October 11, 2002

To Radagast: The Elves
Rune of Mirkwood

I enjoyed your recent writing, regarding the Elves and the way you separated the classes so nicely from The Silmarillion. You seem quite knowledgeable yourself on the story of The Elves in The Silmarillion and these “divisions” are quite confusing, to say the least! But the names given by Tolkien are very pretty, if spoken out loud (try it sometime…)and were probably, quite necessary to differentiate from.

To answer a question on The Elves of the Light, you have already answered your question, in the sense that they were considered the Calaquendi and this name was given to those Elves who lived or had lived in Aman (this name translates to “Blessed; free from evil”). If we take a look at the chart in the back of The Silmarillion, it gives a simple but complex division of the different classes of Elves, depending on their history and where they ended up in Middle-Earth. Actually, Tolkien gave an interesting name by calling it “The Sundering of The Elves” which means "break apart or in two; or...sever finally". But it also shows that The Calaquendi includes three of these classes of Elves, which is interesting: The Vanyar, the Noldor, and the Teleri – also known as The Three Kindreds, whih you mentioned. So, in a sense, these three groups of Elves could also be classed as Elves of the Light and also, as High Elves. The Teleri, it states, was the third and “greatest” of these three hosts. The Sindarin almost made it - they were neither Elves of the Light nor Elves of the Dark - but were Elves of Twilight!!!! The Sindar actually call themselves, "Edhil".

On another point: Has anyone else noticed how Legolas’s face has somewhat changed, since they first showed him at the Council of Elrond, sitting majestically with the others, to the end of the movie when they decided to run with Strider and Gimli, to fight “Orc”? The pictures I have collected, even the Two Towers’ images, show a much more mature and grown-up Legolas. His hair seems whiter and he seems much more stronger and a little older; we all know that Legolas is immortal and still holds "royal beauty". I was just curious if anyone else has noticed this?

Love to The Forum from the Rune….