Tea at Trianon: Who Is Arwen's Mother?

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, December 7, 2021

Who Is Arwen's Mother?

They should make a movie just about Celebrian. From GameRant:

In the book, it is depicted as a green stone in the shape of an eagle, as opposed to the white gems of the necklace Aragorn treasures in the movies. With it she gives Aragorn these words: ‘This stone I gave to Celebrian, my daughter, and she to hers, and now it comes to you.’ and overjoyed, he replies: ‘O Lady of Lorien, of whom were sprung Celebrian and Arwen Evenstar. What praise could I say more?’ Thus, the mother of Arwen is revealed to be Celebrian, Galadriel and Celeborn’s daughter, making Arwen their granddaughter.

This also provides somewhat of an explanation as to why Celebrian is not mentioned in the Lord of the Rings films. Within the adaptations, there is no link between Lothlorien and Rivendell. They have no geographical proximity, as Rivendell is in the north, near the Bruinen river, and Lorien is further south, just beyond the city of Dale. The Misty Mountain range (which can be explored more in The Hobbit film adaptations) lies between them, and there is very few examples of direct contact between the two realms in the movies, for example, Galadriel, potentially the most powerful elf in Middle Earth, does not attend the Council of Elrond. To introduce the connection between the two realms via Arwen’s family tree is arguably too complicated to fit into the limited running time, and not relevant enough to have been one of the key points of the story as it pertains to Frodo being the ring bearer, and the journey to destroy the evil Lord Sauron. (Read more.)

Galadriel and the law of choice. From The Catholic World Report:

Galadriel’s story is part and parcel of a prominent theme in Tolkien’s mythological world—what might be called the law of the choice, not so much expressed as depicted in events, starting with creation. Early in The Silmarillion, we find angelic beings assisting their Creator with the Divine music that brings the physical universe into being. Here, radical freedom is introduced. The Creator’s angelic beings aren’t passive observers but are invited to active participation in the creation event. When Melkor adds discordant notes to the creation music, the Creator does not eliminate those rebellious notes; rather, allowing them to remain and then introducing melodies that bring new and unexpected beauty out of those discordant notes. Likewise, elves and mortals participate in the ongoing creation of their lands, and things of beauty such as the Silmarils.

The law of the choice affects not only the person making the choice but cascades to countless others, including those apparently innocent of the choice. In our own world, how disordered choices produced wars, slavery, Auschwitz. Or when a maimed and wheelchair-bound woman who is heroically living what Saint John Paul II called “The law of the gift” is still affected by the choice made by the woman who’d intended her abortion, the choice of the doctor who performed the abortion, the choice of the man who rescued her from a dumpster, brought her home and, with his wife, raised her as their own daughter. (Read more.)