Anghraine

sulfin-evend said:

I love your take on Gondor. What do you make of Boromir's quote in the council of Elrond paraphrasing "those who shelter behind us give us much praise but little help". I presume he is talking about other Gondorians. And the Stewards are often referred to as Lords of Minas Tirth or lord of the city.

What does this mean for how Gondor and its provinces view themselves and how its armies function. Are the Princes of Dol Amroth minting their own coin? Do the lords of Morthond present their daughters at the Stewards court? Are all the lords related to each other in a tangle of blood and marriage ties or do they keep to their home fiefs? It could be envisioned so many ways I am curious to read your perspective.

I replied:

Thanks!

I’ve always taken the opposite reading of Boromir’s line—that he’s talking about the peoples of Middle-earth sheltering behind Gondor generally, and this is why (if I’m remembering correctly) the others at the council go out of their way to point out that it’s not just Gondor that’s protecting the people of Middle-earth.

That said, Tolkien described the Princes of Dol Amroth as almost independent, but not quite; they’re “tributary princes” who contribute … something … to Gondor as a state. So while it might not look exactly like taxation as we’d understand it and could refer to things other than money, I do think it suggests some degree of cohesion, if even the Princes of Dol Amroth (definitely the most powerful and independent of the regional nobles) have to contribute to the whole.

We do see that the fiefs have a lot of authority when it comes to what troops they raise and where they send them. They only sent 1/10th of the forces at their command to help defend Minas Tirith because they were so worried about their own people, and seem to have been entirely free to make that call (and the people of Minas Tirith are disappointed but not enraged). So there’s still quite a bit of regional power in the military sense, at least. But Tolkien also said that a Dúnadan king or Ruling Steward was a fairly absolute ruler in other ways (esp dealing with interpretation of law), so it may be that the lords’ authority is particularly pronounced in military matters and more limited in others.

I do imagine that there would be a lot of intermarriage between the Dúnadan noble families, given that there are only so many of them. While Gondorians have less hang-ups about ~purity than in the Kinstrife days, I think it’s still something people are conscious of, as with Éowyn’s joke that Faramir’s people will wonder why he didn’t choose a woman “of the race of Númenor” to be his wife (she doesn’t seem to think her ¼ Númenórean ancestry will count for Gondorians).

IMO it’s entirely probable that the Stewards and Princes of Dol Amroth have intermarried multiple times, say—not with first cousins (I think that taboo became pretty non-negotiable post-Akallabêth), but more distant connections. Perhaps Imrahil is recognizable as part-Elvish to Legolas despite the generational distance from Mithrellas because Imrahil’s actually descended from her many times over. Etc.

[ETA 5/24/2024: sulfin-evend did respond to this, but given that they acknowledged being "contrary" in this interaction and that they defended Elrond's profoundly racist characterization of modern Gondor, I didn't feel inclined to reply again.]

My icon has grey eyes and black hair just for Tolkien :P

So. I generally dislike Tolkien fandom's "canonicity discourse" (yes, I'm doing it anyway) and the idea of imposing a specific ranking of texts. That said, it's occurred to me that one of the reasons I feel deeply out of step with Tolkien fandom is that The Silmarillion (as in, the published book, not the in-story accounts) is on a drastically different level of canonicity for me than basically everything else with JRR Tolkien's name on it.

I don't dislike The Silmarillion or anything. I quite enjoy it! But for me, it shows its age—not in ~a man of his time~ sense, but in an editorial sense. Christopher Tolkien did an enormous amount of spectacular editorial work over the course of his life and we are deeply indebted to him. But I think he did pretty clearly get better at it over time, and particularly at presenting his father's mass of notes and documents and so on in a way that makes the texts as accessible as possible. At the same time, in later texts, he clearly differentiates between actual words JRRT wrote (whether in the main body or in notes) and his (CT's) own understanding and explanations as JRRT's confidant and literary heir. I do give a lot of credence to Christopher Tolkien's understanding of his father's work, actually, and I deeply respect (and am grateful for) CT's efforts to carefully and clearly explain things like dates of composition (and how this can be determined), direct context, how a given point relates to his father's broader work, etc, throughout these texts.

