Hi there, I'm Stephanie.

And I'm Lydia. Come along with us as we explore and learn about the world of Tolkien through deep dives on lore, characters, beatalons, and laffalons.

We are excited to have you as a new friend on this journey with us. Welcome to Speak Friend and Enter a Lord of the Rings podcast.

Alright, so here we are now going to sit down and discuss our bid overviews for the Silmarillion. Just kind of like, how did we feel about it overall? What are their takeaway thoughts? I looked at this and it's hard to have, I think it's hard to have words to describe it. Because when I first started reading this, my whole thought was, all right, well, it's time to go read Elf Genesis. And like, that's not entirely wrong. It's not entirely wrong. But it wasn't fully right either.

Yeah, I don't know. Maybe I'm just overwhelmed by the beauty of the last paragraph. And now I have forgotten that one chapter that I hated so much. It was entirely, you're like, it's stunning. I love it. Entirely text to speech that could have been a single map, you know.

Oh my gosh, just geography. Yes, whichever that one was, that was awful. Oh, it's chapter 14. Man, never forget chapter 14. Oh, the Larian and its Gems, yeah. But yeah, like the overall structure of this book was not what I expected. I was expecting it to be a lot harder to read. I was expecting it to be vastly less interesting. I don't know why I had that impression, but I really did.

And I found it to be the other way around. Like you said, we covered so much ground. And when you cover so much ground, so and in some places so quickly, it does give it this kind of like high level scriptural theme, like, okay, and 1000, 1000 years can pass in this sentence, right?

So fast. Yeah, so you can get that like blink in and I sort of feeling and this idea that you're floating above it all so high. But at the same time, despite that, which I think is, I think this is quite telling and I think it's some good writing is despite that fact that time is passing quickly, we got pretty deep in with some of these characters. Like I hated Feanor, but I loved to hate him.

Well, you understood him too.

And you're like, oh, you're messed up, dude. Yeah, you understood him. Like I loved Fingal and Malian. Yeah, but like I didn't end the beginning. Did I judge that? I sure did. I understand by everything I said. But it's million now deep in my heart. Of course, she is.

Man, she helps the middleers together for a while.

Exactly. Did we get really deep in with Meltor? I think so. Probably more than anyone else, really. And yeah, I felt like there were some parts that were maybe like less. What's the word I'm looking for? Plumzy is not the right word, but like maybe like delivered kind of in a straightforward fashion. Like when Tolton goes in and straight up says, here are the gods.

Let me tell you about each one in order. Like that was good. It was interesting, but it wasn't like the story of them necessarily. But then you did like an entire chapter of Owlette and Yovanna, which is still on a different level and it's hilarious.

Yes. And you did their like weird, almost divorced vibes. It's just great. But you can really appreciate it. So he's doing a really good job of giving this this drawn overview. Yeah. And at the same time, piercing it with these sharper character studies.

I think I do think it's so fascinating because we would have times. I don't know. I think it was three things in my head. At the beginning, it was a lot of, I guess we call it world building definitions, understanding where things came from. And I was fascinated by that because I love this world, right? That's why I wanted to read this. But then too, it starts going like you were saying into these little character deep dives or these little couples or these little like stories. And you're kind of, I was a little surprised at first. I was like, Oh, why are we learning about this little story about this thing or this person?

Yeah, especially early on like Fiendle and Malian. I was like, I don't understand why we're talking about this. And then other ones as well. I was like, why?

Yeah. But it helped a lot later. But then, and I would say this is the third section of the book. So it begins with world building and definitions. You then you get little deep dives on different characters, right? Including like the Maglun one and some of these other ones where I'm like, why are we deep diving into these random weird people? But it was interesting to see different characters in this world. And then towards the end, you get like the Baron and Luthien story, you get like the Aqalabath, you get the rings, like you, you get these huge moments.

I mean, you get crazy stuff like the Turin Turin bar.

Yeah, turn on sense. Like you get these characters, these characters starting to be acting and you see history and you see battles and you see things.

And you have sufficient context to look at that and be like, oh, yeah, not only is this bad, but it was inevitable. Yeah.

And so that's what I think was really fascinating about this is I thought it was going to be one tone all the way through. I thought it was all going to be world definitions, or I thought it was all going to be, I don't know, little stories about the gods, or I thought it was all going to be, you know, whatever it was. I thought it was all going to be genealogy.

