Am I the only person in this forum....

Wasn't suggesting that genre fiction couldn't tackle those issues -- only stating my preference.

 

Dictionary.com lists fantasy as a synonym for fiction. I don't think it's abusive of the word at all, abusive of the genre definition of the word, but not the word itself. If you are making up a story then you are fantasising. (I actually prefer the term Speculative Fiction to encompass fantasy and science fiction)

At any rate, my point was that there is very well written fantasy out there, just as there is fantasy trash, and very well written 'real-world' fiction and fiction trash. I think both are in equal proportions. The difference is that the really good fantasy is usually published as literature, just like the really good writing from any other genre is published as literature. (I don't think you were denying that the examples I gave were fantasy, but if you were I'd like to know why you think they're not).

 

I used to hate sci-fi and fantasy, but I've warmed to it and now I write it as a challenge to my creativity. I've discovered that writing about real places you've never been to is even more challenging sometimes. I almost always end up making up the places in my stories anyway, so why not just make it completely fanciful? I usually keep it to a minimum, though. Low-magic, medium tech level since I'm much more inclined to write about technology than magic. I think that if I ever get around to traveling extensively, or as I get older start to realize more potential in my current location, I'll be able to write completely realistic fiction at a steady pace.

 

Well, fine, but that's why I included the word equivocal - because using the word fantasy as in to fantasize whilst making a reference to fantasy as a genre is indeed an abuse of the word.

I don't deny that there is plenty of good fantasy out there - I do deny that it comes in equal proportions to good literary fiction when speaking specifically about published novels merely because literary fiction is harder to get published - one is expected to have published short stories in journals before publishing a novel, whereas that expectation does not exist with fantasy.

 

There is nothing wrong with fantasy, but, like all things that are popular enough and have a big enough market, you will have to sift through a lot of not-so-good stuff to get to the really good stuff.

The thing with fantasy is that it can easily be so broad a genre. For me, that's why I prefer the term Speculative Fiction, meaning that the story takes place on a world other than our present-day world (or the world that has already definitely happened, as in Historical Fantasy).

And not all fantasy is dragons and magic and black and white stuff about good vs. evil. Fantasy just means it takes place on another world, period. It can still have just the same emotions, depth, and thematic complexity as any novel. Actually, in my opinion, fantasy stories that manage to do these things well have to get some credit, because you can't rely on the already existing real world - you have to make up all these little things yourself and make them work in a believable way. But it's hard to do that, which is why stereotypically a lot of fantasy stories take shortcuts by having the cliche dragons and elves and what not.

Just because a story takes place in a place other than the real world doesn't mean it has any less potential. Even for stories in the real world, oftentimes you have to "make up" things even if it is based on reality - it's very unlikely you've actually experienced or seen firsthand every single situation a character has been through, or visited where the story might take place, so you'll still have to make up stuff along the way.

 

I'd like to branch off from this statement to further add information. Sometimes fantasy doesn't just mean magic and alternative worlds and dragons. Sometimes it just means fantastical things occurring within a modern world or realistic world.

Such as I call a horror novel about a haunted house, a fantasy. Because a haunted house is a fantastical thing that is occurring in the real world.

I think ,OP, narrowing your view on what fantasy is. Fantasy isn't just elves and swords and dragons. It's other things as well.

 

People read fiction to find an escape from their boring normal everyday lives. Fantasy is as far away as normal everyday life as you can get. If the writer has its readers dreaming of living in his created world, he has already accomplished his goal. You don't need a fantasy setting to create a fantastic book, but if you wrote a novel about an ordinary London, there better be some damn good extraordinary characters.

 

Hi,

I'd support J P Clyde on that. One of the better fantasy books I've ever read was Free Live Free by Gene Wolfe. It takes place in a run down tenament building in New York, uses characters drawn from the streets, and simply weaves its magic around those very ordinary, real world things. And its beautiful.

Cheers.

 

I'm not sure what your definition of literary fiction is - do you mean that any book set in the real world is literary fiction, or are you specifically talking about books that are classified as 'literature' and sit on the literature shelf? I would argue that the books on the literature shelf are simply a compilation of the best writing from any genre. I highly doubt that one is expected to have published in literary journals before having a general fiction book published.

