Discussion [LOTR] Mithlond/The Grey Havens - For All Creatures of Eru, Great And Small

I was looking through Resource here and realised there wasn't a place for LOTR fans. So, here it is!

Let's start off with a get-to-know you. Tell us how you got into LOTR, who your favourite character(s) is/are, and all of that!




I've been a LOTR fan since the first film came out, but since then, I've read everything I could get my hands on except for "Children of Hurín". I've even read "The Silmarillion" more than once. My friends won't play LOTR Trivial Pursuit with me unless they get to go first. I'm obsessed with the Elves and even speak Sindarin (Not Grelvish! Grelvish is an abomination!!) and do all my own translations for my 'fics. I love all of the movies equally, but ROTK always makes me cry, when Sam and Frodo are on the mountain, and Sam says, "I can't carry it for you, but I can carry you!"


Dana

Mae govannen!

I first read the books before the movies came out, though I had convinced myself that Frodo was going to die, so it took me a while to read RotK. I adore the Silm- I actually like it better than LotR. The sheer epicness of the story and the beauty of the writing makes it all worthwhile in my opinion.

Unfortunately, I haven't read all of the Histories yet, nor Children of Hurín. Since I'm in the process of moving, I don't even have access to the ones I do own, which is a problem since I need Morgoth's Ring (specifically Laws and Customs) for a couple of fanfics I'm in the middle of writing.

You know Sindarin?! I'm trying to learn it, but I don't have the time I'd like to devote to it. Hence, I know almost nothing. What sources do you recommend? (I have the course from Gwaith and know better than to tempt the Ardalambion page right now. My knowledge of linguistics is nill.) And I agree wholeheartidly Grelvish is an abomination. Morgoth must have been the driving force behind the creation.

As for the movies, let's just say I have a love-hate relationship with them. I'm on the purist side, so watching some parts of them are... difficult. *cough*Elrond's character massacre*cough*Elves at Helm's Deep*cough*

My favorite character is book-verse Elrond, followed by Maglor. They both have fascinating and tragic lives, though for different reasons. I'm fascinated by the Elves in general (probably why I like the Silm better).

~ Indy

Sindarin's hard, but not as hard as Quenya. I'm rusty on it, I need to dig my papers back out and go through them.

I have two obsessions bigger than Star Wars- No, wait, three. Supernatural, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Lord of the Rings. *facepalm* I actually have a standee of Legolas in my room. (But I also have one of Jack Sparrow, so that's okay! I have one of Luke, but he's in the closet.) I haven't gotten to the point of wanting an elvish tat, but I have made several elven dresses.

I'm such a geek that I took all the names I could find and plugged them all into "Personal Ancestral File". Did you know that Arwen and Aragorn are both second cousins 63 times removed, and third cousins 62 times removed? Yeah, that's the kind of dork I am.


Dana

Which Jack do you have, the red one or the "At World's End" one? As far as I know, there's only one Legolas. . . . I think Orlando Bloom is hotter as Legolas than as Will Turner.

Mine was a birthday present. I loves it. It's nice to have to reference bits on Jack's costume! I don't have to look it up online, just walk across the room. I do the same thing with the Legolas one. Hee.

So . . . should I post my LOTR/Princess Diaries pseudo-Mary Sue spoof 'fic?

You make me feel old, I was already in college when the first one came out.

The fic is mostly LOTR, but the "Princess Diaries" book characters make brief appearances. I don't even know how it came to be, I just know I started writing it the weekend I had knee surgery and couldn't go anywhere. LOL.

Oh, I understand why the changes were made, for much the same reason (my sister has a degree in film). But still...

Cool tattoo! Is that the Ring verse?

As for bad fanfic, well, let's just say I have a couple novel-length LotR fics that I occassionaly go back and reread. There's good ideas, but not enough to make me want to go back and rewrite. Of course, the last time I read them gave me an idea for one of my current fics, so it all works out.

I'm actually a bigger LotR geek than SW fan. The EU kind of ruined the magic of SW for me. (I like the Thrawn trilogy, the Hand of Thrawn duology, the X-wing series, and a couple random books.) But I first saw SW back in the fourth grade (I'm out of college now), so it's my first home.

The name thing: awesome! Now if only I could find something similar for who owes allegiance to who in Valinor during the Fourth Age and after (assuming all the dead are out of Mandos). I need it for a fic...

Cool on the dresses! Maybe you could help me with my next costuming project: what would a male Elf wear at the end of the First Age?

NYCitygurl, everyone's allowed their opinion. My mother read and loved them in high school, but I can't get her to touch them now. I find getting out of the Shire the worst part for me. Also, The Hobbit is a lot easier to read- it's written in a different style. The one part of the Appendices you should read is the Tale of Arwen and Aragorn. It's part v of Appendix A.

Dear lord, I feel so traditional. My discovery of LotR was by inheritance. My parents read it, then they passed the old, old books down to me.

