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I tend to to think of Tolkien as a weird detour between Robert Howard and Michael Moorcock. The genre I'm thinking of is not really "fantasy" (a term that Tolkien's work has irretrievably muddled) but rather "swords and sorcery."

 Manchu wrote:
I tend to to think of Tolkien as a weird detour between Robert Howard and Michael Moorcock. The genre I'm thinking of is not really "fantasy" (a term that Tolkien's work has irretrievably muddled) but rather "swords and sorcery."

You do realize "swords and sorcery" is a sub-genre of fantasy right? That's like saying Punk Rock isn't a type of of Rock music.

I thought it was already established that Tolkien wrote High Fantasy?

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
I thought it was already established that Tolkien wrote High Fantasy?

Which is still a type of fantasy.

Which is still a type of fantasy.

Of which is he is the primogenitor.

Though if we're talking about the sole pillar of all fantasy I think it would be the Saga of Gilgamesh?

 Ratbarf wrote:

Which is still a type of fantasy.

Of which is he is the primogenitor.

Though if we're talking about the sole pillar of all fantasy I think it would be the Saga of Gilgamesh?

Going back to the Hero With a Thousand Faces that argument is probably valid.

Look . . .

Warhammer <- Dungeons and Dragons <- Tolkien <- Anglo-Saxon mythology <- Germanic mythology <- Indo-European mythology <- Africa.

So this thread which is a rehash of a billion different other threads has gone massively off-topic and is now circling round and round because people are claiming Tolkien copied mythology and tweaked it a little in the process creating the modern fantasy novel and inspiring the next generation of writers to base their work of his as opposed to the original inspiration?

Am I close?

 Cheesecat wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
I tend to to think of Tolkien as a weird detour between Robert Howard and Michael Moorcock. The genre I'm thinking of is not really "fantasy" (a term that Tolkien's work has irretrievably muddled) but rather "swords and sorcery."

You do realize "swords and sorcery" is a sub-genre of fantasy right? That's like saying Punk Rock isn't a type of of Rock music.

Punk *revived* from rock but whether or not it's a type of rock is a long and boring discussion that i'm not willing to have

Warhammer <- Dungeons and Dragons <- Tolkien <- Anglo-Saxon mythology <- Germanic mythology <- Indo-European mythology <- Africa.

Indo European is as far back as you can go as we don't have a record dating any further back.

 Ratbarf wrote:

Warhammer <- Dungeons and Dragons <- Tolkien <- Anglo-Saxon mythology <- Germanic mythology <- Indo-European mythology <- Africa.

Indo European is as far back as you can go as we don't have a record dating any further back.

I was just being an donkey-cave then, I was just going back to the furthest we knew about. Nahmean?

Ah, thought you were serious.

shame on you, shame on you all! How can any self-respecting nerd have such a name-feast concerning fantasy and science fiction authors and NEVER mention the FATHER OF SCIENCE FICTION???

I will now provide that part, thus demonstrating my elite status amongst you lot.

JULES! VERNE!

What about H G Wells? Doesn't he get any love? The guy who covered the basic archetypes in SF from which most now stem; the alien invasion, time travel, missions into space.

 Testify wrote:

 Cheesecat wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
I tend to to think of Tolkien as a weird detour between Robert Howard and Michael Moorcock. The genre I'm thinking of is not really "fantasy" (a term that Tolkien's work has irretrievably muddled) but rather "swords and sorcery."

You do realize "swords and sorcery" is a sub-genre of fantasy right? That's like saying Punk Rock isn't a type of of Rock music.

Punk *revived* from rock but whether or not it's a type of rock is a long and boring discussion that i'm not willing to have

Punk did not revive from Rock because Rock music predates Punk Rock, also you can't revive something that didn't exist before. Rock music originated between the 50's and early 60's where as Punk Rock is commonly cited to have started from the Ramones (1974-1996) although there

were many bands that had a similar aesthetic to the Punk sound before that time (The New York dolls, The Stooges, MC5, Velvet Underground, The Modern Lovers, Patti Smith, etc).

 Cheesecat wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
I tend to to think of Tolkien as a weird detour between Robert Howard and Michael Moorcock. The genre I'm thinking of is not really "fantasy" (a term that Tolkien's work has irretrievably muddled) but rather "swords and sorcery."

You do realize "swords and sorcery" is a sub-genre of fantasy right? That's like saying Punk Rock isn't a type of of Rock music.

I'm saying that "fantasy" as a genre label isn't very meaningful so we have to go more specific.

So Tolkien is high fantasy?

So who is low fantasy?

Conan I guess.
This whole Dark/High/whatever Fantasy thing doesn't really make sense to me either.

 Manchu wrote:

 Cheesecat wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
I tend to to think of Tolkien as a weird detour between Robert Howard and Michael Moorcock. The genre I'm thinking of is not really "fantasy" (a term that Tolkien's work has irretrievably muddled) but rather "swords and sorcery."

You do realize "swords and sorcery" is a sub-genre of fantasy right? That's like saying Punk Rock isn't a type of of Rock music.

I'm saying that "fantasy" as a genre label isn't very meaningful so we have to go more specific.

Oh OK that makes sense, thanks for the clarification.

