Wot, no Tolkein?

[ShadowPaladin V1.0]

Dragons crop up in many mythologies. Although the Chinese would never think of slaying a Dragon.

 

The D&D dragon is more akin to those found in western mythologies. Like the one George is supposed to have slain.

 

Orcs accoriding to the article were inspired by the grendel monster (although they are not aquatic in origin the name is)

[Dark_Raven]

The Oriental dragons are more snake like and the Western dragons are more giant lizard like. Just getting picky about similarities and differences.

[astr0creep]

The Oriental dragons are more snake like and the Western dragons are more giant lizard like. Just getting picky about similarities and differences.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Anyway, LotR is not known for its dragons since their is only 1, Smaug. And that is in The Hobbit. No dragons in LotR, unless you count the Fellbeasts as dragons?

[ShadowPaladin V1.0]

The Oriental dragons are more snake like and the Western dragons are more giant lizard like. Just getting picky about similarities and differences.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

There was a good program on National Geographic yesterday called Dragon Quest. It explored the various dragon myths. And a paleantologist built a dragon from a collection of dinosaur bones which was really interesting.

 

Lots of chinese people still believe in and say they see dragons. Bit like a lot of people in the west see angels I suppose.

 

I'm not really sure what Tolkiens contribution to shaping dragons was...

[Lucius]

[astr0creep]

[Darth Drabek]

I know various mythologies have done "The Quest" before, but Tolkien definitely set the template for a protagonist gradually picking up group members of different skills and abilities to go off searching for a talisman that has the power to defeat evil.

 

It's the classic formula, ripped off (sometimes lovingly, sometimes just ripped off) in books, movies, video games and the occasional TV show.

[metadigital]

"The Quest" is exactly the plot of 99.999% of all Hollywood films.

[Darth Drabek]

"The Quest" is exactly the plot of 99.999% of all Hollywood films.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

True dat, true dat.

 

And the beloved RPG genre. Join up with a diverse posse, have adventures and defeat enemies during the search for a potent talisman that is the key to defeating an ancient evil, etc. etc.

 

There's your debt to Tolkien, right there! Party-based RPGs!

[Ginthaeriel]

Traditional Western Dragons were spawned from anglo-saxon myth and nordic culture: Nidhogg and the other wyrms and dragons who devoured the roots of Yggdrasil, the World Tree, the Dragon slain by Siegfried... hell even in Beowulf, the oldest extant English poem, has a Dragon in it. Tolkien didn't invent those.

 

Tolkien's elves were really more of a merge between the traditional European depiction as small wood sprites or nature spirits, with the fiercer, human sized Nordic elves. The modern day fantasy elves are really not that much different from humans, only immortal, slender, noble and beautiful. Basically, an idealized depiction of mankind... which is probably why they're often depicted as haughty. In LOTR, they were the tenants of the world before the Age of Man, who departed to the island in the west (I forgot it's name), and in lots of fantasy literature, they act almost as a proxy God to the land. As a literary device, it is an imagining of the greater aspects of humanity, which can then be mocked (fancy-pants pansies) or idealized (OMFG MI DUALWIELDING BLADESINGER ELF IS TEH AWESOMEZ, ELVES PWN ALL).

 

Nothing special there: a staple of high fantasy is a clear struggle between good and evil, and thus there must be a force to represent ultimate good. If not elves, then something similar. Probably without pointy ears, though.

 

(Tangent) Indeed, Dark Elves act as a polar opposite to that: a representation of humankind at it's worst, a fallen angel. Satan was once, after all, Lucifer, the morning star. Which is why it seems their depiction is always so needlessly over the top. And that's probably why they're so popular too: they appeal to our darker, selfish impulses.

 

The same can be said of Orcs, Dwarves... hell just about every nuance of Tolkienesque fantasy was a modernization and reimagining of anglo-saxon myth... that was what Tolkien was a professor of, after all. They were worked into the themes of a traditional fairy tale: good vs. evil, a journey into the unknown and a return with knowledge, etc. After all, The Hobbit was the seed that started it all, and it was written as a children's book, originating as one of the many tales he wrote for his children as bedtime stories. i.e. Roverandom.

