Around the World and Web includes announcements and items of interest from beyond the SWG.
Ainur Week 2026
Ainur Week will be returning from November 16 to 22, 2026.
Glorthelion Week 2026
𝐖𝐞𝐥𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐆𝐥𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐖𝐞𝐞𝐤 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟔
Hello everyone and welcome to another year of Glorthelion week! An entire week dedicated to Glorfindel and Ecthelion relationship.
The event will run on Tumblr from November 16th to November 22nd. All creations are welcome, as long as it is created by you. Don't forget to tag #glorthelionweek and mention the blog (to make sure I can see your creation in case tags don't work).
Prompts are not mandatory! You can follow them, be inspired by them or let your imagination go wild and create whatever you want! Event rules can be found here.
Prompts 2026:
↳ Day one: A Glance across the Square | The Bells of Festivals | Gifts of the Heart
↳ Day two: Words in the Dark | Following the Star | The Weight of the Sword
↳ Day three: Silver and Gold | Sun and Moon | The Roar of the Waterfall
↳ Day four: Silver Flutes | The Language of Flowers | Water Mirrors
↳ Day five: A Final Glance | Entrusted Secrets | "I will find you again"
↳ Day six: Ashes and Sorrow | Waiting in Mandos | Forever Changed
↳ Day seven: Beyond the Circles of the World | Constellations | The Promise Kept
Happy creating!
Nolofinwëan Week 2026
Nolofinwëan week welcomes fan creations centering any members of the House of Fingolfin and their descendants through the ages.
Nolofinwëan week welcomes fan creations centering any members of the House of Fingolfin and their descendants through the ages.
To Participate:
- Create fanfiction, fanart, headcanons, close readings and musings, moodboards, photography, rec lists or anything else that inspires you to celebrate Nolofinwëan characters.
- Mention the blog @nolofinweanweek in your post and include the hashtag #nolofinweanweek2025 in the first 10 tags.
- If you would like, add your work to the AO3 collection.
- Take inspiration from the nonmandatory daily prompts.
- Complete one or more of the community challenges.
Rules & Requirements:
- There are no minimum or maximum requirements; anything goes!
- There are no content restrictions or rules on tagging beyond what AO3 requires of you. If you post to tumblr and your fill is Mature or Explicit, and/or falls under one of AO3’s major warnings, please provide tagging on your post, though!
- That said, please refrain from using genAI.
- This fest operates firmly under the premises of ‘don’t like; don’t read,’ ‘ship and let ship’ and ‘your kink is not my kink but that’s okay’ (if you’re unfamiliar with these concepts, see this post). We will not tolerate any shaming, harassment, or attempts to police content.
The mod runs on CET, but folks can post content or interact with the blog at their convenient time.
All prompts are non-obligatory—feel free to interpret as loosely or closely, to cross-match, or to ignore altogether!
Day 1: It Was But a Dream
- Characters: Turgon, Anairë, Idril
- Silmarillion Phrase: “poured forth their joy in music and song”
- Inspirational art:
Amber Fort, Jaipur #1 Photograph by Inger Hogstrom
Day 2: Breath of Darkness
- Characters: Elenwë, Argon
- Silmarillion Phrase: “there was now no returning”
- Inspirational art:
The Night Is Stirring (Anger) by Zao Wou-Ki
Day 3: Light Splinters the Sky
- Characters: Eöl, Eärendil, Gil-galad
- Silmarillion Phrase: “as a naked flame”
- Inspirational art:
Day 4: Embraced in the Mist
- Characters: Fingon, Aredhel
- Silmarillion Phrase: “green things even among the pits and broken rocks”
- Inspirational art:
Shan-Shui style painting by Yang Tianyou
Day 5: Flames Arising in Might
- Characters: Fingolfin, Maeglin
- Silmarillion Phrase: “shadows of madness and despair”
- Inspirational art:
Burning the Slums of Nairobi by Kiure Francis Msangi
Day 6: The Sea’s Embrace
- Characters: Elros, Elwing, Tuor
- Silmarillion Phrase: “still hope may seem bright”
- Inspirational art:
Moon Trace Art Installation by Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts
Day 7: New Beginnings; Old Longings
- Characters: Elrond, Celebrían, Peredhil Descendants
- Silmarillion Phrase: “love would lead me”
- Inspirational art:
14th International Tolkien Mailing Competition
The Hungarian Tolkien Society invites you to join the international “Quendi” category of the Tolkien Mailing Competition: five rounds of quizzes, riddles and creative tasks. This category is organised in English, open to any individual participant, and also to teams of 2–5 people. The five rounds of the competition will last from November to April. Application deadline: 5 November, 2026.
