Ancestors

Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-09-08 at 16:50

Thinking about #conservation and the Elves in the #LordOfTheRings The elves want to preserve things as they were in the elder days. They don't really have a vision for future - some hope to use the power of the three to heal the world, but the wisest, like Galadriel, assume that their time is coming to an end even if Frodo succeeds in his quest.

In the real world, the environmental movement brings together people with many different motivations, and different degrees of hope for the future.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-09-10 at 13:22

I went looking for a recent long-odds climate struggle and found the #StopLine3Pipeline protests.

I had forgotten Tim Walz was governor of Minnesota during the protests.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-09-29 at 19:25

Have you heard of the Te Urewaera Act of 2014? It's a pretty cool law from the Māori that recognized a New Zealand forest as its own legal entity.

"The key principles of the new Act are:

• Te Urewera ceases to be a national park and is vested in itself as its own legal entity; and

• Te Urewera will own itself in perpetuity with the Board to speak as its voice to provide governance and management in accordance with the principles of the Act"

https://www.environmentguide.org.nz/regional/te-urewera-act/

[#]Nature #PersonhoodOfNature

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-13 at 22:55

I want to find a real-world equivalent to the Ents breaking Isengard.

I am tempted to draw parralels to incidents of eco-sabotage, but the comparison is imperfect. The ents are a nation, for one thing. The fight in Isengard is more of a seige of an army than an incident of monkey-wrenching.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-14 at 00:21

Here's an interesting example of state violence against mining infrastructure.

How Brazil is taking the fight to destructive illegal mining

https://www.ft.com/content/5eb64108-3181-4352-804e-aca76e1be505

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-14 at 13:45

I spent much of my early career thinking about peacebuilding. But in this book, I can only reference in a few paragraphs what I spent years trying to learn about nonviolent civil resistance.

It makes sense. It's a book about Tolkien and trees, not arguments on the impact and efficacy of nonviolence.

It just feels like I'm exercising a ghost limb.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-17 at 14:53

What a line from Tolkien. I actually teared up a little in reading it. I think about the things we lose daily.

"Well, cheers and all that to you dearest son. We were born in a dark age out of due time (for us). But there is this comfort: otherwise we should not know, or so much love, what we do love. I imagine the fish out of water is the only fish to have an inkling of water."

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/j-r-r-tolkien-from-a-letter-to-christopher-tolkien

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-17 at 15:23

I have a pretty good excerpt of my book on Tolkien themes and the modern environmentalist movement. I'm mixing together the Ents destroying Isengard with the Brazillian government breaking up illegal mining infrastructure in the Amazon. I'm going to publish it soon - hope you folks are interested.

[#]Tolkien #ClimateCrisis

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-19 at 14:21

There's a generation-long restoration project in Qianyanzhou. This auto-translated article probably has some errors, but the poetry of the language comes through.

"A piece of copper on a sunny day, a bag of pus on a rainy day. Looking from a distance, it's all yellow, looking closely, it's all water and soil."

https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=1684292712024495264&wfr=spider&for=pc

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-19 at 14:21

"A proverb that was circulated in Qianyanzhou at that time revealed the harsh environment at that time. Soil erosion in the hilly areas of Qianyanzhou was becoming increasingly serious, and the fertile red soil was washed away, resulting in a decline in crop yields."

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-27 at 13:23

20,000 words. ✊

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-27 at 19:36

I've finished part 2 of my book on environmental themes in the Lord of the Rings. Next up... the role of hope and despair.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-10-29 at 21:37

In addition to being gorgeous, funny, and devastatingly intelligent, my beautiful partner @mara is a talented editor. She's helping me polish my pitch sample, which I'll be sending to publishers (and maybe sharing with you lovely people.)

Feels like this is happening.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-03 at 20:58

What do #Ents have to do with illegal miners in the Amazon rainforest? What do water protectors share with Hobbits traversing the wastes of Mordor? "Where the Roots are long" is an upcoming book (by me!) which explores environmentalist themes in the Lord of the Rings and how they resonate in the modern movement to address the climate crisis.

Read an excerpt: https://derek.caelin.cloud/where-the-roots-are-long/

[#]LordOfTheRings #writing #books #bookstodon #ClimateCrisis

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-06 at 12:33

‘I wish it need not have happened in my time,’ said Frodo.