 

(Although J.R.R. Tolkien did work on recreating a complete epic, aka his "Legendarium", of his own imagination before the Hobbit; I doubt what he was intending with that was what we would traditionally call "High Fantasy". There's a reason why everyone loves The Hobbit, but not The Silmarillion. He just borrowed ideas from that while writing Hobbit. Tolkien didn't even believe in publishing any of the work in the first place, he never published Silmarillion for example. Middle-Earth was just a way of amusing himself, as a way of giving tribute to the anglo-saxon epics which he studied and taught... it was emulation. Unless in this alternate history, a great deal of people enjoyed reading Beowulf in High School, I doubt there could be a genre forged from that that wasn't as stale and academic as Tolkien himself.)

 

The merging of the epic (all the anglo-saxon themes and imagery which he fused into The Hobbit) with the fairy tale could be argued as what constitutes High Fantasy, and although the whole thing eventually grew into something much more than just a fairy tale, those roots remain.

 

So if Tolkien was killed in WW1 and never wrote Lord of the Rings, then... I would say perhaps what we conceive as High Fantasy (Epic Fairy Tales) would lose a lot of its anglo-saxon nuances and roots. If it were based on the epic traditions of another culture... say, Chinese, for example, we'd have... actually we'd have a more youth-oriented wuxia, I'd think. I don't think eastern traditions really fit the mold well, because of the inherent differences in the culture.

 

So I believe that Tolkienesque was really inevitable, even if Tolkien was dead. The European tradition was the best place to draw from for High Fantasy... and Tolkienesque being an amalgamation of european folklore and myth, would probably have come into existence in a very similar form by another author anyways. That the genre was so popular shows that the concept was probably in the back of many people's minds anyways.

 

Now, what would happen if High Fantasy never EXISTED? If folklore and myth were never merged? Well... I suppose the difference between children's fantasy and academic myth would be much greater and more distinguished... much like the era in which Tolkien wrote LOTR in the first place. There would be no room for Wizards or DnD or pulp writers to corrupt it into the... grungy adventure pop fiction we have today, aka Sword & Sorcery, which were attributes more native to swashbuckler's tales (three musketeers) Science Fiction, comic books, and such.

 

Just look at the stuff that was popular with teens when Tolkien was around- the 50's. Comic books, campy scifi like Buck Rogers... stuff that Fallout was based on without the post-apoc. Actually, versions of all that still exist... so really, we're looking at a vacuum. Without any cultural replacement for high fantasy, it wouldn't make sense for it NOT to be written eventually. It's impossible and fruitless to even try and predict how things would turn out, as the only certain thing we could say is that "High Fantasy just wouldn't exist". Which is an obvious conclusion when you kill one off one of the genre's founding authors, AND assume that there will be no replacement for him.

[astr0creep]

[Lyric Suite]

grungy adventure pop fiction we have today, aka Sword & Sorcery

 

Fancy that, somebody who has never read a Robert Howard tale...

[metadigital]

... hell just about every nuance of Tolkienesque fantasy was a modernization and reimagining of anglo-saxon myth... that was what Tolkien was a professor of, after all.

...

The merging of the epic (all the anglo-saxon themes and imagery which he fused into The Hobbit) with the fairy tale could be argued as what constitutes High Fantasy, and although the whole thing eventually grew into something much more than just a fairy tale, those roots remain.

 

So if Tolkien was killed in WW1 and never wrote Lord of the Rings, then... I would say perhaps what we conceive as High Fantasy (Epic Fairy Tales) would lose a lot of its anglo-saxon nuances and roots. ... I believe that Tolkienesque was really inevitable, even if Tolkien was dead. The European tradition was the best place to draw from for High Fantasy... and Tolkienesque being an amalgamation of european folklore and myth, would probably have come into existence in a very similar form by another author anyways. That the genre was so popular shows that the concept was probably in the back of many people's minds anyways.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

He wrote The Hobbit before the war, didn't he? Does that affect the question Wals posed?