 

I apologise for rehashing a point I made a while ago, but I'd like some enlightenment. I have only read three fantasy novels in my life: The Lord Of The Rings, The Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb and one of the early Harry Potters (I forget what it was called). All three books had two things in common.

1) They were beautifully written. The worlds were described with stylish, elegant detail, and made me imagine I was there. The stories were engaging too.
2) The “hero” in each story was weak and lifeless, devoid of any sort of edge, attitude, humour. Basically they were cardboard cut outs – Frodo, Fitz in The Assassin’s Apprentice, and Harry Potter. They were all self-pitying and deserved a kick up the arse.

From some of the threads on this forum, budding writers seem to be following the same trend, obsessing with their make-believe world, the setting and the types of creature. Perhaps some more effort could be expended into creating an engaging hero, someone with a bit of life.

I know I have only read three fantasy books, but the common themes were there. Am I being unfair? Are there examples of memorable heroes in fantasy?

 

All forms of literature is held upon the crux of its characters. When I think of Lord of the Rings, it's not the dragons, nazgul, or grand scale wars that excite me. Okay, they do, especially in the movies, but it's the characters caught up in these storms, and not just the hobbits or the fellowship. I've always been most intrigued by Eomer and Eowyn. Though while I've only read Lord of the Rings (Fellowship of the Rings, and not all of it, couldn't read past Tom Bombadil or whatever his name is), I do agree that I'm not a fan of Frodo. I just can't get behind a character like him. I want to look up to my characters, and I can't do that with Frodo no pun intended. And the right and wrong/good and evil is just too clear cut.

I think that's why I enjoy the Song of Ice and Fire series much more. It has its fair share of mythical creatures but in its depth it's character driven and where Lord of the Rings was black and white, Song of Ice and Fire is gray. Your self righteous intuition may lead you to the wrong path and your brother could be your father.

 

Yes and yes. You cannot make your judgments based on only three books. Someone just gave you the series of Song Fire and Ice. Eh hem Game of Thrones if you're familiar with the television show.

You have to wade, I agree, through a lot of fantasy. But you cannot compare all of it to what...three books. That isn't enough knowledge to make assumptions of fantasy novels.

You're drawing a big ditch in the sand without further investigation.

 

Fair point. Three books is not a yardstick. Its hard to plough through a story when you don't care about the main protagonist, especially when the book is so long. Fantasy novels are enormous; they are weapons as much as literary creations.

 

I don't write or read fantasy and rarely watch films in the genre. Fantasy just doesn't appeal to me.

I write psychological thrillers and romance/erotic fiction.

 

I don't understand why people feel the need to disparage a genre they don't read.

I don't read romance; it doesn't interest me. My knee-jerk impression has always been that it's all tripe BUT that's not based on anything but my own disinterest and the negative things that other people have said.

A lot of people like the Romance genre. Being more well-read in the genre than I am, I must assume they know something about it that I don't. It's clear quite a few people are finding something worthwhile.

My own disinterest in Romance is meaningless. It unlikely that I'll ever read enough of it to develop a meaningful or informed opinion. There's no reason for any Romance reader or writer to care what I think, and it would be incredibly silly for anyone to let my uninformed opinion influence theirs.

I'm not saying all genres are of equal quality. But someone not well-read in a genre is in no position to judge it's quality or make meaningful generalizations.

 

Just general human insecurities. For some people, if they don't like something they have to disparage it, because they feel that if it has value and they don't like it, it somehow reflects on them. Thus, devalue. It's silly, though.

I am the same way with Romance. It is not something I'm interested in as a genre, and not something I read much of (I've read a handful, and one that was very good).

If I were to opine that Romance novels were no good, or that they didn't have interesting characters, or that they were poorly written, based not only just on my lack of interest in the genre but on my decided lack of familiarity with the genre, I'd be a fool.

But I know a couple of Romance writers, and they have to put up with just those sorts of assumptions when they're talking to people about what they write.

