[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

koryk, on May 5 2009, 02:08 PM, said:

I admit I was thinking on the spot when I wrote that last article. However, to just state the fact that you disagree with me without providing any alternative arguments is unhelpful to say the least. I was trying to elicit further ideas, not scorn. Could you provide some counter-arguments? If not, then shoud you have bothered taking part in this thread?

Woa, easy there. There was no scorn in my post, as evidenced by the first sentence of my post. And the third. And fourth. The second was maybe a little heavy handed, but if you got scorn out of that, you're overly sensitive. I didn't provide alternate ideas because it seemed obvious that my alternate ideas could be summed up as "not what he said." It's like if you had said that you think all fantasy by definition has a duck in it. If I were to then post that I disagree, I would take it for granted that everyone would understand that my alternate stance is "No, that's wrong. In no way does fantasy require a duck."

But, you got fired up from my imagined snub and had to get chippy. So here is my breakdown of exactly what i disagree with about your post. My posts are in bold.

koryk, on Apr 20 2009, 04:37 PM, said:

Fantasy is a completely generic term.

No it isn't. It's a broad category with many sub-genres, but "completely generic" is overstating things.

However, "our" fantasy, i.e. the types of novels that are read by members of this forum, tend to be cleverly grouped together by bookshops into a single area of the shop,

It would seem that you haven't noticed how eclectic the reading choices of members are. We read a lot of non-fantasy. Thus, the types of novels read by forum members are not in fact clumped together in a single area.


whereas there are other types of fantasy that appear in the regular fiction areas.

Nope. If they're not in the fantasy section, they're probably not fantasy. I recommend looking at what section they ARE in, this will inform you of the type of book.

Think of any novel set in a historical time period (e.g. crusades). This is fantasy

Again, nope. Fiction set in a historical time period and place are by definition historical fiction, not fantasy.

since all but a few of the major characters and events are made up by the author and as far as we are concerned it might as well be another world.

I'm beginning to wonder if you are misunderstanding the word fantasy. What you've described here is called fiction. Just because an author makes something up, it doesn't magically become fantasy. It's fiction, by definition. Made up does not equal fantasy.

and as far as we are concerned it might as well be another world.

Ummmm, no, as far as we are concerned it is in the middle east. I can show it to you on a globe. If it was the crusades on a fantastical (see what I did there?) planet, then sure, it's fantasy. But, it's on Earth.

Similarly a lot of the "what if" novels (e.g. germany won WW2) I would consider as fantasy since they deal with a situation that is clearly alien to what actually happened.

See, again you're taking a genre that already has a name and exists and deciding it should be called fantasy. By definition, a book that shows alternate versions of real history is called historical fiction, or speculative fiction. Not fantasy. Maybe if Hitler was a telepath it would stray into the realm of fantasy.

So, how do bookshops decide where a fiction book should go?

First they separate them by genre. Things that are fantasy go in that section. Things that are not fantasy go in other sections, as discussed above. After that it's alphabetical by author's last name.

I reckon our type of fantasy requires specific elements,

I agree!

and this does not include a demand for magic.

Some sort of magic is pretty standard in fantasy. It's possible to have fantasy without it, but unusual. This is starting to delve into subgenres of fantasy. If there's no magic, there had better be some other fantastical (see what i did again) elements to make up for it.



These elements would (in general) be:

a) the principal characters are wholly fictional and have something in their history that makes them special in some way

This is a characteristic of fiction, not fantasy. The word fictional would be your clue. Most characters in any kind of fiction have something that makes them special. If they didn't, why would there be a book written about them?

there is a recognised discipline that profoundly effects the main characters' lifes, be it magic, religion, martial art, philosophical view.

I fail to see how any of these examples other than magic would qualify something as fantasy. By this definition any book about a priest, a ninja, or anyone who has a philosophical view is fantasy. Nope.

c) the story that plays out is heavily dependent on this controlling ethic

see my last comment

I am sure there are other identifiable elements, but it's late. Any suggestions?

Your definition of fantasy is the definition the rest of the world uses for fiction. Think of how many fiction books fit into your description. Almost every novel ever written is fantasy according to your criteria.

Fantasy includes most if not all of these elements: a fantastical (meaning a made up place, not Jerusalem) setting, fantastical people who often have fantastical abilities such as magic, fantastical creatures, and typically a technological level that could be considered pre-modern. Often there will be people killed with swords. Not all fantasy has these elements, and there are probably some that i won't think of until I hit post. A good rule though would be that if a book has most or all of these elements, it's fantasy, and if it has none of these it is almost certainly is not.

So there. Wouldn't this have been nicer if we had left this at my first post?

[koryk]

In response to old Raymond Luxury.

For some reason you have decided to take it upon yourself to annhilate all my points. If I may respond?

Fantasy is of course a generic term, being a broad category with many sub-genres, historical fiction being one of them, in its application of an interesting but totally unlikely departure from reality, which makes it as fantastic as if it were another world, not least the speculative nature of the details of ancient ways of life. (NOTE:

My point about bookshops is that they split fantasy, as you say, into specific sub-genres, some of which appear in the SF & Fantasy section and some of which appear in other sections. You confuse my use of the word fiction with the idea of straight fiction, which is of course restricted to entirely plausible concepts that may or may not take place in the real world but with fictional characters.

