Mystery and Fantasy
Sep. 30th, 2008 06:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerThe Russian word for brother is “brat.” I feel that I need to inform my brother of this fact.
***
For TP fans: has anyone read Melting Stones? Is it any good? After the mess of The Will of the Empress I’m leery of the Emelan books.
***
Recently I had a discussion with a friend, another fantasy reader, which touched in passing on science. “I wish there were more mystery in the world,” she said, and the conversation went on, but I’ve been contemplating since. First: what kind of mystery do you want, that you can’t find enough?
And second: why is it that fantasy, of all genres—fantasy, which has such scope for mystery—has such a yen for explaining everything? Sorcerers understand their systems of magic straight down to their fundamentals, in a way that physicists could only envy. Mythical beasts turn out to be genuine. The old myths and legends are literally true.
Why? Fantasy authors, of all people, ought to appreciate the imagination that creates myths and legends. But no—the people in their worlds are evidently so uncreative that every single creature and story is true, not just in some vague and spiritual way but literally?
Personally, if there were unicorns and centaurs trotting around outside my dorm room, I’d probably be sitting here thinking, “You know what would be cool? A centaur with a unicorn horn. And butterfly wings. And the magical telepathic ability to bond with humans…” and thus a truly mythical creature would be born.
Same with the legends. You’d think the bards would occasionally get bored and embroider on the existing stories, but no—no, the stories haven’t changed at all over the uncounted eons in between the Beginning of the World and the Time of Prophecy whence our hero arises.
The implication here is that if something isn’t real, in the sense that of having physical, demonstrable (scientific, although the authors wouldn’t say so) truth, it doesn’t matter. It’s awfully literalist for a genre that trades in aetheric spirit forces, but then, aetheric spirit forces in these fantasies are only as good as their effect on the physical world.
Our imaginations have been infected by materialism.
***
For TP fans: has anyone read Melting Stones? Is it any good? After the mess of The Will of the Empress I’m leery of the Emelan books.
***
Recently I had a discussion with a friend, another fantasy reader, which touched in passing on science. “I wish there were more mystery in the world,” she said, and the conversation went on, but I’ve been contemplating since. First: what kind of mystery do you want, that you can’t find enough?
And second: why is it that fantasy, of all genres—fantasy, which has such scope for mystery—has such a yen for explaining everything? Sorcerers understand their systems of magic straight down to their fundamentals, in a way that physicists could only envy. Mythical beasts turn out to be genuine. The old myths and legends are literally true.
Why? Fantasy authors, of all people, ought to appreciate the imagination that creates myths and legends. But no—the people in their worlds are evidently so uncreative that every single creature and story is true, not just in some vague and spiritual way but literally?
Personally, if there were unicorns and centaurs trotting around outside my dorm room, I’d probably be sitting here thinking, “You know what would be cool? A centaur with a unicorn horn. And butterfly wings. And the magical telepathic ability to bond with humans…” and thus a truly mythical creature would be born.
Same with the legends. You’d think the bards would occasionally get bored and embroider on the existing stories, but no—no, the stories haven’t changed at all over the uncounted eons in between the Beginning of the World and the Time of Prophecy whence our hero arises.
The implication here is that if something isn’t real, in the sense that of having physical, demonstrable (scientific, although the authors wouldn’t say so) truth, it doesn’t matter. It’s awfully literalist for a genre that trades in aetheric spirit forces, but then, aetheric spirit forces in these fantasies are only as good as their effect on the physical world.
Our imaginations have been infected by materialism.
