Fantasy

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by alatar

Exactly! Maybe he skipped over all of the real life gore and mud because he wanted to, maybe not so much in the way of the lesson, show a world where even war wasn't as ugly, and that the good prevail, and that hope springs eternal.

And isn't that what fantasy's all about? Escape from reality?

But if war wasn't that ugly, then this sets up all kinds of moral cans of worms. Doesn't it?

[alatar]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

But if war wasn't that ugly, then this sets up all kinds of moral cans of worms. Doesn't it?

Are we back to talking about romance? Surely at least one of my daughters will end up dating or even marrying a troll, who, unlike Beren or Aragorn, will treat her poorly, if hopefully nothing worse.

Maybe the books should be printed with disclaimers such as:

This is a fiction/fantasy book, and the characters and events herein do not accurately represent reality as most know it - your experiences may vary.

[Lalwendë]

Hmmm, just that if we have a book (or any other kind of Art or entertainment) which shows war as 'not that bad, really', then hasn't it crossed a boundary? Even in video games where you can hack, slash and do what you like with glee, there isn't any sense that doing this stuff is in any way alright. It always hurts somebody.

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

I like that disclaimer, alatar. When it comes to depictions of "realism," I don't need graphic details of word or image to understand the reality. When I hear that a bomb struck a building full of people, for instance, I don't need to be told the details of what happened to the building and their bodies to know the kind of carnage that ensued, and feel horrified by it. Perhaps other people do. In fantasy, I might need to be told what the effects of a magic "blast" may be, since magic can operate under whatever laws the author wants, and have the results the author desires. But Tolkien's battles were not written as magical battles, and thus I can reasonably presume that their brutality and the results would be much the same as similarly fought battles in the real world.

As to the kind of story Tolkien was attempting to tell, in letter 183, he says:

In The Lord of the Rings the conflict is not basically about 'freedom', though that is naturally involved. It is about God, and His sole right to divine honour.

As this letter is a response to W. H. Auden's review of RotK, it is long and has many things to say; in particular, Tolkien writes at some length about good and evil, motivations, and such. But he ends the letter with an interesting observation:

So I feel that the fiddle-faddle in reviews, and correspondence about them, as to whether my 'good people' were kind and merciful and gave quarter (in fact they do), or not, is quite beside the point. Some critics seem determined to represent me as a simple-minded adolescent, inspired with, say, a With-the-flag-to-Pretoria spirit, and willfully distort what is said in my tale. I have not that spirit, and it does not appear in the story. The figure of Denethor alone is enough to show this; but I have not made any of the peoples on the 'right' side, Hobbits, Rohirrim, Men of Dale or Gondor, any better than men have been, or are, or can be. Mine is not an 'imaginary' world, but an imaginary historical moment on 'Middle-earth' -- which is our habitation.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Ibrîniðilpathânezel

I like that disclaimer, alatar. When it comes to depictions of "realism," I don't need graphic details of word or image to understand the reality. When I hear that a bomb struck a building full of people, for instance, I don't need to be told the details of what happened to the building and their bodies to know the kind of carnage that ensued, and feel horrified by it. Perhaps other people do. In fantasy, I might need to be told what the effects of a magic "blast" may be, since magic can operate under whatever laws the author wants, and have the results the author desires. But Tolkien's battles were not written as magical battles, and thus I can reasonably presume that their brutality and the results would be much the same as similarly fought battles in the real world.

Hmmm, but if you hear about a bombing, for example, without any of the stories involved in it, then the atrocity is just about statistics. We can say with genuine horror "100 people were killed". But if we know a little about those people, it becomes more touching.

Taking the holocaust as an example, it's one thing to know that 6 million were murdered, but it's quite another to read Anne Frank's diary or to watch Schindler's List. The former is just a fact, the latter are stories.

Tolkien knew the human need for stories, and he did not flinch when it came to texts like the Children of Hurin, nor did he flinch in every instance in Lord of the Rings, but sometimes he does flinch. He didn't have to tell us the gory detail if he didn't want to, the stories behind some of the hundreds killed are another way of achieving empathy.