Waymeet Challenge: Shards of Memory
My dear People...today we celebrate Waymeet's one year anniversary!
Voices off: Hurray! Hurray! Many Happy Returns!
We hope you are all enjoying yourselves as much as we are.
*waits for cries of Yes (and No)*
Good.
As we look back on a year of great stories, enthusiastic writers and readers, of generous feedback and a growing sense that we are, indeed, travelling there and back again in fine company, we'd like to offer members a challenge that strikes to the heart of what it is to be human and what it is to love something as much as each of us loves The Lord of the Rings.
In a myriad of ways we, like Sam, "keep alive the memory of the age that is gone, so that people will remember"; we carry on the Story. And while I hope that we are also kept "as busy and as happy as anyone can be" in the process, we must never let go of the past or of what matters most. We are the flawed keepers of our own memories and the memories of others, and with memories we build the future.
For the Shards of Memory Challenge, we've asked our writers for stories about Memory.
Memories can be both comfort and piercing sorrow. Sometimes we would rather forget; at other times we forget what we most wish to remember. We have false memories, feelings of déjà vu, memories which assail us out of the blue, and memories which need a gentle nudge from a friend to emerge. At times we drown in memories to the exclusion of everything else.
We remember first times, last times, times when we feared that a door might be closing and times when one door was closed so that another might open.
We remember.
'Rightly said!' cried Beregond, rising and striding to and fro. 'Nay, though all things must come utterly to an end in time, Gondor shall not perish yet. Not though the walls be taken by a reckless foe that will build a hill of carrion before them. There are still other fastnesses, and secret ways of escape into the mountains. Hope and memory shall live still in some hidden valley where the grass is green.'
Stories for this challenge will be posted from 27 October 2006 until 10 November 2006, with a one week extension until 17 November (if required).
I've placed a few memory-related LotR quotes behind the cut, to inspire us all with purpose.
Indeed we have heard of Fangorn in Minas Tirith,' said Boromir. 'But what I have heard seems to me for the most part old wives' tales, such as we tell to our children. All that lies north of Rohan is now to us so far away that fancy can wander freely there. Of old Fangorn lay upon the borders of our realm; but it is now many lives of men since any of us visited it, to prove or disprove the legends that have come down from distant years." ....
'Then I need say no more,' said Celeborn. 'But do not despise the lore that has come down from distant years; for oft it may chance that old wives keep in memory word of things that once were needful for the wise to know.'
~~***~~
Pippin looked out from the shelter of Gandalf's cloak. He wondered if he was awake or still sleeping, still in the swift-moving dream in which he had been wrapped so long since the great ride began. The dark world was rushing by and the wind sang loudly in his ears. He could see nothing but the wheeling stars, and away to his right vast shadows against the sky where the mountains of the South marched past. Sleepily he tried to reckon the time and stages of their journey, but his memory was drowsy and uncertain.
~~***~~
"We are become Middle Men, of the Twilight, but with memory of other things. For as the Rohirrim do, we now love war and valour as things good in themselves, both a sport and an end; and though we still hold that a warrior should have more skills and knowledge than only the craft of weapons and slaying, we esteem a warrior, nonetheless, above men of other crafts. Such is the need of our days."
~~***~~
"But in my stead you shall go, Ring-bearer, when the time comes, and if you then desire it. If your hurts grieve you still and the memory of your burden is heavy, then you may pass into the West, until all your wounds and weariness are healed. But wear this now in memory of Elfstone and Evenstar with whom your life has been woven."
~~***~~
"At least, I know that such things happened, but I cannot see them. No taste of food, no feel of water, no sound of wind, no memory of tree or grass or flower, no image of moon or star are left to me. I am naked in the dark, Sam, and there is no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I begin to see it even with my waking eyes, and all else fades."
'That is the signal for supper!' said Bilbo. The pain and alarm vanished at once, and the prostrate hobbits leaped to their feet.
~~***~~
And they went off to scribble stories, we hope.
P.S. We wanted to have a banner for you, but the Chief Banner-Maker's computer is vacationing in the Bahamas.