I don't know why I thought that. Genealogy. It had a lot. I was afraid. I had a lot in there. And we still can't pronounce some of the names, but, but I was surprised at how it built on itself. And I, I do think for someone who doesn't love Lord of the Rings or know a lot what's going on, this could be a lot. But for someone who knows Lord of the Rings and has an sense of what's going on and is interested, I thought he did a really intriguing and well done job. Yeah. But honestly, like to get a sense, all you really do need to do is watch the movies. Yeah. That is enough to convey a sense. Yeah. And then you can deep dive into whatever you want.

Probably you should start with the other books. But if you chose wrong, you could always be here instead. Yeah. Exactly.

Like if you're not starting with the Hobbit, what are you doing? I will say, and maybe we will cut this into, maybe we'll have Tessa producer cut this into a separate episode because this is taking longer than I thought.

I will say, I have a whole list of notes Lydia. I'm ready. Perfect. All right. We'll just have Tessa cut straight down the middle of this bad boy. So I will say, I was surprised by Baron and Luthien. Really? I think of all the chapter. Well, not all of them. I was excited for that one. That was probably my top one that I wanted to read.

Yeah. So yes, yes to that. But also, I think that was the one where I thought I had more of an idea of what was going to happen. Yeah. You know, how like sometimes you'll hear a person described and be like, Oh yeah, I totally know what that person looks like. Because it's your friends are like telling you stories about them. You just like build up this image in your mind and then you meet them like, Oh my gosh, you are wrong and your voice. Yeah. And there's like a few rare people in my life who have like, Oh, you meet them and you're like, No, you are as described. I know exactly.

No notes. And for me, Baron and Luthien was not that way. I think I had some idea about what their story would be like. And it was much more exciting than I anticipated. Luthien is like, Whoa, 10 out of 10, 11 out of 13 or the other way around. Like really good. Yeah. Really good. Really enjoyed her. Baron was interesting. He was more rough around the edges than I thought he would be. He was. Yes. He was funny.

I do think it was interesting. I don't know. I thought actually I have a whole list of stuff, but I had notes on maybe I'll like dig into one of them now. No, start it. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. But I think one that I'll mention now is that I think it was interesting not all the stories were happy or you could see how like Baron and Luthien ended pretty happy. He died. She basically did a whole orpheus thing and got him back, but then they had one child and then I think they kind of stayed with the ring and the wilderness and tell or not the ring, the, um, the Somerilian and the wilderness until they died and then the Somerilian went to their kid and then their kid had a whole life of, yeah, the Somerilian.

Sorry. But, um, then the kid had a whole life of ups and downs. Like, I don't know. It was funny because you had this epic story, right? And you just think, man, this is a triumph. It's going to end with all the bells, all the whistles, all the, I don't know, Disney princess happily ever after and it doesn't. And it doesn't. And they live kind of like their lone life by themselves. They have their kid and then the drama moves on to future generations.

I definitely feel like their ending was quite melancholy. Yeah. Because of the way that Baron dies and the lengths that like this kind of like bargain that is presented to them. Like this is, this is your one opportunity to like be together. Like what do you choose, etc. Yeah.

So that was one. I was surprised by it. That was one thought I had is I think Tolkien can write sad endings more than I thought he could from just reading The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.

Yes, I guess I didn't. That's a good point. I didn't really get that impression of him. I just, and I was really shocked by the Turin chapter. Yeah. Yeah. When you hop in there and you're like, guy, you have been reading too much street tragedy. Like this is just insane. It's like almost at extreme. Yeah. And it's, it was very interesting. Yeah. Horrible, but interesting.

And I think it was, and this kind of just goes to what I was saying, but I think it's interesting that you can have honor and die in a terrible way.

You can be evil and survive on for a long period of time or like have the ability to, to impress upon and ruin the lives of the people around you. Like it felt very, it felt very real to me. Like it didn't feel like he was coming up with a sunshine genealogy of stories. Yeah.

And he's not pulling out necessarily these like Dave's, that's Machina's to like make sure that every story has happy ending.

Exactly.

Right. So I thought that was intriguing. And in fact, it is the opposite. He went in for the Turin story and he's like, how can I make these people so unhappy?