‘So do I,’ said Gandalf, ‘and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-06 at 14:02

“He turned to the Company. ‘We must do without hope,’ he said. ‘At least we may yet be avenged. Let us gird ourselves and weep no more! Come! We have a long road, and much to do.”

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-06 at 14:18

The third section of my book is going to talk about the role of hope in climate action - how do people keep moving when...

/waves hand at the situation.

The big takeaway, for me, is that hope is not a prerequisite for action in LoTR. It is a reward.

Sam gives up hope on the slopes of Orodruin, but resolves to carry on regardless. Faramir fights even though "it is long since we had any hope". Gandalf gambles everything on a what is admittedly "a fool's hope".

They act, even so.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-06 at 14:23

The big difference between Denethor and the Company is actually not whether they have hope. Most of the company agree that it is unlikely that they will succeed.

Denethor is different because he loses hope, and decides to give up. Not only does he decide to kill himself - he is willing to bring down others who depend on him. He tries to kill Faramir. He gives up on the defense of Minas Tirith, where he could have been helpful to rally his people against despair.

Giving up hurts other people.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-06 at 14:25

Rebecca Solnit has some great things to say here:

"So, what do we do when the world is ending? The same things that so many of the giants on whose shoulders we stand did when their worlds were ending. We choose to face our despair—to walk toward it and through it—choose to take action, choose to build movements. We do it because we don't know how it ends, because there are possibilities out there that we simply can't see from here."

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-06 at 14:25

"We do it because every person organized and campaign won and fraction of a degree of global warming prevented will save lives. Because movements that believe are far more powerful than movements that don't. And, yes, we fight because fighting is one of the ways we get to nurture our courage and generosity and hope and all those other fundamentally human traits that we treasure most—because our lives will be infinitely richer in that struggle than outside of it."

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-06 at 20:28

Saying it again in video form: hope and action in #TheLordOfTheRings. If you're not feeling very hopeful right now, that's understandable. We see a lot of the characters in LoTR acting without hope.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-10 at 13:23

“Come, come!’ said Gandalf. ‘We are all friends here. Or should be; for the laughter of Mordor will be our only reward, if we quarrel.”

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-10 at 13:34

“We may stand, if only on one leg, or at least be left still upon our knees.’

‘Rightly said!’ cried Beregond, rising and striding to and fro. ‘Nay, though all things must come utterly to an end in time, Gondor shall not perish yet.”

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-12 at 13:45

"I have not passed through fire and death to bandy crooked words with a serving-man till the lightning falls."

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-12 at 14:01

Pleased with my outline themes of Hope and Despair in #TheLordOfTheRings. I'll weave together events from the story with modern climate stories.

• Hope and Despair

• The Line 3 Protests

• Impending Doom of Middle Earth

• Despair as a weapon

• The Nazgul

• The Palantir

• The Words of Wormtongue

• Responsese to Despair

• Embrace Despair (Denethor)

• Hope on, Then

• The plan to destroy the ring

• Theoden riding to glory

• Sam in the black lands

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-11-23 at 23:05

"To hope is to accept despair as an emotion but not as an analysis. To recognize that what is unlikely is posible, just as what likely is not inevitable. To understand that difficult is not the same as impossible. To plan and to accept that the unexpected often disrupts plans-for the better and for the worse. To know the powerful have their weaknesses, and we who are supposed to be weak have great power together, power to change the world, have done so before and will again."

• Rebecca Solnit

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-01 at 14:24

How often would you guess that the word "hope" shows up in the #LordOfTheRings?

Edit: according to my word search, the answer is 399 times. A small portion of these were social nicities (“Not another letter you’ve forgotten, I hope, Mr. Butterbur?’") but the majority were desires and anticipations. It's a story about hope!

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-02 at 16:46

According to my word search, the answer is 399 times. A small portion of these were social nicities (“Not another letter you’ve forgotten, I hope, Mr. Butterbur?’") but the majority were desires and anticipations. It's a story about hope!

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-08 at 19:51

I feel like I just penned a pretty clear thesis statement:

The crisis faced by the modern climate movement is comparable to that in the #LordOfTheRings, with a crucial difference. Both we and the characters of the story face an existential crisis: we must act, and come through a great struggle, in order to have hope for a better future. On the other hand, the story characters face a binary future; they must either succeed or ultimately fail...

