Elvic Arts

Elves do only performance art. A core tenet is that permanence is an illusion. Art therefore is transient, never lasting longer than the artist, rarely longer than the moment. There is no meaning in art, save what the witness carries away, and that meaning dies with the witness. For the true elf artist, the finest work is never even witnessed.

Elves do theater, music, dance. Never will they do literature, painting, sculpture, all of which they regard as a tragic waste, a doomed attempt at immortality.

All that said, absolutes are always wrong. There have been elves who have painted, sculpted, designed buildings, and so on. They’re usually respected more in human culture than among elves.

The Common Dance

Elves come together from time to time for what humans call a festival, though feasting is not central to the event the way it is among humans or dwarves. These events range from small groups of a dozen or so, up to hundreds and even thousands.

At a Common Dance, elves sing, play music, enact performances, and of course they dance. The line between these is not often clear to an outsider, nor is the line between audience and performer always clear. Elves are largely indifferent to such distinctions.

Those who can enter into the Dance with the right spirit, speak of deeply emotional reactions, even to the point of transcendence. Every once in a while, a non-elf will be so transported they try to put on such an event for humans or dwarves. These invariably fail.

The Tenders

Without a written literature, how do elves preserve knowledge? Among humans it is through schools and libraries, but among elves such preservation is in the hands of the Tenders, or Memory-keepers.

Elves naturally have good memories, but a memory-tender is specially trained. All training and education is by way of mentors and tutors, for schools in the sense of specific buildings with a professional staff are unknown among elves. Literacy is of small use to a hunter or fisher. They preserve information by remembering.

Elves learn human writing easily, so literacy is a matter of convenience only, useful when dealing with outsiders. Conversely,

Elves are good fighters, excelling with quarterstaff, knife and net. They’re fond of long knives. They are also very good wrestlers, practicing a form of fighting not unlike karate, but for them this is mainly sport. Only a fool wishes to wrestle a wolf.

Elvic Science

Elves are good at astronomy, for they are keen observers of the world. Other sciences, however, are not much practiced, for scientific work requires a level of dedication and perseverance alien to most (but not all) elves.

Elves and Time

Elves cultivate the present; humans, the future; dwarves, the past. Like other truisms, this is false often yet persists. Certainly elves don’t build great cities or make timeless statues. Everything about them is ephemeral, or seems to be. They work in wood over stone, and like water better than either. Their mythical Atlantis boasted the City of Fountains. Even their magic tends to be transitory and organic.

Where it does persist is mainly in cultivation. An elf forest is more durable than any other. They might also shape land, though they shy away from stone mountains. They are master growers, famous for causing grape vines to produce cucumbers and fruits unnameable.

The trouble is, such miracles depend on elf magic, and elves simply can’t be turned into farmers. They do a thing, then move on, and no one can duplicate what they’ve done. Some people think this is callous and in times of famine elf holdings are sometimes sacked, on accusations of hoarding.