 

The elephant in the middle of your essay is that if Tolkien died prematurely, someone else's vision of nordic myths, with or without anglo-saxon imagery (as this is a far less well known area of expertise), would be what we regard as fantasy. I doubt any single person would duplicate Tolkien's effort, and certainly not his peculiar tastes and biases.

[Ginthaeriel]

Dammit, another hopelessly dense post. Alright, here's the sparknotes version (refer to my last post for evidence and supporting points and stuff)

 

Tolkien never intended to invent a whole new "high fantasy" genre. He didn't even want to publish most of his work.

 

Most of Tolkien's work in Middle Earth was a hobby, as an English professor, he was fascinated with european folklore, especially anglo-saxon epics and myth (since he was the PROFESSOR of that in OXFORD), so he tried to EMULATE this in what he called his "Legendarium", including The Silmarillion. That was not high fantasy, that was epic: very similar to Beowulf.

 

High fantasy really came from The Hobbit.*

 

Did anyone like The Silmarillion? I don't think so. It was the fusing of the epic with the fairy tale that made Tolkienesque fantasy popular.

 

So High Fantasy = an Epic Fairy Tale.

 

An example: Elves are depicted as an idealized version of man. In any Fairy Tale, there needs to be a symbol of ultimate good, and Elves were it.

 

Given the nature of European folklore, I agree with others saying that the creation of High Fantasy was inevitable. If Tolkien didn't write an Epic Fairy Tale, someone else would have, and in the end it would have been very similar: Great Evil vs. Brave Hero, Good Men vs. Evil Beasts, etc. It would be extremely similar, and the only real difference I could perceive would be in the details. IE the elves wouldn't have pointy ears.

 

What would happen if NO ONE took Tolkien's place, and no one ever merged the epic with the fairy tale? Well then the only conclusion I imagine can be drawn would be... High Fantasy wouldn't exist. Hypothetical situations dealing with a LACK of something in the past (rather than say, a CHANGE in something) don't really ever go anywhere. What if there was never a chicken? Then there would be no egg.

 

*It was conceived as a bedtime story for his son, and was written as a fairy tale. He just so happened to fuse stuff from his legendarium into it. It was only a student's urging that he published The Hobbit. And in a rare case of luck, it became a hit. Tolkien never wanted to do stuff like "The Hobbit", it was the only text in which he fused his Legendarium with his children's stuff (like Roverandom). The publisher's had to urge him to write LOTR.

[metadigital]

... Although humans do tend to have a fetish for pointy ears (Mr Spock, anyone), so they probably would be in any fantasy setting.

[Ginthaeriel]

Fancy that, somebody who has never read a Robert Howard tale...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I would classify Conan the Cimmerian as LOW fantasy, or fantasy pulp, rather than Sword & Sorcery. After all, the "magic" inherent in that setting was more divine, or spiritual- not that much of "fairy tale magic", which is how I would classify the "arcane" magic which is featured in fantasy nowadays, but more of the similar epic and mythic powers, making it similar to traditional epics anyways. There wasn't much magic in the setting anyways. The whole setting was technically on Earth.

 

I would argue that Sword & Sorcery is more of the merging of Tolkienesque high fantasy with Howard's pulp fantasy, which I referred to in my previous post as a "corruption", but that's only because everyone here is intent on seeing Tolkien's fantasy as the original high fantasy. And if you look at that way, then yes, Howard DID invent Sword and Sorcery: he was around longer than Tolkien, and Tolkien, instead, could be the corruption.

 

In any case, what can be said is that the "fantasy" of today had many founding fathers, including both Howard and Tolkien and probably many more.

 

The elephant in the middle of your essay is that if Tolkien died prematurely, someone else's vision of nordic myths, with or without anglo-saxon imagery (as this is a far less well known area of expertise), would be what we regard as fantasy. I doubt any single person would duplicate Tolkien's effort, and certainly not his peculiar tastes and biases.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I said that. By no means do I think that if Tolkien died, the exact same course of events as we see today would unfold. I did argue that the nuances would be changed:

the only real difference I could perceive would be in the details. IE the elves wouldn't have pointy ears

But it would be so similar as to be of no consequence. It's all archetypal really. Good guys, bad guys, big villain. I'm a firm believer in the Joseph Campbell... um... camp. After all, I did try and take a stab at High Fantasy from a Chinese perspective, but that's impossible because the background culture that lead to it's creation were so different. The closest equivalent I could think of is wuxia literature such as Louis Cha's work, but that doesn't really incorporate folktale elements like Tolkien.