I remember when we heard about the LotR films being made, dad was like, "You have to finish FotR buy the time the movie comes out!" I did, I finished TTT as well.

Now, me and dad are pestering my brother to read The Hobbit before the movie hits cinemas.

So, all in all, I've read The Hobbit, FotR, TTT, and RotK three times each, and The Silmarillion once (and it hurt.)
My elvish name is Lindethiel, seriously, I'm Lindethiel everywhere, Arwen-Undomiel.com, photobucket, youtube, everywhere except here, I wish I could change my user name, but that would be a bummer. My own fault for finding tf.n before the translation I guess.

I haven't read much LotR fanfiction, most of what I've read was a long time ago, and not all that good quality, but there are some wonderfully talented writers here, so I look forward to finding some! As for writing it myself, I don't think I'd ever measure up to Tolkien, I'm too afraid to try, lol.

I can understand why the movies are the way they are, being a film-trainee too. In my opinion, the movies are the best book adaption films I've seen. PJ did a wonderful job.

Cazz out.

My Sindarin name is Aewgliriel, pretty much means "sings like a bird" . . . which I do not, ha! I was too lazy to come up with a new one after I made one for my LOTR original character. Heh.

I really love LOTR, and have wanted to learn Sindarin for a long time (is that even how you spell it? Oh well). When I was younger, my mom made me read the Hobbit and all three LOTR books before I could see the movies, so I'm pretty familiar with the whole saga. I have the Children of Hurin, but I've yet to read it, and I just couldn't get into the Silmarillion.

My fave character is a tie between Sam and Aragorn. They're both just so good! Aragorn is... well, he's Aragorn, what else do I need to say? And Sam is so sweet! Okay, enough of my gushing.

I haven't written any LOTR fanfic yet, but I want to!

You're welcome!

Cazz, you're lucky to have the old books. I have the movie-verse covers (which will become my fanfic reference books to highligh to death when I buy another set).

I don't have a Sindarin name, though if I wanted, I could possibly translate. I do, however, know my name in Quenya, but I'm not going to post it for safety reasons. But there's a name I truly love in Sindarin, but I know just enough to wonder if it's actually grammatically correct: Iavasel. It possibly should be Eliavas, but that, I have the feeling causes mutations and whatnot that I don't know about.

Yes, that's how you spell it. For a downloadable Sindarin course, try Gwaith-i-Phethdain. It hasn't been updated in four years, so it may be wrong in a few things, depending on what's been published in the language journals. Ardalambion also has good information, though it's more technical.

As for the Silmarillion, it's a history, technically a legendarium. I've heard that if you can't get into reading, rent the audio version. (Either way, read parts of it aloud. The language is pure poetry.) Just give it another try. As for Children of Hurin, I don't think you'll be able to understand it unless you've read the Silm. It's a more "complete" version of one of the chapters therein.

I believe that's where I got my Sindarin language information. It's a hard language to teach yourself! I keep my sentences simple, and remember how to conjugate verbs, and use "Dragon Flame" for quick reference.

i love lord of the rings and for some reason beyond me my fan-fic turned star gate though. but i would like to learn sindarin can anybody help?

I like Ardalambion, personally.

Finally had the chance to get over here. Ok, my story. When FOTR was in theatres I was really not interested in fantasy films at the time, and I thought it sounded really strange and stupid. But one of my friends dragged me to see the movie. Despite the fact that I didn't quite understand the movie totally, I was drawn in by Frodo's quest. So afterwards I ended up watching it a million times when it came out on dvd, and I read the books (including the Hobbit and Silmarillion). The rest is history I've been a LOTR junkie since, and at one point I could quote all the movies.

I'm probably one of the biggest hobbit lovers around, with Frodo always being my favorite. And I'm absolutely and totally psyched for the Hobbit movie. As far as my fanfic goes, all of it is geared towards hobbits in some way. My username is actually partially taken from my OC hobbit character I used to rp.

Oh and speaking of elvish names I figured out that mine roughly translates to Luthien.

Not trying to be rude here or crush any dreams, but "Luthien" means "enchantress". The name you have in your profile would actually translate to something like Daergylwen or Gyltauriel (both roughly translating to God-bearing-maiden).

If anyone wants an actual Sindarin translation of their name, and not something from an inaccurate generator, please let me know! The generator doesn't actually translate your name, it pulls one from a pre-made list. I do actual translations.

For example, if mine were translated properly, my real name (not the Elven name I use, but the one I'd really have) would be Saertathren, meaning "bitter willow".

ETA: Technically, though, my middle name would be Arwen, as my middle name means "noble lady".


Dana

Really? Well I guess my friend who knows Elvish doesn't know what he's talking about. Thanks.

Sorry! *hugs* Didn't mean to burst any bubbles.

You didn't. I was just unaware of that.