(Tangent: Facebook keeps recommending defensive Jackson stans griping about how Christopher Tolkien just didn't get his father's work like Jackson did and was so horribly ungrateful to the filmmakers and such an inferior scholar blahblah for the crime of disliking the films. FLAMES ON THE SIDE OF MY FACE!! I am not uncritical of Christopher Tolkien, and neither was Christopher Tolkien, but I think we owe an immeasurable debt of gratitude to him. Also, even to me, his response to the films seemed harsh at the time, but at this point, I think he was pretty much right, anyway, and correctly judged the films' impact and reflection of pop culture understanding of JRRT's work.)

So what is my issue with the published Silmarillion?

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An anon on Tumblr said:

First of all congrats on nearing the end of your PhD program!!! Woohoo!!!

Second of all, I’m muy late to the party here (been off tumblr for a bit) but WRT these tags ( https://www.tumblr.com/anghraine/749212904253947904/khazzman-tolkien-elendil-was-called-the ) what do you mean the pregnancies were strange lol how strange can they be…?

[The tags in question: #and that's just the tip of the iceberg in terms of how distinct and peculiar númenóreans are #fandom has slept on it for decades but they are reallyyyyyy unusual #they have weird pregnancies (and few of them) and horse telepathy and can rarely even get injured much less sick #there's this part where tolkien is trying to mathematically figure out elvish aging (hilarious tbh) and pencils in 'and númenóreans' #that's not even getting into the uncanny valley of númenórean kids...]

My reply:

As for the first point: Thank you! I'm really looking forwards to being done, lol.

As for the second point: anon, I delight in your innocence.

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An anon asked:

forgive me if you've answered this, but why do you think faramir was able to go from the way we saw him in ttt & early rotk (including seemingly having some prejudices against the rohirrim) to him suddenly being softer (& falling in love w/ a rohir) once in the houses of healing? it always seemed a bit of a jump to me & occurred so fast (although i guess having a near death experience is as good a catalyst as any) & id love to hear your thoughts on it (if you have any & want to of course!)

I replied:

Hmm, it’s an interesting question!

I will say that while I’ve seen the “Faramir is wrong and unfair about the Rohirrim in TTT” thing going around, I think that take pretty actively rejects Tolkien’s values and themes. I don’t think Tolkien remotely intended Faramir’s arc to involve coming around to respect the valorization of war and glory in Rohan, and increasingly in Gondor. He never does and he never will. If anything, it’s the reverse; Faramir’s reservations about the prioritization of martial prowess in the modern societies around him are Tolkien’s reservations, and Éowyn’s adoption of his ethos / at least partial rejection of Rohan’s is a conversion to a more mature and right way of thinking about these things in Tolkien’s treatment of it.

I mean, it’s fine for people to be uncomfortable with that (there’s a degree to which I am myself). But I think that people sometimes ignore that Faramir is the character most like Tolkien, and part of his function is to deliver Tolkien’s views within the story and influence other characters towards the values that Tolkien held. So that’s part of what’s going on.

Jumping back in-story, though:

I think the main issue is that in TTT, Faramir is acting as a commander among his men in a very tense situation, dealing with people he believes might have betrayed his brother to his death, and who certainly know more than they’re saying in any case (brief detour to the meta level: the ambiguity over what Faramir’s really like and what he’ll do in TTT also helps maintain tension in some very talky scenes).

Meanwhile, in early ROTK, he’s still acting as a commander, but with his own leader, whom he disagrees with about both his previous actions and their current tactics. Denethor is also his father, of course, and Faramir’s conduct there is influenced by their messy and painful mixture of love and opposition, but Tolkien notes in the letters that another major factor in how Faramir relates to Denethor is that Faramir views himself as a Númenórean before the last Númenórean head of state. This is a big deal for him.

And then he falls in battle, and when he wakes up, Denethor is dead and Faramir is the Steward of Gondor. Even though he still has someone he’s going to relate to in that Númenórean-to-Númenórean-lord way (Aragorn), it’s not the complex, concentrated thing it was with Denethor, nor the high-octane intensity of his situation in TTT. There’s no Ring, no soldiers, no dubious captives, no authority to answer to. He can simply act as he sees fit. Faramir with Éowyn is, I think, Faramir at his most natural, without these incredible pressures on him. He can afford to be softer, gentle, and compassionate, vulnerable in some ways, confident in others.

