The Tolkien Mailing Competition ("TLV" abbreviated from its Hungarian equivalent "Tolkien Levelező Verseny") takes place for the tenth time this year. In the first seven years it was organised only in Hungarian, and only for Hungarians. Competitors were groups of students aged 10–18-years. They competed in three categories of different difficulty levels, called Hobbits, Dúnedain and Noldor. Every year we had more than a hundred participants from all over the country, who were interested in the world created by Tolkien. But two years ago we decided to go international, and the outcome was definitely encouraging: check out this report and our bilingual blog.
(Click here for the Hungarian article about all categories.)
The international category, called Quendi, is open to individual participants. Both the challenges and the communication will be entirely in English—but don’t be afraid. You won’t need to be fluent in English for taking part in the competition. You only have to be able to understand the texts by Tolkien, and to write an essay—it won’t need to be of university level.
The competition is recommended for the "young adult" age group, since it originally addressed middle and high school students, and we do not plan to make big changes in the style. Still, the competition is open to anybody who feels young enough for it.
We set a maximum limit of 60 for the number of participants in this category. The number of applications were far from this limit in the last two years, but we kindly ask everyone interested in the competition to apply as soon as possible and thus leave us time to plan the process.
Participation in the Quendi category requires a thorough knowledge of The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion and, perhaps, The Children of Húrin. Some questions (riddles, quizzes, etc.) will refer to other works by Tolkien, but you will have about four weeks for each round, that is, plenty of time to look up in the books everything you might need.
There will also be some creative challenges. For example, you may be asked to describe a situation, write a short poem, make a drawing or take a photograph, etc. We would like to be proud of our participants, so we ask you to share the rights of your creative productions royalty-free. The best of your works—with due credit to authors/artists—might be published by the Hungarian Tolkien Society, e.g. on our website, www.tolkien.hu, or in our journal, Lassi Laurië. Please do not publish these works yourself without consulting us first, and especially not before the deadline of the round in question.
The contest starts in October and continues until March. Every month you will receive the questions of the next round, and you will have to submit your solutions until the indicated deadline. Communication will be via e-mail. Our e-mail address is tlv[at]tolkien.hu. Questions and comments are always welcome. We are happy to answer all your questions about the competition—except disclosing the solutions of the actual tasks.
There will be no prizes in the international category, only the public announcement of your achievement and a certificate sent by e-mail. There is no registration fee, either.
If you want to participate, please fill in this online registration form. The application deadline is:
11 of October, 2015
