Possibly the best resource on our site is our Character Biographies. There are more than 150 of them on the site, featuring a range of characters important to The Silmarillion. Like many parts of our site, the character biographies began somewhat by happenstance and then grew into something very different from the original modest idea. The first biography, of Irmo/Lórien, was published in August 2007. To those accustomed to the later biographies, the first biographies are very short. The idea began as a featured character of the month, which would be a sort-of challenge to write about that character, and the month's newsletter would include a brief biography of the character—enough to acquaint a new Silmarillion reader with the basics of that person.

The member who volunteered to take on the task of writing the monthly biography was Oshun, an early SWG member and author of much-loved stories. Oshun quickly ran away with the project, crafting increasingly detailed and elaborately sourced biographies as time went on. Reading back through her work, the short summaries did not last for long. Furthermore, she was insistent on citing her biographies as though they were academic articles. Many fan resources at the time made claims that were difficult to support with the texts, and Oshun was committed that the SWG's reference section—where her biographies eventually came to live—would not be yet another of them.

Over the years to come, Oshun was joined by other writers who contributed biographies of their favorite characters, but her writing makes up the bulk of our biography collection. With time, the focus shifted from presenting the character of the month as a challenge and instead amassing a collection of biographies that could aid someone creating fanworks about a new character in learning the basics about the character, including which texts to read to learn more. Oshun passed away in 2024, but her more than one hundred biographies continue to aid creators who want a quick, well-sourced primer on a character.

Our character biographies now cover most Silmarillion characters, and it's no longer practical to feature a new one each month. However, we do still accept new biographies for characters we haven't written yet; in particular, we are looking for biographies for Elendil, Gothmog, Yavanna, Eönwë, Marach, Hador, Manwë, Melkor, and Nienor. If your favorite character isn't in our collection or on that list, we'd still love to feature a biography of that person! You can learn more about contributing to the character biographies here, or reply to this email.