The Passing of a Mother Beyond the World is a surviving play by an exilic noldorin playwright about three mortal siblings dealing with the tragic and inevitable deaths of both of their parents in old age. The play is a fascinating cultural artifact, both for its reflection of the cultural anxieties of the noldor in exile, and for its very clear lack of interest in how mortals act or think. The siblings range widely in age—the eldest has an adult son of her own, while her youngest brother is a child, apparently conceived when his parents were octegenarians. All of their ages are left vague. Their mother is on her deathbed, and all three expect that their father will not survive the night in his grief.
The family is compellingly written in their grief. The play covers only the day and the night before the death of their mother, as they cry, fight, and attempt to comfort each other. There is nothing glaringly inaccurate about the portrayal of bereavement—only a lingering sense of strangeness in the shock and desperation of it. Surely, a mortal audience might think, they were expecting this? Did they not discuss, for example, who would take care of the youngest child (the subject of a fight in the second act)? They seem surprised and devastated, like a family reeling from a sudden illness or a violent death, rather than the peaceful passing of their elderly parents.
In the final scene, the adult grandchild of the dead couple seems to realize that his mother will also die, and they share the final scene in the play. She comforts him, and the play ends with mother and son sitting together in silence—mirroring the first scene, a peaceful morning in the now dead parents bedroom.
This play seems to be a reflection of the cultural anxieties of the exilic noldor—of a newly doomed culture discovering tragedy and death. The unexpectedness of it, the violence of their grief, even the father dying with his wife, all reflect a distinctly elven and exilic view of death and mourning. The playwright projects these fears outwards, making them more palatable by writing about the mortal children of a dying mortal couple—a safer choice for an elven audience.
“We chose the term “asexual” to describe ourselves because both “celibate” and “anti-sexual” have connotations we wished to avoid: the first implies that one has sacrificed sexuality for some higher good, the second that sexuality is degrading or somehow inherently bad. “Asexual”, as we use it, does not mean “without sex” but “relating sexually to no one”. This does not, of course, exclude masturbation but implies that if one has sexual feelings they do not require another person for their expression. Asexuality is, simply, self-contained sexuality.”
And that’s only the date that Manifesto was written, so asexuals as members of a community must have existed at least some time before that.
So, no: we are not just Tumblr trenders. Get out of here with that.
supporting my asexual friends and foes by rebbloging this
It’s 50 years this month since the first version of the Asexual Manifesto was written. Aces have been writing about our experiences under this name for at least half a century. We are not an internet fad.
While I slog through a fic I actually really want to tell (the joys of writing!) I decided to talk about that Feanor as Melkor’s son AU I mentioned in my tags
So far I have three possibilities, from least realized to most:
Feanor as Melkor and Mairon bio baby, so far I don’t really have much for this one, the Valar find baby Feanor after Melkor’s imprisonment (haven’t decided why Mairon wouldn’t have escaped with the baby) and give him to Finwe to raise (I hadn’t realized it doesn’t makes sense for Miriel to die in this one until now, so either she doesn’t and it’s full throwing away canon or in this one she doesn’t exist and Finwe just didn’t want to tell Feanor who his real parents were, it’s both sad and funny)
Baby Feanor kidnap adopted by Melkor, the timeline is bothering me here, maybe Feanor is born before Melkor’s imprisonment? Or he leaves imprisonment way before the original? I mostly wanted this to be funny about Melkor and Mairon getting so attached and wanting so bad to be good parents to feral child Feanor that they actually get redeemed (although dark!Feanor x Nerdanel is very intriguing)
And the one I (unfortunately) have the most on (as of right now) is Feanor as Melkor… and Miriel’s son, I jokingly thought about this one but alas it got bigger than I expected, so: Melkor decides to go mess with the elves only to find Miriel collecting bugs (they’re silk worms, weird bug girl Miriel for the win!) and he gets actually quite impressed with her desire to not settle with the world and wanting to make it prettier with fabrics, they fall in love (or as much in love Melkor can be, so far he is more like canon evil Melkor than the softer one of the other two ideas) but when she finds out who he is, she runs away and falls for Finwe instead.
Finwe is then totally cool with raising Miriel’s child because he loves her so much but Miriel keeps feeling she’s awful for her previous love for Melkor, combined with the power required to sustain a half-ainur child, and ends up dying.
Finwe of course, absolutely adores little Feanor despite not being his bio dad, and thus names him Finwion (later Curufinwe), but raising a half-ainur child is not easy, especially when you can’t actually ask anyone for help without revealing the truth, so Finwe just has to deal with eldritch child Feanor, alone.
(like, one time there’s a teacher Feanor hates because he heard the teacher say that Feanor killed Miriel, so Feanor gives the teacher a bracelet he doesn’t even understand how he made cursed, the teacher then complains to Finwe, who is just trying to understand how to explain to his son that he can’t do that, also he fires the teacher)
Then it’s basically the same as canon up until Melkor return, because instead of trying to create discord he arrives and realizes Feanor’s his son and tries to pull a Darth Vader and convince Feanor to join him.
Feanor is, of course, against the idea but Melkor is convinced that if he reveals Feanor’s true parentage in the upcoming festival then the uproar and hate will cause Feanor to be more willing.
Only, right before he can make his announcement Feanor shows up wearing the silmarils (Melkor decides to rename him Lightbringer but I haven’t figured out what that is in Quenya) and instead of going along with Melkor, Feanor
Bows. to. MANWE!!!!!
And does a whole speech about Melkor trying to deceive him by claiming he isn’t Finwe’s son (Feanor already realized the truth, he’s just rejecting it) and doing a whole spectacle of proof
The Finwe family isn’t stupid and to Feanor’s surprise, the first person to join his show is INDIS!!! Joined then (in order) by Nolo, Nerdanel, and Maglor (if it was political it would be Maedhros but it’s a performance remember)
Manwe isn’t stupid and understands what they are doing so when Melkor tries to say that it’s all Finwe’s lie he just tells Melkor that it was clear that Feanor was Finwe’s son
Melkor storms out (he still plans to destroy the trees but his objective is Feanor instead of just the silmarils) and the Finweans leave too
Feanor has a cathartic talk and cry with his dad while the rest of the family discuss what this means for them all, Feanor is now more open to his half-family and his relation to the other Valas is totally different, and how that could end up having happier ending to the story.
And that’s how much I have of this one, it compels me but it’s the only one that I have no idea of how to add Melkor x Mairon and the original idea was about THEM as parents whereas this one is about the original Finweans in a different situation so I’m conflicted
real talk why do so many fantasy universes think giant spiders are necessary
The sad part is there’s a decent chance a large proportion of them can be blamed on one spider.
The tarantula that bit JRR Tolkien as a child.
He swore he didn’t have a spider phobia and the experience had nothing to do with the man-eating giant spiders in The Hobbit, the even more giant and even more man-eating spider in Lord of the Rings, or the unholy eldritch spider from outside creation that plunged the world into darkness and made literal Satan scream like a little kid in the Silmarillion. Very few people believe him.
Given LotR’s influence in the fantasy genre, there is a high probability that tarantula is the progenitor of even more fictional spiders than Ungoliant was.
wow fuck that one tarantula
“fantasy universes have too many spiders” factoid actually just statistical error. Georgs Spider, who bit JRR Tolkein & is to blame for menacing over 10,000 fantasy universes, is an outlier adn should not have been counted
rune factory is such a great series bc one day you’re tending your little farm growing veggies to give to your pals then you take your pals out to a fun local landmark and all of you get fucking murdered by a gang of adorable wild beasts and wake up in massive medical debt
9 hours ago
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