pm
|
Nice mnemonics, curiousG //
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 8 2013, 6:36pm
|
Mandos: Hand of Fate
|
telain
|
Jan 10 2013, 1:38am
|
*mods up* //
|
Aunt Dora Baggins
|
Jan 12 2013, 5:29am
|
"The Valaquenta underneath the bough, a squishy chair, Corvoisier, and thou, lurking beside me in the Reading Room."
|
squire
|
Jan 7 2013, 9:09pm
|
...this forum is world enough?
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 7 2013, 9:35pm
|
First of all...
|
Eldineth
|
Jan 7 2013, 11:11pm
|
Eldineth, I would never have guessed from your post that you were not a native English speaker! Well-written post.! //
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 8 2013, 6:34pm
|
Thank you, noWizardme!
|
Eldineth
|
Jan 9 2013, 1:11am
|
Your English is terrific! //
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:38am
|
Thank you!
|
Eldineth
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:26pm
|
I agree with Squire about the Melkorina
|
Ardamírë
|
Jan 7 2013, 11:21pm
|
I think this is where I gave up on my first reading…
|
Mim
|
Jan 7 2013, 11:29pm
|
The Shadow of Your Posts
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 8 2013, 1:56pm
|
Hello! I'm new here and am quite happy to find that I managed to arrive when an electronic Silmarillion-reading party is getting started!
|
Gwenhwyfar
|
Jan 9 2013, 6:33am
|
Neat idea about Nienna and Melkor
|
squire
|
Jan 9 2013, 11:23am
|
Evil bachelors
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 9 2013, 1:50pm
|
"obsidian bunker" and other matters...
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 9 2013, 5:43pm
|
No evil women
|
Mim
|
Jan 9 2013, 5:49pm
|
There was also Thuringwethil
|
DanielLB
|
Jan 9 2013, 6:04pm
|
Females at large
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 9 2013, 6:22pm
|
Sure...
|
Mim
|
Jan 9 2013, 7:10pm
|
Sorry, I'm probably dragging you off subject...
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 9 2013, 8:13pm
|
Amazorcs?
|
telain
|
Jan 10 2013, 12:53am
|
No beards, but . . . .
|
Gwenhwyfar
|
Jan 10 2013, 2:48am
|
Married gods and single heroes
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 10 2013, 2:55pm
|
Good point.
|
Eldineth
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:56pm
|
Surely Orcs are a construction of Sauron?
|
The Gardener
|
Jan 10 2013, 10:40am
|
Perhaps...
|
Mim
|
Jan 10 2013, 1:35pm
|
You assume wrongly...
|
Otaku-sempai
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:16pm
|
Young goblins as a gollum-snack; good point. Though just to be awkward....
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:37pm
|
Orc sex
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 10 2013, 5:59pm
|
You probably just greatly increased the number of hits this thread will get from search engines :) //
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 10 2013, 6:11pm
|
Orc domesticity
|
Gwenhwyfar
|
Jan 10 2013, 7:54pm
|
Great point: "really evil of heart" = incompatible with babies
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 10 2013, 10:08pm
|
Yay for electronic magic!
|
Gwenhwyfar
|
Jan 10 2013, 11:41pm
|
Sam vs. the Valaquenta (stylistically I mean)
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 11 2013, 1:27pm
|
I meant "the word 'valar' appears only 3 times in the text ( not inc. appendices)" //
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 11 2013, 4:47pm
|
Out of which, only two are clear references.
|
sador
|
Jan 17 2013, 12:54pm
|
"The Elder King"
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 17 2013, 1:09pm
|
Actually, Bilbo.
|
sador
|
Jan 27 2013, 10:11pm
|
"light-years" away from the subject, but...
|
telain
|
Jan 11 2013, 4:29pm
|
Wow! I did start something there!
|
The Gardener
|
Jan 11 2013, 6:48am
|
There's a lively discussion of Orc origins on this thread: http://newboards.theonering.net/forum/gforum/perl/gforum.cgi?post=562557#562557 //
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 27 2013, 2:54pm
|
I just don't think
|
Rostron2
|
Jan 10 2013, 10:23pm
|
You still have Bolg Azog's son. //
|
sador
|
Jan 17 2013, 12:51pm
|
Wait...
|
Eldineth
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:25pm
|
The reserves
|
Mim
|
Jan 10 2013, 1:29pm
|
Arien and Galadriel
|
Plurmo
|
Jan 9 2013, 6:31pm
|
Female evil...
|
Mim
|
Jan 9 2013, 7:18pm
|
On Lists...
|
beren_boy
|
Jan 9 2013, 10:01am
|
List of kings
|
acheron
|
Jan 9 2013, 1:30pm
|
Male - Female - and Melkor
|
The Gardener
|
Jan 9 2013, 4:46pm
|
Yes, I always think Elves call out to Varda the way Catholics do to Mary.//
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:38am
|
How did you feel the first time you ever arrived at this chapter and discovered it was a long list?
|
Rostron2
|
Jan 9 2013, 6:19pm
|
Varda, not starry-eyed for Melkor; on being a single Vala/ier
|
telain
|
Jan 10 2013, 1:26am
|
Beware the lonely
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:36am
|
Hmmm
|
Gwenhwyfar
|
Jan 10 2013, 5:30am
|
the importance of being social
|
telain
|
Jan 11 2013, 4:51pm
|
Fab discussion! Valar Rhyme for Hobbit Children
|
hanne
|
Jan 14 2013, 1:18pm
|
Excellent! //
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 14 2013, 1:26pm
|
Truly beautiful and excellent--thanks for posting it.//
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 14 2013, 1:56pm
|
thank you both - am happy you enjoyed! //
|
hanne
|
Jan 15 2013, 2:43am
|
Mods up.
|
sador
|
Jan 17 2013, 12:56pm
|
Doesn't it bother anyone else...
|
Etarre
|
Jan 22 2013, 10:17pm
|
Post away- we have no "last posting date" :) //
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 22 2013, 10:26pm
|
A picture of the Valar in all their might and glory? Got it. It ain't beautiful, but it is fan art
|
squire
|
Jan 23 2013, 2:08am
|
Pre-feminist Tolkien
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 23 2013, 4:57pm
|
Still within a fortnight of your post...
|
sador
|
Jan 20 2013, 4:27pm
|
the Secret Fire
|
acheron
|
Jan 8 2013, 12:27am
|
The "V" Chapter--get ready for "F"s; and, more on Olorin
|
CuriousG
|
Jan 10 2013, 4:53am
|
M for Bad?
|
The Gardener
|
Jan 10 2013, 10:57am
|
when do you want to start the next chapter?
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 10 2013, 3:42pm
|
Ready for the next chapter?
|
noWizardme
|
Jan 14 2013, 4:31pm
|
|
|
|