"Laddie, don't you think you should... rephrase that?"

[athelind]

Nobody quite answered the question I thought I'd asked in my last post. They answered the part about why Fantasy fans keep doing the same thing over and over, but not the part that really interested me.

So let me ask the same question, differently:

If the appeal of Fantasy over Science Fiction is really the comfort of the familiar, why do so many Fantasy fans insist that it's "more imaginative" and "less restrictive" than Science Fiction?

Comments

[morchades.livejournal.com]

Cognitive Dissonance? Projection? Stupidity?

[returntonull.livejournal.com]

I don't really know, but let's put it like this.

I suppose that when they say 'less restrictive' they have that whole 'science' thing in mind. Modern society is kinda at fault for this the scientific community or at least the conservative front of it tends to go "This is the thing we've put it in this box, we know everything there is to know about it." now we know this isn't true at all, but it tends to be accepted.

Now on the other hand fantasy tends to lack this science thing and relies on magic thus opening up those limitless possibilities (Which were open in the first place.) for everyone. You can theoretically do whatever you want. Provided you wanted to, however not too many people appear to want to, for reasons stated/to be stated in the previous post.

So Morchades has a point. People who say this are in effect fooling themselves, or have been fooled into thinking that something is more or less imaginative or restrictive based on the notions of fantasy/sci-fi. Or at least they're trying to justify something when the answer for liking it is "I just do."

As in the end science fiction is very little different from fantasy. Could you tell Lord of the Rings in a Science Fiction setting? Easily. Make the technology involved in this sci-fi tale of the ring, and it could be nigh indistinguishable from the original.

So really, I don't think those statements hold any ground. As always those things depend on the people involved.

[doc-mystery.livejournal.com]

Magic.

::B::

[athelind.livejournal.com]

I've seen few if any applications of magic in a fantasy story that approach the imaginative excesses of, say, Charles Stross in his post-Singularity SF.

[doc-mystery.livejournal.com]

It's not the application of magic in a fantasy story that their fans and devotees admire. It's the *potential* that magic (or something very much like it) can break or unlock all the rigid hidden rules and constraints imposed by Reality.

Much of what has passed for science fiction for the past 100 or so years has already come true else has been disproved by the cold hard facts of biology, physics, and human nature.

Sure, we have our computers and WWW. There are submersibles and hovercraft and space shuttles. We have medical marvels with transplants and prosthetics and bio-imaging and reproductive technologies. Genetic engineering allows for hardier strains of edible plants. Satellites can map the earth and deep space probes can visit Jupiter and Saturn. Once human beings even walked on the moon...

But here can never be a Barsoom-like world on Mars. We aren't going to be travelling again to the Moon any time soon and be setting up colonies there. There are no flying air cars, no space pirates, time machines, cloned humans, immortality pills, transporter beams, all no aliens going to uplift us into a better more kinder utupian world.

The fragile bubble of that elusive 'sense of wonder' that transported us away reading works of SF when we were younger has long ago burst into a shower of tears and crestfallen disappointment.

But it hasn't burst for fans of fantasy and magical worlds for the simple fact that fantastical worlds by definition are already unlikely to exist, and once that hard outer coating of limited unreality can be gulped down and accepted, the rest follows smoothly.

::B::

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

I don't know why, and it annoys me when people insist Fantasy is more imaginative than SF

Fantasy fans talk about world building, and how the author has to build entire civilizations to get the story to work within that framework. What I see more often is a world of our world, eg Feist's "Magician" was just North America, and Middle Earth is just Europe of the 1300s. More imaginative more of the same.

[cpxbrex.livejournal.com]

If the appeal of Fantasy over Science Fiction is really the comfort of the familiar, why do so many Fantasy fans insist that it's "more imaginative" and "less restrictive" than Science Fiction?

Because they are deluded. All fiction, and certainly all genre fiction, is virtually predicated on the idea of doing the same thing over. Heck, if you go and look at what fantasy editors and agents tell you (and I have), they're actually quite honest about it. They very clearly say that the best chances a person has of getting published is to write like an established writer. They are honest in saying that fantasy audiences want to read more things like what they already like.