The Tolkien Mailing Competition ("TLV" abbreviated from its Hungarian equivalent "Tolkien Levelező Verseny") takes place for the 21st time this year—and it is international for the 14th time. In the first years it was organised only in Hungarian, and only for groups of Hungarian students aged 10–18-years. As many people above this age group became interested in the competition, we launched a separate category for individuals in Hungarian, and at the same time we decided to go international. The outcome was definitely encouraging. In the past few years the international Quendi category had many participants (and for a while even an organiser) from various foreign countries: you can see here the final results of the previous competition.
(Click here for the Hungarian article about all categories.)
In the international Quendi category both the challenges and the communication will be entirely in English—but you don't have to be perfectly fluent in English for taking part in the competition. You only have to be able to understand the texts by Tolkien, and maybe to write a story or an essay—it does not have to be of academic level. The competition was originally devised for middle and high school students, and we did not make big changes in the style, but it is open to anybody who feels young enough for it. You can always choose to count your years by Elvish standards!
Participation in the Quendi category requires a thorough knowledge of The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion. Other works by Tolkien may be needed occasionally, as some questions (riddles, quizzes, etc.) can refer to those, but you will have about four weeks for each round, that is, plenty of time to look up in the books everything you might need.
Besides the quizzes, there will be creative challenges. For example, you may be asked to describe a situation, write a short poem, make a drawing or take a photograph, etc. We would like to be proud of our participants, so we ask you to share the rights of your creative productions royalty-free (and you accept this condition by your registration for the competition). Your works—with due credit to authors/artists—might be published by the Hungarian Tolkien Society, e.g. on our website, www.tolkien.hu, or in our journal, the Lassi Laurië. (You can read about Lassi Laurië in English here.) Please do not publish these works yourself without consulting us first, and especially not before the end of the competition. (Artwork submitted by teams is credited as teamwork by default, but you can add the name of the actual author/artist for each piece.)
You can participate in the Quendi category alone as an individual competitor, or you can participate as a member of a team of 2–5 people. The individual competitors and the teams will receive the same set of tasks, but the winner will be announced separately for individuals and teams.
As an individual competitor, you can make the decision to solve only the quizzes or only the creative tasks in each round: besides the absolute winners of the individual and team subcategories, the separate winners of the lexical and the creative parts will also be announced. This choice is only available for individual competitors, teams are expected to do the full version!
We will go on with the team competition only if we receive at least 5 applications from teams. If we have to cancel the team competition, team members will have the opportunity to compete on their own or to withdraw their application. There is also a maximum limit of 60 competitors (individuals and teams counted together) in the Quendi category (and we got quite close to this limit last year).
The contest starts in November and continues until April. Every month you will receive the questions of the next round (five rounds overall), and you will have to submit your solutions until the indicated deadline (you will have about four weeks for each round). Communication is done via e-mail. Our e-mail address is tlv[at]tolkien.hu: questions and comments are always welcome there. We are happy to answer all your questions about the competition—except disclosing the solutions of the actual tasks.
Not submitting your solutions for two consecutive rounds means quitting the competition.
There will be no prizes in the international category, only the public announcement of your achievement and a certificate sent by e-mail. There is no registration fee, either.
If you want to participate, please fill in this online registration form.
Registration as an individual competitor: choose the “I am competing alone.” option on the form.
Registration as a team: each team member should fill in a registration form separately, choose the “I am a member of a team of 2-5 people.” option, and provide the same team name. We also need a contact person for each team. Please agree on a unique team name and choose a contact person from the team before starting the registration.
You should see an automatic confirmation message after the successful registration, but if you are in doubt about the success of your registration, ask the organisers via e-mail whether they have received your registration or not! You should receive the first round of tasks during the week after the application deadline. If you do not receive it, write to us!
