#spanish tolkien society

[arwendeluhtiene]

✨🍃Tolkien throwback🍃✨ Ent-woman, inspired in the Dryades from Classical myth (2013). This drawing was published in the Autumn 2013 edition of the Estel magazine (the binnual magazine of the Spanish Tolkien Society). . . 🎨Media: Graphite . ✨References: Some anatomy references for the pose. .

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[thatscarletflycatcher]

The other day we were chatting with some friends about how so many English-speaking female novelists of the 19th century were daughters of clergymen (Austen, the Brontës, Gaskell, Alcott...), and I joked about Catholicism eliminating the pastor daughter trauma via celibacy, and it opened an illuminating conversation to me.

Someone argued that the comparative lack of female novelists in the Hispanic world would be a consequence of women having less access to education compared to the English speaking world, which I don't feel is at all true; by keeping and allowing religious life for women (which was self organized economically and culturally, and lead to some abbesses to be pretty powerful even in a political sense) many of them were able to reach literacy and become authors.

And surely it was counter-argued that nuns wouldn't be allowed to write novels, and that reminded me and made me consider in a new light the literary tradition in the Spanish language (keep in mind that, while I'm not completely ignorant on the topic, I'm also not an expert and I'm making generalizations because I'm grasping with certain undefined ideas).

So, the basic thing is that romance in the Spanish language begins with poetry. A good part of the early Spanish poetry is called romance because it's written in romance language; and while a part of it is epic (like the song of Mio Cid) or of religious tone (The Praises of Our Lady, by Gonzalo de Berceo), a lot of it is romantic and erotic. And that's more or less the same situation to the Spanish Golden Century; from poetry to theater, which is written in verse, there's just a step, and there you'll find romance stories like Lope de Vega's Peribáñez and the Commander of Ocaña.

Meanwhile the Spanish novel is focused on theses, satire and customs; Don Quixote is satire as a spoof of the French Chilvalry novels; The Blind Man's Guide of Tormes is costumbrist satire. Later on the bulk of the Spanish novel will be the thesis novel: a novel written to demonstrate an idea about people, ethics, or society. When you think about it, the fairytale as a genre is basically absent from Hispanic literature; there isn't a corpus of the Spanish fairytale the way you can argue for the German or the French or even the British. The closest it gets in Spanish is the fable, and adjacent proverbial-metaphorical writing like Count Lucanor (this is due to a mixture of heavy Arabic and Jewish influences mixed with classic Greek culture).

As a side note, yes, an argument can be made for pre-columbine myths and legends, but those aren't really Hispanic, are they.

And this is all what is called Spanish Realism. Until Hispanic literature collides with the boom of the English language novel (and Verne on the French side. Can an Italian elaborate about Italian lit? Because I was thinking about how Salgari, while being on the same wavelength as Verne, doesn't have such a pronounced interest in sci-fi, and heavily leans on the adventure side), the fantastical is basically non existent, and when it is present, it's framed as unsettling and disturbing, a sensation that something is wrong (I'd argue this is even the case for Magical Realism later on). Romance, on its part, remains tightly tied to poetry.

So, ultimately, to track an equivalence with the English speaking female author of the 19th century, you should look for its Hispanic counterpart in female poets.

But also it is a curious thing that a language that has a whole specific mode to talk about possibility and fantasy, would be so deprived... of fantasy. Maybe it's English itself which, by lacking an extensive language to talk about it in everyday life, ends up having it burst in literary writing. In a way I feel it explains to me my own inability to get into fantasy and sci-fi, as either a reader or a writer. My enjoyment of Tolkien is mainly about his prose, poetry and themes, while I'm mostly uninterested in the worldbuilding. It's not that I think there's anything wrong or that I intellectually dislike about fantasy or sci-fi. I just don't vibe with it. And maybe it is that my brain grew fed within the Hispanic tradition, and is more or less set in that mold. Which big if true.

[booksandwords]

J.R.R. Tolkien by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara. Illustrated by Aaron Cushley.

Age Recommendation: Early Primary Topic/ Theme: Creativity, Writing Setting: Britain Series: Little People, Big Dreams

Rating: 4/5

I really like Sánchez Vegara's take on Tolkien's life. She does allow some of the dark to show, the moments that most impacted him. I was a little surprised that his complex but famed connection with C.S. Lewis isn't mentioned at all (🦁🌲 let's see who gets that reference) though seeing the TCBS (Tea Club, Barrovian Society) is as good. It may be better in a way because their impact on his life is more important when you try to prioritise them in order of formativeness. It does handle the darkness in Tolkien's life well the childhood deaths of his parents and the WWI deaths of his boyhood friends in particular. It includes all the most important parts of Tolkien's life including the tender age at which he created his first language 'Naffarin’ (based on Spanish and Latin), the joy his books gave people at the time and the endlessness of The Silmarillion. It does exclude the complicated nature of his relationship with his beloved Edith, but how do you explain that to children? It is all around a very good story, well targeted and not skimming over dark aspects. But...

One big thing I need to note, the thing at stopped this from being a five-star book for me. There is some inconsistency in the amount of time it took him to write Lord of the Rings. The core text says 12 years, while the two-page biography at the end says 17 years. While it appears to be a cardinal sin in what is a biographic piece. It appears the number can be 12 for the actual writing or 17 between beginning writing and publication (taken from The Tolkien Society timeline of the author's life). While it should have been consistent throughout the book knowing these numbers I'm not so concerned about the confusion, but it did take a few minutes to find this information, to confirm that both numbers are correct.

Cushley was a fantastic choice for a worldbuilder and creative soul like Tolkien. The colouring is a wonderful brightness, liveliness to the scenes outside and warmth to the scenes inside, especially by fire/ candlelight, Aaron Cushley has an eye for lighting. Cushley did a wonderful job of portraying the worlds away of daydreaming, the long hours and details of linguistic study and does of course find a way to include a hobbit (*I'm going on an adventure* 😄). The emotion seeping from the post-WWI scene is done well, I particularly appreciate the near featureless faces on that page. It gives me slight shell shock (the period-appropriate term for PTSD) vibes. Something someone else picked up in the illustrations that I did not is the handedness. Tolkein is drawn left-handed, I can't find an answer online as to J. R. R. Tolkien's actual handedness. A note on the cover... I like the inclusion of the one ring on the cover. A symbol of the world for which this man is most widely remembered. Of all the illustrator subject pairings this is one of the better ones with such brilliant capturing of the tone that was needed for Tolkien.

[arda-marred]

One hundred years ago today, four young men convened in an English town, not having seen each other for some time. What makes this trivial event significant is that one of them was J R R Tolkien, and the four comprised his first ‘fellowship’, the TCBS – a group with a profound impact on his youth and on his legendarium. This reunion, on 25 and 26 September 1915, was the last time the four met before they were separated, permanently, by war.

Read more

[tlaquetzqui]

Watching videos about the Amazon Wheel of Time, by fans of the books. Now their total disregard for Tolkien is a lot less surprising. Tip for YouTubers reviewing this type of shit: don’t pussyfoot around what you want to say, when you give spoiler warnings. Say it: “Not that you can ‘spoil’ carrion.” You’ll feel better.

