#monday posts

The trauma of the Darkening being so profound that only a select few are able to sing of the Two Trees in such a way that brings their specters into the air, perhaps only at a ceremony or ritual in remembrance

Elves who can weave into their craft the birdsong of species long gone regionally or completely extinct and just for a moment, bring them back.

The number of elves who can conjure the image of Cuiviénen, or who wish to, waning over time

Images in song having different meanings than their literal interpretation, the development of symbology.

The peaks of Thangorodrim appearing occasionally in first age songs but all but forbidden once the real peaks fell, as though bringing to life in song would be an ill omen.

The differences between cultures and in different times regarding symbology, practice and taboo. For example some cultures revelling in depictions of Morgoth being defeated or caricatured whereas others forbid any depiction of him in this form. Some may utilise this art form only for ceremonial purposes or worship whereas others use it often including for leisure and revelry.

The discourse and contention about whether images from songs truly represent their subject, the use of song to distort or hide as I talked about on my post about taboo topics and images from song

What he doesn’t know is that they came to his room every day for seventeen years. That Diego snuck in through the fire escape and made sure to leave whatever trinkets he found. That Allison fixed up his wardrobe, that Luther would sleep in his room and pretend he was talking to him. That Klaus would sit on his rug and try to summon him, sober and crying because there’s so much fucking ghosts but he has to see Five. That Ben gives over his old books, that Grace often said good night, dear to an empty room that never responded back.

Gelmir is brought to the front lines from Angband already having lost his eyes or his vision during his captivity, such a disturbing detail in itself. We don’t need a detailed description of how this happened to create a deeply unpleasant picture; as disturbing as the more explicitly gruesome nature of the scene is Tolkien’s habit of leaving the worst up to the imagination. It creates a chilling combination

The herald who has come to the front boasts “we have many more such at home, but you must make haste if you would find them, for we shall deal with them all when we return even so.”

Then, in a shocking spectacle, his limbs are cut off and he is left to bleed out

Gelmir spends his last terrifying moments among his captors and tormentors while still in view of his people and his brother, who of course he cannot see. He dies in sight of what might have once been hope, with no comfort or mercy and barely anyone left alive to even mourn his brutal end.

And Gwindor soon will be trapped in the same caverns, experiencing the same horrors his brother did, giving new agony to his death. Perhaps Gwindor even meets prisoners who knew Gelmir

And this is no longer a new tragedy for the Noldor (and it never has for the elves who stayed in Beleriand). Many among their number has loved ones taken captive or who vanished and were beloved, hoped to be dead rather than the alternative. Gwindor might not be the only one there who has an imprisoned sibling, parent, or other loved one

Its very foundations shift and grown as the mountains struggle to accommodate it. Doors vanish, the passages are deliberately designed to be disorienting and, as I talked about on my time and space in captivity post, only a few beings have any extensive knowledge of the fortress’s plans.

Many of the denizens can traverse easily in the dark so entire sections of the fortress have no need for lighting. Prisoners sometimes wander for days or weeks in the darkness there and the isolation and despair this invokes means it is sometimes deliberately used as a punishment

The deepest caverns are as gaping maws and more than a few are swallowed by them. Rumors and horror tales of dangers beyond the denizens of the fortress travel around the prisoners but also among the soldiers and higher ups.

Angband will eat you alive, will trap you in its walls like a fly in amber…

It’s got the shocking, public nature of deaths like Gelmir’s with the others forced to watch helplessly as someone they have spent so much time with meets a gruesome end, all while knowing they are to meet the same

Then at the same time it has a claustrophobic, chaotic feeling as the group huddles in the gloom of their prison. In particular, I’m obsessed with the description of Finrod and his companions in that pit, suddenly seeing the appearance of eyes in the dark

Pressed against a wall, covered in blood and viscera whose source they can only identify if they know intimately the sound of their friend’s screams