A little post about elves...

Okay, so not so little.

I just realized it's Tolkien's birthday! I was going so save this post for later, but in honor of the great author, I'm going to speak a bit about his elves. Be warned, this is a fan-girl post. If you've heard some of this before, forgive me, I lose track of my gushing. It contains some spoilers for The Silmarillion...

I'm a big, big fan of elves. The elves in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit movies are probably who started me on my fandom. But then of course, I read Tolkien's work, and to be honest, I found the most interesting elf in Lord of the Rings to be the little recognized Glorfindel (who I recently discovered to be even more awesome than I'd imagined).

But then I read The Silmarillion. Elves. Everywhere. Complicated, incredibly powerful elves.

Feanor threatens his half-brother, Fingolfin

 So as it is, my favorite literary elves can be found in that history volume that only dedicated geeks dare finish. In a way, I think they might be my favorites because Tolkien left so many of them to the imagination. He recounts their stories with a very distant touch, leaving the reader to discover more in their own mind.

Finrod Felagund

Finrod Felagund. Ever heard of him? He was the brother of Galadriel, and Tolkien called him "the fairest and most beloved of the house of Finwe." In case you didn't know, the house of Finwe had some of the fairest and most beloved elves in it ever. Tolkien giving this elf that title is pretty big stuff. And I daresay he deserves it.

Finrod was the first elf to discover mankind, and his friendship with them later saved his life when a man named Barahir rescued him on the battlefield. He gave Barahir his ring as a token of their friendship. This ring...two serpents with emerald eyes, one devouring the other, crowned in golden flowers. That's right...it's that ring...Aragorn's ring.

 This guy also held unusual power. He actually disguised himself and his friends as orcs and tried to hold onto that disguise in a contest of power with Sauron. (Mmhm, that Sauron.) Sadly, he lost when Sauron brought to mind one of the elves's greatest sins, and Finrod and his friends were thrown into a dungeon to be eaten by a werewolf, though Finrod was going to be spared for further torture. Here Finrod claims my favorite death by Tolkien. First off, he dies well. Self-sacrifice and all that. Further more he kills the werewolf with his own hands and teeth! Hard-core. Mortally wounded, he dies in a friend's arms. But Tolkien didn't just leave us there. I will forever be grateful and indebted to Tolkien for showing us a little scene of Finrod back in his heavenly home, reunited with his father and also (so I've heard is written somewhere) his long lost sweetheart. *sniff, sniff* So happy ending, all that!

Maedhros

Of course, The Silmrallion is not really famed for happy endings. Let me introduce to you Maedhros, champion heart-breaker. Eldest son of Feanor, he inherited no small portion of his father's reckless fire. But besides carrying on his mother's red hair, he also had more of her noble spirit. Sadly, the fire of his father prompted him to take part of the oath that cursed his entire family...and he was doomed from then on. Naturally, Tolkien figured that now since he was doomed, it was time for the readers to get attached to him. Throughout his life, Maedhros stood up against his father and his brother's hot-headed ways in an effort to maintain peace among his kindred. In fact, he even determined to set up his family's kingdom farther away from most of the elves to prevent strife and to be the first line of defense against the evil Morgoth. Maedhros gladly built his fortress on Morgoth's porch, so to speak.

You see, at one time Maedhros was captured and tortured by Morgoth. Thus we come to one of my favorite stories by Tolkien. Though Maedhro's own brothers didn't dare try to rescue him, Fingon--cousin and former best friend to Maedhros--put aside their family feud and set out alone into the bad guy's very own demesne to save his friend.  Good ol' Fingon, this moment of glory rocketed him up to one of my favorites too. Eventually he found Maedhros hanging by his right hand on a unscalable wall, but before he was forced to shoot Maedhros as an act of mercy, one of the great angelic beings had mercy and sent one of his eagles to bear Fingon up to Maedhros.

Fingon rescues Maedhros

Fingon needed to cut off Maedhros's hand to free him, but Maedhros recovered and lived to wield his left hand more dangerously than ever before.

Tragically, that ol' family curse later resurrected to drive Maedhros mad and turn into him into a villain until he finally fulfilled the oath, recognized what a monster he'd become, and threw himself into a firey chasm in despair. Yeah. Thanks for that, Tolkien. :/ We don't ever get to know if he was forgiven for his deeds and released back to Valinor....come on...

Yep, so there you have it, my top two favorite literary elves!

Did you notice something? Elves, imprisonment, torture... and DEATH!!! Really, one of the worst is the elf who actually escapes and gets back home, only to have his sweetheart fall in love with someone else, and then he dies on the battlefield. Tolkien, I love ya and you're a genius, but you are depressing.

That got me thinking you see...what if an elf went through all that and actually had a happy ending? Mind-blowing, right? Thing is, what would it take to realize that happy ending? Could it even be possible?

And that's where Moonscript started. ;)

Illustrations copyright: Hannah Williams 2015