Discussing: Writing canon wives
Writing canon wives
Deborah
Message: 3547
30 Jan 03 10:40 PM
Original Post
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Message: 3547
30 Jan 03 10:40 PM
Original Post
General Audience
Read-Only
I've been working on a Nerdanel story for a while. We have a little bit of information about her - that she was the daughter of Feanor's teacher, and a great artist in her own right, creating both abstract and very realistic art. We also know that she wasn't particularly beautiful. What we don't know is why she married Feanor, what finally drew her to leave him, and (most interestingly to me) what happened to her after she left him, and after he left Valinor. In trying to imagine her character I find myself mostly working off of Feanor - trying to imagine what sort of woman would be good for him.
Is this off topic? If not, I'd be curious to hear about the ways people go about developing personalities for canon wives - Finduilas, Rosie, Celebrian, etc. - and how you keep them from going Mary Sue in a bad way.
Deborah
Re: Writing canon wives
I'm probably the last person to have any qualification on this issue, but I am naturally a theorist
Empathy, not sympathy for characters I think, is the best advice for writing, especially for fanfiction to prevent the infusion of the author into the character, which already happens enough in a normal story. But that's a given.
I'm writing a short Hallacar/Ancalime fic at the moment, and I'm cheating, trying to write in the objective POV.
For dangerous subjects such as Feanor, I create an OC(or OC with canon name) to tell the story instead of participating in them. Remember that Mandos? That was me, Miriel was not me.
I have some opinions regarding Nerdanel however, a lot actually, but I don't think you asked for them...
In trying to imagine her character I find myself mostly working off of Feanor - trying to imagine what sort of woman would be good for him.
Good for him? The thing is, I don't think she was good for him in the long run. She may be wise, but would stubborness akin to Erendis ruin their supposedly perfect elven marriage, I think so.
She was the best avaliable for him, the most like him probably. They were young when they married according to my interpretation; something holds them together.
I shall desist now.
Ah Feanor....you know, I have a 25 chapters planned for N/F that I'll never finish
. It's been in my hardrive for at least a year.My best wishes to you, hopefully Nerdanel and Feanor are cooperative for you than for me.