I can't think of a NON european High Fantasy. All the ingredients are so intrinsically tied to european literature. European Fairy Tales and the Nordic Epics (the very founding of anglo-saxon, and therefore English, culture) were both such prominent parts of the western literature, that it seems impossible to incorporate the two without having the many traditions of both being "sucked in".

Maybe if someone else wrote it, the elves would be a foot shorter. The dwarves WOULD be evil. The star of the show wouldn't be some puny runt, but a barrel chested barbarian, to be more in line with Beowulf, the epic which The Hobbit was actually based on. But in the end, I don't think it would be SO different that it'd actually matter.

 

Besides, I doubt it's even possible to project HOW it would be different unless we posed the question with some theoretical alternative to Tolkien. Right now, in our "alternate history", just about anyone could have written High Fantasy, and so we have no point of reference.

Edited March 7, 2006 by Ginthaeriel

[Lyric Suite]

I would classify Conan the Cimmerian as LOW fantasy, or fantasy pulp, rather than Sword & Sorcery. After all, the "magic" inherent in that setting was more divine, or spiritual- not that much of "fairy tale magic", which is how I would classify the "arcane" magic which is featured in fantasy nowadays, but more of the similar epic and mythic powers, making it similar to traditional epics anyways. There wasn't much magic in the setting anyways. The whole setting was technically on Earth.

 

I would argue that Sword & Sorcery is more of the merging of Tolkienesque high fantasy with Howard's pulp fantasy, which I referred to in my previous post as a "corruption", but that's only because everyone here is intent on seeing Tolkien's fantasy as the original high fantasy. And if you look at that way, then yes, Howard DID invent Sword and Sorcery: he was around longer than Tolkien, and Tolkien, instead, could be the corruption.

 

Erm...

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sword_and_sorcery

[metadigital]

The elephant in the middle of your essay is that if Tolkien died prematurely, someone else's vision of nordic myths, with or without anglo-saxon imagery (as this is a far less well known area of expertise), would be what we regard as fantasy. I doubt any single person would duplicate Tolkien's effort, and certainly not his peculiar tastes and biases.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I said that.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Yes, but I was writing it as you were adding your epilogue.

By no means do I think that if Tolkien died, the exact same course of events as we see today would unfold. I did argue that the nuances would be changed:

the only real difference I could perceive would be in the details. IE the elves wouldn't have pointy ears

But it would be so similar as to be of no consequence. It's all archetypal really. Good guys, bad guys, big villain. I'm a firm believer in the Joseph Campbell... um... camp.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

But the details are what make the fiction Tolkien Fantasy.

 

You are describing a template for all myths, not Tolkienist fantasy specifically.

After all, I did try and take a stab at High Fantasy from a Chinese perspective, but that's impossible because the background culture that lead to it's creation were so different. The closest equivalent I could think of is wuxia literature such as Louis Cha's work, but that doesn't really incorporate folktale elements like Tolkien.

I can't think of a NON european High Fantasy. All the ingredients are so intrinsically tied to european literature. European Fairy Tales and the Nordic Epics (the very founding of anglo-saxon, and therefore English, culture) were both such prominent parts of the western literature, that it seems impossible to incorporate the two without having the many traditions of both being "sucked in".

Maybe if someone else wrote it, the elves would be a foot shorter. The dwarves WOULD be evil. The star of the show wouldn't be some puny runt, but a barrel chested barbarian, to be more in line with Beowulf, the epic which The Hobbit was actually based on. But in the end, I don't think it would be SO different that it'd actually matter.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If the hero wasn't a halfling, then a lot of the point of the story is void. Ergo, not Tolkien.