I know even more. Because the evil timeline, it's so bad. Yeah. So that was one of my bullet points that I had. Yeah. Nice. Nice. Let's see. Another thing I thought was interesting that I thought I'd bring up is all the deep dives into how the worlds are created and their gods and everything was super interesting. But I thought it was intriguing that their gods are, or these Valar gods do words kind of, that they're fallible at times. And sometimes they get involved. Sometimes they don't get involved. Sometimes they make the wrong call on people. Like, yes, like Melkor. Like Melkor. Come on. Come on. Or Soran, you just leave him hanging there.

But he has a theme. It's well supported, right? Like when they make the wrong call on Melkor, we have a sense of man weight and how like that's the only thing he could have done. Yeah. Right. Yeah. That's just how he is. And then I also love what is the name of Manway's wife? Always forget her name.

Oh yeah. I love her. She's hilarious. Well, we figured that out. I just loved how like when he was making the wrong call on Melkor, she was just like, oh, she's like, why are you being like this?

Covering her face with her hand. She's like, oh, why is he like this? Yeah. But I think it's really interesting building that back up because I think you get more of a sense of Arda. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You get more of a sense to the question of why does evil happen in this world? Right? Because that's a question that people ask in today's world. They say, why do bad things happen?

Right? And you, I think you have that question in every world. But in this world, it's super interesting in the summer really. And because when they say, why do bad things happen or why are the gods not intervening or what's going on, you have the backstory, you have the understanding, you understand the dynamics of this world to know what's happening. And I don't know, to kind of see the foibles, to kind of see some of the things that are happening on the bigger scale. So I thought that was intriguing.

And I also appreciated that like, you know, that question of why are bad things happening is not just logistical. There's a philosophical answer to that. It's not just like, oh, the bad thing is happening because so and so was, you know, a sleep on watch and then they work just not here, etc.

Right? It's, there is a philosophical answer to that and Tolton chose an answer and he was very consistent with it, which I think is important for theme. Like he could have had in each of these stories, he could have had a different answer like, oh, this evil arose because of, you know, this, like, I don't know, sin or this, this character trait. And over here in this chapter, it's a different one, but he was remarkably consistent and or at least the way I read it, I read it as this way about it being essentially a combination of these three things, greed, pride, and this like need to control or dominate other people. And he's like, he was, he pretty honed in on it. He's like, if these are your character traits, beware, watch out.

Honestly, that went into one of my other bullet points, which is insignificant people can make a difference, but it's pride, cruelty, and greed that are the real enemies. It's not if you're powerful, if you're not powerful, it's not if you're, I don't know, influential, not influential. It's not where you're born. It's not where you're from.

It's not what race you are, elves, men, dwarves, like his real thing is like, it doesn't matter who you are. It's pride, cruelty, and greed or jealousy and greed that can morph anyone, even a glorious being.

And we see this immediately from the beginning with Feyenoord. Like right away, he doesn't, he doesn't, he's not like subtle at all about it. We don't start off with like, oh, I guess we start off a little bit with the golden age of the elves, but very quickly, we dive into the noldor and we're very quickly introduced to Feyenoord and right away we're like, oh, something's wrong with this one.

Yeah, or more gods or anyone. It's clear that it's like he's very talented. Yes. You know, it's not like he's like malfunctioning. He's hyper-functioning, but he is going the wrong way with it. Yeah. So it's very interesting. So it's just fascinating to me. It's kind of like, it doesn't matter who you are. These are the things you need to worry about, right?

Yeah. Something that comes to mind that I didn't expect at all. I had no concept of the secret city of Gondolin. Oh yeah. That was kind of fun. Like zero. And it was pretty pivotal. Really cool stuff happened. I really enjoyed it, but this whole time when it first showed up, I was like, what is this place?

Never heard of it. Is it Gondor? Because I was like, it starts with a G. Yeah.

And is that right? Is it Gondolin? That's the hidden city?

Yeah. Was it a name with the other city that starts with a T? I'm forgetting its name. I'll come back to it if I remember, but yeah, Gondolin, the hidden city. I was just like surprised by everything that happened there. And again, it was really tense, right?

Because there is this hidden city and it stays hidden for so long, but then finally, finally, finally, it is revealed and it just feels so inevitable when it happens. Yeah. And you just feel so bad for them.

