Around the World and Web

Around the World and Web includes announcements and items of interest from beyond the SWG.

Forgotten Ground Regained Features Tolkien-Inspired Alliterative Poetry

In late July, issue 11 was released of Forgotten Ground Regained: A Quarterly Journal of Alliterative Verse, containing 22 poems by 18 poets on the theme, "Alliterative Verse in Arda" (poetry on or about J.R.R. Tolkien and Tolkien's Middle Earth).

The current issue is one of a series of thematic issues. Past themes include "Poems of Love and Loss", "Images of the Natural World", "Mythic Tales and Sacred Truths", "Protests, Prophetic Truths, and Poetic Battles", "Norse and Icelandic Forms", and "Psalms and Meditations". Forgotten Ground Regained is edited by SWG member and Mereth Aderthad presenter Paul D. Deane. (You can view his Mereth Aderthad presentation on alliterative verse in Tolkien here, in addition to alliterative poems created to accompany his presentation in the Mereth Aderthad fanzine.) Several members and friends of the SWG appear in the magazine, including Paul, Himring, Zdenka, Dawn Felagund, and Savannah Horrell.

You can read the "Alliterative Verse in Arda" of Forgotten Ground Regained here.

Forgotten Ground Regained is always open to Tolkien-based poetry, so aspiring scops should check out the submission guidelines here!

Sindar Week 2026

Welcome to Sindar Week 2026!

This year’s event will be from Monday September 7th to Sunday September 14th

The prompts are:

Day 1 — Firsts & Lasts | Doriath | Thingol & Celeborn  

Day 2 — Water & Air | Falas | Círdan & Lúthien  

Day 3 — Sorrow & Grief | Mithrim | Daeron & Nimloth 

Day 4 — Friends & Rivals | Mirkwood | Thranduil & Legolas 

Day 5 — Earth & Fire | Lothlórien | Celebrían & Amroth 

Day 6 — Joy & Celebration | Edhellond | Nellas & Mablung 

Day 7 —  Language & Memory | Cuiviénen | OCs & Unnamed Characters

As always, the prompts are only optional and inspirational, and there is no requirement to stick to them. Mix and match, use none, one, all of them.  Happy creating!

Finwean Sibblings Prompt Fest 2026

2026 schedule:

Prompting: September 1st-14th 

Publishing of prompt list: September 19th (at latest) 

Claiming Begins: September 21st at 18:00 UTC 

Works due: November 20th 

Posting starts: November 27th

Full Rules & Requirements can be found here: Desktop | Mobile

Tolkien Sapphic September

 

Tolkien Sapphic September is a month long event focusing on Sapphic relationships and characters in Tolkien and adjacent materials.

This is an ANTI-AI event- ai created, assisted, or concept built pieces are NOT ADMISSABLE.

This includes: canon characters, lotro characters,ocs, imagines, x readers, and self inserts.

This event is FULLY FOCUSED on Sapphics this INCLUDES ALL 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈 identities!

Past works, works in progress, and late submissions are WELCOME!💫

Submissions to the blog and reblogs here from the Tolkien Sapphic September tags will begin the 1st of September and go throughout the month.

We have an AO3 collection which is happily accepting submissions

Basic rules:

  1. No AI
  2. No incest
  3. Main ship MUST be sapphic.
  4. Any sexual works must be 18+
  5. Appropriately tagged for readers

Prompts

These are totally optional and can be altered and combined!!! Think of this year as a custom tea blend all for you!!!

Tea chart

Pine
Old lady yuri
Snowed in
Winter

Lemon balm
Hate sex 
Enemies to lovers
One bed

Strawberry
Devotion
Kink
Lust

Basil
Pining
Childhood friends
One bed

Earl grey
Arranged marriage
Letters
Royalty
Books

Rosemary
Modern au
Meet tragic
Adoration
Instrument/art

Valerian
Tragedy
Good bye 
Last kiss
Hope

Berry
Horror
Hunter/hunted
Survival


Dandelion
Forbidden love
Loyalty
Resiliency
Hope

Rose
Toxic (to sweet or not)
Opposites attract
Rivals to lovers

Mint
Pride
Gift
Three kisses

Chamomile
Meet cute
Friends to lovers
Fluff


Ginger
Yearning 
Indirect kiss
Confession
Smut with feelings


Catnip
Crossover
Self insert
Indulgence


Around the World and Web Archive

Events listed here are no longer active but are listed on the site for historical purposes.

Finwëan Ladies Week 2022

This is a week-long Tumblr event celebrating the ladies of the line of Finwë! There have been events within the Silmarillion fandom focused on the sons of Finwë and their descendents, and to add to the fun this week was established to give his wives, daughters, and other female descendants their own time to shine.

