The Life of a Bard by Dreamflower
pipspebble · 28 September 2004 · Chapter 7
Oooh, now things are going to get *very* interesting, indeed! *rubbing hands together in gleeful anci............PAtion* Can't wait to see how Dear Cousin Fro handles this. Wonderful story! As always. :-)
Author's reply
Yes, Frodo will handle it. Once more, he pulls Paladin's chestnuts out of the fire.
shirebound · 28 September 2004 · Chapter 7
"He must have been a remarkable person.” Frodo shook his head. “He *is* a remarkable person.” I do love that! What a fun story.
Author's reply
Frodo knew in his heart that Bilbo was still alive. He would not have allowed him to be talked about as though he were dead. I'm glad you're having fun! 8-D
Viresse · 28 September 2004 · Chapter 7
Lovely chapter. And what a relief that Menelcar did mention Pip to Frodo! I like him, and do NOT want him to have to face Paladin's wrath. Much better to have Frodo take care of Pip's impulsiveness this time.
Author's reply
Oh yes, good old Frodo to the rescue!
GamgeeFest · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 6
Oh dear, Pippin's really going to do it isn't he? Or, he's going to try. It's nearly impossible to dissuade that Took from anything once he's made up his mind. Funny bit about the bagpipes and the funeral song. That's something any kid would do, well except they have CD players now. :)
Author's reply
Well, he'd just about decided to give it up, before Paladin lit into him. And then his father made the mistake of making him think that Merry would be better off without him around. Top it off with threatening him (as Pip sees it) with the Thainship... I'm glad you appreciated that bit. Annoying the parental units with your mood music. I did it as a kid, and had it done to me as a parent. But really, bagpipes could make it *very* annoying indeed.
Elenar · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 6
Poor Pip. If only Paladin and him could communicate better. I really like Menelcar. I am looking forward to more.
Author's reply
Poor Pip and poor Paladin. But their communication problem is pretty common for fathers and sons at that age. Besides, then we'd have no story. 8-) I'm glad you like Menelcar. I'm rather fond of him myself.
Bodkin · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 6
Running away to become a wandering minstrel seems a BIT of an extreme reaction - but that's Pippin for you! It's no wonder Merry didn't want to let his cousin out of his sight on the quest - there's no (Palantir), (swearing allegiance to Denethor), (the troll) knowing what that Took might get up to when left alone for a couple of minutes! What is it about fathers and sons of a certain age? They seem able to cope with daughters, but seeing their sons idling and having fun drives them insane.
Author's reply
Pip's nothing if not impulsive. And this is very typical of a certain type of male adolescnt. (My own son comes to mind. 8-D) The idea goes to action, without ever seeming to pass through anything like a thought process in between. In this case, he actually has made an attempt to think it through, but all his useful reflections fly out the window in the face of his father's anger. It doesn't take long for Pip to get in trouble if he's bored, does it? It's a frustrating dynamic between parent and child, and balance and timing are everything.
Lindelea · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 6
The dynamics between Pippin and his father ring very true. (Heartbreakingly so.) A British friend once told me that their phrase for "baby-sitting" was "child-minding". So Merry might likely "mind" Pippin, though he might not "baby sit" him. OTOH, I might be mistaken. The foolish child had no idea of what his father had sacrificed in order to make it possible for him to hold the Thainship. I'm dying to read this story, even though I'm in the middle of my own version. (Actually, I might not read it until I was done with my own version. I usually can't read in the same time period where I'm writing, but "Thain" gives me a bit of a buffer with half the chapters about Bucca, and also your minstrel Pippin is just different enough from my shepherd's-apprentice Pippin that I can manage without blurring my vision.) He guessed he was hungry, after all Very tweenish! (and my stomach is rumbling. Guess I'd better stir myself and make breakfast!) Sharp Vinca. (There was something he wasn't telling her.) BTW, I don't know if the thought appeals, but if you'd like to use any of the songs in the "Shire Songbook" you're welcome to them. All the musicians of my acquaintance were always swapping songs and thus "introducing" us to other musicians far and near... what delight! You make me remember long evenings, nursing a cup of tea in a coffeehouse, listening and singing by turn. You may already have all your songs planned out, I realise. I'm really enjoying this story! Ah, Pippin, playing a dirge. Over and over. It's enough to drive any parent mad. Being stuck at the Great Smials for the rest of his natural born days... ah, Pip, I can think of worse things... but you're like a cork, aren't you, and you always bob to the surface, no matter how roiled the waters may be.
