Aren tengwar supposed to be used phonetically?
Why, yes, they generally are. If I were writing Sindarin or Quenya with tengwar, I would definitely spell phonetically using the proper mode. It would be incorrect to do otherwise. Actually, it’s hard to imagine a non-phonetic Sindarin or Quenya mode because those modes are designed to match the sounds of the spoken languages. English, however, is not spelled phonetically. (If you’re not sure you believe me, take a look at the word “phonetically”. Why on Earth do we pronounce “ph” like “f”? Or look at the word “believe". When I say it, both of the vowels sound the same, but they sure don’t look it! And we completely leave off the sound of the final “e”!) And, to make matters worse, not everyone pronounces English the same way. Vowels are particularly problematic. Now matter how you pronounce yours, you can be certain that someone, somewhere, pronounces them differently. Tolkien states in the appendices to The Lord of the Rings that there is no correct tengwar mode for the English l
