In lieu of reading about projectile point typology

[huinare]

- Watching Tibetan sky burials on youtube totally counts as doing anthropology homework, right?

- Huzzah, new artist!crush. Lucy Nurnberg.

Geography of Death III

- I've been considering the nature of some of Tolkien's inventions I hadn't much thought about before, e.g. Balrogs. 

For someone who is mainly interested in darker characters, I've never found the Balrogs particularly compelling so I've generally ignored them.  Now that I've started to ask what on earth a Balrog is, I find this is puzzling.  At any rate, it's puzzling for me given the various strictures my interpretation of Arda's physical and metaphysical properties puts on these matters. 

I could interpret Balrogs the same way I interpret Ulmo's Maiar, as entities who are so emotionally/spiritually attached to their own element that they're become predispositioned to it and can't exist in any other type of physical state.  That's all well and good until I consider how one goes about "killing" such a being, as Balrogs seem a bit prone to being killed.  One can't kill a malleable amalgamation of flame.

The killing thing I've addressed with Draugluin and the dragons by conceiving of them as the results of quasi-sorcerous, quasi-scientific programs to bind Maiar to the frames of creatures.  Somewhat the same as Melkor himself, these Maiar have been "distilled" into something other than themselves (Draugluin into sentient, mortal offspring--dragons into the indefinite maintenance of a massive organism that is technically impossible)--so that, when their forms are killed, their spirits no longer have enough of themselves to hold onto and patch back together into a new incarnation.  If I take the same tack with Balrogs, envisioning them as being chained to solid forms, that brings up the annoying yet very interesting question of what kind of weird biochemical things would have to go on to sustain a burning body.  Way out of my league with that one there, yet that's kind of the way I'm leaning because it would be fairly creepy and horrific as well as an intellectual challenge.

Comments

[engarian.livejournal.com]

Well, if you agree with the conception that a balrog is a body of living flame with a corporeal structure, then you also have to face the basic stricture that its' body cannot be consumed by fire even though it is made of flame.

Kayelle Allen has an interesting structure for her Sempervians - that when they die and are reborn, their cells duplicate and self-destruct almost simultaneously. In essence the body dies and cell A dies at the same moment that new cell A-1 is ready to take its place. This leads to elevated body temperatures and a painful rebirth for them as their bodies self-destruct and regenerate simultaneously; i.e. high levels of heat generated by the old cells as they self-destruct. Maybe hot enough to support flames? Whew! But I can see it working in the case of balrogs (to return to the appropriate uni and away from the Tarthian Empire).

- Erulisse (one L)

[huinare.livejournal.com]

No easy answers in my brain to the question of what it even means to be a body of flame. Can the flame manifest in shape other than a humanoid body? Can it take other shapes? If extinguished, can it rekindle itself at will, or does it need something like existent fire to rekindle it? etc... Also since Gandalf refers to the Balrog as a thing of slime after it fell into the water, I lean toward the idea that the Balrog is some other type of material entity which happens to be on fire..

Not familiar with Allen's work, but that is fascinating. And sounds like it would be excruciating to go through constantly...could explain the Balrogs' ill-temperedness. X)

[engarian.livejournal.com]

I'm not surprised that you are unfamiliar with her work, it is erotica so much less well known. I found this part of her uni applied well to your balrog conjectures, however. And yes, I think it would be excruciating to go through. Her Sempervians have to go through rebirth quite often, I imagine they do anything possible to avoid the experience.

At the kernel of the balrog entity must be a physical form because it is that which Gandalf battles through water and flame, and it is a body that rests on top of the peak. Perhaps in the early days of their development they might have been able to choose their form, but as they chose one form again and again, maybe they lost the ability to experience other shapes? Just a suggestion. Well...back to my research :-)

- Erulisse (one L)

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the idea of simple habituation to a particular form eventually constraining the being to that form has crossed my mind (in my 'verse, this is what happened with Huan and Ungoliant). I think I had nixed it for the Balrogs for some reason, though I can't remember why at the moment. Hrm.

Happy researching. November approacheth!

[engarian.livejournal.com]

I know, the clock is ticking. Right now it starts at 7:04:31:07. Pardon me while I scream......

My desk is full of papers and post-it notes, my notebook is getting filled with dates and places, maps are on my walls and my logistical map is on the desk next to me. I'm as ready (almost) as I'm going to be and RL looks like it might kick me some issues also, just trying to make things more difficult for me. *sigh*

On one hand I want it to start already, on the other hand I'm terribly afraid that I haven't researched this enough to get a novel out of it and that the timelines won't work. Oy1

- Erulisse (one L)

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Meep! Bear in mind that people don't usually get polished drafts out of NaNo, and imperfection is to be expected along the way (yeah, I'm one to speak, being a perfectionist..)