I think that's bullshit. I think there are huge untapped audiences out there waiting for stuff that's off the average (such as y'all furries -- I sometimes wish I had the taste to write furry literature to capitalize on this obvious market of people who are quite willing to spend money to support furry artists), but as media companies consolidate they tend towards the production of literature with "mass appeal". Which means that smaller audiences get fucked. Anything off the average would require them to do research, or cultivate markets, or whatever, and for a big corporation that doesn't make any sense. Too bad they've bought out all the small and mid-sized publishing firms in a short-sighted attempt to further consolidate their distribution and marketing departments.

Fantasy authors are selected not because they appeal to niche audiences. The market for them is, functionally, dead. They require market research that is more difficult than mass producing regurgitated fantasy and engaging in a marketing scheme to sell it, because we ain't got nothing else to read unless we play by their rules.

Tho' it's not entirely the fault of the publishing world. Sure, they have consolidated, they are not interested in doing research much less developing new audiences (not just y'all furries, but also, say, non-white audiences), but the fantasy fans refuse to acknowledge as legitimate anything other than the present distribution system whereby it is assured they get shitty generic fantasy ad nauseum. Until fantasy fans themselves stop regarding Amazon.com and B&N as the place to buy fantasy stories, until they stop validating the system that feeds them the crap they have now, it will continue indefinitely.

Not that I'm bitter. But I think this answers your question, hehe.

[cpxbrex.livejournal.com]

Note. I am slightly drunk. My thoughts in the above were not elegant, but nevertheless I think they are largely true.

[toy-dragon.livejournal.com]

Deep down, people tend to want the same thing delivered in an endless variety of clever new packaging.

[athelind.livejournal.com]

*Bzzzzt!*

I'm sorry, that was the question being answered in the LAST post!

Thank you for playing. Here's a copy of our home game!

[bfdragon.livejournal.com]

Maybe because to a great deal of people, "Sci-Fi" is TV and movie Sci-Fi, particularly StarTrek/Wars, etc. On the other hand, Fantasy has been the domain of animation and generally more risky sorts of film.

I DO agree with you, you can't swing a dead cat in just about any fantasy setting without hitting an Orc or what not, but, compared to Alien-of-the-Month-with-Crap-Glued-to-Forehead, it seems down right fresh and new. Especially with the new crop of fantasy cinema compared to the dearth of even decent sci-fi, much less anything ground breaking.

Even worse, sci-fi that steps a little too far out of those typical expectations, sorts of get shoved into fantasy. Rather then an exercise in thought, sci-fi has become another backdrop for action movies. And while I would take BSG over another cop show any day, it has held back Sci-Fi from much exploring in popular culture.

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

As with all stereotypes I think your premise is incorrect in its generality.

There are fans of both genres who want the familiar (can we say Star Trek?) and those that want the unfamiliar (e.g. Charlie Stross).

Those that say that one genre is more imaginative than the other are incorrect (in either direction).

I understand the impression that fantasy is more imaginative, and it could be I suppose, but I don't know any fantasy authors worth their name that don't put work into maintaining their magical systems as if they were a science. No reader really wants an "anything can happen" world. If anything can happen, you don't need the story, the hero can just make a wish or cast a spell.

[normanrafferty.livejournal.com]

Because some people believe that making things up out of nothing, without doing any research or obeying any speculative rules, is "more imaginative".

[silussa.livejournal.com]

I essentially concur.

Science-fiction means you actually have to have some thought to develop a rational chain of reasoning, or at least of development.

Fantasy, on the other hand, you can just write in large strokes without worrying about internal logic. At least, so the general perception goes. (I don't agree with it, myself, but then, I believe from experience that fantasy also has to have a framework of some sort...note the entire, long Oz series as an example, which finally deals with the question "why do all the other animals talk...except Toto?")

[wy.livejournal.com]

So ... what about Science Fantasy as a genre? :P

[araquan.livejournal.com]

Maybe they're suffering from the illusion that Star Trek and Star Wars are what Sci Fi is all about?

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

Oh. Well, if they're saying fantasy is less restrictive a genre, and if it actually isn't, then I will make the HYOOOOOOGE logical jump here and conclude.. they're deluded.

