What Next To Read . . .?

[radagastly]

There is, of course, the thread over in Novices and Newcomers, called What other Fantasy books do YOU read?:

http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=1338

It has many, many pages of people's recommendations. I enjoyed Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber series, which has some fairly good characterization, but does not, alas, have quite the literary breadth of Middle Earth. That's my favorite lately. Some of the older fantasies, written before Tolkien's popularity, are less bound by the archetypes he created. The Worm Ouroboros by (I believe his name was) Ellison (not Harlan Ellison, but someone much earlier), and Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy. If I were you, I'd check out the thread I linked. There must be something there that catches your attention.

Originally Posted by radagastly

There is, of course, the thread over in Novices and Newcomers, called What other Fantasy books do YOU read?:

http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthread.php?t=1338

It has many, many pages of people's recommendations. I enjoyed Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber series, which has some fairly good characterization, but does not, alas, have quite the literary breadth of Middle Earth. That's my favorite lately. Some of the older fantasies, written before Tolkien's popularity, are less bound by the archetypes he created. The Worm Ouroboros by (I believe his name was) Ellison (not Harlan Ellison, but someone much earlier), and Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy. If I were you, I'd check out the thread I linked. There must be something there that catches your attention.

The thread you speak of, What other Fantasy books do YOU read, just talks about fantasy novels people like. It does not distinguish between those novels which can genuinely be likened to the LOTR in terms of characters, literacy, intellect etc. This thread demands these to a far higher order.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

In terms of "moderns" with a high degree of intellect and literacy, E.R. Eddison's (not Harlan Ellison's!) The Worm Ouroboros (1922) rates very highly, as does David Lindsay's Voyage to Arcturus (1925; a challenge to read, in places nearly as dense as Joyce). Also, although IIRC also unknown to Tolkien, Peake's Gormenghast (1939). William Morris was a profound influence on Tolkien, especially The Roots of the Mountains, The House of the Wolfings, and his version of Sigurd; he also serves to demonstrate how elegant Tolkien's archaizing style really is compared to Morris' labored Victorian tushery!

Brilliant but utterly un-Tolkienian is T.H. White's The Once and Future King (1954).

Then of course there is all the ancient material: especially Beowulf (personally I prefer Tinker to either Heaney or Clark Hall) and the Volsungasaga, as well as Snorri's Prose Edda.

Indispensable also is Malory: as a matter of personal taste I think Caxton's edition is an improvement on the Winchester MS text.

Post-Tolkien there isn't a whole lot. Ursula Leguin is a brilliant author, but her best stuff is scifi rather than fantasy. Gene Wolfe (who corresponded with Tolkien as a young man) is very good in a wierd, hallucinatory way; but his mytho-historical work like Soldier of Arete is to me better than his fantasy New Sun series.

Of contemporaries, George R. R. Martin is about the only one I have time for, and he's basically mind-candy: a sprawling soap-opera episode of Dallas or Dynasty, with bloodshed. (A separate case is Guy Kay, whose one foray into high fantasy, The Fionavar Tapestry, isn't all that good, but whose quasi-historical novels are very good indeed).

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hickli

In terms of "moderns" with a high degree of intellect and literacy, E.R. Eddison's (not Harlan Ellison's!) The Worm Ouroboros (1922) rates very highly, as does David Lindsay's Voyage to Arcturus (1925) (a challenge to read, in places nearly as dense as Joyce). Also, although IIRC also unknown to Tol;kien, Peake's Gormenghast (1939).

Then of course there is all the ancient material: especially Beowulf (personally I prefer Tinker to either Heaney or Clark Hall), and the Volsungasaga as well as Snorri's Prose Edda.

Indispensable also is Malory: as a matter of personaltaste I think Caxton's edition is an improvement on the Winchester MS text.

These sound much more like it, novels with a proven track record behind them that probably would not go amiss with Tolkein.

As for the Lone Wolf books, these excellent adventures were not in the main novels arena but single player role play books. Lone Wolf reminded me much of Aragorn in character & power as the Kai Lord & Grand Master. The Guild also had some connotations with that of Elves in Middle Earth. Keketaag the Avenger was an excellent champion of the Dark God Naar, much like the Witch King for Sauron. It appears Joe Dever was also a Tolkein enthusiast when writing these books.