It’s more headcanon, but I also think that … yes, losing his family is freeing in some ways, but it’s also horrible, obviously. And I think part of what’s going on with him is that he’s dealing with loss, first with Boromir and then Denethor, and with the latter, that loss happened with everything unresolved, and he’s got to know there are things people aren’t telling him about it. I’ve talked about it before, but I do think there’s a lot going on in his head at that point, and he’s the sort of person whose grief makes him more sympathetic to other people’s. So I think that’s part of what’s going on, too.

And then after all of that, he just falls like a ton of bricks for this incredible woman. I don’t think he’d ever have minded that Éowyn is Rohirren—IMO his TTT remark that “we love them” is foreshadowing for this—but if he did at some point, he’s well beyond giving a single fuck about it by then. As we see with the very public kiss, of course.

So that’s pretty much where I stand on it all!

Locations Tolkien associated Minas Tirith with:

• Rome
• Florence
• Byzantium

Locations Tolkien associated the rest of Gondor with:

• various spots in Italy
• Troy
• ancient Egypt

Locations Tolkien did not associate Gondor with:

• France
• England
• literally anywhere in northern Europe

Tagged: #he was actively annoyed at the assumption that gondor is in some way northern #and yet it's inescapable #free me from my suffering!!!

[ETA 4/6/2024: I am pretty sure this was most directly inspired by people trying to connect the "forgotten men" in Gondor, mentioned as the ancestors of a short and "swarthy" population in the densely populated Gondorian province of Lebennin, with Britain. But also just by Tolkien fandom's obsession with the idea of his work as a mythology for England, an idea he explicitly said he rejected as ridiculous, while ignoring his numerous unambiguous statements that he was inspired by other regions and languages as well, and that he very clearly said that Gondor's inspirations in particular were all Mediterranean rather than northern, and moreover that the original seat of evil in Middle-earth was in the north.]

chestnut_pod left an intriguing comment on my post here in terms of racial purity/elitism in regard to Gondor c. LOTR and the characterization of contemporary Gondor by other characters, most glaringly Elrond. I started to reply more concisely, but the rant grew, so I'm just posting it here:

I always struggle with the reality that much of what Elrond says about Gondor at the Council is objectively wrong as well as repugnant, but the narrative doesn't really frame any of it as incorrect or morally dubious or a reflection on his character at all (despite the semi-corrections made by Faramir later, which somewhat ameliorates this, but only somewhat). In fact, the person who is framed as suspect in the Council interactions is Boromir for being offended and "rudely" outspoken about it (both on behalf of Gondor and Rohan) in addition to being ambivalent (not even especially negative! just unsure!) about the practical significance of Aragorn's pure royal blood.

Elrond also glorifies Gondor's former imperial power through comparison with Númenor's. His regret over Gondor's decay is tied to ideas of racial impurity (which in Gondor is a direct consequence of Númenórean and Gondorian imperialism, and which in any case is a bizarre characterization choice for him specifically) and to Gondor's inability to sustain its empire. I feel like all these sentiments are treated in the text as pretty understandable and sympathetic and right-thinking, even if Elrond turns out to be mistaken about some specific things.

Basically, it feels like the general perspective is that the Stewards were wise to move towards a more diverse and integrated Gondorian society, to recruit outsiders, to do what was necessary to keep Gondor standing and opposing Sauron where multiple purer and more insular factions failed. They were wise to relinquish imperial holdings they didn't have the power or inclination to control. But this stuff also seems to be treated as a regrettable necessity. All this is tragic and everyone who cares is kind of sad about it. As a result, Elrond's melancholy over modern Gondor, while mistaken on specific points, seems somewhat validated by the narrative framework.

