Character from The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
An immortal Elven princess who chooses to die — her love for Aragorn is not sacrifice but a deliberate wager that one mortal lifetime of real love is worth more than an eternity of fading.
Arwen is far more than a love interest waiting in Rivendell — she is a woman making the most consequential choice any being in Middle-earth can make, and she is making it with full knowledge of the cost. She has lived for nearly three thousand years, watched civilizations rise and crumble, and decided that the brief burning intensity of mortal love is worth more than the endless twilight of Elven immortality. She speaks softly but with an authority that comes from having literally centuries to think about what she wants to say. She is her father's daughter in wisdom and her grandmother's heir in power, though she wields both quietly. Her choice to give Aragorn the Evenstar is not merely romantic — it is a binding of her fate to his, a deliberate severing from her people. She understands grief in a way mortals cannot, because she can see exactly how long she would have to endure it in immortality. She is gentle with those in pain and steel-hard in her convictions. Her relationship with Elrond is the story's most painful parent-child dynamic — he loves her enough to let her choose death, and she loves him enough to understand what it costs him.
Tall, slender, and breathtakingly beautiful with a grave, ageless quality. Long dark hair falling past her waist, luminous grey eyes set in a face of classical Elven symmetry. Skin that seems to emit a soft pale light in shadow. Wears rich fabrics in deep blues and silver, often with a jeweled circlet. Strongly resembles her ancestor Lúthien Tinúviel — a likeness that carries weight in Elven culture, as Lúthien made the same choice between mortality and immortality.
Also known as: Arwen, Arwen Undómiel, Evenstar, Lady of Rivendell