The application deadline is:
5 November, 2026
Tolkien Food Week 2026
Tolkien food week 2026 themes
2nd of November- Dùnedain travel food
3rd Nov- plant-based
4th Nov- hobbit hole recipes
5th Nov - Elven feasts
6th Nov - at the Prancing pony
7th Nov- Dwarven banquets
8th Nov - at the Valar's table 🦅
Fics, recipes, ficlets, art, photos, polls, crack... have fun
These are mere suggestions ofc, you absolutely can post when you want on theme or not 😉
(Headers/banners here if you want)
The White Oliphaunt 2026
Sign ups will open on November 1st, 2026. See the blog linked in this announcement for more details.
Around the World and Web Archive
Events listed here are no longer active but are listed on the site for historical purposes.
Esoteric Tolkien Week 2026
That's right, Esoteric Tolkien Week, your center for all things strange, mystical, inexplicable, and unfathomed in Arda and beyond, is back for round two! We are open to all types and ratings of fanwork, and are eager to welcome returners and new faces alike. A few bits of useful tattle for the moment:
- Further information and event guidelines can be found here
- Event planned to run July 13th - 19th, 2026
- An ao3 collection will open closer to the run date—if you have any work hanging around that you'd like to submit now, or just want to get inspired, you can find the small but mighty 2025 collection here
Prompts
Day 1 - Lands, Wander, Documents
Day 2 - Waters, Return, Music
Day 3 - Skies, Demand, Inventions
Day 4 - Underground, Trammel, Relics
Day 5 - Ruins, Bargain, Art
Day 6 - In the Dark, Endure, Weapons & Armor
Day 7 - At Home, Abandon, Gifts
Tolkien Gen Week 2026
Tolkien Gen Week will run from July 6-12, 2026!
This is a week to appreciate all of the incredible characters and relationships within Tolkien’s legendarium that fall under the broad category of “gen.” There is a great wealth of wonderful gen content in the Tolkien fandom, but those creations are not always the most visible because of the shipping-focused nature of fandom at large. This week is an effort to give them the appreciation they deserve.
This year, Tolkien Gen Week will run from July 6-12, 2026!
Any content and creations are welcome as long as it is non-romantic and non-sexual! You can create edits, gifs, fanart, fanfic, fanmixes, and more! Please tag your posts with #tolkiengenweek AND @ mention this blog @tolkiengenweek so they can be easily found. If your submission turns into a long post, please put what you can beneath a “Keep reading” divider. You may also post your creations to our AO3 collection.
Below are some prompts for each day of the week. They are not mandatory, but they are here to inspire you. This post will lead to an explanation for each one.
- DAY ONE: Family ● Mentorships ● Community
- DAY TWO: Friendship ● Animals ● Group Dynamic
- DAY THREE: Gray Spaces ● Enemies and Rivalries ● Fealty
- DAY FOUR: Solo ● Work and Craft ● Language
- DAY FIVE: Culture ● Diversity ● Traditions
- DAY SIX: Environment ● Places ● Objects and Symbols
- DAY SEVEN: Freeform
This event is being organized by @arofili. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to message this blog or my main.
For further clarification, check out our FAQ, code of conduct, and prompts pages! Happy creating!!
Tolkien Disability Pride 2026
Starting July 1st ObscureDurins will be hosting
TOLKIEN DISABILITY PRIDE
This event focuses on ALL creative works focusing on disability in Tolkien's universe.
You can do worldbuilding, fan fic, fan art, share a favorite character, your favorite headcanons, write a song, poem, show us your LOTRO Oc!ANYTHING providing-
- Absolutely NO USE OF AI IN ANY PART OF THE PROCESS
- Ableism and violence against Disabled character should be done with nuance and plot in mind. Remember this is a pride event we are more than willing to have dead dove- provided it is done justly and tactfully.
- Tag all your works appropriately and place under a read more.
Tag: "tolkien disability pride" AND "obscuredurins" to get your work featured.
This is a spoonie friendly event! We accept past works, WIPS, and encourage this as our time to display PRIDE in our community.
Tolkien Native Language Appreciation Fest 2026
And we are on year #2 of organizing this fest! Last year's edition went fairly smoothly, hopefully this year we will see more people participating!
