so I am extremely behind on my silm rereading, but I want to rec some things before we all get too far away from the Valar-centric chapters:
cosmic horror ainur are possibly one of my favourite silm things, and @napoldeinlove has done some fantastic art of Manwe and Varda here and here
I also really like things exploring underappreciated Valar (and particularly the Valier) and @misbehavingmaiar has written a really fantastic little fic about Vana here which made me think about her in a whole new way.
while I’m at it, I also want to just recommend misbehavingmaiar’s entire blog; Wesley’s interpretations of Sauron and Melkor are fresh and original and depict them as complex, well-rounded characters with understandable motivations while also not shying away from the fact that both of them are kind of terrible people. He is also a fantastic writer and artist and has some awesome headcanons which have given me a completely new perspective on some aspects of Tolkien’s world and made me think about others that I had never really considered before. As a warning to first time readers, misbehavingmaiar is an RP blog and therefore contains spoilers through the end of the Silm; you may want to save reading it till you finish the book
I haven’t been much of a dwarf person in the past, but @determamfidd’s wonderful fanfic Sansukh has just about converted me. It’s a long fic (it has just hit 40 chapters and about 400, 000 words) covering the time between the Battle of Five Armies through to the end of the War of the Ring from the perspective (mainly) of the Dwarves of Erebor. Dets does a fantastic job of integrating the bits of Dwarvish culture we know about into something interesting and believable, and is spot-on in her interpretations of the characters of the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings and their relationships with each other. She also has some of the best OCs that I have seen for a long time, and I would gladly read reams of fanfiction about any of them, because they are anything but two dimensional and each of them could easily hold up a story on their own
FIRST OF ALL I’M NOT CRYING YOU’RE CRYING DON’tLoookAtmEE
NAPOLDEINLOVE IS A TREASURE and also I gotta check out these Erebor fics I am excited for dwwaarvesss *3*
[Sauron] loved order and co-ordination and disliked all confusion and wasteful friction. It was the apparent will and power of Melkor to effect his designs quickly and masterfully that had first attracted Sauron to him.
I want to believe that the stubbornness that keeps Melkor from reforming is the same stubbornness that keeps Manwe from falling.
I want Manwe to argue with the Almighty on behalf of the Numenorians; I want him to beg the One to find a punishment for Sauron and the rogue king that does not harm innocents. And when the answer from on high comes that there shall be no mercy, for reasons ineffable, I want Manwe to have a moment where he contemplates rebellion– for good and selfless reasons, but rebellion nonetheless.
And I want the main reason he stops himself to be that he cannot, even for an instant, let himself give in to Melkor’s logic– even though not doing something because “that would be just like my brother”, IS Melkor’s logic.
I need them to have moments where their temper reveals them to be brothers, and more than that, mirrors of each other.
‘What a nice day in Umbar. But why is a crowd gathering over there? Maybe I should investigate.’
‘This fountain is new. And what an interesting…sculpture….’
‘Wait… Isn’t that…?’
‘………….’
-pretends he didn’t just look at a sculpture depicting Osse and Sauron kissing nor that he might have stared at Osse’s sculpted rump a little too long-
‘No…nothing new to see here… Ah, what a beautiful day in Umbar.’
It’s been a slow day for me today. But here’s a sketch og High King Fingon. Long time since I drew anything on paper. I should go back to it more often.
The voice laughed low. “Well, what else is art for, if not the expressing of one’s innermost fantasies?”
Ossë scowled at the sculpture and shrugged, crossing his arms petulantly. “It just seems rather rude to so openly display a personal fantasy. If the artist based those figures on reality, I cannot imagine that both sources would be pleased to be so violated.”
Fixing his gaze on one of the water spouts, the Man’s glare was curiously timed with a sudden surge of water, the pressure bursting the pipes and swiftly flooding the street.
“Ooh, I heard that, for a time, both figures were quite happy with the arrangement! Whatever came after, there was a moment in which these two and their desires were in perfect alignment… this work commemorates that instant, freezing them both in time at the second of their harmony.”
The admirer tutted as the pipes burst. “Ah, will you look at that… A day’s repair at least.” He clucked his tongue and patted the base of the statue, inspecting the rupture with an entirely unperturbed expression. The market-goers gasped at the initial flood, but soon began milling around the swelling puddles, some splashing through them as relief from the dry heat. A few children played in the gushing spray before the architect himself turned a valve to shut off the water.
((First of all, how dare you, I have at least 10,000,000 things that I need to draw on a deadline but now i gotta draw fish ass THANK YOU SO MUCH))
“Really?” Replied a silky voice in the crowd. “I heard it was made true to life.”
Ossë stiffened and glanced briefly over his shoulder, then returned his attention to the fountain. It was a very detailed sculpture. He circled cautiously around, mostly looking at his figure rather than his cousin’s.
“Quite a bit more coiling of tails than I think would be appropriate,” he rumbled, to most seeming to speak to himself. “And the embrace seems more gentle than one would expect. It seems the artist likely put his own wishes and fantasies into his art. Hardly surprising.”
The voice laughed low. “Well, what else is art for, if not the expressing of one’s innermost fantasies?”
‘Kill him, lord!’ she said. ‘Kill him too! And then come with me. If you bring their heads, Larnach my father will not be displeased. For two “wolf-heads” he has rewarded men well.’
MisbehavingMaiar: Tumblr Archive 