Rules for Writing Fantasy
Monday, October 31st, 2005 02:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
robinturnerI've just finished reading Robin Hobb's Tawny Man trilogy, which is some of the best-written fantasy fiction I've read in years. Of course, this isn't saying much, since most fantasy fiction is dross*, but it got me thinking about how to write a fantasy epic that isn't embarrassingly bad. Here are some rules I thought up for budding fantasy writers.
Go easy on the magic.
If you have no magic at all, then you're not really writing fantasy, you're writing a kind of historical novel with the disadvantage of having no actual history. On the other hand, a surfeit of magic can make the rest of the action impotent. What is the point of brushing up your martial skills when some passing wizard can conjure up a fireball that will lay waste to an entire barbarian horde? A society in which magic was both effective and commonplace would not resemble the quasi-feudal societies of most fantasy fiction, but would be something much, much weirder. One thing which makes Hobb's writing good is that the magic is fairly subtle (most of it is just different forms of telepathy) and it is introduced gradually, with most of the characters not really knowing its full potential. George R.R. Martin goes even further: in A Game of Thrones, there are only hints of long-forgotten magics. In other words, for sword and sorcery, you want nine parts swords to one part sorcery.
Note: if you can come up with a pseudoscientific explanation for the magic (as in Sheri S. Tepper's books) that's a big plus.
Think about economics.
Economics may sound like a dull subject for a fantasy writer to be concerned with - they don't call it "the dismal science" for nothing - but considering the mundane underpinnings of your imaginary society pays off in believability. Most fantasy worlds are, as I just said, quasi-feudal, so they need a feudal economy. If you want to play around with the social structure, you need to change the economy as well. Let's say we want, in contrast to our classic feudal society, an egalitarian, freedom-loving one. How would these fantasy anarchists make a living? Would they have common ownership of land (and if so, why?), or would they have a non-agricultural economy (herding the great Gruntha beasts, for example).
Oh yes, and on the subject of economics, please remember that unless your fantasy planet has a radically different mineral composition to Earth, a gold piece is a hell of a lot of money, and not something an adventurer would blow on a night in a seedy inn.
Brass bikinis do not a feminist novel make
We all like warrior women. Female readers like them because they represent strong women, and male readers like them because chicks in skimpy armour are hot. However, unless you're going for the token warrior woman who can be explained by some social or magical anomaly, you need to think a bit more. If a society offers equal slaying rights to women, what other changes would that require? What kind of economy would it have in order to allow its womenfolk to rush off on quests?
You also need to consider the physical aspect of combat. Women can fight pretty well, but not in the conventional medieval style that is standard in sword and sorcery novels. Those swords were heavy; most men who don't work out at the gym couldn't wield them effectively, let alone the willowy warrior women beloved of fantasy writers (see the opening scene of Red Sonja for a particularly absurd example of skinny girls brandishing swords that would make even Arnie's muscles burn). Look at examples of how women have actually fought in history, such as the Scythian "warrior princesses" or the naginata-wielding samurai women.
Of course you can have powerful women without the brass bikinis. Robin Hobb's Outislanders are quite matriarchal, not because their women go to war, but because the women own and farm the land while the men go fishing or raiding (economics again!). Then of course you can always resort to magic, as in Andre Norton's Witchworld books.
Only plunder two features from any historical culture
Let's say you want a bunch of scary sea-raiders in your story. This automatically says "Vikings" to the reader, so you need to be careful not to bring in all the other cultural baggage as well. Following the two cultural features rule, this leaves you a choice of only one of the following:
Don't use silly spelling
One thing that did irritate me about Hobb was her spelling of the dragon's name: Icefyre. What is it with fantasy writers that they need to change I's to Y's (and vice versa)? And anyone who spells "fairy" "faerie" needs to be shot with a faerie dart. You are not Edmund Spenser, and you don't live in the sixteenth century. At the other extreme, don't go so far from traditional English spelling that the reader is left with no idea of how to pronounce the characters' names. Please think about the phonology of your mythical languages, rather than typing consonants and apostrophes at random. If I see more than two weird names on the back of a book, I put it back on the shelf.