Finwëan Ladies Week began in 2019 and has run every year since. We are back for more in our fourth year, this time from September 19-25, 2022!

Any content and creations about the ladies of Finwë’s line are welcome! You can create edits, gifs, fanart, fanfic, fanmixes, and more!

Below are some prompts for each day of the week. They are not mandatory, but they are here to inspire you. This page will lead to a detailed explanation for each one.

DAY ONE: Míriel Þerindë and Indis
DAY TWO: Findis and Írimë Lalwen
DAY THREE: Aredhel and Galadriel
DAY FOUR: Later Generations
DAY FIVE: Ladies Who Married In
DAY SIX: Original Characters
DAY SEVEN: Freeform

This event is being organized by mods Anna @arofili and Elle @elesianne If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to message this blog or reach out to Anna on their main blog. Anna runs on Pacific Standard Time, and Elle runs on Eastern European Summer Time, so we will be active and modding on those schedules, although you are free to post your content at the time most convenient to you!

For further clarification, check out our aboutFAQ, and prompts pages! Happy creating!!

Mobile links are accessible here.

Spook Me Multifandom Ficathon 2022

When the chill winds of autumn rattle the bare limbs of the trees, and dark clouds race across the face of the moon, the veil between worlds lifts to reveal:

The Spook Me Multi-Fandom Halloween Ficathon 2022!

Halloween is the best time of year for reading stories that offer pulse pounding thrills, blood curdling dread and hair-raising horror.

All fandoms are welcome. Stories can be Gen, Het, Slash or Femslash. All ratings are accepted.

Dates to Know:

September 5: Sign ups start.
September 15: Sign ups end.
September 17: Prompts sent out.
October 20: Reminder posted here - please friend if you want to get the reminder.
October 26: Master Post opens, stories are due!

Participants will choose a monster prompt from a list and receive two artwork prompts from the moderators.

Complete Spook Me guidelines can be found here.

Tolkien Short Fanworks September Prompts Posted

Here is our thematic prompt and our formal challenge for September:

The thematic prompt is: "harvest".
The formal challenge is "work song".

As always, the two prompts can be filled independently, if you wish, or combined with prompts from other challenges.

Usual reminder that although you can fill the prompts in any way you like, in order to post the fill to this community or to the related collection on AO3, the fanwork can only have a word count up to 1000 words and must be linked to a Tolkien fandom.
Rec lists and podfics can be posted as fills for thematic prompts, as long as the fanworks concerned meet those conditions.

Also we continue to welcome other pieces unrelated to any challenge, of course, including cross-posts and older stories!

Tolkien Fandom Against Gatekeeping

In anticipation of The Rings of Power bringing new fans to the fandom, this Tumblr blog seeks to stop gatekeeping behavior that has plagued the fandom in the past. Run by longtime SWG member Independence1776, it urges us to "Be like Elrond, kind as summer," when interacting with new and less knowledgeable fans.

The SWG stands with Indy in our opposition to gatekeeping in the Tolkien fandom and continues to welcome fans with all levels of experience with the legendarium and fans who came to the fandom through all means: books, games, films, shows, and other entry points. You can find our reblog of Indy's post here.

"Silmarillion Daily" Newsletter

"Silmarillion Daily" compresses the timeline of the First Age into a year-long newsletter, as a fresh way to experience The Silmarillion at the same pace as the events happen in the story.

Once you sign up, you will get a welcome email that will tell you all you need to know, but here are some highlights:

  • We’ll start on September 15, 2022. A month from now, and also the anniversary of the publication of The Silmarillion
  • Because we had to decide on arbitrary dates, we did some math and chose to cover everything from the birth of Fëanor to the end of the First Age - the idea is to track the tale of the Silmarils, although we won’t neglect other aspects: if Tolkien has provided a date, we’ll include it in the newsletter.
  • Every week, you’ll get relevant reading suggestions that will cover the entirety of the Quenta, paragraph by paragraph. For the three Great Tales (the Leithian, the Narn, and Gondolin), optional daily reading suggestions will also be provided
  • If, however, you’re short on time, don’t worry - each email should take less than five minutes to read
  • Hopefully enough people will sign up that we can make this a sort of tumblr bookclub and have really fun weeks where everybody gets together to cry over a specific event! It you enjoy experiencing First Age emotions, please join us!

You can sign up for the "Silmarillion Daily" newsletter here.

Silmarillion Zine Looking for Mods

Soleil is planning a Silmarillion zine and is looking for mods to assist. The zine would involve collaborative work between writers and artists. She is looking for assistance with art, graphics/layout, organization, and writing. While zine experience is preferred, it is not required. Follow @silmzine on Twitter for more.