The worst one is some girl, her accent is probably a Romance language but I can’t tell if it’s Italian or Spanish or some smaller thing. She sees the trailer and she’s super enthusiastic, innocently happy to see a work she loves adapted. And then she gets more and more disappointed and hurt by each episode, till at the end she’s just a ball of pain. It hurt to watch.

Apparently they didn’t only make the tiny isolated villages nobody ever leaves be super ethnically diverse, without having them be rabid segregationists—which is the only way small isolated communities don’t quickly all round out to one phenotype. That is but a trifle, an hors d’oeuvre before a feast of shit.

They:

Aged up all the characters by about half a decade.

Made the goofball twerp into a philanderer who steals from women he sleeps with. In, again, a relatively small community where word would get around fast. There wouldn’t even be many women who’d sleep with him at all, let alone women who wouldn’t have heard about stuff going missing. How many unattached women willing to knock boots with some rando do these writers think there would be, in a small village society?

Gave a character a wife he didn’t have in the books, because, again, teenagers. Then they kill her off in gruesome fashion to try to be edgy. (Apparently someone at Screen Rant claimed to be a fan of the books but then said “That might fly in the 1990s but not now, because Women in Refrigerators™”—homes if you’d read the books you’d know she only even existed now, step off.)

Had a character who has a family, instead be a Moses-style foundling, and deprived her of a very notable tic.

Decided that the prophesied dealy that’s always a man can be male or female. Just in general they fucked with the gendered aspect of the setting’s magic system, something even I know about. And I can only name one book in the series (The Eye of the World), and only because they name dropped it a lot in the videos.

Delayed the entrance, then utterly drab-ify, the clown dude. And not let him teach the two guys to play instruments, and earn their lodgings.

Removed the dumb inquisitor guys’ insignia and had them send people to someone they actually hate for medical care.

Turned a treasure room into a pile of trash.

Had the protagonists build a bunch of fucking bonfires while being chased by what amount to greenskins crossed with beastmen. Which is suicidal foolishness.

Had the noncanonical wife show up in her not-widower’s nightmares as a zombie getting her guts eaten by wolves.

Utterly drab-ified the nomadic people who are apparently described as wearing like “so many bright colors it hurts”.

Cast a woman described as “tall and beautiful” with a startlingly homely actor, of average height or less. She’s also gotta be pushing fifty, and her order actually basically never age due to their magic. (Canonically you can catch them in disguise because they have young faces with old eyes.)

Also they killed off one of the members of that order, her or one of the others I wasn’t paying attention, when she’s supposed to live for at least a few more fucking books.

Had characters in scenes they would never be allowed to be present for.

Deleted a male clan elder from the nomad people so they can make them a matriarchy. He’s also supposed to be a guy that controls wolves that were apparently still included in an episode even though they now make no sense.

Added a bunch of child murder, cannibalism, and evisceration, just to be edgy. Also a bunch of combat.

Put whole towns and inns that don’t exist and remove ones that do.

Removed entire romance plotlines.

Added hamfisted supervillainy to characters that were clearly already pretty one-note. Also added some weird exploitative stuff (if you think a work can’t use something to titillate while also portraying it as bad, you are unacquainted with the “women in prison” genre).

Shoehorned in a lesbian romance not only out of nowhere but between two women who fucking hated each other, whose respective branches of their order had hated each other for 2000 years.

Turned a no-nonsense tactician who rules as a mother figure into a power-tripping petty tyrant and a vindictive sadist. Though it’s been suggested the showrunner (taking bets now for how long before he’s accused of sexual harassment or worse) thinks this egotistical bullshit is a strong woman, rather than a monstrously weak and pathetic one trying to hide it.

Decided that platform shoes were sufficient to portraying a giant, and gave him honestly some of the most amateur-hour, “BBC pre-Doctor Who reboot” makeup I’ve ever seen.

Rushed through important plotlines from the book, to give more screen time to a different lesbian scene involving one of the characters from the previous one. Who is straight in the book. With a bondage-y subtext because the other woman in the second one is that power-tripping asshole from before.

Changed how the fast-transport magic statues work, fucking over the giant guy’s people to no purpose.

After the actor playing "former goofball turned larcenous philanderer” left, apparently because he didn’t want to get the COVID shot, they put in multiple monologues about what a bad person his character was. Which he was but nobody noticed till the actor left, which is to say the writers don’t know they wrote him as a reprobate, they’re just lashing out at the actor for displeasing them.

Gave a character the ability to defeat a demon creature that haunts the transport-statue network, because Girl Power™ (possibly just “we wanted to shoehorn in a fight no matter how little sense it makes”—likely both), where in the books the only way to survive is to get the fuck out of Dodge.

Changed a wooden city built into a cliffside, with roofs designed for dealing with snow, to a stone city in what looks like a subtropical desert with nary a cliff or mountain to be seen. Also made it a star fort with no artillery. Which is like a tank without a gun.

Changed the reason the protagonists go to the eponymous Eye of the World, from investigation to directly confronting the villain. Also kept a character from going there even though it’s his homeland. And he, a tracker and woodsman who’s been guarding one of those mage ladies for a decade, has to be told how to track his own liege by a goddamn farmgirl.

Changed a character’s power from seeing auras around people that seem to mean something like “something important is gonna happen to you” to having actual specific visions. Probably just for plot convenience, because her real power allows less exposition per scene.

Apparently rushed the development of the main guy’s power and the introduction of an artifact by like four books. There are fifteen of these fucking things, guys, if you’re worried about getting to them all maybe do a better job on the first one.

Randomly had the main guy go through another character’s backstory. Only for him it was the present. Because…who the hell knows.

Apparently forgot the only people with magic, with one exception, are members of that order. So it makes exactly zero sense to have a member of the order ask other people that can use magic to help them: they’re all already members, dumbass. (Oh wait, apparently they made the queen one herself. Which she is not.)

Failed to understand how a chokepoint works. In a battle that doesn’t exist in the book but is clearly intended to rip off Helm’s Deep.

Made characters repeatedly do stupid shit nobody would, just to make other characters look better when they do the not-stupid things. Which on the rare occasions they’re actually using the book, is usually something the turned-stupid character actually did.

Spent a significant portion of an episode getting a box out of a place it’s not supposed to be. Because moving containers (which are clearly empty) is good television.

Had a like group-spellcasting thing that apparently doesn’t exist, at least not like that. I would have to see the effect play out in realtime (for which I would have to watch the show, so…) to be sure, but at least one person says the spell they cast like this was clearly copying visual beats from Thor in Wakanda in…whichever of the last two Avengers movies. Which I can easily buy between “let’s force this PG-rated story to be The Next Game of Thrones™” and that Helm’s Deep shit. (Also I did see the spellcasting itself and it really does look like the Ark of the Covenant melting Nazis.)

Had an avatar of the setting’s ultimate evil, who is apparently not even encountered yet, get easily outwitted by a moderately skilled ordinary mage.

Had the main guy fake his death and infodump things he would not know.

Had the one mage, the one randomly inserted in multiple lesbian scenes, lose her power somehow.

Had someone who died come back to life, which is absolutely forbidden by the setting’s rules.

