altariel: (Default)
altariel ([personal profile] altariel) wrote2004-03-02 04:19 pm

I was adored once too

From [livejournal.com profile] thrihyrne, via [livejournal.com profile] fileg and [livejournal.com profile] windswept1:

My other writing friends: I invite you to share with me your top 5 phrases of your own stories that you adore. Sentences, short paragraphs, one particular image or feeling that you think you captured perfectly and you are proud of...



From The Burial of the Dead: Denethor on the pyre looking into the palantír

Thirty years gone; a boy with a sword and a boy with a book; quick as a river and keen as a flame, possessed of a spirit that is not mine.

I like this because all four of them are in it.


From The Sickle of the Valar: Denethor again

Grief, he observed, had form; absence had presence. At its end, her life had been light, feather-like, a wisp waiting trembling for the cut. Sheared, he had made for her a monument – white slabs of marble levelled in unequal remembrance of her brittle beauty. In death, she had taken on the presence, and the permanence, of stone.

Although it does make me sad.


From The King's Shilling: Faramir to Gandalf

‘Take this with you on your journey, lord,’ he said. ‘For this is our final parting, is it not?’

The old man nodded.

‘And should you ever, in that bliss, happen to look upon it – remember us, the men of Minas Tirith, who chose, in the end, to be your willing pawns.’


This one makes me sad too.


From A Kind of Valediction: Faramir to Denethor

' - And I have a son,' he said softly. 'And not a tomb.'

And this...


From A Game of Chess: Aragorn to Faramir

'Duck,' he said.

But this one makes me laugh.


[identity profile] altariel.livejournal.com 2004-03-02 12:04 pm (UTC)(link)
That one from The King's Shilling really does me in, I have to confess. I think it's because I don't often put the Men I write about alongside the immortals who knew them, by writing about Elves or wizards, etc. I know this is what's really at the heart of Tolkien, but I just find it too bloody miserable to contemplate too often, to be honest.

[identity profile] glitterboy1.livejournal.com 2004-03-02 02:55 pm (UTC)(link)
You're right, it *is* miserable, from just about every point of view.