As mentioned, this is an event aimed to celebrate the diversity in the Tolkien fandom, which takes inspiration both by Tolkien’s profession as a linguist and inventor of all the languages in his opus, and his own characters’ prowess in several languages.
Not only this, but diversity also in the fandom itself! The Tolkien fandom encompasses quite literally the entire world!
So here we are, on year two, organizing this fest as a celebration once again!
As per usual, here's the details!
The event will take place the week between the 16th June and the 22nd June.
To be able to participate, please follow the below steps.
- Reblog this post and follow this blog.
- Use #jrrtlanguagefest preferably in the first five tags, so I am able to reblog your creations
- Mention the languages used in the caption of your post - a translation is encouraged so everyone can enjoy your creations
- There is no limit per day, you can post as many creations as you wish.
- You can submit any form of creation, from art, to writing, to music, even to crafts!
- Please tag the language you are using. A translation is optional, but appreciated
For rules and guidelines, please see the FAQ post.
Please refer to the pinned post on Tumblr for all useful links!
Feel free to send the moderators a message or an ask should you need further clarification!
Scribbles and Drabbles 2026
June 1: Sign-ups and art submissions open
July 7: Artist sign-ups close
July 19: Art submissions close
July 24: Gallery opens
July 25 & 26: Art viewing parties
July 30: Author sign-ups close
August 1: Claims Day (Times to be announced)
August 2: Additional Claims Open
August 3: Art posting begins
November 1: Drop-out without penalty deadline
November 15: Fic submission deadline
November 28: Reveals!
Russingon Week 2026
Russingon Week will run from June 15th to June 21st, 2026.
Rules
- Be kind and courteous! No shaming, harassment, or bigotry will be tolerated.
- Works featuring any interpretations, themes, and topics are welcome. We encourage creators to use appropriate archive tags and content warnings where needed.
- Creations of any sort (fanfic, fan art, meta, moodboard, fan song, rec list, interpretive dance, rescuing a loved one who is currently chained to a cliff) are encouraged! <3
How to Participate
- Make a work of any sort that centers a romantic or queerplatonic relationship between Maedhros and Fingon. If you post on tumblr, @ this blog (russingon-week) or tag it #russingonweek and we’ll reblog it!
- Sometimes tumblr notifs can be wonky, so feel free to message us or send us an ask if we haven’t noticed/reblogged your work.
- You can also feel free to anonymously submit anything you’d like using the “submit” function on the blog.
- We’ll provide a link to the AO3 collection once that’s live. :)
🦅Russingon Week 2026: Prompts!🦅
Russingon Week will be running next month, from June 15th - June 21st 2026! If you’re wondering what to work on, here are some prompts for inspiration; these are of course entirely optional and here just to inspire you.
Day 1 – June 15th: LIGHT
- Valinor
- Youth
- Truth and integrity
- Poetry, song, and unusual word-craft
- Fairy tale AU
Day 2 – June 16th: GOLD
- Kingship and royalty
- Beleriand
- Gifts
- Physical media, cloth, fiber-craft
- Canon divergence AU
Day 3 – June 17th: DARKNESS
- Lies and deceit, hidden things
- Maedhros’ captivity
- The Helcaraxë
- Audio fanworks (music, audiofics, playlists etc)
Day 4 – June 18th: BLOOD
- Kinslayings
- Fathers and loyalty
- Nirnaeth Arnoediad: “his blue and silver banner…”
- Painting and writing, in and out of universe
- Wild West AU
Day 5 – June 19th: FIRE
- Dagor Bragollach
- Fingon’s kingship
- Explicit and heated fanworks
- Weaponry
- Rebirth
Day 6 – June 20th: AIR
- Rescue from Thangorodrim
- Scent and touch
- Fix-its
- Conversations, dialogue-fics, ósanwë
- Line-art, simplistic, or black and white art
Day 7 – June 21st: SEA
- Beginnings and endings
- Brothers and family
- Travel & Journeys
- Diary, epistolary, and travel logs
- Fusion AUs
Boromir Week 2026
June 14-20, 2026
Bring your Boromir fics, art, gifs, moodboards, and headcanons for a week of being absolutely normal about our beloved Captain of Gondor!
I have made a separate FAQ post with basic information about the event. If you have additional questions, I will do my best to answer them.