Basically, Rafe Judkins decided to deliberately fuck up his adaptation, motivated by vaguely ideologically-rationalized malice. Which is not surprising, given that a former Survivor contestant who wrote a few episodes of second-rate shows would not be put in charge of something like this on merit. He was put in place because he greased the right palms and kissed the right asses, and mouthed the right platitudes. He may be the most evil of these vandals yet, which is saying something; the sheer glee with which he deliberately ruins something people love is amazing to behold.

On the other hand I’m going to see if I can get my hands on the books, since apparently there’s a lot more there than I thought.

[wumingfoundation]

Morning Star, A Novel by Wu Ming 4. English translation, full text, downloadable.

Morning Star [Stella del mattino] is Wu Ming 4’s first solo novel, originally published in Italian in 2008. Since then, it has been translated into Spanish (Estrella del alba, Acuarela, Madrid, 2012) and French (L’Étoile du matin, Métailié, Paris 2012).

The novel’s main character is Thomas Edward Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia, the British liaison officer who during World War I fomented and accompanied the Arab revolt against the Ottoman Empire. From that experience he drew a ponderous memoir, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, first written in Paris in 1919 and then rewritten between 1919 and 1921, during his stay in Oxford.

Morning Star takes place precisely in that time frame and in that city – with some flashbacks to Arab-Middle Eastern scenarios, since Lawrence’s story is also a sort of prism through which to observe the events of the birth of the Middle East as we know it today.

In that same period three other WW1 veterans were also in Oxford. They would become quite famous in the years to follow. Robert Graves was already publishing poetry, as an exponent of the so-called War Poets. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was a member of the staff of philologists working on the Oxford English Dictionary. Clive Staples Lewis, known as Jack, was the youngest and most “complicated”. In the second half of the 1920s he would become Tolkien’s colleague and friend.

Morning Star recounts their encounters – friendly or conflicting, intentional or fortuitous, real or imaginary – with T. E. Lawrence, a very ambiguous and multifaceted character, as well as the first modern pop star, who inspired essays, novels, documentaries and films.

Salwa Khoddam, writer and founder of the the C.S. Lewis and Inklings Society (CSLIS), and Maurizio Vito, a scholar in contemporary Italian literature, translated the novel into English, out of pure passion for its multiple subject matters, with no contract or professional obligation towards any publisher. We decided to make their translation available to our readers.

Download page.

[manuscripts-dontburn]

The Ship of Dreams: The Sinking of the Titanic and the End of the Edwardian Era

Author: Gareth Russel

First published: 2019

Pages: 423

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 4 days

This is a beautifully written account of the Titanic which concentrates on a handful of selected passengers and delves into their pasts, feelings and how they lived after the tragedy. It has enough new information to engage those who already have read on the subject (like me), and it takes time to dispel some of the popular myths and contested theories. The only thing which I slightly minded was the fact that from time to time the attempts of painting the picture of an era the reader is actually taken away from the Titanic for far too long and so the narrative is disrupted. But this happens mostly in the first part of the book. The story of the sinking and its immediate aftermath are done a very respectful and moving manner.

My Dark Vanessa

Author: Kate Elizabeth Russell

First published: 2020

Pages: 384

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 7 days

This was a really difficult book to go through. So much about it is so messed up, so disgusting. And through it all, though Vanessa herself never admits it, it is a cry for help which so many girls and women have sent into the unfeeling world, which still does not care.

Seduction: A History From the Enlightenment to the Present

Author: Clement Knox

First published: 2020

Pages: 516

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 8 days

First of all: this book does not cover the entirety of human civilization, in fact, it only starts with the era of enlightenment. And if you are only after the discourse on seduction and sexuality, you might as well only read the last portion of this book. However, if you like engagingly-written accounts of interesting people (in this case chosen as representatives of ever-changing stances on the question of seduction), you might enjoy it as much as I did. True, the author sometimes goes into such details that have very little to do with the original topic, and I was also surprised that the focus was pretty much only heterosexual, but overall I found this interesting, well-written and food for thought.

Little Lord Fauntleroy

Author: Frances Hodgson Burnett

First published: 1886

Pages: 320

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

How long did it take: 1 day

Soooooo The Secret Garden is one of my absolute favourite books and I also loved The Little Princess, but this book.... is really boring and ridiculous simply because the kid in the centre could never exist. Also, poor people are to be PITIED, but also HATED when they want something. Or was that not the message?

Brontë's Mistress

Author: Finola Austin

First published: 2020

Pages: 320

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 3 days

This was.... fine. It is well researched and read very easily.... it does make Lydia Robinson into a real, flawed human being (still unlikeable though).... but on the whole it did not excite me in any particular way. I did not understand Lydia´s fascination with Charlotte at all, in fact all of the references to the Brontë sisters, besides Anne being the governess, felt rather forced.

The Hobbit

Author: J. R. R. Tolkien

First published: 1937

Pages: 374

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 17 days

This was a re-read. I loved it of course. Utterly charming.

The Pull of the Stars

Author: Emma Donoghue

First published: 2020

Pages: 304

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 2 days

Three days on a small maternity ward for pregnant women afflicted by the Spanish flu. On one hand, it does move very slowly and goes into great detail. But for all the relative "shortness", this story is full of intense emotions. Meticulously researched, it also offers a grim, but fascinating view into the reality of an ordinary Irish woman at the end of the WWI. After I have finished, I needed a long, deep breath to calm down everything I was feeling. What else can I say?

Sea Prayer

Author: Khaled Hosseini, Dan Williams

First published: 2018

Pages: 48

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 10 minutes

A cry for help made of painful words and stunning pictures. A cry for humanity. A silent cry. No less heartbreaking for its quiet tone.

The Other Bennet Sister

Author: Janice Hadlow

First published: 2020

Pages: 655

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 13 days

What a wholesome, comforting book! It is very respectful to the original Jane Austen novel, draws and builds upon it and always managed to stay true to the atmosphere and nature of it. It is not plot-heavy and is more of a character development story, but that character development is truly wonderfully done. Janice Hadlow lets Mary Bennet bloom!

They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South

Author: Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers

First published: 2019

Pages: 320

Rating: ★★★★★

How long did it take: 3 days

Though some of the points are repeated over and over again, this is an excellent book both as a source of learning and engaging reading material. It is also painful. And necessary.

High Society: The Portraits of Franz Xaver Winterhalter

Author: various

First published: 2016

Pages: 256

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 2 days

This book is made stunning simply by featuring a vast number of Wilterhalter´s paintings. It is hardly a detailed exploration of his life or development as an artist, but it gives a casual admirer of art enough information to create an image of him as he was and as he worked. I especially appreciated that the descriptions of every painting included a life story of the sitter. All in all this book is a tribute to Winterhalter, a beautiful gallery of portraits and an introduction to some of the most prominent members of the high European society of the 19th century.

Sin Eater

Author: Megan Campisi

First published: 2020

Pages: 304

Rating: ★★★★☆

How long did it take: 2 days

This book has the most intriguing premise, presents a little known but fascinating institution of sin-eaters, is heavy on atmosphere and above all is compulsively readable. The constant theme of death and dying is handled with great respect but could be too much for more sensitive readers. What the book needed though was some more editing. Certain thoughts and sentences appear way too often and lose their meaning, becoming more annoying than powerful. And I swear that the word "mayhap" constituted like 20% of all of the vocabulary used.

