Founded in 2005, the Silmarillion Writers' Guild exists for discussions of and creative fanworks based on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion and related texts. We are a positive-focused and open-minded space that welcomes fans from all over the world and with all levels of experience with Tolkien's works. Whether you are picking up Tolkien's books for the first time or have been a fan for decades, we welcome you to join us!
Sign-Up to Hand Out Scavenger Hunt Prompts Our May challenge will be a Matryoshka built around a scavenger hunt. If you'd like to hand out prompts (and receive comments on your work for doing so!), you can sign up to do so.
New Challenge: Everyman Create a fanwork about an ordinary character in the legendarium using a quote about an unnamed character as inspiration.
Cultus Dispatches: Fanworks, AI, and Resistance by Dawn and Grundy The fan studies column Cultus Dispatches returns with a history of how Tolkien fanworks fandom has reacted and resisted generative AI by drawing strong boundaries in a way that is not typical for the fandom.
Inspired by collecting the prompts for the Everyman challenge, this essay considers how ordinary people are subsumed and silenced in The Silmarillion, which begins a three-book arc that ends with the rise of the humble and ordinary.
A Teleri fishing boat captain turns to farming on abandoned Noldor lands after her ship is stolen. A Noldor farmer returns with Finarfin to find that his land belongs to the Teleri now.
In his old age, Isildur's former esquire Ruinamacil, known to later histories only as Ohtar, writes his own account of his escape from the ambush at Gladden Fields and journey to Imladris, and the history of his friend whom Isildur ordered to flee with him.
These were simply flashes, a hint of a wider, greater world. A tantalizing glimpse of more, always at the edge of awareness, never within reach. Míriel would grasp it, if something as intangible as the concept of color could overflow in bounteous wonder over her hands.
By definition, fanworks fandom does not draw a lot of boundaries, but community archives and events have taken a strong stance against AI-generated fanworks due to ethical considerations and member input.
In a book as full of death as the Quenta Silmarillion, grief and mourning are surprisingly absent. The characters who receive grief and mourning—and those who don't—appear to do so due to narrative bias. Grief and mourning (or a lack of them) serve to draw attention toward and away from objectionable actions committed by characters.
This presentation for Mereth Aderthad 2025 discusses the parallels between the concept of abnegation in the scientific work surrounding the atomic bomb and in The Silmarillion. The relinquishment of self-interest in favor of the interests of others, abnegation was identified by Tolkien as a powerful act of spirit and reason. The legendarium has many examples of the complexities of abnegation, which parallel similar discussions held by physicists during and after World War II.
Bilbo, the strange old hobbit with the wandering feet, senses something special in young Frodo the first time he sees the lad; as they become close, they find in each other a cameraderie not well understood by other hobbits. Five poignant moments between Bilbo and Frodo Baggins over the course…
The Silmarillion Writers' Guild is more than just an archive--we are a community! If you enjoy a fanwork or enjoy a creator's work, please consider letting them know in a comment.
I love it. It is fabulous. I really wish I could draw! I would illustrate it. What fun that would be. Although, actually, it might be funnier to imagine the illustrations that to actually see them.
I adore Finrod and his geekishness anyway. This sounds like him in my head.
Actually, I just remembered that Pandemonium has an illustration in my biography of Finrod here that almost fits one of the possible illustrations: http://www.silmarillionwritersguild.org/reference/characterofthemonth/finrod.php Scroll down until you get to the cartoon.
This was just fantastic! Your Finrod is both unintentionally hilarious and charming! His awkwardness (and complete obliviousness to said awkwardness) makes it even more endearing. I am imagining all of his sketches. And giggling.
I like to think that Finrod is wise enough to be aware of some of the awkwardness. But then, he is writing this to impress his girlfriend, so he would never admit to it. He is a gentleman explorer, comfortable everywhere!
Recapping from the SV site, but it bears repeating... :^)
Sketches from Beleriand is hilarious, but I would expect no less from you, tehta. Each of Finrod's parenthetical asides on his enclosed sketches (or list) are increasingly hootworthy, and you've captured his scholarly (and patronizing - although a well-intentioned kind of patronizing) voice perfectly. A great andvery entertaining read!
And this...
"Imagine the scene: off in the distance, the mountains rolled towards me, softened by the distance and shaded an impossible indigo. Meanwhile, beside me, every blade of grass, every flower-petal, every leaf on every tree stood out in the still, glowing air, sharp and separate, as if masterfully wrought from a ductile metal. (Not from stone, though: even if I found some in the right blue-green shade, I could never carve it so finely.)
(I confess I am quite pleased with the descriptive powers displayed above, but in case they have failed me, I am enclosing a few watercolours. I believe the third is the best.)"
AH HAHAHAHA! That was the first bit that sent me well and truly over the edge.
And you're right: Finrod's sketch would have been FAR more anatomically correct than my badly drawn cartoon. :^D
This is so wonderful! I love eager, slightly clueless Finrod and his inquisitiveness. I like to imagine his letters somehow survived the fall of Nargothrond and found their way to Amarie eventually… I can see her much later showing the sketches around at family gatherings like other people do with baby photographs, a blushing Finrod in the corner trying to ignore them all ;-)
Comments on Sketches from Beleriand
The Silmarillion Writers' Guild is more than just an archive--we are a community! If you enjoy a fanwork or enjoy a creator's work, please consider letting them know in a comment.