I know. I know. You can see all the leading up to.

They almost made it, right? Yeah.

Even, even, oh gosh, who's the God of the Sea? Almost. Even almost like don't get too comfy. Right? Like he's trying to warn them. Oh boy. It's true. It's wild.

Yeah. Okay, let's see. What else do we have here? Oh, I thought it was interesting. that this world is large and he goes into a lot of detail about a lot of people but there's always someone else showing up or there always is a little other group of people that change the dynamics or there's always like there's still side characters like Tolkien's known for world building but in a way that he doesn't answer all the questions right and so he did that very elegantly here too where you get the gist of his story but then you have men entering the picture and these men had been off to the side and then they start working for morgoth and then you have

like it's because just when things start feeling stable yeah some new player comes yeah and

so it's a large world it's full of dynamics you dig into all these little stories but you get the sense like you can't fully know everyone and you can't fully know what's going on all of the time and it gives a very realistic feel to his writing for me which feels more like world history where it's like yeah there's so many trends and so many things going around

and in tons of people enough enough being left hanging where it feels realistic yeah right not everything is neatly wrapped up yeah I do feel like more things could be neatly wrapped up but like that's also a good feeling right I think there is a super I don't know I think some authors fall into this trap of like over explaining things yeah and not not leaving enough room for imagination and he does the opposite of course you want to know what's happening after the third age but who knows let us deep dive on that later because we just don't know at the time so

yeah and then I think something else that stood out to me kind of about his storytelling and the way that the similar alien ends is it's it's fascinating that as a story like the Lord of the Rings trilogy felt all encompassing but then you put it into the history of the world and you recognize that there's even more in the future and you recognize you realize that this part is just one part of the puzzle the world goes on

and and you find out how how small a slice yeah how small

that story really is right and then also something that's interesting in his writing is that you're going to be fighting kind of the same battle over and over and over again through time you see the Valar fighting morgoth you see him coming to Middle Earth you see the Moldor fighting morgoth you see you know more got getting chain you see soren coming back you see soren coming back again and really this ties into our earlier comment where if you have pride and evil and jealousy like this is just a moment in time but people are going to have to be brave and people are going to have to step up and there's going to

be battles all periods and kind of that cycle right like we believe that

things just cycle on and there's always going to be another story I don't know I think that's

intriguing I also think it's interesting that his evils the evils that he introduces are so enduring yeah right I mean meltor is around for a long time time sorrow for the same and of course that's because we you know they're a Valar and Amaya like respectively yeah but those were also deliberate choices that he made and I think it's also a commentary like not only yeah it's a commentary probably linking into this idea of like you know these are the vices yeah cause this evil and it lasts a long time and it's exactly what you said like every generation is going to fight in this battle essentially yeah I really enjoyed the story of new manure yeah that's a big one that was that was really cool I loved the Atlantis vibes when they got some I loved the Noah vibes when just a few of them a state I loved the actually they there was they had a very biblical story it felt like it has this whole civilization falling into a wicked ways and temptations it really does feel like alright here's our flood story yeah the earth is so far gone we're just gonna cleanse it I there's a it's fun to see the Valar be like yeah because they're they're so off the page for so long that when they show up and they're just like eh time to wipe this civilization away oh my god

well I just thought it was so intriguing because when I loved that story I believe this is accurate I read it online that Tolkien had this dream about like this huge wave of water coming over him and like this he thought it was a hereditary dream that his family would carry on his son had it like the tsunami he used to have this kind of this nightmare and he thought it was I think almost like this stress this this human and hereditary stress hereditary stress dream that would come a memory of something that happened of something that's sunk under the water and I thought that was so intriguing I think that's part of the reason why he felt like he needed to write something like the downfall of Numenor but also to your point about like the biblical sense I love it like when people are so prideful they're like we can go against the gods right oh it's very like tower of Babel like we're gonna build our way to heaven like it's yeah or is that is that the right the tower of Babel that's the one yeah yeah and it's just um I don't know I think it's

you're watching them and you just know it's going to end so horribly for them

yeah that's so fascinating and you almost honestly you almost get a sense of like yeah why can't I be like the gods like what like part of it is is it

pride is it this like yeah exactly so fascinating it's really during this particular story because it ties so tightly into that pride which is yeah in here and also ties into the fact that like those valor are not seen very often yeah and so you get you can understand why they're thinking the way they are yeah you know who among them has seen a valor none yeah who among their elf acquaintances has seen a valor yeah two maybe um maybe zero I don't even know if they knew any but yeah like you can see exactly their chain of thought yeah and how that was a taste and