Just Send Me Word: A True Story of Love and Survival in the Gulag

Author: Orlando Figes

First published: 2012

Pages: 352

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

How long did it take: 20 days

I feel kinda bad giving this book mere 2 stars, but I would like to point out that it is not the story, but the overall presentation of it that made this book an unpleasant chore. The whole time I was reading I kept having the same thought: This book should have been an edition of selected letters with explanatory footnotes, not a "proper book". Considering the 75% of the text ARE the letters anyway, the writing by Orlando Figes usually just jerked me out of the story and frankly seemed redundant. Interesting subject and admirable main characters, whose love and devotion is inspirational, but somehow still not a good book.

All My Friends Are Dead

Author: Avery Monsen

First published: 2010

Pages: 96

Rating: ★★★☆☆

How long did it take: 5 minutes

Gave me a few chuckles and was cute. Nothing deep about it though.

[aeternalswirlingfight]

(English below) Nuevo post en el blog! Pilar Erika y yo trabajamos en una traducción al quenya para la edición de invierno del 2020 de la Estel (nº 94, pp. 41-46), la revista de la Sociedad Tolkien Española (STE). Tradujimos unos fragmentos de uno de los poemas de Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, la poeta y escritora mexicana del siglo XVII que se hizo monja para poder escribir, y que, a pesar de la sociedad tan patriarcal y jerárquica en la que le tocó vivir, era tanto una feminista subversiva como un ejemplo de persona LGBT+ histórica. Nos lo pasamos muy bien en este trabajo, ya que combina varios de nuestros temas favoritos: El feminismo y la visibilización de mujeres en la historia, Tolkien y los fandoms, las lenguas raras e inventadas, y la traducción .                    ................................................................................

New blog post! Back in 2020, fellow Tolkienite and feminist Pilar Erika and I worked on a Quenya translation which got published in the Winter 2020 edition of the Estel (no. 94), the biannual magazine of the Spanish Tolkien Society (Sociedad Tolkien Española, STE). We translated excerpts of one of the poems of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, a 17th Century Mexican nun who was also a subversive feminist and LGBT+ poetess and writer. We had a blast with this work, as it combines some of our favourite topics - feminism and herstory, Tolkien and fandoms, rare and invented languages, and translating .

[humble-boness]

About Us

Refer to this post to know what the blog is about !

Skye: Hi guys I intend to be unknowable unless the posts are consumed (this is literally why I don’t dare to call this blog studyblr)

Study: 1st year Master in Psychology (the Netherlands)

Nationality: Viet

Interest: critical thinking, psychology, programming, writing, reading

Language I speak: Viet, English, barely Dutch

Language I want to eventually speak: Dutch, Czech, French

Goldfish: I’m pretty sure if you are a stalker you would find out who I am in a matter or minutes. But here is my attempt to be a fellow GenZ- 

Study : 2nd year of undergrads in Phil of Science and Health, Society, and Policy 

Nationality : Taiwanese/American 

Interest : Cosmic Horror, Making anything unnecessarily philosophical. 

Languages I CAN speak : Mandarin, Mingnan, English 

Languages I wanna speak : Spanish, German, and ELFISH (Tolkien)

[rosellaortiz]

Full Name: Rosalynn Orm Tolkien (Riddle)

Nickname/Alias: Sweetie, Jellyfish, Jelly, Orm, Rosa, Tol, Kiki

Meaning: In German Baby Names the meaning of the name Rosalyn is: Compound of 'horse' and 'snake'.

Orm; Snake

Origin: German

Title: Miss, Lady.

Pet Name: Dove, Tater Tot, jelly bean

Signature: Rosalynn Orm Tolkien

Gender: Female

Gender Role: feminine

Orientation: Panromantic Asexual

Real Age: 13

Age Appearance: Younger

Birthday: October 31, 1995

Deathday:

Birthplace: Malfoy Manor

Astrological Sign: Scorpio

Zodiac Sign: Pig

Hogwarts’s house; Slytherin 

Patronus; Grizzly bear, snake.

Immediate Family: Foster mother; Johanna Tolkien

Distant Family: Malfoy Family

Parenting: Johanna was a little bit of a strict and fun-loving parent.

Upbringing: Treat people how you want to be treated.

Infancy: Dropped, only made to turn into a Horcrux.Besides that a very good baby.

Childhood: Member of the order found her alone in a house. Took her in. Great toddler. Johanna raises her and adores her

Adolescence: Will figure it out.

Adulthood: Will found out

Coming of Age: When the minster of magic had to explain who her birth parents are. Around 11, before starting Hogwarts.

Evolution: She was a very bubbly and happy girl before becoming paranoid and scared people will figure out who her birth parents are.

Species: Human

Ethnicity: British

Blood Type: Blood Rh-null

Preferred Hand: ambidextrous

Facial Type: Heart

Eye Color: Heterochromia iridium, Silver/white(Right), Blue/teal(left)

Hair Color; Black (poliosis(near the front of head))

Hairstyle: tight Curly

Skin Tone: Pale

Complexion: pale

Makeup: Some. Mostly eyeliner and eyeshadow. Chapstick.

Body Type: Hourglass

Build; chubby thigh,

Height: 4'11"(149.86cm)

Weight: 122 IB 

Cup Size: 23 B

Shoe Size: 37 EU

Birthmarks/scars: Birthmark behind the ear. Childhood injuring scars.

Distinguishing Features: Long Eyelash and poliosis, heterochromia iridium.

Health: Good health(Seeker of Slytherin's quidditch team), has an undetermined sickness

Energy: Depends on the days.

Memory: Pretty good memory.

Senses: Needs glasses. Eyes are awful. Everything is good.

Allergies: None.

Handicaps: Glasses

Medication: None

Phobias:

Autophobia; fear of being alone

Claustrophobia; fear of confined, crowded space.

Aphenphosmphobia; fear of being touched.

Addictions: Coffee, 

Mental Disorders: Depression, Anxiety.

Style: Casual

Mode of Dress:

Grooming: Well-kept

Posture: Good Posture.

Gait: Medium speed, hold up high.

Coordination: Fit enough, incredible flexible

Habits and Mannerisms: Tapping her nails against table or tights. Bits lip.

Scent: Strongly smells like lavender and honey.

Mood: Mostly a good mood.

Attitude: Friendly. Sometimes bitchy.

Stability: Not too bad.

Expressiveness: Hides emotion.

When Happy: Hums, sing draws

When Depressed: Write, listen to podcasts, cries to sleep. Writes to her mom.

When Angry: ignores everyone, Screams into the pillow

Current Residence: Hogwarts

Community: Purebloods 

Family: Foster mother; Johanna Tolkien

Birthmother; Bellatrix Lestrange

Birthfather; Tom Riddle

sister; Delphni Riddle

cousin; Sadie Black

Pets/Familiars: Munchkin cat(black), Rottweiler.

Wardrobe:

https://www.pinterest.com/Pan_Rosella/rosalynns-outfittolkienhp/

Equipment: Wand

Accessories: Glasses, Serpent tempter pendant, silver intertwining snakes, serpent snake, elven ring fem leaf ring, ear piercing.

Trinkets: serpent tempter pendant.

Funds: wealthy.

Home:

Neighborhood: high and mighty.