My list of elements of fantasy is inclusive in that fantasy needs ALL of the elements I describe, not just one or two, some of which you point out are also shared by standard fiction. I enquire if there are any additional elements that are also essential.

This all gets away from the point, which is how to recognise that collection of fantasy sub-genres that comprise Fantasy with a big F as opposed to all fantastic fiction (aha, another generic super-genre!).

Take Steven Erikson, for instance. Most of the main characters, but certainly not all (some of which exist deliberately to tie use into the human perspective), have that "special" quality I referred to earlier, for instance Paran (master of the deck), Fiddler (able to tap into the essence of the deck), and so many more. The controlling discipline is that of the warrens and houses, and almost every character is aligned in some way with a particular warren, house, god, or whatever else.

Take GRRM as well. We have most of the major characters belonging to one or other of the noble houses of Westeros, the controlling discipline being a quite rigid feudal/chivalric society, but with sufficient fantastical elements such as the dragon connection (always good in fantasy) and others that it must be considered Fantasy.

So then, what about old Dan Brown. Obviously pure fiction, but what does it lack in terms of Fantasy. Well, for one, the characters do not have that "special" quality - Langdon is a product simply of university education. The recognised discipline of the Da Vinci Code or Angels and Demons is Catholicism/Bible/Knight Templar etc. which are all grounded in truth rather than being purely fictional.

I know that this argument is vague, and more conceptual than realistic, but since it is borne out of a genuine attempt to categorise Fantasy as a distinct concept, I hope that it can be considered valid, if inaccurate.

[koryk]

Oops, managed to submit same response thrice, and not even finished!
Could the moderator remove 2 of the 3 please?

[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

koryk, on May 15 2009, 05:19 PM, said:

In response to old Raymond Luxury.

For some reason you have decided to take it upon yourself to annhilate all my points. If I may respond?

Um, the "some reason" is when you said this:

Quote

Could you provide some counter-arguments? If not, then shoud you have bothered taking part in this thread?

You wanted counter-arguments, so they were provided.

[HoosierDaddy]

I choose no sides. Koryk there is a nice big ole DELETE Button for the 2 copy-posts, that's how you get rid of them.

[Aptorian]

Yes, the delete button does in fact delete things.

But I removed them for you, because I'm such a helpfull sort.

Also, remember to keep it civil guys, it sounds like you've gone off on the wrong foot. Take a deep breath, have beer, chill out relax.

[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

It's all good. I am zen.

[koryk]

Beer sounds good to me.

So, is Fantasy simply anything that we know cannot possibly have taken place? THis seems to me to be too wide a definition. For example, a book about werewolves set in the modern day falls into this, but books about werewolves are typically found in the Horror sections of bookshops rather than the Fantasy sections.

Perhaps I am over-analysing. I give up.

[detritus]

alt146, on Mar 10 2009, 04:49 PM, said:

Bauchelain the Evil, on Mar 10 2009, 05:43 PM, said:

I must agree with those that require the magic element to call a book fantasy. Be it in an alternate world or in ours, for me the fantay genre is based on the presence of magic.
For example I wouldn't call A Game of Thrones, which I however loved, because there was no magic. I would call i more a sort of alternate history.

There is magic in aSoIaF - it's just very low key.

Spoiler

The Others, Daeny's dragons and the Red Witch

would be examples.

Thats What I was going to say. There is without a doubt magic in the Ice and Fire books. No way around it. They are 100% fantasy(the best out there In my opinion).

[lord of tragedy]

mandog lets not be silly. the fat gimp will never finish writing them and most of that is due to a plain lack of respect for his readers and they are incredibly limp in parts, breanne, catlynn, sansa, aria, theon. jamie has no hand boo hoo.

the last book was pants and the most interesting character, daenyrs, will never make it back to westeros.

[Bauchelain the Evil]

mandog, on May 18 2009, 12:52 AM, said:

alt146, on Mar 10 2009, 04:49 PM, said:

Bauchelain the Evil, on Mar 10 2009, 05:43 PM, said:

I must agree with those that require the magic element to call a book fantasy. Be it in an alternate world or in ours, for me the fantay genre is based on the presence of magic.
For example I wouldn't call A Game of Thrones, which I however loved, because there was no magic. I would call i more a sort of alternate history.

There is magic in aSoIaF - it's just very low key.

Spoiler

The Others, Daeny's dragons and the Red Witch

would be examples.

Thats What I was going to say. There is without a doubt magic in the Ice and Fire books. No way around it. They are 100% fantasy(the best out there In my opinion).

Maybe I had to explain myself a little bit better: I'm not saying that ASoIaF isn't fantasy, because in the later books of the series there is obviously magic, just that AGoT wasn't fantasy because in that book there was no magic.
Hope I've expressed my thoughts better

This post has been edited by Bauchelain the Evil: 19 May 2009 - 06:06 PM

[Sixty]

AGoT had the people that

Spoiler

get killed by Others in the prologue

.

(And if that's considered a spoiler... -.- May as well be safe)

[masan's saddle]

Was pootling around on Pajiba and saw this and thought of this thread, categorises fantasy based on magic, monsters and realism. Doesn't add anything particularly mindblowing but his references are good.


http://www.pajiba.com/book_reviews/assassi...-robin-hobb.php