Author's reply
It's sad, but true that adolescent sons hardly ever seem to be able to get along with their fathers. I will check on the phrase, and if necessary, change it. Thanks for the heads-up. I'm not sure how much detail I will go into with this. I have most of the backstory in my head, but I don't always feel it necessary to put it forth. (I'm planning to check out your story soon. It sounds really interesting.) Tweenish and hobbity. 8-D I think Pip's sisters were pretty sharp. Vinca's paying him a bit more mind than usual, as she has appreciated his attempts to cheer her up. I very much appreciate the offer, and may very well take you up on it, even if it is only in using the title, or a few lines. I had certain songs planned, mainly the Bard song, and the one I wrote, and certaing songs out of Tolkien that could conceivably be attributed to Bilbo. But I may need more. I remember being miserable one afternoon when I was about 15, and playing "Shades of Gray" over and over on my (*gasp* I'm revealing how ancient I am here) *record player* until I had nearly worn the track out. My mother was not amused. Of course, Pip has no clue as to what the future holds for him in just a few short years--I'm sure that at some point on the Quest, the idea of being stuck at the Great Smials would have begun to have more appeal.
Lindelea · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 5
The description of Pippin's reactions to staying with either of his beloved cousins was interesting and revealing, I think. always left a note saying which cousin he had decided to inflict himself on You made me laugh! Paladin, why do I have the feeling that you ought to get hold of yourself, stifle your anger, and go down to the tavern to see what's transpiring? I knew a few song-gatherers, in my college days, who travelled the Appalachians collecting Scottish and Irish ballads, among other music. Impulsive Pippin! And Merry as his anchor! O Thunder! a very hobbity oath. You have such a sure grasp of your characters. Thanks!
Author's reply
Thank you; I had hoped that would come across that way. I can see him having very different reactions to being with either Merry or Frodo--as close as these cousins are, they have very different personalities, which can result in a very different dynamic. Yes, and I imagine the notes usually began with "Since nobody appreciates me around here, I'm going where someone understands me..." LOL! Very good feeling; unfortunately, not going to happen... I can see Menelcar in that sort of role; as a minstrel in a world before recording existed it would be the only way to expand one's repertoire. I would guess he first began to come across Bilbo's songs in Dale... Yes, Merry is his anchor. Notice the only thing to put the brakes on his idea was the thought of missing Merry. I'm glad you like that oath. I try to keep most of my oaths appropriate to JRRT's ideas, but somehow, I think Pip would want something a bit stronger to say than "Bless my buttons!" 8-D
Lindelea · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 4
Pippin's been seduced! (The life of a Bard indeed...)
Author's reply
8-D Looks that way. But he's done his share of charming Menelcar, as well.
Lindelea · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 3
less chance of it coming to his father's ears Ah, Pippin, why does this remind me of my brothers when they were teens? The innkeeper's estimation of Pippin is a nice little character sketch. "No use wasting music on an empty room." ...not going to throw all caution to the wind. Very hobbity and practical! Menelcar sounds quite like a few other professional musicians of my aquaintance, with his eye for the crowd whilst keeping up a pleasant conversation. Pippin's songs are lovely and very Tolkienesque. I looked up the one from The Hobbit; did you write the other? Brava! I like the picture of Pippin on the table, and then the Man taking his place there.
Author's reply
Probably for the same reason he reminds me somewhat of my son as a teen. LOL! I'm glad you liked that. The innkeeper is sort of an impartial observer here, seeing things about Pip that his father, for example, would not see or appreciate. Thank you. Master Dodd is a very practical hobbit. It's a habit a professional would definitely get into, especially after thirty years on the road. Yes, "Nob o' the Lea" is mine. I had a lot of fun with it. (By the way, though I did not originally intend it to, it scans to "The Campbells are Coming") I think in the absence of any proper sort of stage, that the table would be appropriate.
Lindelea · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 2
less chance of it coming to his father's ears Ah, Pippin, why does this remind me of my brothers when they were teens? The innkeeper's estimation of Pippin is a nice little character sketch. "No use wasting music on an empty room." ...not going to throw all caution to the wind. Very hobbity and practical! Menelcar sounds quite like a few other professional musicians of my aquaintance, with his eye for the crowd whilst keeping up a pleasant conversation. Glad the children slept in a little today so I could read more of this delightful story.
shirebound · 27 September 2004 · Chapter 6
Uh oh. If only Pip's father would sit down and talk with him, and find out how stifled Pip feels. Ah well, there wouldn't be a story, then, I guess! :)
Author's reply
You are right, there wouldn't. But Paladin is as volatile in his own way as Pip is in his; stubborn and proud, to boot.
esamen · 26 September 2004 · Chapter 5
Oh, no! My favorite Took in trouble (again)? Poor Pip. I so had hoped that they would run off to Bag End together . . . and that hope's not quite over yet . . . I'm not sure how you are going from here and I can't wait to find out! Happy typing.