Which only pushes the question back one level. Why are they deluded? Or are they really deluded? Is "Fantasy is less restrictive" really something most fantasy fans say, or something widely said by the respected voices of that genre? I'm not attacking your assumptions. I really don't know, since I don't follow either fandom.

If what you say is correct, it seems to me the reason must be they feel science itself is restrictive. Which of course it is, in real life. Science is the cruel bully that tells the inventors of wonderful perpetual motion machines that they must actually (gasp!) PROVE their machine works before we'll believe it. Science insists on pointing out to Christians that there's no proof of the miracles of Jesus. Science insists on pointing out to Mormons that no, the Middle-American native civilizations were NOT exiled tribes of Jews. Science insists that the angels you saw when you were on LSD were, or at least could have been, merely a malfunction in your brain.

Science insists on proof of things. How evil! How heartless! If only those cold, nasty scientists had some faith, Tinkerbelle would live, the fairy dust would work, and we could all fly off to Never Never Land!

A lot of people feel that way about science. It's the bully that won't let them believe. The fact that while this bully doesn't let you sprinkle yourself with fairy dust and fly, it does provide you with airplanes; while it doesn't allow you to project your spirit across continents to speak with people on the far side of the world, it does provide telephones; in short, the fact that science makes technology and technology makes "magic," often goes unnoticed.

There seems to be something unsatisfying about magic that's available to anyone, no special merit or revelation required.

So let's run with that idea for a moment. If you feel science is the enemy, science is too restrictive, science and magic can't coexist, then your novel of an unrestricted world has to be about a world without science. That could put us anywhere from Ogg and Mugg gumming mastadon bones in a cave somewhere up to the beginning of the Renaissance. But people tend to like their heros to have swords, quaff ale in the pub-- live in a low-tech version of the city-and-farmland world they already know. So that puts them in a world where technology exists, but only to the level of the blacksmith shop and streamside gristmill. In the Middle Ages. Plonk in the center of Tolkein territory.

If you go with the idea that science itself is too restrictive, so that to be free to dream you must dream of a world without it, then that's where you are going to end up.

Of course, I don't buy that science and magic are exclusive. There I go, writing fantasy books in which magic has been so well-developed that it has become a science in itself, yielding its own magic-based technologies. And then you yourself have called what I wrote "science fiction" and not fantasy.

Maybe that's part of the answer too. Maybe it's just that any fantasy that rises out of the Tolkien Idealized Middle Ages, the Golden Middle Ages without the Huns and the Plague, gets called something else. That would require your hardcore fantasy fans to reject such works as being not fantasy. And that seems to lead back again to their seeing science as a bully, I think.

(You've gone around the circle twice now, Hafoc. Shut up and go home.)

[fragglemon.livejournal.com]

Are there really people out there calling themselves " Fantasy Fans "?

Yes, I do think you should rephrase that.

[baxil.livejournal.com]

Before answering that, let me take a step back.

In both your previous post and this one, you have pointed out two observations:

1) Self-identified fantasy fans say they like the freedom it gives them.
2) Books/stories/settings labeled "fantasy" are repetitive and derivative.

Both of your questions have taken one of these facts for granted, and then sought to explore the other one. The only difference is that you've reversed the order of the assumption.

(Personally, I think you were more successful with your previous post. Asking why fantasy is repetitive provided some useful genre criticisms. Assuming that fantasy is repetitive is producing a lot of genre hate.)

I think the crux of the matter has nothing to do with either of the questions you've asked thus far. I think the real discussion (and this came up a little bit in your first thread) is what counts as fantasy.*

Take -- for a simple, single example -- China Mieville. If Perdido Street Station doesn't count as fantasy because it contains "SF elements", then of course the "fantasy" genre is going to be retarded; your definition is deliberately excluding from the genre a body of truly imaginative stories just because they don't exactly clone an existing and weary model. On the other hand, if that's fantasy, assumption #1 is weak, so what's the purpose of this question?

--
* And what's marketed as fantasy. See discussions elsethread, which I think were a good analysis.

[thistledown.livejournal.com]

Could it be that GOOD Science Fiction requires the Author to have the story details based on actual scientic realities/possibilities ? Sure..the author can stretch that to it's possible limits (and beyond) but there's still that basic, underlying reality.

