2005 Author Reviews for
Kenaz

In my opinion, one of the most difficult things to do is to imitate another person's poetry. Even harder than that is the imitation of a song, because in a song, it's much more obvious when the meter is off. And the more popular the song, the more difficult the task becomes. So I stand amazed at Kenaz's skill in adapting one of Gilbert and Sullivan's more tightly written pieces and making it work for Haldir. An undertaking like this required a very good feel for rhythm, a background in canon knowledge, and lots of creativity. Apparently, Kenza has all these elements in spades, because Haldir's rendition of A Modern Major-General feels exactly on and I find it very easy to picture a small chorus of Marchwardens chiming in from the background to join him in singing this song. Excellently written! Tight and very much in keeping with the spirit of the original.

What made Kenaz so very good in the story "The Confused Elf" was the use of foils. Playing Haldir's perspective and Celeborn's perspective against one another was really a stroke of brilliance. It enabled Kenaz to pull out for examination all the ridiculous points in believing Haldir to be dead, and it gave Celeborn some absolutely fantastic lines, such as the line about not trusting things that had been written by hobbits, though apparently the entire printed media is subject to suspicion. In any case, Kenaz makes it seem as though all of Middle-earth has lost its mind due to the movies and the only one with any real sense of what is going on happens to be Haldir. Poor guy. Kenaz pits him up against a brick wall, and the brick wall wins. But it was a fun fight while it lasted, and I applaud Kenaz for such a pointed and fun swipe at some of the elements from the movies.