Twilight.

Possibly historical fiction that has fantastical aspects thrown in as well, ala Bernard Cornwells Excalibur Trilogy.

Fan fiction?

 Ratbarf wrote:

Fan fiction?

Wouldn't fanfic often follow the genre that they are copying though?

 nomsheep wrote:

 Ratbarf wrote:

Fan fiction?

Wouldn't fanfic often follow the genre that they are copying though?

Not really, I mean look at 50 shades of grey....

Oh wait....

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 nomsheep wrote:

 Ratbarf wrote:

Fan fiction?

Wouldn't fanfic often follow the genre that they are copying though?

Not really, I mean look at 50 shades of grey....

Oh wait....

That's become a book in it's own right *shudder*

Twilight is romance fiction with a horror flavoring.

Cornwell's Warlord trilogy (his Arthurian one) is historical fiction, with a little bit of fantasy seeping in at the edges. He's generally pretty careful to make the fantastic elements ones which could be explained by coincidence and/or an unreliable narrator.

"Low" vs. "high" fantasy definitions vary, but usually it includes some (if not all) of the following...
1. A plot which is generally local and personal, rather than epic and sweeping. Events concerning commoners, focusing on local personal conflicts and events, rather than kings of men and wars between civilizations are often considered low as opposed to high fantasy. The protagonists may be thieves attempting a score, soldiers in a fantasy army dealing with the grit and death at ground level, or an apprentice wizard who can't just magic his way out of a bad situation.
2. Protagonists who have venal rather than noble motivations, who are written to be flawed limited, rather than iconic and/or omnicompetent.
3.Characters written with an attempt at having plausible, recognizable human motivations rather than being vehicles to convey archetypes or metaphors.
4. Magic being rare, severely limited in application and/or having harsh drawbacks to use.
5. Descriptions and detail focusing on grit, dirt, blood and the nastier and unpleasant aspects of life in a pre-modern world. A low-fantasy story is more likely to mention infected wounds or characters needing to engage in eliminatory functions.

Thanks Manny.

 Mannahnin wrote:
Twilight is romance fiction with a horror flavoring.

Cornwell's Warlord trilogy (his Arthurian one) is historical fiction, with a little bit of fantasy seeping in at the edges. He's generally pretty careful to make the fantastic elements ones which could be explained by coincidence and/or an unreliable narrator.

"Low" vs. "high" fantasy definitions vary, but usually it includes some (if not all) of the following...
1. A plot which is generally local and personal, rather than epic and sweeping. Events concerning commoners, focusing on local personal conflicts and events, rather than kings of men and wars between civilizations are often considered low as opposed to high fantasy. The protagonists may be thieves attempting a score, soldiers in a fantasy army dealing with the grit and death at ground level, or an apprentice wizard who can't just magic his way out of a bad situation.
2. Protagonists who have venal rather than noble motivations, who are written to be flawed limited, rather than iconic and/or omnicompetent.
3.Characters written with an attempt at having plausible, recognizable human motivations rather than being vehicles to convey archetypes or metaphors.
4. Magic being rare, severely limited in application and/or having harsh drawbacks to use.
5. Descriptions and detail focusing on grit, dirt, blood and the nastier and unpleasant aspects of life in a pre-modern world. A low-fantasy story is more likely to mention infected wounds or characters needing to engage in eliminatory functions.

So, almost like Conan then?

Also if I remember right low fantasy has less monsters as well usually.

 Cheesecat wrote:
Also if I remember right low fantasy has less monsters as well usually.

So not Conan.

Well damn. Does anyone have an example of low fantasy then?

The Kingkiller Chronicle by Patrick Rothelfuss springs to mind.

That's true; low fantasy tends to include fewer nonhuman races and monsters.

Remember, "low" is really more a relative term to "high" than being an absolute category. Not all stories will confirm to all characteristics on the above list. For example, there's a series called "Orcs" written by Stan Nicholls, which focuses on a military unit of Orcish raiders, in service to an evil sorceress queen. Some elements, like nonhuman protagonists and them winding up questing after magical artifacts, are a bit high-fantasy. But the style of the stories (disclaimer: I only read part of the first book, as it really wasn't to my taste) was more low fantasy, as it was going for a gritty feel, the protagonists had a mix of realistic motivations and flaws, there was double-crossing and uncertain alliances, characters were using narcotics, etc.

Most Conan stories and similar sword & sorcery tales are more toward the "low" end of the spectrum.

I'd say that Jack Vance's Cugel the Clever stories, in his Dying Earth setting, are low fantasy by virtue of venal and roguish characters, of low personal power, even though there is powerful magic and fantastic creatures in the world. Stories focusing on powerful wizards like Rhialto, OTOH, are more mixed, or high fantasy.

Joel Rosenberg's Guardians of the Flame books are pretty classic. They have some high fantasy elements like dragons and powerful magic, but OTOH the protagonists are real people (several of them college students transported into the bodies of their D&D characters, basically, in the first book), who quickly realize all the bad parts of being in a medieval fantasy world. Like slavery, rape, and friends dying horrible deaths.

I believe I've heard Glen Cook's Black Company books frequently described as being low fantasy.