Transportation: Horse and cart, flow fireplace, brooms

Collections: Rocks, crystal

Most valuable possession: serpent tempter pendant.

Prized Possession: elven ring fem leaf ring.

Lovers: doesn't have a crush at the moment.

Marital Status: Single

Sex Life: non-existent

Type: N/A

Position: Sub

Plays: Don't know yet.

Fetishes: None yet

Virginity; still one

Element: Water

Occupation: Three Broomsticks

Work Ethnic: Likes her jobs

Rank: Bar Maiden

Income: don't know

Wealth Status: Upper

Experience: Helped her mother in the cafe /bakery she owns in the muggle world and wizardry world.

Organizations/Affiliations: none

Education: Pretty good

School: Hogwarts

Grade: perfect marks

Special Education: almost a perfect

Social Stereotype: meh

Intelligence: Linguistic

Extracurricular Activities: Quidditch team, Duelling club.

Religion: Pagan

Morals: Everyone is a person no matter how small or big someone is.

Crime Record: No crime record. Does well with the ministry of magic.

Motivation: Family, friends, love

Priorities: First; family

Second; love

Third; friends

Philosophy: "Everyone is born a blank canvas, overtime we fill that canvas."

Etiquette: Great manners

Culture: Taking off shoes before entering a home, allowing the guest to eat first.

Traditions: Sits with family.

Superstitions: Four-leaf clover, Knocking on words. Don't open an umbrella inside.

Main Goal: Getting through school.

Minor Goals/Ambitions: making friends, win the quidditch game.

Career: Teacher at Hogwarts

Desires: people to just along

Wishlist: new broom

Accomplishments: yeah making it on the quidditch team as the seeker.

Greatest Achievement: Getting on the quidditch teams

Biggest Failure: not protecting her cousin.

Secrets: She has an older sister, tom riddle, and Bellatrix is her birth parent.

Worries: losing teddy or her mother, and her cousins.

Best Dream: becoming a caretaker of mythical creatures

Worst Nightmare: birth father coming back or her older sister breaking out of Azkaban

Hobbies/Interests: Hiking, camping, gobstones, watching(quidditch, wizard chess) Archery, running, geocaching, astronomy, gardening, drawing, flower, baking, bread making, quilting/crocheting/knitting, journaling, podcast hosting.

Skills/Talents: sing, drawing.

Likes: Plants, candles, coffee, sweets, audiobooks/podcast, potions, herbology, gardening, care of mythical creatures, storms, thunderstorms, drawing, bubble baths, Asian food.

Dislikes: unorganized, low hungry, her birth parents, people who compare her to her "parents" or sister, history of magic.

Sense of Humor: Dark, sarcastic

Pet Peeves: Slow walkers, noisy eater, Full mouth talker, couples who sit next to each other(instead of across from each other) in a booth, knows-it-all, 

Quirks: Unique eye or hair, sleeps with a stuffed animal.

Strengths: Good listener, calm under pressure

Flaws: Blunt, callous, cursed, flirty, klutz, overambitious, paranoid, soft-hearted, jealous.

Perception: there is some much to help chang     

Lures: kind people

Soft Spot: kids, muggle-borns.

Cruel Streak: family gets hurt

Powers/Abilities: controlling dark matter, snake talk

Origin: born with it.

Source: emotions

Ability: still don't know how to control it fully.

Weaknesses: family, friends, sketchbook/sketchpad

Immunities: can't feel the heat, pain

Restrictions: can feel pain if it is overbearing

Favorite Colors: Purple, teal, black.

Favorite Animals: wolf, sharks,

Favorite Mythological Creatures: Dragon, basilisk.

Favorite Places: Diagon Alley

Favorite Landmarks: Eiffel Tower,

Favorite Flavors: Strawberry, Blackberry.

Favorite Foods: Asain food, 

Favorite Drinks: Cold ice tea/coffee.

Favorite Characters: Hagrid,

Favorite Genre: Horror, fantasy, D&D, thriller, 

Favorite Books: "IT", "The Shining", "The Adventure Zone"

Favorite Sports: Quidditch

Favorite Stores: Wesley joke shop

Favorite Subjects: Flying class, potions,

Favorite Numbers: 25

Favorite Flower; Monk's Hood, Muscari, Lotus, Tea rose.

Languages: English, French, Spanish, German, Scotland.

Accent: British.

Voice: soft and confined

Speech Impediments: Smoothly,

Greetings and Farewells: Bonjour

State of Mind: Doing okay, paranoid.

Compliment: Je suis étourdi par votre beauté

(I am stunned by your beauty)

Insult: Tête de noeud

(Knothead)

Expletive: Casse-toi

(Fuckoff/bug off)

Laughter: Giggles mostly.

Reputation: Well behavior, great manners

Compliments: Great listener, pay attractions, sassy.

Insults: the good of nothing half-blood, daughter of killers

Self-Impression: Hates herself

MBTI Personality Type: ISTJ

Enneagram: Logistician

Ego/Superego/Id: society, and the idea of right and wrong.

Role: Leader

Symbol: Meadow of wildflower

[arwendeluhtiene]

'Int én bec/ ro.léic feit/ do rind guip/ glanbuidi/ fo.ceird faíd/ ós Loch Laíg/ lon do chraíb/ charnbuidi.' "The little bird / has whistled/ from point of beak/ bright yellow;/ throws out a cry/ over Loch Laoi,/ a blackbird from branch/ heaped with yellow (blossom)". Watercolour illustration of the titular blackbird of this 9th Century Medieval Old Irish poem (October 2022) 🍀🍃🐤✨ This watercolour appeared in my published article translating this Old Irish poem into Quenya in Estel 99 (Summer 2023 edition of the official magazine of the Spanish Tolkien Society).

✨ArtStation: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/Nyk54N ✨Blogger: http://aeternalswirlingfight.blogspot.com/2023/10/quenya-translation-aiwe-int-en-bec.html

[meldelen]

Olvidado Rey Gudú - A review

“En ocasiones, cuando se embriagaba, Sikrosio decía cosas extrañas. Señalaba al Norte, y murmuraba: «De la Selva, llega el misterio». Indicaba después hacia el Este: «De la Estepa, la destrucción, el fuego, la muerte...». Luego, volvíase hacia el Sur: «Del otro lado de las Lisias, el sueño, lo imposible..., y la mentira». Por fin, con voz donde latía una misteriosa tristeza, señalaba a Occidente: «Y de más allá de las tundras, el olvido».”

Here goes, finally, my re-reading of this classic of Spanish fantasy. How, don’t you recognize it? Not even the author? Shame. Olvidado Rey Gudú is the masterpiece - and more than that, the life-lasting work - of an author who was the third woman to occupy the RAE, winner of the Cervantes Prize, member of the Hispanic Society and nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature. She has a thousand more awards, which are explained for one reason only: her prose is perfect. Difficult, but perfect. And she provides a combination that until now I have only seen in someone like Tolkien: merging fantasy, that genre so reviled by high literature, with a perfect literary technique.

Yes, I don't understand why some people compare her to George R.R. Martin - or even hinting that she should have learned from him (!?!?). It's the other way around. The only person with whom this author can be compared is with Tolkien himself, and it is not a trivial comparison, because the old English Professor and father of the genre was equally exquisite, refined with his prose; and like him, Matute makes her words sing, and also her words hurt, sometimes making you reread a paragraph again so you can try to figure out where that wound came from.