I think it was neat something else that I might add into the vices of things that Tolkien like really harped on and we talked about this a little bit last episode but the death is a gift concept a lot of these people who like this is part of the big thing about Numenor is like Soran was like why can't you live forever right like why can't you have the gift of the gods and be elves and be something that you're not right like fighting against your knee or like

something that you're not something that you're I love that I just think it's fascinating that Tolkien is like maybe death isn't the worst thing maybe our strive for immortality our striving to be remembered our striving to have eternal life is actually the thing that is the worst death of all because we are kind of like ruining our soul to survive yeah you're ruining your character yeah that's a really good and I yeah when we first read that line about men being gifted with death it was just such a counterintuitive and interesting way to put it I honestly don't even know if I've seen a book that has done I don't know it's it's interesting yeah I think a while ago we kind of talked about like what sort of heritage like what elements of Tolkien have been taken and propagated in like common fantasy yeah and that wasn't one of them yeah cuz it's in some element it is right but just in the element of like oh you're right evil human sorcerer wants to live forever of course that's pretty classic yeah but the idea that that death is a gift for humans is yeah controversial I would say still

this dimes back into we talked a little bit about Tolkien this is early on I think in like who he was as a person in his heritage part of me wonders is this a philosophy that he feels like he had to adopt after seeing World War 2 and all of the death and the pain and the carnage and thinking maybe there's something worse than death and maybe that's losing who you are as a person

and also the opposite thought of maybe there's a hope after maybe there's a hope and he keeps it a mystery in this book we don't know I don't think does it say anywhere like we don't know what happens to men after they die

then yeah certainly don't know yeah and the elves don't know and since the story is about the elves I think it's focused on less but we don't know and it doesn't seem like anybody in the book knows either yeah so I kind of love that he doesn't talk about it it's just one of these great mysteries that is left open yeah and it just it makes the world feel

fleshed yeah it feels it feels very relatable because you know we have no way at this point of escaping death right where we're not immortal and so to have a world where other people are are battling with that I think I even saw an interview with him I don't know if this is possible it was like maybe a reading of one of his letters and he said the main theme of Lord of the Rings is death he said that's what I'm writing about is death and I thought yeah wow that's not like that's not what I was getting from his writings at first I went first glance but that's ultimately his theme is death

and I thought that was so interesting it always makes me think of that quote between Daniel Finnpippin yeah I have it up so I'll just quote it yeah but it's that moment in the movies where they're sitting in ministeria hearing everything going down it says Pippin I didn't think it would end this way dandolph end no the journey doesn't end here death is just another path one that we must all tape the grain rain turtans of this world roll back and all turns to silver glass and then you see it white shores and beyond a far green country under a swift sunrise yeah so that is as close as he gets to describing what what is hoped for after death and honestly that's all you need because if you think about it I mean this is dandolph who has died yeah he can tell you pretty explicitly what's going on after death because he was sent back yeah and that's another interesting theme that was pulled off very effectively because you know for something that has been transmitted into other fantasies is alright here's our dandolph character and they're dead yeah because now we need we need the hero boy to you know rise up and and you know yeah become independent right man all made sense it's the heroes journey but in this case dandolph is sent back and he's resurrected and there are not very many resurrections that I can think of in fantasy at least nothing that doesn't feel like actually the author just pulled a punch here yeah you know it feels very meaningful for dandolph I like her a lot but yeah that's another element that like that I guess that's the main water means but so to wrap it back around I you know what we don't see any resurrections in the cylinder really and so it must have been a rare thing like the only one we have is dandolph right so that must be a very rare

thing and then the thing that Baron and Luthian kind of their contract

right true Luthian had to go and and negotiate and negotiate whereas I think man way on this one was like nah you're not done you're back in play

is it even man way don't you think it was a reluvator oh it might have been

I assumed it was actually can man way reinstate players I don't know I think you're right that might have been a this might have been a move above his head