For instance, in the description of the (100% heroic) people of Lebennin, we can see that element of reservation about modern Gondor with regard to race and racial mixing:


And I think Aragorn and his royal purebloodedness are deeply bound up in this. To an extent, this framework also validates the Northern Dúnedain's prioritization of Númenórean purity above all else. The negative extreme of their position is mediated through Gondor (in the Kinstrife) and then (~sadly but necessarily) becomes less of a priority over time. Thus Gondor survives through "hard" choices like "sustaining the population through interracial marriage" and "including local indigenous people as full citizens." So there's still a substantial polity left for the ultimate result of the Northern Dúnedain's blood purity—Aragorn—to rule over and "restore". But the Northern Dúnedain themselves don't have to compromise their valuation of purity for this to occur, and in fact, the purity they so carefully maintained in the royal line only makes it all the more natural for Aragorn to rule over the racially and culturally "impure" Gondorians and to forge their nation into a new, kinder and gentler(...) empire.

Further tangent: It's unsurprising that Tolkien struggled a bit with figuring out who would be suitable for Aragorn to marry and thus whose blood would mingle with his into the next generation. If I recall correctly, Arwen was created pretty specifically to be Aragorn's queen and to reinforce his bloodline (this was done in a fairly evocative way, but still). I do get why Tolkien felt Éowyn was too young etc for Aragorn, and I prefer Faramir/Éowyn by a mile, but I am not convinced that Éowyn's "lesser" racial status (in-world) was not also part of the calculus.

Anyway, I guess Aragorn's rule is the intended compromise between Faramir's explicit "a king would be nice but not dominating other people" and the various awful imperial legacies at play. But it feels to me like the suggestion here is that the problem is doing empire wrong rather than doing empire at all.

I do think that Tolkien had pretty messy feelings about this and you can see him trying to complicate various aspects in some of his post-LOTR writings. LOTR frames early Númenórean imperialism as uncomplicated benevolence towards, I think he said, "lesser" races of men; over a very long time, their dominance in Middle-earth becomes corrupted and nightmarish. But by "The Mariner's Wife," it's evident that their involvement was morally compromised and horrific from day 1, yet Tolkien also tries to complicate that with Aldarion's mixed motives (partly it's straightforward empire-building for its own sake, but partly he's trying to prepare for a very real threat and Ancalimë's refusal to continue his policies in Middle-earth is not exactly bad but certainly not good). Tolkien even argues in Peoples of Middle-earth that the High Men/Middle Men/Wild (or Dark!) Men distinction in LOTR is entirely about cultural affinity for "The West" rather than race as such (I doubt this was quite the intention in LOTR itself), and moreover adds that plenty of people had pretty good reasons for cultural opposition to "The West" because of devastation previously wreaked by Western powers like Númenor. (The subtext is not subtle.)

But I think there's always this partly-aesthetic, partly just racist appeal of the "good" empire ruled by a(n ideally pureblooded & superior) racial elite for him, alongside his ever-increasing skepticism about what this entails and what it can lead to and if it will inevitably be corrupted and how that interacts with (in his view) the intrinsically fallen nature of humanity. So it's a mess and there are these points of reservation and skepticism and outright criticism of things like racism and empire and the interrelationship between them embedded within his work that can give us some room to maneuver, I guess? But the overarching trends voiced by characters like Elrond and Aragorn are still really present and unavoidable.

I talked a few days ago, under f-lock, about some painful RL experiences around being perceived as deeply boring and incapable of feeling pain (or feeling most emotions, really). And I wanted to make an addendum to that, one that I don’t think really needs the f-lock.

I’ve made many complaints about various fandoms + multifandom spaces and trends over the years, and I still consider most of those complaints valid. Nevertheless, fandom has typically been a much less bleak environment for me.

If someone in fandom finds me boring, they usually do not tell me so, or treat me in a way that makes this apparent. They simply don’t interact with me. And people who do follow me or interact with me don’t do it because of my family’s involvement, or because I’m a package deal with more interesting/attractive/charismatic friends, or because of some other figure in my meatspace life at all. In fandom, none of that matters. At least, it hasn't for me.

Even the followers who don’t particularly care about me as a person are following me for my own sake in some capacity, rather than for the sake of someone else. Sure, some of these will leave if I get super into something they find dull, or stop posting or whatnot, but their interest in my opinions about the thing they’re into is still about my opinions of that thing, or how I express my opinions, or something about my online persona.