Now, if what you are expecting is a pleasant, fast paced book, full of swearwords, tits and dragons, then this is not Olvidado Rey Gudú. This book, which took her a lifetime to write, her life work, tells of the rise and fall of the fictional Olar dynasty, in the imagined kingdom of Olar. It is a considerable thick book, but until beyond the middle of the book, it reads very fast and very well - if you are in the habit of reading! Because nowadays it seems that books have to be easy to swallow, like a liquefied porridge...

Kingdom of Olar, location of the events.

Thousands of characters pass through your eyes, each one more endearing than the previous one, although caution, Olvidado Rey Gudú does not provide a happy ending, nor does it have a happy beginning or development. Only the title is a song to melancholy. The book is melancholic. A child of war, with her childhood shattered, Matute suffered in the flesh of a writer and in inspiration the trauma of the Spanish Civil War, which had her Muse dead rather than alive for most of her life - and still she managed to write what she wrote! Thus, you do not have before you a story that tries to convince you, but the author writes for herself, how she wants and what she wants, without bothering to be logical, without fear of being misunderstood, because it is not easy to understand what you are reading. 

Several topics you cross with this book: memory, oblivion, loss, hatred, cruelty, ill-fated love. Most of her characters - particularly the males - are absolutely hateful, and most of her characters - particularly the females - behave incomprehensibly. There are magical and strange events that the author will not bother to explain to you, because explanations are superfluous; and it is here where the book becomes difficult to digest. There is no purpose, it is not intended to show you anything. Lean out and read, and don't ask for more.

Each character is unforgettable in their own way, but Queen Ardid manages to out-stand, probably her favorite character, the orphan girl who grew up among vineyards accompanied by a goblin (Trasgo) and a sorcerer (Hechicero), and wise as she was, devised the perfect plan to take revenge on her father’s murderer; marry him and become the queen of his kingdom. However, her wisdom played a trick on her by deciding to extirpate - magically, it is understood - the heart of her only son, Prince Gudú: incapable of love by such a spell, it will take years for Ardid to discover that she has created a monster. But she will find out, and she will regret it.

Press note with the last edition, including illustrations and new notes.

Around this monster that is Gudú a mesh of characters is articulated, and which, to a greater or lesser extent, will be victims of his monstrosities. To highlight, the Princess Tontina and her magical innocence, his cousin, Predilecto, with more shape of a king than Gudú himself precisely for his ability to love; Ondina, fairy of the waters, who in trying to love and understand humans will forge her own annihilation - just like the goblin himself - and many other characters who suffer the terrible decision of Ardid, without even knowing why or how.

The ending is devastating, because no character survives the monstrosity, except Gudú, who is punished, without understanding why, to contemplate the collapse of his kingdom in oblivion, that kingdom that cost him a whole life to build and lacks purpose when everyone who filled it is gone. Thus, the author constructs a tribute to the melancholy of loss and how the lack of love, or the inability to love, is the greatest of the mutilations.

Olvidado Rey Gudú is a lyrical, symbolic, literary tale that more often than not doesn’t pretend to relate concrete events, but build allegories - even the author's intention is seen when she grants her characters names as curious as they are symbolic, and she laughs at herself through Ardid and Gudú.

That is why it is so difficult for many people to read this book, so they call it boring and hard to go through, and that is why, I am afraid, it has never been translated into English or popularized, not even in Spain; which seems to me a terrible crime, considering the literary height of its author. But since I don't want to be a pushy snob either, I have to admit that the book itself becomes difficult to follow more or less at the height in which the characters of Tontina and Predilecto, who grant us the most beautiful love story, disappear.

Quote from the book. Illustration: Àngel Lluís Sànchez.

In short, a masterpiece, difficult, strange, hard to read, but a masterpiece after all. We have had the privilege of meeting a Spanish Tolkien, and we have not recognized her, because we are not up to such a narrative. Hopefully one day we will be.

As for the rest, I recommend it to fantasy lovers who are not afraid to face a challenge. In the end, the journey pays off, albeit a painful journey, with no reward in the end; a personal testament of the same author and the time she had to live.

[aelaer]

☕ Wakanda, controversy? Paradise? Unrealistic? Need-to-visit? What about their politics, what do you think about it? The way the ruler is chosen, or their view on outsiders? Or really just a comment on the Black Panther movie, if you so wish. xD

There's an ask I've been meaning to get to for a while but I can't be bothered to get my computer right now and I can't save drafts of asks on the phone. So here's one on the fly.

Anyway the actual ask. Note that I know absolutely nothing about Wakanda in the comics; this is all based on what we've seen in the MCU and what I know from history and current events.

Controversial: Not to me. They had the right to hide from the rest of the world. I don't think any one country "owes" other countries in the facet of technological development. Are individuals/organizations nice enough to share their medical and technical developments? Yeah, all the time. But no individual or country owes it to the world. I'm pretty big on countries retaining their own autonomy.

(Though ideally every government wouldn't be severely oppressing or mistreating their people. That'd be a nice world, wouldn't it? But we can't just... blow up every oppressive government. The States tried during the Cold War- though replace oppressive with communist- and that turned into a complicated, messy clusterfuck with unexpected consequences that the world's still feeling today 50-70 years later. Yeah it sucks that people are suffering, but when the West tries to police the world it all goes to shit. I don't have a good answer to this problem, I'm afraid.)

Paradise: I doubt it. Every country has problems, whatever they are. Every country has people who are rich, poor, healthy, sick. They're certainly one of the best, if not the best, well off in the MCU's Africa at least. Because they hid their technology so much their GDP must have been in the toilet before they started their outreach programs and (potentially) selling vibranium for silly high prices. I'd be interested in seeing what their tourism department post-reveal looks like; it's possible it's as strict as North Korea, which has its own downfalls.

I think I'd be most interested in Wakanda helping out stable and relatively corruption-free African countries with steady democracies in developing a solid infrastructure to grow from. It's hard to develop as a society when you don't have plumbing and electrical grids. Wakanda could help with that, and teach the much-needed infrastructure jobs needed to sustain such a life. From there, it's significantly easier to actually work on other quality of life issues, such as education and health. (When it comes to African charities, I'm always looking for those that teach the populace and support infrastructure as that's what will help in the long term).

Unrealistic: North Korea demonstrates that such a closed-off country is not unrealistic at all. Combine that with their cloaking technology and border guard and they're set. That said, like North Korea, it'd be harder to maintain in the 21st century.

Need-to-visit: Depends on the individual's interests and their tourism policies lol.

Wakanda politics: Not sure how long the system got choosing a new ruler will last in the 21st century onwards, especially as a battle of strength doesn't allow female victors due to the physiological differences between men and women. It seems like a tradition that will eventually die out as gender roles become more equal with the passage of time.

View of outsiders: I imagine it'll turn into something like Japan, which remains one of the most homogeneous countries in the world and quite stringent in who they give citizenship to. Citizenship to others will not be wide spread, if permitted at all in the first couple decades. But Japan's opened up very much on the tourism side of it; it might just take Wakanda a couple decades to get to that level of tourism.