yeah exactly and it's like that's almost works because it's like Dane you are you gotta go back you are not done yeah imagine that you're dying you're like yeah I did it I'm done and then God is like no sorry yet back into the frying pan but powered up but powered up I guess you're powered up yeah that's fair

yeah I think that is such a strong theme and in his writing and I guess the last thing on my list which is something that's kind of obvious but I love talking about is like the idea of kind of great things happening from small people yes and I think also and I love this quote from the movie like when Frodo's like I wish the ring had never come to me and Gandalf's like so do all who see such times but like that's not for us to decide all that's we have to decide is what to do with the time that's given to us and I really feel like that's what you see consistently in his writing in the books but also consistently in his writing in the summer and where not everything goes the way that you might want it but the people who you know are good and true are our our work in their hardest are doing the best and they're making a difference like you're

saying and there's a resilience and there's a reason it is interesting that in the end it is small little things it is it's really the small little things it's the fact that Frodo remembers Dolem's name yeah that is one of the most pivotal points and he hears it once from Gandalf yeah you know he easily could have like disliked disregarded it yeah all these little things but they take forever to build up yeah right

you only see a snippet from your perspective you're not seeing the full picture

only until the very end when it finally has added up and the rain is in the fire yeah yeah and we've talked about this before one of my favorite things darn it this is also not Silmarillion though but the summer and sets the scene for it yes thank you you've rescued me one of my favorite things is how Dolem is the reason that the rain goes into fire that Frodo ultimately failed yeah I think that is such a crazy ending to a book where the theme is that you know the wheat are here and will I forget the quote that you came out of with Gandalf like the wheat will sometimes confound themselves when the wise are faltering yeah exactly and man Dolem is the weakest character

character wise physically actually he seems kind of strong

physically strong morally weak I would say yeah and it's just interesting it's such a bold choice and I feel like throughout the Silmarillion he makes other bold choices like that when Feanor does the tinsling yeah that was a bold choice I was not expecting things to go that far that quickly yeah yeah instances like that obviously the turn-turn bar stuff in a better version of boldness like Luthien and Baron their plan just being like we're just gonna walk in and take to the Silmarillion yeah

like crazy we're gonna do it because they're driven by by by by love and not not fear or

covetousness they were not afraid yeah or yeah I they were not afraid

I also think you just reminded me of something with everything you're saying that I think is perfectly portrayed probably at the beginning of the summer and when Morgoth is about to do all of his craziness right and he says I want to go off I want to create I want to have power and influence over people and I think he gets my art yeah he gets a message from a Louvitar and I think it might have been through man way I can't remember but a Louvitar basically says he's like you can go and you can do all of this but no and recognize that whether you do good or whether you do ill it's all going to bend towards my ultimate plan for my creations right like you can go and you can you can choose to do you can choose to be evil if that's what you choose to be and choose to have an impact on the world but you should know that everything is going to bend towards my ultimate plan and which is

good which is another strong message yeah that's like a very hopeful message there is evil in the world you are not going to root it out yeah and I think that is a very clear message every time that evil is like defeated in any fashion there's always some little paragraph afterwards where it's like yeah so they defeated the evil and yet there were still orcs in the country and evil little spiders everywhere

and I saw spider the other day and I was like oh when can we get rid of these but like that's also a powerful message to the good where it's like there is always going to be evil in the world you're not going to eradicate it you need to learn

to survive it essentially

and that it might all bend for good

right that could come out of this yeah in the long run things are going to be fine yeah yeah I thought

it's a very hopeful message it's very hopeful and I think that's kind of what he paints with a simile rillian that's kind of what he paints with lord of the rings and yeah I just I went into it thinking it was going to be really heavy and not not probably not everyone's and maybe not my cup of tea and I'm just impressed as always so yeah

well I am feeling super smug and accomplished like I said I'd say every time like I can now look for the simile rillian in the eye when it sits on my shelf yes love that for me I

also love that um yeah an incredible read so grateful you came on this journey with me Lydia thank you so much and yeah just so grateful we had this opportunity to record and read this together

yeah so happy and good luck to everyone who is reading because you finished the recordings you can start now I know

we will continue with deep dives and maybe some watch alongs maybe we do some read alongs with the books we'll see but

we're very happy to be done with the simile rillian piece okay yeah perfect you you