Announcing the Silmarillion Awards

By Zachary TotahFantasy

Welcome to the first ever Silmarillion Awards!

What are the Silmarillion Awards, you ask?

Here’s an overview written up by Jenelle Schmidt, one of the co-creators of this event of awesomeness.

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The Silmarillion Awards have been created by DJ Edwardson and Jenelle Schmidt as a way to honor J.R.R. Tolkien as the Father of Modern Fantasy, open up a discussion about some of our other favorite fantasy works, and to have a ton of fun this summer.

silmarillion-awards
Thanks to DJ Edwardson for this neat graphic

When we started thinking about creating a sort of “Fantasy Oscars,” we found it difficult to fathom any award that wouldn’t be won by a character or item from The Lord of the Rings… so, to make things a bit more interesting, we decided to call them “The Silmarillion Awards” and have characters from LOTR and The Hobbit present the awards as examples of the ultimate standard for each award. Hopefully that will even the playing field a bit.

Joining our team are eight other bloggers and authors who will each be hosting one of these awards, called Silmarils, on their blogs towards the end of July.

But before we get there, we need YOUR help! Starting today, June 20th and proceeding through July 1st, the nomination period for each award will be open. Please visit the participating bloggers (found in the list below), read the descriptions of the awards and make your nominations!

Nominate characters in the comments of each blog post. If someone has already nominated the character you would have nominated, you may either second that nomination, open a new nomination, or do both.

We will be picking the 5 characters with the most “seconds” for the final voting period that will take place between July 4th – 13th, so you may also “third,” “fourth,” “fifth,” etc. any nominations you particularly like.

Fine print:

1) Please do not nominate anything from one of your OWN books!

2) You may nominate a character AND second, third, fourth a character… but please only vote once. (i.e. You cannot nominate a character and then also second that same character).

3) Please share about the Silmarillion Awards on social media to spread the excitement far and wide across Middle Earth. Use the hashtag: #silmawards2016 wherever possible!

4) Don’t nominate a Tolkien character for the awards, as the characters presenting the awards are already the standard for each award.

5) Don’t stress if a character you nominate doesn’t win this year. We are hoping to make this an annual tradition, and these awards are LIFETIME AWARDS, meaning that they cannot be won by the same character more than once!

Official Schedule:

Phase 1 – June 20-July 1: Award nominations open

Phase 2 – July 4: the final nominees will be announced and voting will open and last through July 14th

Phase 3 – July 16-28: Presentation of the awards, 1 per day, each award will be hosted on a different blog each day

Phase 4 – Celebration! July 29th was the official publication date of the Lord of the Rings back in 1954. We invite you all to celebrate with us the 62nd birthday of this masterpiece of Fantasy Fiction. Congratulate the winners, take and post a photo of yourselves with LOTR paraphernalia, write a blog post about your favorite LOTR moment, scene, character, quote, or memory… get creative and have fun!

List of Participating Blogs:

Special thanks to Deborah O'Carroll for creating this nifty grahic.
Thanks to Deborah O’Carroll for creating this nifty infograhic.

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Pretty awesome, don’t you think? Be sure to check those other blogs out. There are plenty of awards up for grabs that need your votes.

I’ll be hosting the Wisest Counselor Silmaril. Below are the criteria for the sort of character who ought to be nominated for such an award.

Keep in mind that LOTR characters will be presenting these awards as the ultimate standard of Fantasy Fiction and are therefore exempt from the voting.

The winner of the Wisest Counselor Silmaril should go to a character who above all exhibits unmatched wisdom in all dealings, in word and deed. Yet it should not be a wisdom that leads to vanity or unwarranted belief in one’s own mental competence. This character should also fill the role of sage counselor, providing those around him or her with timely advice and a listening ear.

This award will be presented to the character YOU vote for. This presenter is a well-known individual who goes by many names. He’s gifted with great wisdom and foresight, an ability to see potential not based on power but based on the courage one possesses, and a memorable—if not biting—wit. And…he may or may not smoke a pipe.

Leave your nominations and votes in the comments. Let’s have fun!