Black Panther film: Fantastic film. Definitely top 3 antagonists (though the morons on Twitter who agreed that it's totally okay to kill people based on what some of their ancestors did really missed the point of the film). But he was sympathetic, though like I said, he very much embodies "the end DOES NOT justify the means".

Really loved all the actors. Tickled me that Andy Serkis (who've I've met, he's so awesome) and Martin Freeman were the "Tolkien white guys". I saw this in theaters in Spain actually, and I wasn't bothered by the Spanish subtitles at all (as I went for original English voiceover naturally!) Chadwick Boseman was an inspired casting choice. Shuri is the perfect role model. Brilliant writing and direction from the team.

Hmm. This got longer than I thought it would be.

[script-a-world]

Submitted via Google Form: Is it possible for a (kinda) isolated civilization to got a industrial revolution? This civilization spread around a whole continent with various resources: grain, wood, minerals, etc. Has different ethnic groups (principally separated by zone: north, center and South). The government it’s like a federal monarchy (I don’t know if that’s really a thing or not), that means that exist a central power but there are principles (is this the English word for the government of a prince? If not I apologise, English it’s not my first language) or provinces (specifically on the North and the South of the continent), that rule and regular their own lands, but answer to the king.

Also, this civilization has a long history, but had not a bronze age crisis (or a similar thing to). I don’t know if that can affect the technological development or not. Although the civilization has its dark ages that after motivated cultural, social and technological changes. They have a cultural capital in the South, where art and science are cultivated. Even there are sapient people of other continents. Reading and writing are beginning to spread around all social classes, but maintains the majority on nobility and sacerdotes.

Also, a civil war would stop or accelerate the industrial process or not?

I apologise for the large of my questions. But I tried to give you the more information I could.

Tex: It is indeed possible for an isolated civilization to have an industrial revolution, though they might follow a different path to it. I will get to explaining some particular nuances of that sort of “revolution” in a bit, but I would like to address some other things in your question first.

Federal monarchies are a thing, albeit rare, and usually constrained to theory because of the difficulty in real-world execution of the idea. Lands governed by a prince are called principalities in English, though sometimes also princedom (following the same -dom rules as kingdom).

The Late Bronze Age collapse - if that is to what you’re referring to? - is a dark age unto itself, and rather the opposite in terms of societal effect to a technological revolution. The causes and timing of a dark age will calculate the breadth and depth of impact to your society; in general, the more momentum a society has in terms of culture, science, and international relations, the more impactful and difficult it is to recuperate from a dark age.

“Reading and writing are beginning to spread around all social classes, but maintains the majority on nobility and sacerdotes.” What is the history behind this? Has the literacy rate risen gradually and steadily, or has it been irregular, marked by various events that would preclude a regularly increasing rate of literacy? If literacy has been restricted to the noble and religious castes, why so? Has your society had a Carolingian Renaissance before its industrial revolution?

The interesting thing about industrial revolutions is that they are built upon previous technological and scientific leaps - Wikipedia’s timeline of historic inventions parses them by era, and hopefully is available in your native language.

One of the main points of the eponymous Industrial Revolution is the shift from hand production to mechanical production. Electricity factored into this only at a later step, so it was not truly necessary to kick-start the first era. There are in fact many industrial revolutions (we are currently in our fourth), and I would like to note that they often coordinate with renaissances, staggered as they are around the world.

A federal monarchy, in this instance, would function as a sort of microcosm for global patterns of dark age → renaissance → technological revolution. You mention that the South is the cultural capital of your society, and seems to house much in terms of institutional knowledge. This area, then, would be the nexus point of your society’s economy. Regardless of any isolationism, centralizing the innovative parts of one’s society makes it especially vulnerable to collapse in the case of, say, a civil war.

The Athenian coup of 411 BC during the end of the Peloponnesian War is a good example of this. While the Athenians briefly enjoyed a restoration of their government (Wikipedia), it was dissolved a short while later (Wikipedia). Athens remained a cultural center, possibly by habit, though it had lost what remnants of bureaucratic authority and autonomy it once had.

If all knowledge of technological innovation is cloistered within one area, and that area is besieged by a war - civil or not, then it will definitely set your society back by however many ages of knowledge lost. Fortunately, many real-word societies were sensible enough to create and distribute copies for the sake of preserving cultural heritage, functioning also as an excellent PR move to laud the benefits of their society for the sake of both conquest and trade.

Provided that neither city (like Roanoke Colony and the Land of Punt) nor continent become lost, some knowledge will always be retained and utilized if necessary. Technological revolutions impart the advantage of freeing up human capital from menial labor that would otherwise take up a person’s time and ability to contribute to society in a meaningful way, which is economically beneficial.

I am not very certain how isolationism would factor into this, but it would seem that maintaining some degree of separation in multi- and international politics would be advantageous in advancing one’s society in the pursuit of knowledge. However, should others find rumors of this advancement, your society may eventually be approached by potential allies or enemies.

If there is a civil war occurring while your society is approached by outside influences, please be aware that these others may take advantage of this instability, especially if there are natural resources compounding the value of your society’s human capital. There is also the issue of relative stratification of different ethnic groups, since you had mentioned it - if the schism is along ethnic lines, then there’s potential for others to ally themselves along those lines, exacerbating the conflict. Either way, there is likely to be moral grounds upon which the conflict is centered, and interference from outside groups has the potential to heighten and polarize tensions.

To quote the play Agamemnon by Aeschylus: “In war, the first casualty is truth.” No war is truly without a morality, which may quickly become propaganda, in order to sway the participating peoples. The importance you ostensibly give the South as a center of culture in the same question of dark ages and civil wars and technological revolutions lends to me the idea that something happens with it in your story. Are its relations with its neighbors healthy, or strained? Why so? Is it - or someone else - pushing for advancement at the expense of cultural mores?

J.R.R. Tolkien’s novels are often accredited the message of anti-industrialism (Wikipedia, Medium, Tolkien Gateway - Oxford section) and the perpetuation of the Merry England ideology. This is something your society might see during cultural upheaval, particularly if it’s caused by innovation that at first seems to run counter to their culture. The arts might take on a facet of this conflict, particularly in literature under the form of social and proletarian literature. Le roman à thèse is a particular subgenre of this literature, one which focuses on persuading the reader to agree with the author’s argument. Factory girl literature maintains similar themes, critiquing industrialization primarily from the perspective of Asian authors utilizing the factory girl archetype.

In terms of literature recommendations, I have two more to offer you: A Dream of Arcadia: Anti-Industrialism in Spanish Literature, 1895–1905 by Lily Litvak (ISBN: 978-0292741300) and

The Lives of Machines: The Industrial Imaginary in Victorian Literature and Culture by Tamara Ketabgian. Both detail the reactions of a culture during and after an industrial revolution, and what type of counter-culture arises from it.

I think it is possible for an isolated society to have an industrial revolution, but it would likely be on a smaller scale than a non-isolated society, and their efforts might more be on rehabilitation of their environment and encouraging a more profound and beneficial relationship with nature, rather than chasing the next generation of shiny objects and possible advancements in warfare.

A federal monarchy may present some unique issues with this setting, because of its comparatively rigid bureaucratic hierarchy and propensity to shatter along federation lines - which is where I think conflict is most likely to lie in this situation - and your society may not regroup under the same parameters. Most likely, all of this would follow a previous industrial revolution, à la the Progressive Era of the US/La Belle Époque of Europe.