Besides, I doubt it's even possible to project HOW it would be different unless we posed the question with some theoretical alternative to Tolkien. Right now, in our "alternate history", just about anyone could have written High Fantasy, and so we have no point of reference.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That's the point of the question. Be creative! Be the Tolkien!

[Ginthaeriel]

Erm...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sword_and_sorcery

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

From the same source:

Many attempts have been made to redefine precisely what defines S&S as a clear sub-genre. Although many debate the finer points, the general consensus is that S&S is characterized by a strong bias toward fast-paced, action-rich tales set within a quasi-mythical or fantastical framework.

That article states Homer's Odyssey as the roots of Sword & Sorcery, for goodness sake. I'm not arguing that Howard *couldn't be called* Sword & Sorcery, and you'll note that in my post I said that his work was probably crucial to the development of the "genre". But it's such a vague and nebulous "genre" in the first place, taken so long in the making, that the only definitive example would be the modern examples of Sword & Sorcery: like Moor****.

As I said:

grungy adventure pop fiction we have today, aka Sword & Sorcery

"Grungy adventure pop fiction"... I don't see anything wrong with that definition of S&S. And the only "definite" S&S existed after the 60's, since that's when the term was invented, and didn't really get used that much until recently.

I'm not sure why you cited that source, to be honest... It just kind of helped prove my point...

[Ginthaeriel]

But the details are what make the fiction Tolkien Fantasy.

 

You are describing a template for all myths, not Tolkienist fantasy specifically.

Well, I think I really tried to hammer down the point about "epic fairy tales", and I disagree that ALL myth would follow the same formula as Tolkien. I agree that the details are what make it Tolkienesque... but we're positing a world where Tolkien is dead. We are left with only fantasy. That's kind of... broad.

 

If the hero wasn't a halfling, then a lot of the point of the story is void. Ergo, not Tolkien.

Exactly. Not Tolkien. We're in a world where Tolkien is DEAD, remember?

But it would *still* be High Fantasy. And I don't think the current state of High Fantasy would be much different in the situation I proposed.

 

That's the point of the question. Be creative! Be the Tolkien!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

First of all, I doubt even if anyone did it, it'd still be very different from Tolkien, because in order to create High Fantasy you'd need Epic and Fairy Tales. You'd have to draw from classic European epics and Fairy Tales, and Tolkien basically did just that: he ran the whole gamut of mythic literature. Emulating that would only result in minor variations... which I really don't see the point in listing.

 

I don't think "what we would do in Tolkien's shoes" was really the question, and if it was, I don't really have an answer since I can't really imagine what I would do to combine Fairy Tale with Epic. I'm a much bigger fan of Cyberpunk and Steampunk, and I absolutely dreaded Lord of the Rings.

[Cantousent]

It's impossible and fruitless to even try and predict how things would turn out, as the only certain thing we could say is that "High Fantasy just wouldn't exist". Which is an obvious conclusion when you kill one off one of the genre's founding authors, AND assume that there will be no replacement for him.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

...And yet you yourself are a practitioner of the same exercises you deride in others. If "t's impossible and fruitless to even try [sic] and predict..." then why do you predict how things would turn out in the first place?

 

The truth is, all we can argue is counter-factual history because, at the end of the day, Tolkien did exist and he is one of the genre's founding fathers. To argue whether someone would replace him is pointless as he was there and needed no replacement.

 

So, saying that the genre would not exist without him sounds a bit arrogant, I suppose. Saying that the genre would essentially be the same without him aspires to the same heighth of arrogance. Maybe you've got a crystal ball, but I don't think so. I just think you know some facts and you've got really strong opinions but the difference between the two escapes you.

 

The biggest roadblock to the folks who want to devalue Tolkien's contributions to the genre is his legacy. You might want to suggest that everything was going to work out largely the same without him, but you notice that there is quite a slew of folks arguing about whether or not Tolkien is important. Apparently, he's important enough that all these folks argue about him.

