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kaberett... as elaborated on specifically in yánasenesse | brief sanctuary, which has been gleefully tagged canon compatible ("you can install this fic without canon crashing and that’s what matters")
Notwithstanding the unarguable and fairly obvious fact that all of Fëanáro's children would have done better without him as a father, the thing that suddenly clicked into focus for me yesterday is that (curuwen's) Carnistir in particular would have been immeasurably better off as Nolofinwë's child.
(Note that for this post I'm largely using Quenya not Sindarin names for characters, where the Sindarin names are the ones that are actually used in the Silmarillion itself -- for Watsonian reasons regarding when the text was compiled and the point at which we received it -- which means that if you're reading this post with a background of Lord of the Rings and the Silmarillion but not the Legendarium as a whole this might be hard to follow. For its own Watsonian reasons yánasenesse uses Quenya rather than Sindarin. As you might recall from my vital functions posts, I've mentioned rereading the Silm for the specific purpose of reading this fic and I have taken copious notes and indeed drawn myself extensive family trees with names and etymologies in multiple language variants on them, despite having last read LotR and said Silmarillion in their entirety somewhere over 15 years ago, because I am familiar with this author's writing from other fandoms and I know that the amount more I will get out of the story having done this self-set homework will be totally worth the effort, but that doesn't mean anyone else has to! But it does mean you might want to pull up a list of names if you're just reading casually.)
I am thinking, here, of three passages in particular. In Chapter 11:
Also in Chapter 11:
And then, finally, in Chapter 13, also Irissë's point-of-view:
Obviously, the idea that somebody has to be The Best (Ever) at A Specific Thing to be Good Enough is toxic and damaging -- but even within that toxic framework, Carnistir had, I think, at least the potential to be uniquely and spectacularly good at logistics. Unfortunately for him, the rest of his immediate family -- well, even if they didn't exactly consider it beneath them, it was something they (in the ways that mattered for the overall dynamic) very much took for granted, rather than understanding and appreciating as skill and mastery in its own right.
Contrast with Nolofinwë's family, in which the people who Settle In To Do The Thankless Work are actually explicitly valued.
So there we go! A whole 'nother layer of completely avoidable tragedy! Exactly what the Silmarillion needed.
Notwithstanding the unarguable and fairly obvious fact that all of Fëanáro's children would have done better without him as a father, the thing that suddenly clicked into focus for me yesterday is that (curuwen's) Carnistir in particular would have been immeasurably better off as Nolofinwë's child.
(Note that for this post I'm largely using Quenya not Sindarin names for characters, where the Sindarin names are the ones that are actually used in the Silmarillion itself -- for Watsonian reasons regarding when the text was compiled and the point at which we received it -- which means that if you're reading this post with a background of Lord of the Rings and the Silmarillion but not the Legendarium as a whole this might be hard to follow. For its own Watsonian reasons yánasenesse uses Quenya rather than Sindarin. As you might recall from my vital functions posts, I've mentioned rereading the Silm for the specific purpose of reading this fic and I have taken copious notes and indeed drawn myself extensive family trees with names and etymologies in multiple language variants on them, despite having last read LotR and said Silmarillion in their entirety somewhere over 15 years ago, because I am familiar with this author's writing from other fandoms and I know that the amount more I will get out of the story having done this self-set homework will be totally worth the effort, but that doesn't mean anyone else has to! But it does mean you might want to pull up a list of names if you're just reading casually.)
I am thinking, here, of three passages in particular. In Chapter 11:
There were others at tables and benches set around the large open circle of the working tent, for there were many things that needed doing; and every so often Carnistir would stride in to add a flurry of activity around the tables doing the first steps of inventory, and then stride out again. He, at least, was in better temper than he had been lately, even if he was the only one who got any particular satisfaction out of simply counting and re-counting things he in some way possessed.
