thearrogantemu:

thearrogantemu:

I MIGHT LOVE AULE EVEN MORE THAN MANWE, DEAR READER (what,
Superbeings Wrestling With The Complexities of Creation is apparently one of my
favorite tropes)

1-3 things I enjoy
about them

How the desire to give and teach is such an intrinsic part of
his nature. I think that reflects something true and healthy about the nature
of craftsmanship. I don’t even mind that almost everyone who goes wrong
(Feanor, the Noldor in general, Sauron, Saruman) were particular favorites or
proteges of Aule. I think this stems more from Tolkien’s passionate interest in
creation and its perils than from his anti-technology strain, though certainly
the consciousness of the brutalities of technology divorced from art is never
far from his mind. Aule’s domain is perilously adjacent to power, after all: he’s
a maker of tools, and while tools should be for better understanding and better
loving the world, for adding your own vision to it, there’s nothing in their
nature that prevents them from being misused for mere domination or exercise of
will.

It’s just so cosmically
appropriate that he’s paired with Yavanna (and I love how both of them
together are different aspects of Earth). The tension between Aule and Yavanna –
between building and growing, artificial and organic, garden and forest, runs
throughout the legendarium. So many of the characters in which this tension
appears are in conflict, but at the root, or possibly at the highest and purest
level, those concepts are literally wedded. I think this informed by profound
love on the part of the author. Look at the way Tolkien loves trees, genuinely
loves them, not just regarding them as Symbols of Unspoilt Nature. Yet at the
same time he is himself an artificer, not a gardener; a builder of worlds, a
maker of languages.

Come to think of it, I think there’s an excellent reason that an image of a tree is Tolkien’s own
explanation of/metaphor for his life’s work in Leaf by Niggle, (which is an apologia
pro vita sua if I ever read one, and a gorgeous, wrenching meditation on creation
and creating.)

I love the way he defends those he loves coupled with the
trouble he has in forgiving them. He extends them the benefit of the doubt,
possibly far beyond the point where he should, but once that relationship is
broken, it’s broken for good (unlike with, for example, Manwe, who clearly
longs for reconciliation, or Ulmo, who seems to accept and even share the
ambiguous nature of the Incarnates). Given his nature, I think he’s inclined to
see relationships mechanistically – as things that work until they break, and
things broken are in need of repair rather than healing.

Something interesting
about them based on tenuous circumstantial evidence

Okay this is straight-up headcanon – simply putting together two
events that we know happened – but I imagine the final straw that broke Sauron’s
loyalty to his first master and sent him to Melkor’s side was the creation of
the Dwarves, and the events surrounding them. Sauron, who we know admired
Melkor’s ability to effect his will upon the world, can’t decide which he finds
more infuriating – that Aule should have yielded up his creation in the first
place, or that the life of his creation depend on an act of mercy. (He doesn’t
understand forgiveness in the least, nor has he gotten much better at it when
it’s his turn to ask for mercy at the end of the First Age.)

A question I have
about them

What does happen to
the souls of Dwarves who die?

A random relevant line
I like

Gonna be a random relevant passage because this whole
interchange is magnificent:

And the voice of Iluvatar said to him “Why hast thou done this?
Why dost thou attempt a thing which thou knowest is beyond thy power and thy
authority? For thou hast from me as a gift thy own being only, and no more; and
therefore the creatures of thy hand and mind can live only by that being,
moving when thou thinkest to move them, and if thy thought be elsewhere,
standing idle. Is that thy desire?”

Then Aule answered “I did not desire such lordship. I desired
things other than I am, to love and teach them, so that they too might perceive
the beauty of Ea, which thou hast caused to be. For it seemed to me that there
is great room in Arda for many things to rejoice in it, yet it is for the most
part empty still, and dumb. And in my impatience I have fallen into folly. Yet
the making of things is in my heart from my own making by thee, and the child
of little understanding that makes a play of the deeds of his father may do so
without thought of mockery, but because he is the son of his father. But what
shall I do now, so that thou be not angry with me for ever? As a child to his
father, I offer to thee these things, the work of the hands which thou hast
made. Do with them what thou wilt. But should I not rather destroy the world of
my presumption?”

Aule sweetheart nobody
but you said anything about anger or anything about destruction. Two parts of Aule’s nature are coming into
conflict here, I think – his independence and curiosity with his law-abiding,
rule-craving side. (Surely there are many smart bookish types here who grew up
as simultaneous non-conformists and adult-pleasers who can relate!) And Aule is
shown mercy twice over – mercy for his presumption in creating the Dwarves, and
mercy for his presumption in attempting to destroy them.

My preferred version,
if there is more than one version of their story (or part of their story)

Can’t actually think of any major variants.

Favorite
relationship(s) THE DWARVES

How would they react
to Tom Bombadil

Wariness. There’s absolutely nothing that he can offer or teach
this creature. What are the rules that govern this encounter???

Optional: Something
about them that I think people forget

He gets Tolkien’s own “secret vice” of language creation! He creates
Khuzdul for his beloved children, and is in the process of teaching it to them
when surprised by the Creator of the Universe. And Sauron, once his servant, presumably
learned this skill from him (though his conlang is considerably less
successful.)

Actually, come to think of it, isn’t language itself a fusion of
the artificial and the organic?

HANG ON after chatting with @sumeriasmith about this I have Further Thoughts.  Sumeria points out that one of the lesser-noted damages that Melkor does to the world is in making the rest of the Ainur more hesitant to push boundaries than they might otherwise have been.

Look at the sequence that Aule goes through in his response to Iluvatar’s question:

1: I love the world and wanted people to whom I could show its beauty.

2: I’m following my nature; you made me a creator.

3: Do you want my creations? Here, you take them.

4: No, wait, I should destroy them, right? I’ll smash them right now.

He could have made a stand on any one of the points before he gets to destruction, and yet he doesn’t. I wonder if what’s going through his head is oh God, oh God, this is how Melkor started (and that’s not wrong!)

Indeed, the thing that Iluvatar cites as questionable in Aule’s activities is the way that his creations aren’t independent beings. They’re animated only by his will. And Aule reads this as a dire reproach. “I did not desire such lordship,” he protests. I suspect what’s going through his mind here is oh no I’ve made slaves.

This is, of course, long before Melkor’s own creation (ish) of the orcs, but Melkor does also do something grotesquely similar. Except that in his case, being animated only by his will was the desired end rather than an unfortunate side effect. 

So when Aule rushes to destroy the Dwarves even before it’s demanded of him, it’s not mere reflexive rule-following. He’s seen a deep and dreadful wrong in creation thanks to Melkor, and he’s passionate not to do the same wrong to the world. What Sauron (in my headcanon above) sees as unforgivable weakness of will is, like most of the errors of the Valar, an error of love.