71–80 of 109 posts
One fascinating aspect of Tolkien’s oeuvre is that his writings are, how to put it, endlessly derivative. Not only did he use words from different languages, motifs from different mythologies, and images from different poetical traditions. He also mercilessly raided the writings of George MacDonald for characters and plot elements (try reading ‘Phantastes’ or ‘The Princess and the Goblin’ to appreciate just how freak…
One fascinating aspect of Tolkien’s oeuvre is that his writings are, how to put it, endlessly derivative. Not only did he use words from different languages, motifs from different mythologies, and images from different poetical traditions. He also mercilessly raided the writings of George MacDonald for characters and plot elements (try reading ‘Phantastes’ or ‘The Princess and the Goblin’ to appreciate just how freak…
Also, to say Tolkien re-arranged things is true as far as it goes, but look at how much he re-arranged: he used his knowledge of several languages to create several other languages; he used his knowledge of several myth systems; he used his own personal experience in war.
One fascinating aspect of Tolkien’s oeuvre is that his writings are, how to put it, endlessly derivative. Not only did he use words from different languages, motifs from different mythologies, and images from different poetical traditions. He also mercilessly raided the writings of George MacDonald for characters and plot elements (try reading ‘Phantastes’ or ‘The Princess and the Goblin’ to appreciate just how freak…
Sometimes, authors take their influence and create something greater (as Tolkien did with MacDonald), and sometimes the derivative work doesn't understand what made the original great so falls flat. Also, to say Tolkien re-arranged things is true as far as it goes, but look at how much he re-arranged: he used his knowledge of several languages to create several other languages; he used his knowledge of several myth s…
I don't intend to tear down the grandparent, but I thought their perspective was surprising and it brought up the philosophical meaning of newness and what constitutes creation for me.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think this quote refutes the author's point. Tolkien was vehemently denying that his works were allegorical, in the sense that one should not look for deeper, hidden meaning in the LOTR or any other tale set in Middle-Earth. But this article simply describes how Tolkien (allegedly) tried to compose a stronger English mythology, then eventually abandoned the idea and settled for the purely fictional setting th…
Tolkien rejected the idea to compare Sauron and Hitler. He rejected that LOTR was his way to handle his war trauma. His biggest argument is that most ideas existed before WW2.
A few examples can be seen when characters walking for days start walking by the grass at the borders of the path, or to describe fields without cattle in wartime.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I think we have an unhealthy obsession with trying to achieve 100% original thoughts and ideas This is pretty much forced on people by the nature of the intellectual property system. If it's ""derivative"" of something written in living memory, you have to pay.
Also every critic (hell, every person with a social media account and too much time on their hands) will endlessly berate you - and you see it too. Critics have also learned that, unless the film/book/game/etc is absolutely breathtaking, bashing and looking for any little thing to pick apart gets more attention. The easiest attack to make is, “this [media] is just a poor man’s [other media].”
I mean, yes, _something_ in the story is going to be repetitive.
But the unrealistic expectations people have these days is that it that it should be 100% original. don't write stories about humans, write about aliens, but no, alien vs predator covered that.. it is never ending.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would think "high fantasy" to be defined as "tolkienesque" (great evil to defeat and save the world). But there's a ton of fantasy where the other important tropes of Tolkien (great lost past, the dark empire, all good on one side and all bad on the other, the pure heroes) is missing. The first that come to mind are "the wheel of time" and "the chronicles of Thomas covenant". Also if you move from high fantasy ther…
> there's a ton of fantasy where the other important tropes of Tolkien (great lost past, the dark empire, all good on one side and all bad on the other, the pure heroes) is missing. The first that come to mind are "the wheel of time" We must see different things. As I see the wheel of time: - Great lost past. This one's obvious; the Age of Legend is a huge focus of the books. - The dark empire. Doesn't exist in the p…
There is one Big Evil but the lesser ones are all scheming against each other. In Tolkien there's just a bit with Saruman and the spiders, but you don't really have factions amongst the ringwraiths, for example. It's all just a battle between Sauron/everyone or Melkor/everyone.
The good ones in WoT don't simply start separated but actively hating and fighting each other, Rand has to go to war with many nations and specific groups within nations, and some of them just split and start killing each other. This is not the same as Gondor and Rohan being on bad terms, or some elven clans just standing on the sides.
In Tolkien's universe you 99% of the time know who is evil and who is not (elf, dwarf, hobbit, ent, eagle, northern man = good; orc, goblin, troll, dragon, great spiders, eastern man= bad).
Yes, a couple human characters are ambiguous, but it's a pretty small minority.
In WoT you have a couple evil races and you, the reader, have a clear view of who is good and who is bad.
But in-world people want to kill other people because each thinks the other is evil: that looks a substantial difference to me.
Re: pure heroes, I meant that the main characters basically are all 100% good. This is the same in both universes too, just not a constant in all high fantasy. At least I think, I didn't finish the wheel of time ;)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Perhaps, one can say that Tolkien is 20th century‘s Shakespeare Hmm, I doubt it. The Hobbit is fun, but many adults returning to LOTR think "gosh, this is long, dull and badly written". Here's an example, which is also a more interesting review than the unherd one: https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v23/n22/jenny-turner/reasons...
So this is a weird question, but I am actually serious.... Isn't all "good" literature meant to be "long dull and badly written[to the untrained eye]"? The more I think about what you said, the more I realize that the image of "nobel winning" literature that I have in my mind is by definition long, boring, impossibly allegorical and it must feel like you have to be superhuman to read it and understand it. Equally, in…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
He did it so well that most "high" fantasy that came out after him felt derivative of Tolkien. I'd really like to see counter-examples though; I feel like I haven't dived into the genre enough, in part because I'm turned off by the sheer volume of some book (series) on the one hand, and the juvenile tropes (generic hero's journey formula) on the other.
For post-Tolkien fantasy with little or no Tolkien influences or tropes, the most obvious recent example is Game of Thrones. I suppose it's arguable whether it's High Fantasy, but looking at the character arcs of John Snow and Daenerys I think it clears the bar.
There's perhaps no direct borrowing of names and character types, but by George R.R. Martin's own attestation, he sought to write a story with a scope approaching Tolkeins but disposing of Tolkiens idealism and dualism. He was deeply influenced by Tolkiens writing, and sought to correct it's flaws.
https://www.tolkiensociety.org/2019/09/george-r-r-martin-i-k...
One fascinating aspect of Tolkien’s oeuvre is that his writings are, how to put it, endlessly derivative. Not only did he use words from different languages, motifs from different mythologies, and images from different poetical traditions. He also mercilessly raided the writings of George MacDonald for characters and plot elements (try reading ‘Phantastes’ or ‘The Princess and the Goblin’ to appreciate just how freak…
Maybe this is down to a difference in time as well. Forster, writing before the Great War, could believe in the power of recognizing the connectedness of people to one another, and Tolkein perhaps could not.