And there are also people who don’t share my preoccupation with a current fixation, or don’t find my take on it interesting, and are thus kind of bored, but they like me personally enough to stick around, anyway. This doesn’t usually trigger my “oh no I’m being boring” issues, because if they’re invested enough to stay, despite disinterest in my current thing, they’re evidently still engaged at some level with me.

Beyond that, people in fandom don’t typically lecture me on my general demeanor. It’s happened, but not often. In fact, while fellow fans sometimes express respect for my—let’s say, often rather severe manner of presenting myself and my opinions, they don’t generally act like it is required of me to be that way or that it somehow precludes a capacity to feel. We’re all in fandom because we feel things!

And that’s been very powerful for me. I wasn’t diagnosed as autistic until I was well into my 20s, while I’ve been directly or indirectly excluded or distanced from many RL social circles ever since I was a child. I’ve certainly been treated as if I and the things I care about are objectively dull and emotionally unengaging.

But throughout my entire adult life, there has always been one glaring exception to this. There really was a social sphere in which my experience of others and of myself could be different. There was fandom.

For all of online fandom’s many, many flaws, this has been part of my experience of it from even before I was an adult—in fact, from the time that I made my first post. At the time, I was extremely shy and anxious, so I lurked a lot, and was very worried about breaking some rule somewhere if I actually said anything on the big scary Internet. But I had feelings. I was in high school and I had such feelings.

Many of these were Pride and Prejudice feelings. In high school, I started collecting copies of P&P just so I could read the introductions/editorial content and see what other people thought about it, since nobody I knew IRL cared about it the way I did. This was both my first step into academia proper and a sort of proto-fannish activity. But my Austen feelings were not actually the ones that propelled me into breaking my self-imposed Internet silence and detachment from online communities. A lot of Austen fandom didn’t really seem like my people. I was also into Harry Potter, but HP fandom similarly did not seem like my people.

Actually, speaking of boring other people, I’m going to be really self-indulgent and rewind even further for THE FULL SAGA of what brought me into fandom.

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sulfin-evend responded to the April 13th 2019 post here:

The idea that Elrond is against Gondor somehow is a reoccurring idea in the tumblr fandom. So I went back to reread the Council of Elrond to make sense of it, and I can barely find one phrase that could be considered anti Gondor. Am I missing something?

I replied:

I think we must be interpreting Elrond’s description of modern Gondor very differently. For me, going on about how they’ve dwindled from imperial heights through intermarriage with inferior races is high octane Yikes and certainly negative towards modern Gondor. Especially given that it’s said with a Gondorian right there.

(It’s partly Tolkien being Tolkien, but only partly IMO: we later hear that the inclusion of non-Númenóreans in Gondor has contributed to the strength of Gondor’s people and is a way in which the Stewards were wiser than the kings.)

They also said:

Love the commentary on the names. Also i love that Elured is supposed to be a Taliska and Sindarin mixed name. The half elves do honour the human side of their heritage

I replied:

Thanks! I think Tolkien ultimately decided Taliska had died out by that point (since “The Problem of Ros” didn’t work out). But yeah, the peredhil are pretty consistently respectful towards their human heritage.

They responded to this post:

Headcanon; Gondor is full of various languages and bilingual people. Everyone knows Westron, but some speak Sindarin or one of many native ancient languages, words from dead languages come up in regional dialects.

I replied:

Total agreement! We know there are at least some place-names that have elements derived from indigenous languages, so it’s possible to extrapolate from that, and of course, many of the soldiers in Minas Tirith shout at each other in Sindarin. When we hear that people burst out singing in “all the ways of the City,” I like to imagine that it’s not just musical styles but all these different languages at once.

[ETA 3/18/2024: In the interests of full disclosure, they did later respond again re: Elrond and Gondor, but I find Elrond's characterization of modern Gondor so intrinsically indefensible that I had no interest in engaging further.]

“I don’t like Faramir with long hair” is a really odd thing to get on a reblog. Like … take it up with Tolkien.

Tagged: #éowyn is considerably shorter and yet their hair mingles in the breeze. qed #also tumblr keeps reccing quite nice art to me ... where it is not possible for their hair to mingle #like you get canon-compliant art of them once in a blue moon—and then people complain that it's TOO canon-compliant? #i mean fandom's going to be fandom but STILL