Voices off: Hurray! Hurray! Many Happy Returns!
We hope you are all enjoying yourselves as much as we are.
*waits for cries of Yes (and No)*
Good.
As we look back on a year of great stories, enthusiastic writers and readers, of generous feedback and a growing sense that we are, indeed, travelling there and back again in fine company, we'd like to offer members a challenge that strikes to the heart of what it is to be human and what it is to love something as much as each of us loves The Lord of the Rings.
In a myriad of ways we, like Sam, "keep alive the memory of the age that is gone, so that people will remember"; we carry on the Story. And while I hope that we are also kept "as busy and as happy as anyone can be" in the process, we must never let go of the past or of what matters most. We are the flawed keepers of our own memories and the memories of others, and with memories we build the future.
For the Shards of Memory Challenge, we've asked our writers for stories about Memory.
Memories can be both comfort and piercing sorrow. Sometimes we would rather forget; at other times we forget what we most wish to remember. We have false memories, feelings of déjà vu, memories which assail us out of the blue, and memories which need a gentle nudge from a friend to emerge. At times we drown in memories to the exclusion of everything else.
We remember first times, last times, times when we feared that a door might be closing and times when one door was closed so that another might open.
We remember.
'Rightly said!' cried Beregond, rising and striding to and fro. 'Nay, though all things must come utterly to an end in time, Gondor shall not perish yet. Not though the walls be taken by a reckless foe that will build a hill of carrion before them. There are still other fastnesses, and secret ways of escape into the mountains. Hope and memory shall live still in some hidden valley where the grass is green.'
Stories for this challenge will be posted from 27 October 2006 until 10 November 2006, with a one week extension until 17 November (if required).
I've placed a few memory-related LotR quotes behind the cut, to inspire us all with purpose.
Indeed we have heard of Fangorn in Minas Tirith,' said Boromir. 'But what I have heard seems to me for the most part old wives' tales, such as we tell to our children. All that lies north of Rohan is now to us so far away that fancy can wander freely there. Of old Fangorn lay upon the borders of our realm; but it is now many lives of men since any of us visited it, to prove or disprove the legends that have come down from distant years." ....
'Then I need say no more,' said Celeborn. 'But do not despise the lore that has come down from distant years; for oft it may chance that old wives keep in memory word of things that once were needful for the wise to know.'
~~***~~
Pippin looked out from the shelter of Gandalf's cloak. He wondered if he was awake or still sleeping, still in the swift-moving dream in which he had been wrapped so long since the great ride began. The dark world was rushing by and the wind sang loudly in his ears. He could see nothing but the wheeling stars, and away to his right vast shadows against the sky where the mountains of the South marched past. Sleepily he tried to reckon the time and stages of their journey, but his memory was drowsy and uncertain.
~~***~~
"We are become Middle Men, of the Twilight, but with memory of other things. For as the Rohirrim do, we now love war and valour as things good in themselves, both a sport and an end; and though we still hold that a warrior should have more skills and knowledge than only the craft of weapons and slaying, we esteem a warrior, nonetheless, above men of other crafts. Such is the need of our days."
~~***~~
"But in my stead you shall go, Ring-bearer, when the time comes, and if you then desire it. If your hurts grieve you still and the memory of your burden is heavy, then you may pass into the West, until all your wounds and weariness are healed. But wear this now in memory of Elfstone and Evenstar with whom your life has been woven."
~~***~~
"At least, I know that such things happened, but I cannot see them. No taste of food, no feel of water, no sound of wind, no memory of tree or grass or flower, no image of moon or star are left to me. I am naked in the dark, Sam, and there is no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I begin to see it even with my waking eyes, and all else fades."
'That is the signal for supper!' said Bilbo. The pain and alarm vanished at once, and the prostrate hobbits leaped to their feet.
~~***~~
And they went off to scribble stories, we hope.
P.S. We wanted to have a banner for you, but the Chief Banner-Maker's computer is vacationing in the Bahamas.