Your worldbuilding seems to indicate a circumvention of New Imperialism and jingoistic foreign policy, so unless somebody comes knocking at your society’s door, this industrial revolution and civil war you have mentioned might be very toned down in terms of potential impact. A parallel of the Long Depression is still feasible, and might be a major contributing factor in your society’s civil war.

[teacupwriter]

Amnesk - constructed language

So, the lovely @nievesgarden recently asked me about the (sort-of?) conlang I’m developing for my historical-fantasy wip The Lost Country. I decided I’d better make a proper post about it, and share a bit of my process thus far.

You can get really detailed and go full Tolkien with a complete lexicon and all that. I chose to... not. My characters won’t be speaking or writing in my conlang for any extended amount of time (because then I’d have to translate?) and it’s not the focus of the story. But I think at least conceptualizing a conlang can enhance and deepen one’s worldbuilding, and they’re also super fun! So, yeah!

amnesk - overview

Amnesk is the dominant language of Amnexia: a tiny country hidden within the western Pirineus mountains, on my alternate historical-fantasy earth Terrus.

Amnesk developed as a sort of ‘sister language’ to Euskara, the language of nearby Basque country. (Which exists in real-life! It’s known as Vasconia on Terrus.) In real life, most linguists and experts consider Euskara to be the oldest living indigenous language in Europe. Unlike the languages of surrounding areas (French, Spanish, Catalan) Euskara did not evolve from Latin, and sounds nothing like any Romance language.

If it weren’t for the geographic (and later, self-imposed) isolation of Amnexia, Amnesk likely would have remained a dialect of Euskara. As it was, with Amnexia’s consolidation into a nation in its own right, Amnesk diverged from Euskara and became a fully-differentiated language. They sound similar - a bit closer than Spanish and Portuguese, or Spanish and Catalan. Euskara speakers would be able to understand Amnesk, and vice versa. But they differ structurally, and over the years most of their words have slipped apart by at least a syllable or letter’s difference.

predominant sounds: Consonants - ‘k,’ ‘s,’ ‘x,’ ‘p,’ and ‘t.’ Vowels - ‘eh,’ ‘ah,’ ‘oh,’ ‘ee,’ and ‘oo.’ Amnesk is a susurrous language, full of hushed, whispering sounds, peppered with hard consonants. It is soft, silvery, but not smooth like Spanish or French - it pops and clicks, like static. Their tongues are able to distinguish between ‘s,’ ‘x’ and ‘z’ in a way that non-speakers can’t.

lexicon: again, I’m not writing a dictionary or anything, but a few words have come up so far that I can share:

aika - father

amka - mother

aska - parent (gender-neutral, singular, can be made plural)

estera - pledge (see my worldbuilding pt. ii post for an explanation of the pledge tradition)

kenzin - empath powers, powers of magic perception

sorken - witch/magic practitioner

sorkenza - witchcraft (more specifically, ancient polytheistic religious practice through the use of magic)

basic grammatical structure: A typical sentence in Amnesk would sound, to an English speaker, a bit backwards. It takes passive voice to the extreme: [object] - [verb] - [subject]

It’s a bit more complex in practice: [subject pronoun/placeholder] - [object] - [verb] - [subject]. (Plus other variations which I’ll invent if necessary.)

Example: English - “Sarah walks the dog.” Amnesk - “She the dog walks Sarah.” The subject is often eliminated entirely, instead saying - “The dog [is] walked,” and the subject is inferred from context.

In most idiomatic Amnesk phrases, everything is being done to or through the subject of the sentence. (This is something I kind of stole from Spanish.) Especially because Amnexia is a society of empaths, they experience and express emotions as something acting upon them.

Example: English - “They felt sad.” Amnesk - “Sadness [was] felt [through] them” or “Sadness gave [itself] to them.”

informal/formal verb conjugations: In Amnesk, verbs are conjugated differently depending on who you’re talking to. This goes for all verbs, not just ones that relate to the person in question - if you’re telling a stranger, “The dog ran past me,” then the verb ‘ran’ is conjugated differently than it would be if you’re telling your friend.

gender neutral pronouns: In addition to male and female pronouns, gender-neutral pronouns are commonly used in Amnesk. (As in Euskara, objects and adjectives are not gendered.) Nonbinary and gender-fluid Amnexians often choose to use these neutral pronouns, though not always. *As a cis binary person myself, I welcome any input from nonbinary writers and worldbuilders on how to respectfully develop and include this!*

And to all reading this: I would be SO happy to hear any feedback you might have!! Questions, suggestions, constructive criticism - please reply, reblog or dm. Also, any other conlang folks out there? I’m such a newbie, I’d love to hear from people who’ve done this before! :)

[tag list under the cut]

Tagging all my The Lost Country people, in case you’re interested (I will not be offended if you aren’t haha, I know this is pretty technical/boring worldbuilding stuff): @cabaretofwords, @katiehahnbooks, @micastarsandmirrors, @violet-clouds-and-skies, @dantedevereaux, @el-norawrites, @scribble-dee-vee, @icechimaera, @pixel-sylveon, @missaddledmiss, @kittensartsbooks, @blackwatergold, @oceanwriter, @nievesgarden ♥︎♥︎

[liu-anhuaming]

book recommendations

literally no one asked for this but i love to read and i want to tell you about the best books i’ve read so let’s go. also, there’s no particular order to these

* means an absolute favorite of mine

updated feb. 5 2019

📖  the princess bride by william goldman *

📖  east of eden by john steinbeck

📖  the raven and the reindeer by t. kingfisher *

📖  the lunar chronicles by marissa meyer

📖  the bear and the nightingale by katherine arden *

📖  the abyss surrounds us by emily strutskie

📖  a criminal magic by lee kelly

📖  good omens by neil gaiman & terry pratchett

📖  foundling by d.m. cornish

📖  the hate u give by angie thomas

📖  human acts by han kang

📖  the four books by yan lianke *

📖  the mysterious benedict society by trenton lee stewart (this is my absolute favorite book if you read any book on this list please read this one) *

📖  the hobbit by j.r.r. tolkien

📖  reckless by cornelia funke

📖  where’d you go, bernadette by maria semple

📖  where the mountain meets the moon by grace lin

📖  the queen’s thief series by megan whalen turner *

📖  the raven cycle by maggie stiefvater 

📖  ella enchanted by gail carson levine

📖  the female of the species by mindy mcginnis

📖  dune by frank herbert

📖  the night circus by erin morgenstern *

📖  ...and the earth did not devour him (...y no se lo tragó la tierra) by tomás rivera (you can find a bilingual edition since it was originally written in spanish and translated into english and it’s super interesting)

📖  grimm’s fairy tales by the brothers grimm

📖  deathless by catherynne m. valente *

📖  the thief lord by cornelia funke

📖  the agency series by y.s. lee (if you love spies and historical fiction read this whole series)

📖 the master and margarita by mikhail bulgakov *

📖 heart of a dog also by mikhail bulgakov (both this book and m&m are satire about soviet russia and they’re excellent)

📖 the buried giant by kazuo ishiguro

📖 the man who spoke snakish by andrus kivirähk

📖 severance by ling ma *