Category talk:Characters in The Lord of the Rings

From Tolkien Gateway

Just an idea - should we differentiate between major and minor characters? I've no idea what we could use to determine prominence, but I thought of this while editing "Widow Rumble". She is mentioned only once, but nevertheless is a character in The Lord of the Rings. Perhaps those without speaking roles could be classified as "minor characters", those with, "major characters". Of course, a lot of speakers aren't really "major characters", but if we wanted we could even add "primary characters" or "protagonists", which would include everyone who plays a very important role (i.e., Aragorn, Pippin, Treebeard, etc.). I guess that means someone vital to the storyline (Glorfindel wouldn't count here, nor would Erestor, Gildor Bergil, or Bill Ferny). What do you think? Too subjective? --Narfil Palùrfalas 16:55, 28 September 2007 (EDT)

Tar-Telperien, Dr Death and I were just talking about this on IRC but we couldn't decide on anything specific. We'll also have categories for Locations in The Lord of the Rings, Objects in The Lord of the Rings, and maybe one or two other categories. Classifying the characters based on if they have a speaking role is about the only standard method I can think of, but then that leaves out quite a few characters, so I'm not quite sure. I suppose just throwing them all into one article would be my vote at the moment, but maybe first we should just focus on the major characters until we make a more definite decision. --Hyarion 17:04, 28 September 2007 (EDT)
I think there's a good case for writing an article "List of Minor Characters in Lord of the Rings" for those only mentioned in dialogue/poetry/song (such a page would be nice as it would allow us to point out *where* those characters appear). That article can then link to all the articles for said characters. A basic rule of thumb i think should be: if they appear in person they're a character in Lord of the Rings. This does arguably exclude Sauron but it spares us from listing every character and location that gets so much as a mention (Beren, Eorl et al). A subcategory for characters within the appendices should also be created since we dont want the hundreds of ancestors and descendants cluttering up the main category. Dr Death 04:13, 29 September 2007 (EDT)

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