 

I don't think the Op's intention was to disparage a genre (fantasy), just to find out if everyone on this forum actually writes fantasy, something I have asked myself in the beginning too, because most (ok, at least a great deal) of the threads you see in the character and plot-sections reveal that the person is writing fantasy so it's easy to get that impression. No one is looking down upon it, I just think it was an honest question. Even I felt a little lonely as a romance-writer when I was new because it seemed I was the only one. Now I know better though

 

He also, in the OP and elsewhere in the thread, makes negative generalizations about Fantasy based on just a few examples-- and then uses these false generalizations to argue that Fantasy is inferior to books set in the real world.

I certainly understand the impulse to say "Hey, am I the only one here who writes X? Everyone else seems to write {genre I have no interest in}". There are sites where I've felt the same way. . That aspect of his posts I have no objection to.

Edited to Add: Some of his negative generalizations are thing that are common in badly-written fantasy, and that crop up occasionally in otherwise stronger examples of the genre as well. But to argue that they are inherent (when there are plenty of excellent examples that contradict this), and argue the superiority of other types of fiction on that basis, is not justified.

 

Firstly you are perfectly entitled to love or hate any books or genres of your choice

Secondly I think you are being a touch unfair in making sweeping generalisations there are certainly fantasy works where the protagonist is the key point of interest but the three you've listed aren't. In Lord of the Rings Frodo is essentially an audience-surrogate for you to follow for a series of epic-scale events. The world and the dramatic events going on it are the engaging point of the book IMO and there is nothing wrong with that. It might not be your cup of tea which is completely fine but an "engaging hero" is not the only thing that can make a story compelling.

In the Harry Potter series for example Harry himself has next to no character progression but what was interesting for me was seeing how the other characters developed and progressed as a result of having Harry enter their lives. To me that made the difference between them being engaging easy reading and something I'll read once and forget competely.

Regarding Fitz in The Assassin's Apprentice I find it hard to argue with the assessment of the character, he can be so very whiny and over the full six books it can get very frustrating seeing him make the same mistakes over and over again. I still enjoyed them though as they are so very beautifully written and the story sucks you in very well but this was for me very much in spite of wanting to strangle Fitz every fifty pages or so!

The Song of Ice and Fire series has already been mentioned and while it might lack a single protagonist or "hero" in the conventional sense what it does have is a a very full cast of characters where you really feel that the time has been spent fleshing them out.

 

Given the number of Fantasy novels in print, I think it should be readily apparent that "3" is not a sufficient sample size to draw any conclusions.

 

You know, good fantasy writers also focus on writing an engaging hero. But it's also expected that good fantasy writers also focus on the setting and even the types of creatures that are there, so that they don't repeat the cliche settings and creatures that pop up so often. Or maybe, you know, it's just that the writers on this forum prefer to post posts about settings and creatures rather than characters, but that doesn't mean they don't focus on characters. Absence of evidence does not mean evidence of absence.

 

I'm sorry, I must have missed that then. To be honest I haven't read every post in this topic.

 

Heck, I've read a LOT more than just "3" literary novels, but I don't feel qualified to make generalizations about literary fiction (or even do a good job of defining what it is).

 

I write both fantasy and real world novels. I rarely use a real world setting though because I'm not well traveled and the people who live in any town (except my own) that I try to use as a setting are going to know that I don't live there and have never visited it no matter how much I research it and they'll get upset by the minor differences or the things I might be implying about how seedy this or that area is or how upscale another one is.

 

I think it's important for aspiring writers to do their best to stand out. A writer can be original in so many ways. One doesn't necessarily need to indulge in fantasy to be different. Mainstream fiction works as well, and in my opinion, a majority of the best written books are NOT fantasy.

I do my best to always go against the conventions of writing. How else can an aspiring writer stick out, if not to do what others say 'don't do!' A fantasy novel, I think, is the ideal way to do this because, after all, it is fantasy. Anything goes! But, as I said, anything goes in mainstream fiction as well. It's all got to do with that is more attainable, what the writer enjoys more, believes in.