chess-ka:

determamfidd:

poplitealqueen:

I love the idea of eloquent dwarves.

I love the idea of these stout, hairy, dirt-under-their-nails people writing the most beautiful poetry; singing the loveliest songs; being the floweriest mofos to ever pop out of the ground.

And I can’t stand when people say it’s not proper to have them like that simply for being dwarves. That’s wrong. So wrong. Because there’s so much diversity, in this world and fantasy ones.

Why should all dwarves be lumped together as vulgar, ineloquent beasts?

Why should all elves be pristine, clean, and graceful?

Why should all hobbits be scared, weak, and uneducated about the outside world?

Great stories are made from bending the ideas that have been laid out before, not sticking to them like bugs to flypaper.

“And, Legolas, when the torches are kindled and men walk on the sandy floors under the echoing domes, ah! then Legolas, gems and crystals and veins of precious ore glint in the polished walls; and the light flows through folded marbles, shell-like, translucent as the living hands of Queen Galadriel. There are columns of white and saffron and dawn-rose, Legolas, fluted and twisted into dreamlike forms; they spring up from many-coloured floors to meet the glistening pendants of the roof: wings, ropes, curtains fine as frozen clouds; spears, banners, pinnacles of suspended palaces! Still lakes mirror them: a glimmering world looks up from the dark pools covered with clear glass; cities, such as the mind of Durin could scarce have imagined in his sleep, stretch on through avenues and pillared courts, on into the dark recesses where no light can come. And plink! a silver drop falls, and the round wrinkles in the glass make all the towers bend and waver like weeds and corals in a grotto of the sea.”

Gimli, The Two Towers 

(the “Glittering Caves” speech is often cited as Tolkien’s most beautiful and lyrical writing ever. Hell yeah, I am down with poetic Dwarves!)

The Glittering Caves speech is gorgeous. And Gimli is clearly shown to be an eloquent character throughout the book:

-His very first lines in FotR have him engaging in a bit of wordplay with Elrond:

‘Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens,’ said Gimli.

‘Maybe,’ said Elrond, ‘but let him not vow to walk in the dark, who has not seen the nightfall.’

‘Yet sworn word may strengthen quaking heart,’ said Gimli.

‘Or break it,’ said Elrond

And we can’t forget that Gimli asks Galadriel for a gift of her hair – something denied even to Feanor – and she specifically comments on his eloquence: “None have ever made to me a request so bold and yet so courteous.” In doing so, she practically scolds the gathered elves for their prejudice against the dwarves and their belief that they have no skill in words. And with good reason! Gimli’s request is lovely and poetic, saying that her beautiful hair “surpasses the gold of the earth as the stars surpass the gems of the mine.”

There’s also that haunting moment in Khazad-dum where Gimli recites some dwarven poetry to the Fellowship. The poem (read it here – it’s quite long so I won’t paste it) is so haunting, filled with loss and grief and longing. Gimli’s recital clearly has an effect on the Fellowship, and Sam (who, as we know, loves poetry and even writes it himself) liked it so much that he wanted to learn it.

Gimli is only one dwarf, of course, and he’s clearly a dwarf of some status and education, but he’s Tolkien’s greatest representation of the dwarves and clear evidence that they can be eloquent and poetic.