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The wolf-pits, the wine harvest, the festival in hell
The first time I heard the story of Beren and Lúthien, I was taking the Green Line to the MFA to look at the cinerary urn of A. Folius Felix and his wife Manilia Optata, and ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
captainbutler was telling it to me. My efforts to read The Silmarillion kept bouncing off the theogony of the Valar and the sense that I was reading the kind of nineteenth-century translation from the Sindarin that would have lost all the heft and strangeness of the language and retained only the word order; I never made it more than about fifty pages in. But when I went tonight to dinner with yhlee and other awesome people—these last seven days have almost been better than anything in the previous half-year—I brought with me the same jacketless first-edition hardcover I've been throwing myself at since high school, so I wouldn't have anything else to read on the subway.
Now fair and marvellous was that vessel made, and it was filled with a wavering flame, pure and bright; and Eärendil the Mariner sat at the helm, glistening with dust of elven-gems, and the Silmaril was bound upon his brow. Far he journeyed in that ship, even into the starless voids; but most often was he seen at morning or at evening, glimmering in sunrise or sunset, as he came back to Valinor from voyages beyond the confines of the world.
On those journeys Elwing did not go, for she might not endure the cold and the pathless voids, and she loved rather the earth and the sweet winds that blow on sea and hill. Therefore there was built for her a white tower northward upon the borders of the Sundering Sea; and thither at times all the sea-birds of the earth repaired. And it is said that Elwing learned the tongues of birds, who herself had once worn their shape; and they taught her the craft of flight, and her wings were of white and silver-grey. And at times, when Eärendil returning drew near to Arda, she would fly to meet him, even as she had flown long ago, when she was rescued from the sea. Then the far-sighted among the Elves that dwelt in the Lonely Isle would see her like a white bird, shining, rose-stained in the sunset, as she soared in joy to greet the coming of Vingilot to haven.
Maybe I will read The Children of Húrin after all.
captainbutler was telling it to me. My efforts to read The Silmarillion kept bouncing off the theogony of the Valar and the sense that I was reading the kind of nineteenth-century translation from the Sindarin that would have lost all the heft and strangeness of the language and retained only the word order; I never made it more than about fifty pages in. But when I went tonight to dinner with yhlee and other awesome people—these last seven days have almost been better than anything in the previous half-year—I brought with me the same jacketless first-edition hardcover I've been throwing myself at since high school, so I wouldn't have anything else to read on the subway.Now fair and marvellous was that vessel made, and it was filled with a wavering flame, pure and bright; and Eärendil the Mariner sat at the helm, glistening with dust of elven-gems, and the Silmaril was bound upon his brow. Far he journeyed in that ship, even into the starless voids; but most often was he seen at morning or at evening, glimmering in sunrise or sunset, as he came back to Valinor from voyages beyond the confines of the world.
On those journeys Elwing did not go, for she might not endure the cold and the pathless voids, and she loved rather the earth and the sweet winds that blow on sea and hill. Therefore there was built for her a white tower northward upon the borders of the Sundering Sea; and thither at times all the sea-birds of the earth repaired. And it is said that Elwing learned the tongues of birds, who herself had once worn their shape; and they taught her the craft of flight, and her wings were of white and silver-grey. And at times, when Eärendil returning drew near to Arda, she would fly to meet him, even as she had flown long ago, when she was rescued from the sea. Then the far-sighted among the Elves that dwelt in the Lonely Isle would see her like a white bird, shining, rose-stained in the sunset, as she soared in joy to greet the coming of Vingilot to haven.
Maybe I will read The Children of Húrin after all.
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I think that is wonderful.
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