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Originally Posted by Leto
You know, until you mentioned it in the preceding post, I had never considered the LOTR to be fantasy. [...]
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Well, when Tolkien set out to write it, there was no "Fantasy" genre. There were a bunch of books that were more or less considered speculative fiction or science fiction. He set out to create an English myth. What ended up happening is that he created a fictional world whose integrity and believability was unprecedented. This is why it is considered the foundation of the fantasy genre. It set the standard. Elves, dwarves, orcs, goblins, dragons, etc., most fantasy literature base these concepts on Tolkien's treatment of them.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Leto
So, a few years later when I read through The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, I kind of knew where he was coming from. I think that as the tales of the Unbeliever are to LOTR, so is LOTR to the Nibelungenlied. To me, Thomas Covenant is prime Fantasy genre while LOTR was something that stood out on its own. Maybe it created the genre.
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To overlook the sources for the LOTR would be a shame. Tolkien was a philologist and so was steeped in history and ancient cultures and literature. If you are at all familiar with medieval and pre-medieval literature, you should see it in the LOTR. For example: the Horn of Gondor and
The Song of Roland.
EDIT: Oh, and about Thomas Covenant: I have heard great things about
Lord Foul's Bane, and so I've added it to the list.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LordEden
Promise I don't, I just get into the "epic" side of fantasy. I like it when I get into it, but I don't actively seek it out. The series I usually classify as epic get WAY to bloated by the end (even GRRM has a slight case of the bloat IMHO) and usually seek out single books or less "epic" series. Good enough to tell a tale but not bloat city when it comes to sub-plots, characters, and locations.
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Which is odd because the LOTR hits the epic sweet spot: a slow build to a world-changing crescendo. How can you get any better than going from a half-sized country bumpkin to a mountain of fire surrounded by thousands of orcs and a ring that can destroy the world? And it does so quite wonderfully. It doesn't use the cheesy tropes we see elsewhere, like the country bumpkin is actually the heir to the throne and a part of an ancient bloodline of warriors, etc.
Yes, you must read it, Eden. You must read it
nao!