Fantasy, on the other hand, allows any conceviable thing to exist..all it has to do is be consistant within the story-line.

Possibly another reason Fantasy is supposedly more 'popular'is the 'dumbing down of society in general, and it's dissolusion with Science. In the era of the "Classic" sci-fi (1930'2-1960's ??) Society had a belief in Science being the great shining Hope of a better, brighter future. Now Society has become more dissolusioned with Science.

Anyway..that's my 2 cents worth..for what it's worth :) And I like classic sci-fi..as well as Fantasy. My only crterion is that its a good story :)

[thoughtsdriftby.livejournal.com]

thinking more the fans are jaded with technology, future having less "Wow factor" now
already here atomic power/submarines/little boxes with worldwide personal video
seeing imaginative as the realm of the writer not the genre, differing in forms of speculation only IMO

labeling/classification of genre by various fandoms as very problematic
sadly easy fixes seem more tolerated in fantasy/horror, more criticized in science fiction/mystery
less restrictive... perhaps if this crutch is used, perhaps harder to constantly avoid

fantasy having existed so much longer than science fiction, forever bumping along in incremental steps of mythos in a time-line series of authors. fandom assembles each new cannon of expectation around their chosen, creating new markets / new restrictions. curious sometimes listing to authors discuss their fandom, the crowding in of creative writing in treasured worlds.

[atomicdumbass.livejournal.com]

Howdy; I have worked on fantasy MMO games for seven years. I've run into this issue time and again. Imagination versus familiarity.

To a game executive, "Fantasy" is another way of saying Elves, Dwarves and Magic. It's a univerally spoken conceptual language. That makes it very rigid and conservative, but useful to the marketing department.

I worked on a game and asked: "How should the Dwarf stand when he uses a really tall bow?" I was told: "Whatever. The players won't ever equip their Dwarf with a bow. If they want an archer, they'll use an elf."

So not only will the game developers bow to the genre restrictions, they're also confident that the players will be just as conservative.

To the games industry, Fantasy is a mix of Tolkein and D&D. You won't get China Mieville, or even the Neverending Story. Certainly not Charles Stross, unfotunately.

The Second Life people making their game, and following the genre restrictions, are just making something they like. And they like the genre with all its comforts and prohibitions. If they've thought far enough, they'd realize that more people will play if they stick to the cliches.

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

My intuition is that this is because there isn't even the faint veneer of it having to have any hope of "working" in the real world.

If you write "science fiction" then there's an obligation to have to spin a good line of bullshit as to why this crazy gizmo the plot depends on works. Even if you mostly avoid the old Gernsbackism of having a character deliver a five-page lecture on 'Observe, friend citizen, how we have tamed the power of the ATOM!' the first time they flick a light switch, you still have to knock a few bits of Weird Physics together. Nanomolecular manifolds with embedded quantum computers and a strange matter reactor folded into tenspace to provide enough power to lean on Spooky Action At A Distance and wave a wand, whatever.

If it's "fantasy" then you only have to make it work narratively. You can pull anything out of your ass and paper the cracks in suspension of disbelief over with a pretty thin layer of cliches, and people will buy it.

Stepping outside of the definition of "fantasy" as "stuff that could easily be a D&D sourcebook, there's a big restriction that people consuming generic fantasy tend to ignore: it has to be emotionally plausible. Which is pretty fucking hard, and which is why there's not all that much really good fantasy out there.

In SF, the generic environment got obsoleted. The world looks nothing like anyone's predictions. Our current predictions will probably be just as laughable in twenty year's time. So bad SF, where it's just using the standard background, without any kind of unique invention, without any compelling characters to make you give a damn despite the absurdity of the world, ages badly. But in fantasy... nostalgia for a past that never was works a lot longer. Tolkien's world is about as implausable now as it was then.

(I hate most fantasy, yet I'm knee-deep in a fantasy comic. Of course, 'Five Glasses of Absinthe' owes as little as possible to Tolkien - it owes a hell of a lot more to L. Frank Baum, Lewis Carroll, and Tim Powers, who fill their worlds with weirdness and surprise, rather than endless gritty details of nostalgia.)