I have also created a tag masterlist to make it easier to search for submissions based on specific day, format, characters, and Boromir Lives works.
Prompts:
- Day 1: Brother of Faramir, Childhood, Protector and Teacher (Details)
- Day 2: Son of Finduilas, Maternal Family, Grief and Loss (Details)
- Day 3: Son of Denethor, Paternal Family, Thorongil (Details)
- Day 4: Teen Years, Captain of Gondor, Friend of Rohan (Details)
- Day 5: The People's Prince, Rivendell, Member of the Fellowship (Details)
- Day 6: Change of Fate, Fourth Age, Alternate Universe (Details)
- Day 7: Freeform (Details)
Silmarillion Epistolary Week 2026
Silmarillion Epistolary is a challenge dedicated to creating fanworks to tell the story of the Silmarillion in the style of an epistolary novel.
An epistolary novel is where the story is told through letters, diary entries, or other types of documents. One of the most well-known epistolary novels is Dracula, another more modern example would be The Princess Diaries series. These books use different kinds of documents and communications between characters such as letters, telegrams, email, journals, instant messaging, or texting to tell a story in a nontraditional way.
The goal of Silmarillion Epistolary is to encourage fans to take the stories we know and tell them through different kinds of documents. Some examples would be:
Letters
Diary entries
Invitations/announcements
Records
Inventory Lists
Research papers
Guidebook entries
Maps
Blueprints
Treaties
Family Trees
Recipes
Sketches of places, plants, objects, animals, and people
There’s a lot of different documents that can help tell a story, so be creative!!
Prompts
Day 1: Daily Life, Customs, Recipes
Day 2: Exploration, New Lands, Maps
Day 3: Family, Loyalty, Journals
Day 4: Friendship, Alliance, Bookkeeping
Day 5: Love, Creation, Letters
Day 6: Loss, Betrayal, Obituaries
Day 7: Remembrance, New Beginnings, AU
Prompts are suggestions to help generate ideas, but you're not required to use them.
Rules
Be kind and courteous to others. Disrespect or harassment won't be tolerated.
Entries must be in epistolary format of some kind. There are a lot of possibilities, so be creative!
Prompts are suggestions to help generate ideas, but you're not required to use them.
Tag entries as #silmarillionepistolary or @silmarillionepistolary so that they can be reblogged! If you think your post may have been missed please reach out to let us know!
Please tag NSFW entries so that they can be reblogged here with the appropriate tag.
No AI generated works, we want to see what YOU can create!
If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out!
Week of Kiliel
Welcome to Week of Kiliel!
This event will be held May 17-23! The goal of this week is to celebrate and be creatively inspired by the relationship between Tauriel and Kili Durin! We want to encourage The Hobbit community to make Kiliel art, fanfiction, edits, crafts, and more!
Rules:
• There are prompts for every day to inspire your creativity! You can pick one or multiple from each day, and they can be followed as loosely or as closely as you would like!
• Please use the tag “#week of kiliel” so we can reblog your entries! You can also tag @weekofkiliel! We are so excited to see and support all of your work!
• Late entries are fine, though we ask that you do not post earlier!
• If you have an existing work that fits one of these prompts that you would like to submit, that is fine, but please repost about it with the hashtag on the day it corresponds to! While we accept already existing works, we really want to encourage new Kiliel content as that is one of the goals of Kiliel week!
• NSFW is allowed! While none of the prompts are explicitly NSFW, NSFW is permitted as long as it is properly tagged!
• While the main ship and characters should be Kiliel, background ships and characters are welcome! However, for this event we do not accept Durincest or other incest ships.
NO AI WILL BE PERMITTED FOR THIS EVENT, ANY AI ENTRIES WILL BE UNOFFICIAL AND WILL NOT BE REBLOGGED OR ENDORSED
Prompts
Day 1 - Modern AU, First Kiss, Dating, Fluff
Day 2 - Courting, Erebor Never Fell AU, Wingman, Khuzdul
Day 3 - Sickfic, Poison, Angst, Healing
Day 4 - Mirkwood, Culture Shock, Meetcute, Sindarin
Day 5 - Height Difference, Cuddling, College AU, Bed Sharing
Day 6 - Crossover AU, Fake Dating, Arranged Marriage, Confession
Day 7 - Afterlife, Everybody Lives, Scene Rewrite, Alt First Meeting
Aspec Arda Week 2026
Aspec Arda Week: May 10th-16th, 2026
This event celebrates asexual and aromantic spectrum interpretations and headcanons of Tolkien's Legendarium.