Author's reply
Pip and trouble just seems like a perfect formula for a story, doesn't it? No wonder it's "poor Pip"! Well, just you wait and see...
pipspebble · 26 September 2004 · Chapter 5
*Oh, Thunder! he thought, I’m in real trouble now.* What a *perfect* reaction to the storm poor Pippin is about to face! I can tell already I'm going to be sucked completely into this one. What a pleasure to continually feast on the banquet of your talent! Thank you for coming up with this wonderful scenario. :-)
Author's reply
*blushes* Thank you. I was inspired by a really nice song. "Sing Ho for the Life of the Bard" which I quoted in Ch. 4. And a storm is probably a good description of Paladin's feelings about now.
GamgeeFest · 26 September 2004 · Chapter 5
I like Paladin's description on how Pippin behaves after coming back from "visiting" his cousins. I can easily see that happening. Good for Pippin not being impulsive this time around. He was able to realize what a mistake it would be to take off before he did it. Too bad he didn't think before taking off to the inn though. Paladin's got him trapped pretty good now. Pippin's in for it.
Author's reply
I thought about it, and decided that a visit to Merry and Buckland would cheer Pippin up, and help ease some of his excess energy. He'd come back in a better mood, if not actually sorry for whatever he'd done wrong in the first place. On the other hand, he admires Frodo, and would take any of his advice to heart. He'd come back full of good intentions, inspired by Frodo's wisdom. But he's too full of energy and mischief for it to last very long. Well, he's *trying* not to be impulsive. Let's see if he still feels the same way after his father gets through with him...
RogerGamgee · 26 September 2004 · Chapter 5
Hmm...I sense a big storm brewing here. Pippin has openly defied Paladin this time, and there are going to be major consequences. I think Pippin is finally starting to realize just what he's getting into. He'll be leaving his family behind, and most of all leavng Merry, from whom he's been virtually inseparable. Menelcar told him it would be a hard road, and Pippin now is starting to see just how true that is. I can only imagine how Paladin must be feeling. This isn't just another 'sulking episode'...Pippin has deliberately gone against his father's express wishes. I wonder how Pippin is going to explain this one. Pippin's impulsiveness comes through in this story... I read Pearl Took's story 'Running Away' here on SoA the other day, and it brought home how stubborn Pippin can be when he wants to be. One can only hope he learns how to temper that impulsiveness when he becomes Thain - his experience with the palantir hopefully made an impression on him that he'll remember for a good long while. Great story thus far...keep it up!
Author's reply
Oh yes, *deliberate* disobedience is a lot worse than just slipping out and doing something not quite approved of, but not actually forbidden. And it makes Paladin angrier that he defied his mother ( at least, my husband always got more ticked at our son for disobeying me than when he disobeyed his father). Pippin really is making an attempt to think it through and not be impulsive, but, let's face it, aside from the stray thought of Merry pinning him down, he probably would have rolled right along with it. I read that one as well. An excellent story, also showing an impulsive and misunderstood Pip. Poor lad, he does seem to have a rough adolescence, no matter *who* writes about him!
shirebound · 26 September 2004 · Chapter 5
How lovely to think that Bilbo's songs have spread throughout Middle-earth! But Poor Pippin, what a decision he has before him.
Author's reply
Yes, I think Bilbo's songs would have spread. Remember, he's been gone from the Shire for fourteen years now, and he *did* make a journey to Erebor and Dale before he settled in Rivendell. Pip's got a big decision to make, but is he mature enough to make it for the right reasons?
Bodkin · 26 September 2004 · Chapter 5
Probably not a good moment for a Pippin / Paladin confrontation, since Pippin is decidedly unrepentant at the moment and more than half-way decided on the life of a wandering minstrel. Good story.
Author's reply
You've got that right. One of the problems that Paladin seems to run into in trying to discipline the tweenaged Pippin is a very bad sense of timing. He always seems to confront him at just the time to make things worse instead of better. Thanks.
Budgielover · 25 September 2004 · Chapter 4
Oh, I see where this is going with our impressionable young lad... ;) I always loved in Tolkien's writing how the hobbits were so free with song. That is hard to write in our fanfiction - we are no longer a muscial society where singing is socially acceptable. More's the pity. Fics that include the hobbits singing are rare, and I've never read one that dealt so much with music before. I'll be interested to see where you take our lad in this.
Author's reply
Oh yes, as impressionable as they come, especially without his cousins around to temper his enthusiasm. I do wish more fanfics would make use of the way JRRT wove song into his stories. I've heard some people who complain about the way the characters in Middle-earth burst into song at the drop of a hat. But it's not unrealistic. In a world without canned music, all you got was what you made yourself, or someone made for you in person. Someone said that we live in a world where our lives have a soundtrack, but a little bit has been lost, I think, now that music from others is so easily available. I love to include singing in my fics, and often do, although this one has a lot more than most. Only natural, I suppose, considering the plot.
