There and Back Again V

This year's theme didn't resonate with me as much as last year's (it's hard to beat Invoking Wonder), but I had a lovely time.  

I did have to take my Old Norse final over the weekend, but luckily the three hours could be apportioned any way we chose (not necessarily done in one fell swoop), so it didn't get too much in the way.  And I missed one of the keynote speeches because I was fielding urgent calls from work.  But I'd anticipated the need for this, since we'd just barely finished our last big meeting of the year when I sprinted out to head down to Virginia.

There were many good talks, but probably the program highlights for me were at the start and end of the conference (or did the principles of primacy and recency make them stand out?):

• John Garth on the origins of Tolkien's creation myth - he's pieced together a nifty argument about when and why Tolkien started writing it, but for me, the greatest thrill was learning about the possible connections to a Babylonian creation myth, "The Revolt in Heaven," as woefully mistranslated by H. Fox Talbot.  
• Kate Niggle on metanoia in LotR - she noted three who successfully turn: Gimli (called by Galadriel), Theoden (by Gandalf), Eowyn (by Faramir).  And of course there are others who have a chance -- even many chances -- and sometimes come ever so close...

The Prancing Pony podcasters were very fun as well; they've probably gotten a lot more followers and fans after the conference (half the attendees had never listened to them before).  And of course Tom Shippey and Tom Hillman were delightful as always.  TH adapted a recent blog post on lameness in The Children of Húrin, throwing in (among other things) a quick but accessible explanation of a bit of characteristic Greek meter ("shave-and-a-haircut") that gets disrupted by lameness in the Iliad.

Luke Shelton had us do a fun exercise in diamond-ranking our "favorite" members of the Fellowship. This of course led to lively debate.  The loudest and most insistent members of the group placed Sam as #1 and Legolas as #9.  But even once that was settled, the rest of the ranking remained hotly in contention.  At 10:49 am, it was Aragorn > Gandalf > Frodo > Boromir > Gimli > Pippin > Merry.  By 10:51, Aragorn had dropped two levels (coming in below Frodo), while Merry had risen two levels (coming in above Gimli).  

I think many will be eternally grateful to Doug Anderson for introducing us to the Fire Swans: 

As always, there were creative costumes for the masquerade - Corey and his wife as "Jonathan and Mina Harker" was the sentimental favorite for me.  "Melkor on vacation" was a hoot (and with stunning papier-mâché accessories).  Karita and Lance were lovely as something like the Universe and Star Fleet (she was wearing a solar system dress possibly from ThinkGeek, and he was wearing some kind of Star Trek shirt).  

It was a qualitatively different experience, actually, to travel down with someone and then be looking out for each other throughout the weekend.  Didn't quite expect that.

And utterly delightful to see Dr Flieger and Charlie on the way back home.  I found myself wishing we could send Tolkien folks to visit her every week.