A Young Celeborn And Galadriel, Sometime During The First Age

on a scale of one to spontaneous combustion, how pissed off would you be if your rightful property was

Stolen

Stolen

Claimed by another

Stolen

Stolen

Passed down as an heirloom

Wilfully kept from you

Passed down as an heirloom

Wilfully kept from you

Actively removed from your vicinity

Used as collateral in an underrepresented diplomatic negotiation

Sent to space.

Maglor, even tempered and with a voice like molten gold. Maglor who kills at Alqualonde and burns the ships and does not speak against his father. Maglor who runs around Beleriand with Maedhros for their hunts and diplomatic feasts. Maglor who takes the Gap and holds the front with his elder brother, keeping the other five behind their lines. Maglor whose voice is strong and commanding on the battlefield but persuading and compelling in meetings and honeyed and cristal clear when raised in song. Maglor who follows Maedhros and protects him from treachery during the Nirnaeth. Maglor who kills and kills in Doriath, in Sirion, who buries his younger brothers. Maglor who takes pity on little children and raises them, growing fond of them, as little might be thought. Maglor who is sick and weary, who has seen his land lost, his people turn their back on him and Maedhros, Maglor who prefers to surrender than to commit another atrocity, who still hopes beyond reason that there can be forgiveness even for them, that the oath can sleep if the Silmarils are safe, even if they do not have them, who hopes the Powers can render their oath void, and if not, better the Everlasting Darkness than killing again. Maglor, who caves, who kills again, who betrays one last time, who listens and follows his elder brother one last time as they stand back to back against Eldar, Men and Maiar. Maglor, who, despite everything, casts the Silmaril away. Maglor who might have faded, might be alive, alone at last.

Maglor, whose voice and words are the only thing of him left behind, telling of the sorrows of the Noldor.

Fruit harvest festival

Nerdanel & Feanaro

"A king is he that can hold his own, or else his title is vain" says Maedhros and it reveals something interesting about how he sees kinship and his role as leader.

A king is he that does not delegate and when wants something done, goes himself. He leads by example, he negotiates (attempts to, at least) with Morgoth, he places himself at the northern border of Beleriand, and the text tells us that he is even "very willing" that Morgoth's force falls heavier on him. He is ever watchful, he goes personally into battle, and is at the frontline, doing deeds of surpassing valour.

And when he is king no more, when Himring has fallen, and what little hope they had of defeating Morogth has vanished, he has his oath. He loathes what the oath makes him do, this the text says plainly, but the fact remains that he does it all the same.

He clings to the oath, terrified of what could happen if he breaks it. In his last conversation with Maglor, he appears to be more concerned to be an oathbreaker, than anything else, convinced that the doom of an oathbreaker is worse than that of a kinslayer. Because a king that breaks his oaths, is no king at all.

He is trapped in the condrum that the 'heroic' mentality poses. Until the bitter end. When faced with the very fact that the oath was void, his entire worldview, his certainties crumble, and his life has no meaning anymore.

one thing about them is that they will simply insult morgoth to his face <3 full brothers in heart indeed

jrr tolkien: I write literally every kind of character jrrt: this is Beren, he's a wifeguy jrrt: Tom Bombadil, a total mystery but also a wifeguy jrrt: Treebeard, former wifeguy jrrt: Samwise Gamgee, future wifeguy jrrt:... jrrt: Turin Turambar, wifeguy gone terribly wrong

Again, about how the Legendarium begins and ends in fire...

Melkor being drawn to the Flame Imperishable started a whole story. The One Ring perished in the fire, and new beginning was made.

Fëanáro born in fire started a compilation of his actions. As he died in fire, a new era was made.

Maedhros coming back as fire provoked a flipping of narratives. Dying in fire started a new Age.

However, Nerdanel, while starting in fire, did not end in fire. She ended in water, where her story will remain to be written and mourned, and never ended and never started anew.

The same goes for her son, Maglor, who held fire in his soul, and did not end in fire, instead walking along the shores that separate him and his kindred.

In Tolkien, fire is of endings turning into new beginnings.

In Tolkien, water is of a story that never quite ends and that never quite begins afresh, forever haunting the timeline.

Nelyo scribble.

Feanor: You can trust me! Let's not forget who pulled you out of the lake when you were six.

Fingolfin: Let's not forget who pushed me in.

The reality of my Silmarillion fan experience is this: Yeah, sure, I feel the tragedy of the Fëanorians and like Maglor with the best of them but... but... look, there's this other elf to be found on the seashore. He's a procrastinator. He's a bloody procrastinator who had a mission from his king and yet spent years hanging around a place doing nothing because he liked the nature there. And then he got his ass kicked by the sea and lost all his companions. And somehow that did not make him bitter and when he was told by a random human on the shore that he needed to go to the secret city because Ulmo, the Vala of the sea, told him to, his reaction was "Okay, we're going."

As an adult, I guess the reality of my Silmarillion / Unfinished Tales fan experience is that Voronwë is the ADHD hero I needed in my teenage years.