[Formendacil]

I have definitely mellowed on my definition of canon in the past decade and a half from a rigid "it's what's written in the books with the latest published iteration settling any disputes" position. I mean, that's still basically my principle, but it isn't as rigid.

Mostly, I think, with a little more life behind me and with a fair amount of pondering things that might matter a bit more (like, the canon of Scripture), I find that I don't quite know how to define canon. Is it "what actually happened in Middle-earth," which is a bit nonsensical a question for fiction. Is it "what Tolkien intended," which requires an answer to the question of WHEN and also admits of no obvious authority (Tolkien being dead and all). I've had to settle on "well, canon is what I think happened." This is generally consistent and it does have an authority I can appeal to... it just takes all the ammunition out of telling someone else they're wrong, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.