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-08 at 19:52

...Elrond tells Aragorn that he must “either to rise above the height of all your fathers since the days of Elendil, or to fall into darkness with all that is left of your kin.” For better or for worse, we have degrees of failure with which to contend. Every fraction of a degree we can prevent the planet from warming will result in a better possible world; every delay of change will bring commensurate loss of life and make a harder world to survive in.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-22 at 18:19

There's a climate denier argument that has fascinated me recently. It has broad appeal: I've heard it expressed by the incoming Trump Energy Secretary, and by centrist Democrats.

The theory goes like this. #CarbonEmissions have gone way up since the post WWII era. We've seen warming, but we've also seen dramatic increases in human well-being since economic growth (driven by fossil fuels) has lifted many out of poverty. Therefore, the benefits of fossil fuels outweigh the costs.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-22 at 18:24

Obviously the "things have been a certain way, so I will expect it to continue to be that way" mode of thinking is part of the human condition. Our brains are wired to expect what has happened before to continue to happen. Philosophers at least as far back as David Hume where looking at "The Problem of Induction": https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/induction-problem/

The thing is, we've gotten pretty good at modeling the #ClimateCrisis, and we know the trendline will not continue, in fact is in the process of breaking.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-22 at 18:28

Just for funsies, think of scenarios where trendlines suddenly stop. I'll go first:

• I get all the benefits of a speeding car right until it hits the wall

• A winter snow is mighty enjoyable right up until I get burried

• The first cookie tastes delicious, the twentieth cookie makes me sick.

A warming world will not behave like the old world. We're projected to lose 90% of coral reefs with the current level of warming. Tuvalu will go under water. We can model that!

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-22 at 18:33

I've tried figuring out how this all relates to my book (see bio!) but honestly, there are not a ton of "deniers" in #thelordoftherings

Wormtongue tries to convince Theoden not to act, but it's not a good faith argument. He wants Rohan to collapse because he thinks he'll benefit.

The closest might be Saruman. He thinks the new order under Sauron could be ok? "There is hope that way. Its victory is at hand; and there will be rich reward for those that aided it."

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-23 at 17:45

Mapping out responses to the #ClimateCrisis and the, uh, Sauron Crisis in #TheLordOfTheRings

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-23 at 18:21

Tiny update - the folks I'm particularly interested in are in the "despair zone".

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2024-12-24 at 14:34

OK, this is an important point. Characters in #TheLordOfTheRings are constantly "despairing", but to despair is not necessarily to give up.

In the story we see three reactions to despair. Frodo, Faramir - in fact, most of the principle cast - each feel a sense of hopelessness at some point, but continue to push forward. Some characters are overwhelmed and do nothing - this is Theoden, when we first meet him. And some actively subvert the heroes - see Denethor and Saruman.

[#]bookstodon

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2025-01-05 at 20:03

Somehow I've reached 30,000 words in my exploration of #TheLordOfTheRings and its lessons for the #ClimateCrisis.

I spend a big portion of the book looking what characters do when they come to despair. Word 30,000 came as I was exploring Éomer's defiance of the black fleet during the battle for Minas Tirith.

We may not feel hopeful about the coming years, but even so, we have to keep going.

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2025-01-18 at 14:19

“Not all is dark. Take courage, Lord of the Mark; for better help you will not find. No counsel have I to give to those that despair. Yet counsel I could give, and words I could speak to you. Will you hear them?”

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Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2025-01-20 at 15:35

Today I'm writing the section about Sam in the black lands, and how he holds on to hope the longest in what is arguably the darkest road.

Sam is just... he's just the best, you know? He is utterly, utterly devoted to Frodo. Every part of him to his bones loves Frodo. And he does everything in his power to help him, sacrificing water, food. He carries him on his back up a god damn mountain. He expends the last of his strength and will to get him to his goal.

[#]LordOfTheRings

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Toot

Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2025-01-20 at 16:05

This book is ultimately about hope, despair, and action in the climate crisis, but I'll be damned if I can't talk about how Sam is the GOAT. It's my book! I can do what I want!

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Descendants

Written by Derek Caelin is writing a book on 2025-01-29 at 04:33

"Come, come! We are all friends here, or should be; for the laughter of Mordor will be our only reward if we quarrel."

My reaction when I see all the lefties here fighting each other. 😮‍💨

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