The tasks did not really need him, but Makalaurë had some time ago realized that, while he himself might not understand why his brother found being absolutely certain of these things by doing the counting himself so soothing, Carnistir did find it so. Then Makalaurë had given him just enough assistants that Carno might possibly avoid thinking he was being given work that was beneath him, and otherwise stole those with more complex skills to other tasks that needed them.
It needed doing, Carnistir was meticulous, and it meant that at least once, for a few days each cycle of the moon, Carno was reliably and more or less contentedly occupied. As contented as Carno ever was.
Also in Chapter 11:
[Irissë] had come to realize, in time, that [Tyelkormo] and his brothers all tended - in one pursuit or another - to take anyone's surpassing them as proof of their own failure, and that perceived failure as a moral transgression. And it was not as if the competition itself were the part that mattered: surpassing others did not seem to mean success, and success did not necessarily gratify.
It was only the other way around: being surpassed, at least in the thing that mattered, meant they had failed, and failure meant that they were somehow flawed, inadequate, stained.
[...]
It also made her wonder two other things.
The first being that if perhaps Carnistir's harshness could be traced to how, when Irissë stopped and thought carefully, she could think of no one thing in which he excelled all his brothers. Where Lauro had music, and Tyelko had the hunt and the understanding of kelvar of all kinds, and where Curvo had skill unsurpassed by any but his father in all the things his father valued, and where the twins had their private tricks and wisdoms . . . well.
Though in many things Carno was excellent, there was no one, no single thing in which he could be secure and call his own and surpass even his own brothers; and perhaps that was why especially come the end he had hewed so closely to Fëanáro's desires and was, for instance, the only one of the family who had followed their father's shift to calling their eldest brother Nelyafinwë. If he could not be paramount at any one thing, he maybe could be paramount at obeying his father's will.
And then, finally, in Chapter 13, also Irissë's point-of-view:
Findekáno cared absolutely nothing for the struggle over who could call themselves what now that Haru [grandfather; Finwë] was dead, Findekáno cared less than Atar ["father"; Nolofinwë] and Atar cared only insomuch as, from the moment that Fëanáro's madness had become clear, he felt it also clear that he could not leave their people to be wrecked by it. Had to do what he could to mitigate that madness.
Turukáno cared more; he was more like Amillë [mother; Anairë] in that, and less like Atar. Not so much because either of them cared for mastery or dominion, even, but because of some deep sense that those who took responsibility, who took on the work that was arranging the world so that it was set in some kind of order and justice and good governance for those who lived in it, should have the recognition and some reward.
Obviously, the idea that somebody has to be The Best (Ever) at A Specific Thing to be Good Enough is toxic and damaging -- but even within that toxic framework, Carnistir had, I think, at least the potential to be uniquely and spectacularly good at logistics. Unfortunately for him, the rest of his immediate family -- well, even if they didn't exactly consider it beneath them, it was something they (in the ways that mattered for the overall dynamic) very much took for granted, rather than understanding and appreciating as skill and mastery in its own right.
Contrast with Nolofinwë's family, in which the people who Settle In To Do The Thankless Work are actually explicitly valued.
So there we go! A whole 'nother layer of completely avoidable tragedy! Exactly what the Silmarillion needed.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-09-03 03:44 pm (UTC)Ooof, yep.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-09-03 03:50 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-09-04 06:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-09-04 11:15 pm (UTC)I upset myself quite a lot! So I decided to share, As Is The Way Of Our People...
(no subject)
Date: 2022-11-24 12:12 pm (UTC)This post's making me think of
By contrast, in another of my favourite Silm longfics,
(no subject)
Date: 2022-12-16 02:33 pm (UTC)WHY are computers LIKE THIS :|
And, as a child, was kicked out of his sports team for biting.
I absolutely adore that this is given as an example of him being More Sympathetic Than He Sounds, because yes, you are absolutely right. I think for non-yánasenesse Silm-fic I am going to wait until I have actually finished the Silm, but I have Marked for Later!