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.
This is so beautiful!! You have perfectly captured the underwaterness, the flow of fabric, the lights on the floor... I could just stare at this for hours ?
This is absolutely breathtaking. The more I stare at it, the more lovely it seems. THANK YOU for taking a moment from my fic and making it come alive on the page. The sense of floating, of water and light, of love and redemption -- it's all there, and portrayed so beautifully. It's truly humbling for a writer to receive such a gift. And the thought that it was Kei's universe that inspired all this makes it all the sweeter. I feel very lucky today.
Thank you for the inspiration. Creating art is such a solace for me sometimes, so it was lovely to work on something that was related to Kei's creations while also having the element of healing energy. And I'm really pleased you like it so much.
Yes, I'm totally in love with her Gil, but even more, I never saw much in Erestor until I read hers, and now he's one of my favourite, multifaceted, characters.
I've been reading more of her fics that have been sitting in my to-read queue with such bittersweet feelings, grateful that she's still here in that form, and really sad I can't tell her how her stories and characters make me feel...
Thank you so much, Gabriel! The painting is indeed beautiful, and I'm so glad you liked the fic. Kei's Gil-galad really is top notch, as is her Erestor. It was quite moving for me to write these characters (whom I used to write back in the early 2000s in stories Kei used to read) but give them more of a Keiliss spin. This fic is pretty special to me for that reason.
Like Anerea, I have some of Kei's stories in my to-read queue, but I haven't been brave enough to actually read any since she passed away. I click on them and then chicken out. Still too sad -- but I'll get there. Her stuff is too good not to read and re-read.
You're right about her fics, ' too good not to read' and I remember thinking once after reading her very seemingly simple Gil stories that just seemed to ensnare you as if by magic, that I wanted to write like that.
I've never interacted much with Keiliss, but anytime I did, she took the time to reply to my comments on ao3. I heard she was dedicated and kind. I heard of what happened, I'm glad she's no longer suffering.
Comments on Answering Light
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.