Budgielover · 25 September 2004 · Chapter 3
Couldn't I just see Pippin's sweet face as he sings... I had forgotten the song from "The Hobbit" - I will have to go back and read it. I wonder if you have ever read a wonderful song that I am "sure" Pippin must have written - Willow-wode's "Not a Happy Camper." Look it up on her website - it is hysterical.
Author's reply
I know I could. *sigh* There are a great many nice songs in The Hobbit. And though most of them are described as Elven or Dwarven songs, I think it safe to say that whatever the songs were the first time Bilbo heard them, by the time he got around to writing them down, they would become his words in the end. Most of the time it in fact says something along the lines of "There was much more of it than this, but this is how Bilbo remembered it..." I went back and looked it up. I remember that! It's a hoot. Can't you just see Pip making that up, and singing it to Frodo in Minas Tirith in front of the whole Fellowship? Someone ought to ask her to write that up as a fic! 8-D
Budgielover · 25 September 2004 · Chapter 2
I just had to grin when I came to the section "Pip lit up with pleasure" - I could just see Billy Boyd as Pippin in that sentence. I also could see the Man having to sit on the floor to converse with the hobbits - a reversal of Frodo and Company among the Big Folk at The Prancing Pony. Master Dodd's caution of informing this stranger that Pip was the son of the Thain was very well thought out. Of course the hobbits would be cautious of Big Folk and protective of their leading family, and especially of Pip.
Author's reply
I think that sitting on the floor when visiting hobbits only makes sense for Big Folks, don't you? Yes, Master Dodd would be a bit canny about that. Hobbits of the Shire don't deal much with Big Folk, and they would naturally be at least a little wary, even of someone they deemed as seemingly harmless.
budgielover · 25 September 2004 · Chapter 1
I thought you captured our Pip so well here - generous of heart, intensely loving and loyal, a little sneaky and a not-yet adult tweenager. I liked how you described how he felt about Merry having to beg off his much-looked forward to visit (the bit about having to repair the ferry was inspired), and how he translated his disappointment into music. The little bit of movie-verse of Pip playing the fiddle was delightful. I look forward to more.
Author's reply
I'm so glad you like the way I wrote Pip. That was just what I was aiming for. I just thought that might be the kind of job Saradoc would entrust to his son when he had come of age, and that Merry would take it very seriously indeed. My Pip is *very* musical, I guess that is a bit of movie influence.
GamgeeFest · 25 September 2004 · Chapter 4
Oh-uh. Pippin's getting ideas. I can just see him now, sitting on a stool, fiddle in hand, a mug of ale nearby. Gives me kind of an espresso club feel. ;) How fun that the bard knew one of Bilbo's songs. Though having been in Dale, he would have undoubtedly heard a couple. He was surprised when Pippin joined in though.
Author's reply
Yes, Pippin is getting ideas--as though he ever needs help in that department! Cute image--thanks! 8-D The bard knows a few of Bilbo's songs, and yes, Pip did indeed surprise him!
SharonB · 25 September 2004 · Chapter 4
Yes, they did get to do a duet. So, is Bilbo's story the one Meneclar is in search of? He hit up with the right hobbit to find out if so. The songs were nice. Must go put on some LORT DVD's to add to this mood. ;-)
Author's reply
It looks that way, doesn't it? Oh yes. We came home from going out to supper tonight and put in RoTK; got to listen to Pippin sing again. *sigh*
RogerGamgee · 25 September 2004 · Chapter 4
When I read these lyrics, I started wondering if your muse was working overtime creating these beautiful songs! I loved the final song duet between Pippin and Menelcar...I only wish I could have heard it instead of just reading the words. It's interesting to see how much Pippin craves a life free from responsibility - wandering about earning his living through song. But I'm not sure if he realizes at this point (since this IS prior to the Quest) just how difficult that sort of life can be. Anyone who has been involved in the music business could probably tell you it isn't all it's cracked up to be. Beautifully written....looking forward to the next installment.
Author's reply
Oh I Wish!!! But except for "Nob o' the Lea" all the songs are by someone else. The first one in this chapter was by a fellow SCAdian, on a tape I've had for about eight years. I was listening to it as I was driving away from Ivan, and imagined Pippin listening to it. (I gave her the credit in the chapter footnote.) Most of the others are quotations from JRRT, who IMHO, is one of the great poets of our century, and underestimated at that. Pippin at this time is only an adolescent, and a life free from responsibility sounds mighty appealing. Of course he has no idea of how *hard* it will be, and Menelcar is fairly happy-go-lucky, so he doesn't mind many of the hardships that would probably NOT appeal to a hobbit, such as sleeping outdoors in all kinds of weather, missing meals, and going perhaps days without any audience at all.