[ SECRET POST #2209 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2208 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 06 pages, 121 secrets from Secret Submission Post #316.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Eh, having just re-read the Silmarillion and read the first few chapters of The Hobbit (and having read LOTR years ago), I'd say the Elves are definitely portrayed as perfect in the books too. Or ... maybe not perfect, but certainly generally just better. Beautiful, ageless, speak the prettiest languages, unaffected by power-hunger or greed, immortal unless they die of violence or heartbreak, great singers ... I doubt the Elves would pass a Mary Sue test! =D Many of them look down on humans and consider them power-obsessed, foolish and kind of creepy for aging or becoming sick and dying.

(I still love them. I think it was the languages I fell for.)

Then again, these books (except maybe The Hobbit) are supposed to be thought of as translations from the original Quenya or something, right? What I mean is, they're written as the Elves' own stories, so of course they're not objective descriptions of the peoples of Middle-Earth.

[(Anonymous)]

Pretty sure Bilbo wrote The Hobbit or There and Back Again and Frodo wrote The Lord of the Rings (except for the epilogue which Sam wrote) but they're both pretty pro-Elf so very not objective at all.

[(Anonymous)]

You think elves in the Silmarillion are portrayed as perfect?! But the Silmarillion is full of elves making a total hash of everything because of power-hungriness and greed!

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

First of all, I meant to say the text more or less says they are perfect, but then shows something very different. Second, could you give examples? I totally agree with you on elves making a total hash of everything, but I'd point to other traits than power-hunger and greed as the cause. Arrogance, say, and envy, and pride, and an obsession with beauty.

[(Anonymous)]

Wait, you just reread the Silmarillion and still think Elves are portrayed as 'unaffected by power-hunger and greed'? Or that their being immortal is the better option in the long run? Return your copy now, you've been robbed, some pages must been missing. A lot of pages.

[(Anonymous)]

Nonononono! I think the elves themselves believe they're better than everyone else. And I think Tolkien might have thought so too, but I'm less sure of that.

The text also says over and over that humans want power so badly, and the dwarves are heavily implied to be pretty greedy (in the last chapter, about the Third Age and the Rings of Power, it's said that the Dwarf rulers were better able to withstand the corrupting power of their rings than the human kings, so it didn't turn them into tyrants (or ringwraiths), it just made them greedier. (I suppose this is what happened in the backstory sequence in the Hobbit movie?) But virtually nothing negative is ever said about Elves, which suggests we're meant to think they aren't greedy or power-hungry.

And, you know, in a way I could almost agree. As a race, Elves don't have all that much in the way of power games (court intrigues, for instance), and they don't tend to collect riches as a goal in itself. It's just that they're so hung up on BEAUTY, the end result is pretty much the same. Once you've read even a couple of chapters of the Quenta Silmarillion, the idea of Elves being all flawless and perfect seems pretty laughable.

Don't even get me started on the immortality thing. It's supposed to be this ~gift from Eru Ilúvatar~, but it entails disease, aging, only getting to stay in Middle-earth for a comparatively short time, and having absolutely no clue what happens next. It also sets them apart from the Elves and the Ainur, and keeps them from going where they'd be protected from Morgoth and Sauron - the land that's also the home of the Ainur. The Elves (and the text) seem to think the humans should basically STFU and stop worrying and whining, but it also says outright that the Elves were creeped out by humans catching diseases and growing old in less than a century. I imagine the haughtiest Elves would see humans as something along the lines of, say, sickly talking chimpanzees with the lifespans of hamsters.