This morning I was trying to sketch, but inspiration had given me a wide berth so I decided to take a break and go for a wander. As I walked over the small bridge and into the wood I noticed a patch of light and it reminded me of Ted Nasmith’s illustration of Lúthien Tinúviel from J. R. R. Tolkien’s Silmarillion (though most folk that read this website will probably know that anyway ;-)). Anyway, there was no sign of Lúthien when I took this photo, and Beren was obviously off doing better things, but looking at the light on the leaves did give my inspiration a bit of a kick start.

If you’ve not read the story of Beren and Lúthien what are you waiting for

“Then Sauron stripped from the their disguise, and they stood before him naked and afraid. But though their kinds were revealed, Sauron could not discover their names or their purposes.

He cast them therefore into a deep pit, dark and silent, and threatened to slay them cruel, unless one would betray the truth to him. From time to time they saw two eyes kindled in the dark, and a werewolf devoured one of the companions; but none betrayed their lord.”

Though if I were stuck in the pit, dark, silent and know that at any moment a werewolf could appear to eat me I’d have been shouting for a quiet tête-à-tête with Sauron on day one

When Looney Tunes illustrated the Silmarillion…

they may have misread the part about Ulmo – here, Elmer (lord of the seas) makes his way to Tuor.

With apologies to Tolkien, Looney Tunes, Tolkien fans, and generally everyone else.

Next I’m going to try and colour the pen & ink in Photoshop elephants, one day I’ll afford the full version, but for now adding a colour or two should be possible

The trouble started a week or so ago when I started reading The Silmarillion again, this was to get ideas for an illustration or two for the theme of the month over at john-howe.com, now I’ve read the book a number of times, and have dipped in and out of it at random over the years, but this is the first time I’ve really sat down and read it with a view to illustrating something from it. One of the first things that struck me was how many images suggested themselves from early on; scenes that once were very abstract (such as those in Ainulindalë) became quite distinct in my mind.

It was, however, when I got to Manwe’s little pad ‘Ilmarin’ that my brain started to churn with ideas, at first the scene was easy to imagine, the mountains upon which Ilmarin sprang easily to mind. Then my mind turned to the style of building Ilmarin would take that I encountered problems; there is little in the way of architectural description to work on so I let my pencil wander. At first I went for a towered castle (complete with round towers at varying heights and nice point roofs), but this did not feel right, then I sketched a square towered castle, or more accurately a square peel tower with a chunky house strapped on the side, this did not feel right either. The main descriptive phrase describing Ilmarin “mansion of Manwe” made me think that the building should be more of a country house affair than anything else, something like this…

For some reason though I keep thinking to myself that is should be more majestic maybe incorporating some features from a cathedral, maybe a flying buttress or two. It was thinking of this that resulted in me not really sleeping this morning, something I know I’ll regret later

Now I need to sketch some more, formulate an idea or two, I’ll post updates another day

note: I’m using the name Ilmarin here to mean the mansion of Manwe, I realize that is could be taken to mean the whole of Taniquetil as well.