Innumerable Stars Exchange running in 2022

Innumerable Stars is a Tolkien fandom gift exchange for all works by Tolkien or associated with Middle-earth. It runs on AO3, Dreamwidth and Tumblr.

The schedule for the Innumerable Stars Exchange for 2022 has been posted to the  Dreamwidth community (the post is linked) and is as follows: 

Nominations Open: Sunday, 14 August 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

Nominations Close: Sunday, 28 August 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

Sign-ups Open: Sunday, 28 August 2022, 11:59 PM UTC

Sign-ups Close: Sunday, 11 September 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

Assignments Out: Monday, 12 September 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

Assignments Due: Sunday, 23 October 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

Works Revealed: Sunday, 30 October 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

Authors Revealed: Sunday, 06 November 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

 

Guidelines and Rules for  the exchange in 2022 can be found  at this DW post.

Silvergifting Week 2022

Silvergifting Week will happen on Tumblr August 8-14, 2022!

This week-long Tumblr event celebrates the relationship between Celebrimbor and Mairon | Annatar | Sauron. The event mod is @elennalore. The purpose of this event is to encourage people to create all kinds of fanworks that are focused on Celebrimbor/Mairon pairing (including Celebrimbor/Annatar and Celebrimbor/Sauron). Fanart, fanfiction, headcanon, moodboards, fan crafts, meta … you name it!

The content created during this event will be reblogged on this blog if tagged #silvergiftingweek or if your post mentions @silvergiftingweek.

All different interpretations of Celebrimbor/Mairon | Annatar | Sauron relationship are welcome! Diverse takes are encouraged. DL; DR rule is active in this event. So, if you don’t like it, don’t read it.

This is a Ship and Let Ship event. If you don’t like this ship or a certain interpretation of it, do not bash others for liking them. Ship hate or homophobia is not welcome.

I ask people to respect general Tumblr content posting rules when participating in this event. NSFW text entries and potentially triggering content are allowed, but they should be posted under cut “read more”. When reblogging content on this blog, nfsw entries and potentially triggering content will be tagged accordingly. If you need a specific tw (trigger warning) you can DM the mod.

 

Prompts

Day 1 (August 8): Beginnings | First times

First meetings. Developing relationship. First kiss. First time.

Day 2 (August 9): Happy times | Living together

Deepening feelings. Falling in love. Is it genuine love? From both sides? Or not? Living together in Ost-in-Edhil. Comfort. Happiness.

Day 3 (August 10): Collaborators | Community

Working together. Interaction with other people. How do others see their relationship? Ambition. Crafting Rings of Power together.

Day 4 (August 11): Betrayal | Bad Ending

Suspicions. Identity reveal. Secret side projects in Ring-making. Lovers to enemies. War against Eregion. Captured by your former lover. Celebrimbor’s tragic fate.

Day 5 (August 12): Post-canon | New beginnings

What happens after canonical events? Trauma healing. Reconciliation. Halls of Mandos. Valinor. Fourth Age and onwards. Will they find each other again?

Day 6 (August 13): Canon divergence | Alternative universe

What if... Silvergifting happened in an alternative universe? An ending different from canon? What about a modern AU? A steampunk AU? Give your AU view of their relationship.

Day 7 (August 14): Freeform

A place for your own personal take on their relationship not covered in previous prompts.

August Challenge at tolkienshortfanworks posted

The August challenge at the tolkienshortfanworks community on Dreamwidth has been posted. The thematic prompt is: "art or craft found in unexpected places". The formal challenge is "diary entry". They can be filled independently and combined freely with other prompts. 

In order to post the fill to the Dreamwidth community or to the related collection on AO3, the fanwork can only have a word count up to 1000 words and must be linked to a Tolkien fandom.

Rec lists and podfics can be posted as fills for thematic prompts, as long as the fanworks concerned meet those conditions.

New community members always welcome!!

Tolkien of Colour Week on Tumblr

The mod of Tolkien of Colour Week writes in their announcement post:

I am very excited to announce Tolkien of Colour Week from 1st - 7th August 2022!

This is a week to celebrate Tolkien fanworks with characters of colour. Below are the themes and prompts for each day (you do not have to use the prompts but they are there to encourage creativity!) If you have questions about the prompts or anything else please send me a message or ask and I will be happy to respond.

Prompts

Day 1: Family – Connection to Lands – Connection to Waters

Day 2: Music – Language – Stories

Day 3: Friendship – Celebration – Cross-Cultural Ties

Day 4: Cultural Pride – Pride in Identity – Growing Up

Day 5: Faith and Religion – Life and Death – Environment

Day 6: Multicultural Identities – Migration – Time

Day 7: Intersectionality – Gender – Sexuality – Disability

Tag #tocweek2022 and mention @tolkienofcolourweek in your posts so that I see it and reblog. This event is run by @brighter-arda.