[Ginthaeriel]

It's impossible and fruitless to even try and predict how things would turn out, as the only certain thing we could say is that "High Fantasy just wouldn't exist". Which is an obvious conclusion when you kill one off one of the genre's founding authors, AND assume that there will be no replacement for him.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

...And yet you yourself are a practitioner of the same exercises you deride in others. If "t's impossible and fruitless to even try [sic] and predict..." then why do you predict how things would turn out in the first place?

Well, my predictions were rather broad, nearing obvious (if Tolkien did not exist, Tolkienesque would not exist. But High Fantasy would probably still exist, because of the fact that the genre was so steeped in past western traditions, and that at the time, there were so many other fantasy writers), and backed up with a whole slew of reasoning and evidence. And even then, I can come to no conclusion other than two very, very general and vague facts. What others are proposing here though, is a complete reimagining of the very details of the literature and its developments, which as I said, is impossible.

Also, I'd like to inquire how I'm in any way "deriding" anyone? I'm simply putting forth my own observation that it's rather fruitless to work through such a totally hypothetical situation.

The truth is, all we can argue is counter-factual history because, at the end of the day, Tolkien did exist and he is one of the genre's founding fathers.  To argue whether someone would replace him is pointless as he was there and needed no replacement.

Well, I didn't actually start this thread, so I think you're kind of talking to the wrong guy here.

So, saying that the genre would not exist without him sounds a bit arrogant, I suppose.  Saying that the genre would essentially be the same without him aspires to the same heighth of arrogance.  Maybe you've got a crystal ball, but I don't think so.  I just think you know some facts and you've got really strong opinions but the difference between the two escapes you.

Frankly, I don't see how I'm being arrogant for trying to answer the question to the best of my ability. I never claimed I had a crystal ball, and I am certainly not saying that my word is law. I've opened up my line of reasoning to plenty of possible criticisms, and I've tried to counter every point. I'm only trying to engage intellectually at the topic. If you think I've said something wrong, then please, tell me where: I am constantly seeking to improve my knowledge and understanding of things.

 

At least I am attempting a stab at the question at hand with the only two answers that I feel can actually be argued at any length with the evidence and the facts at hand. I mean, you COULD say that if Tolkien never existed, a sudden new era of romantic fiction would arise, but I can't imagine any way you could prove it.

The biggest roadblock to the folks who want to devalue Tolkien's contributions to the genre is his legacy.  You might want to suggest that everything was going to work out largely the same without him, but you notice that there is quite a slew of folks arguing about whether or not Tolkien is important.  Apparently, he's important enough that all these folks argue about him.

When did I try and devalue Tolkien's contributions? The same argument: that had a person not existed, another would take his place to deliver the same innovations, has been made for just about every single great figure in this world. From Einstein, Bohr, Euler, Newton... no one is devaluing their achievements, but that doesn't mean we can't hypothesize can't we? Hopefully it's a discussion where we can learn something from.

[Gromnir]

... Although humans do tend to have a fetish for pointy ears (Mr Spock, anyone), so they probably would be in any fantasy setting.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

ther is no mention of pointy ears in lotr.

 

that is the thing 'bout lotr... tolkien describes physical aspects of elves and dwarves and orcs n' such very little. he gets credit for inventing, but recognize at least that without no physical dscription offered by tolkien, his readers seemed to come to similar conclusions 'bout those appearances nevertheless... 'cuse as tolkien expected, those things were already part of the collective mythology o' english speakers.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[astr0creep]

Gromnir is a Cyborg!

 

Ho! bad bore!

[Lyric Suite]

I'm not arguing that Howard *couldn't be called* Sword & Sorcery, and you'll note that in my post I said that his work was probably crucial to the development of the "genre".

 

The point is that the term 'Sword & Sorcery' was coined after the work of Robert Howard.

 

He is the pivotal focus of the 'genre'. What you refer to as 'S&S' today is nothing but a flawed derivate of the type of 'epic' pulp Howard was known for (among other things).

 

In short, Howard IS the quintessential Sword & Sorcery writer.

 

As for the development of the conception of 'arcane' magic in modern fantasy, i'd say Howard had by far a greater role here. You should know this if you had read any of his tales.

Edited March 7, 2006 by Lyric Suite