91 thoughts on “Announcing the Silmarillion Awards”

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  6. Pssssh, it’s easy to guess which character is presenting this award. 😉
    For this award, I nominate Rayad from Jaye L. Knight’s Ilyon Chronicles. I also nominate Aslan from The Chronicles of Narnia.

    Reply
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    1. I second! I love Aethelbald! I also seem to be the only being in the universe who likes his name…

      Reply

    1. Oh, interesting point! Oh, I don’t know if I can second him. I almost can because of your point. But Dumbledor! I can see Lupin in his mentorship of Harry, but Dumbledor had a greater responsibility so he wasn’t as involved in mentoring Harry (I think he preferred a more hands-off approach, from a distance, allowing Harry to figure it out for himself???). Hmmm…must think some more on this. 🙂

      Reply

  13. I second Endathlorsam, Rayad, and Aslan.

    Also, I nominate Granny Noon from the Dragon Keeper Chronicles by Donita K. Paul

    Reply

  15. I’d like to nomiate Beana, from the Tales of Goldstone Wood (even though she spends most of her time in goat form…especially because she spend most of her time in goat form).

    I’d also like to second Aslan!

    Reply
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  21. I nominate Halt from Ranger’s Apprentice, because he is an awesome mentor and character in so many ways! I also second Aslan and Professor Kirke.

    Reply

    1. HALT! Oh, yes, Halt. I love Halt. For a very long time he was level with Aragorn in my mind, and he’s still very high on the Ladder of Awesomeness.

      Reply
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  24. I nominate Tam al’Thor, the Rand al’Thor’s adoptive father, from the Wheel of Time. When every other “counselor” was trying to manipulate Rand, his father was the only one who provided wisdom with the intent of actually helping him.

    Reply

  25. I’m seconding Beana. Shapeshifting goat lady FTW.

    I’m nominating Rupert Greaves from ND Wilson’s ASHTOWN BURIALS. He was a terrific Reasonable Authority Figure. He’s also Not Dead, which means free to go on being awesome.

    Reply

  26. I nominate The Chronicler (I think that’s what he was called?) from The Peleg Chronicles by Matthew Christian Harding.

    Reply

  28. I’m going to second Cosimo from the Bright Empires Series, as well as Halt from the Ranger’s Apprentice series, and Prince Aethelbald from Tales of Goldstone Wood.

    I really can’t think of anyone new to nominate.

    Reply

  29. I nominate Sebastian Sternbough from The Dark Sea Annals by Wayne Thomas Batson! Oh, and I also nominate Grimwarden from The Berinfell Prophecies…also by Wayne Thomas Batson (and Christopher Hopper).

    Reply

    1. I second Grimwarden! (I don’t remember that much about Sebastian, otherwise I would second him too. It really is high time to reread that series…)

      Reply

  30. I nominate Solomon Shepherd from the Echoes from the Edge trilogy by Bryan Davis. He raised his son Nathan very well, instilling in him a strong moral code.

    Reply

  31. Hey Zachary, I haven’t known precisely where to place my favorite literary character of all-time simply because he is not easily “contained” in a single category. However I would like to nominate Kiernan Kane from the Minstrel’s Song Series as the Wisest Counsellor. Kiernan is indeed wise and his purposes are always good……..but his wisdom and his goodness are almost always observed in retrospect. Kiernan offers his advice and he performs his deeds…….but he never places himself in a position of authority or superiority (as another favorite…..Gandalf does). There is a Greatness about Kiernan that we the reader discover through the dialogue of others….but Kiernan never proclaims his own authority or his own greatness….with the exception of his occasional boasting about what a great story-teller he is (which we come to learn is quite true inspite of his claims). His Wisdom and His Deeds are second to none……but the truly unique way that the author unfolds these to the reader is very powerful and very intriguing. The characters throughout the Minstrel’s Song Series continually ask the same thing that the reader is constantly wondering…………”just who is Kiernan Kane”. I encourage you readers and fans to discover for themselves.

    Reply

  32. I second Tam al’Thor and nominate Sephrenia of The Elenium Series by David Eddings. It’s been a while since I read this series, but I always equate tea with her. Wisdom is increased exponentially when a character drinks a lot of tea.

    Reply
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