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on celegorm and lúthien (their love or "love", politics)
Lúthien, who is discovered by Celegorm’s hound while fleeing through the forest, reveals herself shortly after to Celegorm and he seems thus:
For reference and comparison, Beren is just the same:
So Lúthien is beautiful and loveable, and it happens fast but I don’t think we may say it’s trivial bc of how quick it is; because if you said it isn’t genuine of Celegorm, at first, you would need to say it’s also not genuine of Beren.
Celegorm is a prince of the Noldor, and he is also called the fair and we know the Eldar care much about names and naming — he is also a son of Fëanor and one of the most proud. And he’s in love now. And he would believe, for all his great qualities ( and I mean the truly great, besides that damning Oath he swore and losing Himlad he still has a lot going for him; maybe even more now because he’s taking Nargothrond ), that Lúthien would love him too, of her own. That she would see him as a prince and herself as a princess, to rule whatever realm together. That he would only need to charm her away from thoughts of Beren. Indeed his motivation is his own love.
Lúthien, I think, does not find Celegorm and Curufin as her captors until she is at Nargothrond, and they don’t let her from the room they’ve given her (.......they didn’t just... chuck her in an actual prison cell). This is where The Silmarillion diverges into its final form from drafts, and where I go back to the drafts for my own portrayal and understanding of the story.
Celegorm withholds from Lúthien for reasons that are not yet his motivation to stay her, but because he doesn’t wish to reveal what he knows of Finrod’s and Beren’s quest — neither to her, nor the people of Nargorthrond — because all that he knows but hasn’t said is his claim to blame.
In the Lay of Leithian — even more than in the Silm — it’s Curufin who immediately and more so than Celegorm puts forth politics.
------ You can say Tolkien’s concept for (Elven) marriage is very catholic and over-the-top idealized, but, for the Eldar, I tend to agree in a way because they are idealized beings to begin with. We have sex that supposedly does not happen without marriage, and so if you boil it down to sex = marriage (both ways even) it’s kind of a krass idea, but here in rp I’ll take it for my own portrayals at least. For that reason, and for the reason that the “spiritual” in all of Tolkien’s legandarium, but again especially among the Eldar, is so greatly empathised, I tend not to agree with the concept of arranged/forced marriages (for political goals, etc.) being known or practiced among them. Because even the seemingly most basic , yet most important thing — conceiving a child — among the Elves, needs conscious effort from both mother and father; in theory there are no accidental pregnancies or children from rape or other deception. And so, no arranged marriages in the most traditional sense — of parents choosing partners for each others’ children, regardless of love — would even come to fruition; among Tolkien’s elves there’s just no good reasoning for it. ------
But, even so, didn’t Celegorm and Curufin seek to force Thingol to give Lúthien’s hand to Celegorm??
Yes, yes they did... but Thingol and not Lúthien herself:
They would have sought to force Thingol to let Lúthien marry in the same sense that Beren sought his agreement, if he brought the Silmaril.
And they, Celegorm and Curufin, surely thought that Celegorm may win Lúthien’s love — were convinced that his great qualities would win her in time — so that only her father would be the one actually pressured.
------ There is Curufin’s brief interaction with Eöl, where for once, thank you very much Pengolodh, he gets out looking fairly a good character and not a mere villain; Curufin, for his part, does not accept Eöl as kin because he forced Aredhel and had no blessing from her father either. So he — and presumably Celegorm just as well — find this important. ------
And might not Lúthien, if she married, and married if Thingol received a Silmaril, at least marry someone who held a claim to them? A son of Fëanor?
Alas, they were too frikkin haughty and Lúthien loved Beren, and not Celegorm. And Thingol took their word sent to him as a threat because he already had beef with the sons of Fëanor.
So Celegorm sought marriage to Lúthien out of love, not politics ( Curufin a little more so; who might have thought in his own way that he could convince Lúthien marriage to his brother would be best for her ), at least at first, and wanted to seduce her, not force; but she did not forget Beren.
For reference and comparison, Beren is just the same:
So Lúthien is beautiful and loveable, and it happens fast but I don’t think we may say it’s trivial bc of how quick it is; because if you said it isn’t genuine of Celegorm, at first, you would need to say it’s also not genuine of Beren.
Celegorm is a prince of the Noldor, and he is also called the fair and we know the Eldar care much about names and naming — he is also a son of Fëanor and one of the most proud. And he’s in love now. And he would believe, for all his great qualities ( and I mean the truly great, besides that damning Oath he swore and losing Himlad he still has a lot going for him; maybe even more now because he’s taking Nargothrond ), that Lúthien would love him too, of her own. That she would see him as a prince and herself as a princess, to rule whatever realm together. That he would only need to charm her away from thoughts of Beren. Indeed his motivation is his own love.
Lúthien, I think, does not find Celegorm and Curufin as her captors until she is at Nargothrond, and they don’t let her from the room they’ve given her (.......they didn’t just... chuck her in an actual prison cell). This is where The Silmarillion diverges into its final form from drafts, and where I go back to the drafts for my own portrayal and understanding of the story.
Celegorm withholds from Lúthien for reasons that are not yet his motivation to stay her, but because he doesn’t wish to reveal what he knows of Finrod’s and Beren’s quest — neither to her, nor the people of Nargorthrond — because all that he knows but hasn’t said is his claim to blame.
In the Lay of Leithian — even more than in the Silm — it’s Curufin who immediately and more so than Celegorm puts forth politics.
------ You can say Tolkien’s concept for (Elven) marriage is very catholic and over-the-top idealized, but, for the Eldar, I tend to agree in a way because they are idealized beings to begin with. We have sex that supposedly does not happen without marriage, and so if you boil it down to sex = marriage (both ways even) it’s kind of a krass idea, but here in rp I’ll take it for my own portrayals at least. For that reason, and for the reason that the “spiritual” in all of Tolkien’s legandarium, but again especially among the Eldar, is so greatly empathised, I tend not to agree with the concept of arranged/forced marriages (for political goals, etc.) being known or practiced among them. Because even the seemingly most basic , yet most important thing — conceiving a child — among the Elves, needs conscious effort from both mother and father; in theory there are no accidental pregnancies or children from rape or other deception. And so, no arranged marriages in the most traditional sense — of parents choosing partners for each others’ children, regardless of love — would even come to fruition; among Tolkien’s elves there’s just no good reasoning for it. ------
But, even so, didn’t Celegorm and Curufin seek to force Thingol to give Lúthien’s hand to Celegorm??
Yes, yes they did... but Thingol and not Lúthien herself:
They would have sought to force Thingol to let Lúthien marry in the same sense that Beren sought his agreement, if he brought the Silmaril.
And they, Celegorm and Curufin, surely thought that Celegorm may win Lúthien’s love — were convinced that his great qualities would win her in time — so that only her father would be the one actually pressured.
------ There is Curufin’s brief interaction with Eöl, where for once, thank you very much Pengolodh, he gets out looking fairly a good character and not a mere villain; Curufin, for his part, does not accept Eöl as kin because he forced Aredhel and had no blessing from her father either. So he — and presumably Celegorm just as well — find this important. ------
And might not Lúthien, if she married, and married if Thingol received a Silmaril, at least marry someone who held a claim to them? A son of Fëanor?
Alas, they were too frikkin haughty and Lúthien loved Beren, and not Celegorm. And Thingol took their word sent to him as a threat because he already had beef with the sons of Fëanor.
So Celegorm sought marriage to Lúthien out of love, not politics ( Curufin a little more so; who might have thought in his own way that he could convince Lúthien marriage to his brother would be best for her ), at least at first, and wanted to seduce her, not force; but she did not forget Beren.