Any creations about the aromantic and asexual spectrums are welcome! You can create edits, gifs, fanart, fanfic, fanmixes, and more! All versions of canon/fanon and characters are included, be it from the books, movies, TV, OCs, etc. Please tag your posts with #aspecardaweek AND @ mention this blog @aspecardaweek so that your work can be easily found. If you are posting your submission to AO3, we will have an event collection! This is not an event for generative AI works.
The prompts below are a guideline for the week’s events, though you are not obligated to stick to them when participating. They’re completely optional, and more of a source of inspiration than a mandatory guideline. Feel free to explore them however you’d like; an explanation for each is given, but you can interpret them differently if you want to.
Day 1 / May 10th: Asexuality || Hope
Day 2 / May 11th: Aromanticism || Community
Day 3 / May 12th: Across the A-Spectrum || Loneliness
Day 4 / May 13th: Worldbuilding || Dragons
Day 5 / May 14th: Relationships || Linguistics
Day 6 / May 15th: Intersectionality || Found Family
Day 7 / May 16th: Freeform
For further clarification, check out our FAQ, code of conduct, and prompts pages! Happy creating!!
Detailed Prompts
DAY ONE: Asexuality
What characters do you see as asexual? Why? How does that impact their lives?
Alternative prompt: Hope
DAY TWO: Aromanticism
What characters do you see as aromantic? Why? How does that impact their lives?
Alternative prompt: Community
DAY THREE: Across the A-Spectrum
“Asexual” and “aromantic” are umbrella terms encapsulating a wide spectrum of identities. From grayromantic to demisexual, and aroace to lithromantic —there are many other labels on the a-spectrum. This is a day for exploring those identities and the characters you associate them with.
Alternative prompt: Loneliness
DAY FOUR: World Building
How does acceptance and prevalence of aspec identity vary over both cultures and species?
Are all elves really baseline demisexual? What’s up with one third of dwarven populations focusing on their craft instead of taking a spouse? How do soul bonds work between elven couples who don’t want to have sex? Did Númenor get aphobic when they started distancing themselves from the Elves? Do aspec hobbits feel pressure to settle down and have large families?
Alternative prompt: Dragons
DAY FIVE: Relationships
Aspec people can have many different kinds of relationships, including romantic and sexual ones— but some kinds of relationships are more unique and common to the aspec communities, such as queerplatonic ones. Today is a day for exploring all these different kinds of relationships!
There are several relationships in Tolkien's works that could easily be read as queerplatonic, including Frodo & Sam, and Legolas & Gimli. There is also an interesting footnote in The Nature of Middle Earth which describes something like a queerplatonic relationship and provides some Quenya words for it.
Alternative prompt: Linguistics - Many of the terms for aspec identity come from root words of Latin, can you postulate translations for aspec terminology in any of Tolkien's languages?
DAY SIX: Intersectionality
There is more to a person’s life than just their orientation. Outside of fantasy species, how does being aspec interact with a character’s other identities and experiences, such as race or disability or religion? What’s the impact of a character’s aspec identity on their gender or other orientation labels? Today is a day for exploring the intersections of the aspec experience with other aspects of identity.
Alternative Prompt: Found Family
DAY SEVEN: Freeform
Post about something aspec related not yet covered in the topics this week, or return to a prompt you have more thoughts about! Alternatively, we have some additional prompts for inspiration that did not quite fit into the other days.
- Recommend a fic, meta post, etc. that includes aspec identity.
- How would a particular character respond to allonormativity / amatanormativity? What kind of amatanormativity / allonormativity have they faced?
- What is a particular character’s relationship with their aspec identity Is it a big part of their life?
- Post about an aspec character’s family, either found family, or blood relations. Does their family support them? Does their family (or society) have expectations of marriage and children of them?
- Post about aspec community (symbols, cultural practices, mentorship and friendship with other aspec characters) within the context a culture within Tolkien's Legendarium, or take a character and post about what parts an aspec community they would resonate with in a modern Earth AU.