Silmarillion Book Club

[PlainDealingVillain]

Clearly, an Hour is four hours.

[DanielH]

Or it’s an inconsistency either between different canon books or between canon and Lintamande’s world; the Silmarillion spends so little time in Valinor wth the Trees that it’s hard to be sure.

[Nemo]

I think Sauron stuck around managing Angband after the Valar destroyed Utumno, so he never had to hide his political affiliation. The glowfic version has him in Valinor but I think that's just because it's cooler this way? Alternatively it's not really that hard to hide things from Valar.

Elves have to go to Mandos, and it might not be instinctual that once dead you go west. Maybe after Orome made contact Mandos got a wave of terrified spirits? This is obviously the origin of the word, fëar. (Not really.)

[jalapeno_dude]

FYI in case anyone is looking for pre-existing in-depth discussion of the Silmarillion and doesn't mind it in audio format: there are recordings of a course/podcast here which seem pretty interesting, though I haven't actually listened to them. The same person has done equivalent courses on LOTR, Unfinished Tales, and 6/12 of HoME so far; see here. I have listened to the first several Unfinished Tales lectures and they've been really good.

[DanielH]

It seems to me, based on the Silmarillion’s account of the rescue of Maitimo from Angband, that Manwë didn’t send an Eagle specifically to aid the rescue, but that the Eagles were already present. Findekáno also cried out for help right before shooting, which is why an Eagle turned up then.

This makes a lot more sense than what I’d previously understood of the glowfic account:

• No echo of their lamentation needed to pass over the mountain; help was already there
• You don’t need a near-infinite air speed to get there from Valinor if you’re already present
• Why then? Well, because that’s when he asked for help. And, since he was sneaking around in magic darkness, that might also be the first time the Eagle saw him, although any explanation that relies on eagles of any capitalization not seeing something is suspect.

Manwë or Thorondor could definitely still have been more helpful, but it wasn’t quite as bad as I’d thought.