Forget that you ever read The Lord of the Rings
Another thing that makes me put a book back on the shelf is when the blurb says "comparable to Tolkien at his best".** If your publisher feels obliged to exaggerate your writerly skill to this extent, it probably means your book is so unoriginal, they can only think of comparing it to The Lord of the Rings because, well, it's got elves and stuff. Elves, orcs, halflings and the other stock characters are fine for Dungeons and Dragons scenarios, but usually spell death for a novel. Either make up your own mythology from scratch, or do as Tolkien did and rewrite folklore, not other people's fantasy worlds.
* There again, most fiction of any variety is dross, and I'd still rather read dross which has sword-fights in it than dross about ordinary people wrestling with the ordinary problems of their ordinary lives.
** This raises the question of who Tolkien was compared to. Fortunately I have the answer: the original blurb for The Lord of the Rings compared it to Spenser's Faerie Queene. This shows how original Tolkien was - the only author they could think of comparing to died several centuries ago.
Go easy on the magic.
If you have no magic at all, then you're not really writing fantasy, you're writing a kind of historical novel with the disadvantage of having no actual history. On the other hand, a surfeit of magic can make the rest of the action impotent. What is the point of brushing up your martial skills when some passing wizard can conjure up a fireball that will lay waste to an entire barbarian horde? A society in which magic was both effective and commonplace would not resemble the quasi-feudal societies of most fantasy fiction, but would be something much, much weirder. One thing which makes Hobb's writing good is that the magic is fairly subtle (most of it is just different forms of telepathy) and it is introduced gradually, with most of the characters not really knowing its full potential. George R.R. Martin goes even further: in A Game of Thrones, there are only hints of long-forgotten magics. In other words, for sword and sorcery, you want nine parts swords to one part sorcery.
Note: if you can come up with a pseudoscientific explanation for the magic (as in Sheri S. Tepper's books) that's a big plus.
Think about economics.
Economics may sound like a dull subject for a fantasy writer to be concerned with - they don't call it "the dismal science" for nothing - but considering the mundane underpinnings of your imaginary society pays off in believability. Most fantasy worlds are, as I just said, quasi-feudal, so they need a feudal economy. If you want to play around with the social structure, you need to change the economy as well. Let's say we want, in contrast to our classic feudal society, an egalitarian, freedom-loving one. How would these fantasy anarchists make a living? Would they have common ownership of land (and if so, why?), or would they have a non-agricultural economy (herding the great Gruntha beasts, for example).
Oh yes, and on the subject of economics, please remember that unless your fantasy planet has a radically different mineral composition to Earth, a gold piece is a hell of a lot of money, and not something an adventurer would blow on a night in a seedy inn.
Brass bikinis do not a feminist novel make
We all like warrior women. Female readers like them because they represent strong women, and male readers like them because chicks in skimpy armour are hot. However, unless you're going for the token warrior woman who can be explained by some social or magical anomaly, you need to think a bit more. If a society offers equal slaying rights to women, what other changes would that require? What kind of economy would it have in order to allow its womenfolk to rush off on quests?
You also need to consider the physical aspect of combat. Women can fight pretty well, but not in the conventional medieval style that is standard in sword and sorcery novels. Those swords were heavy; most men who don't work out at the gym couldn't wield them effectively, let alone the willowy warrior women beloved of fantasy writers (see the opening scene of Red Sonja for a particularly absurd example of skinny girls brandishing swords that would make even Arnie's muscles burn). Look at examples of how women have actually fought in history, such as the Scythian "warrior princesses" or the naginata-wielding samurai women.
Of course you can have powerful women without the brass bikinis. Robin Hobb's Outislanders are quite matriarchal, not because their women go to war, but because the women own and farm the land while the men go fishing or raiding (economics again!). Then of course you can always resort to magic, as in Andre Norton's Witchworld books.
Only plunder two features from any historical culture
Let's say you want a bunch of scary sea-raiders in your story. This automatically says "Vikings" to the reader, so you need to be careful not to bring in all the other cultural baggage as well. Following the two cultural features rule, this leaves you a choice of only one of the following:
- blond hair
- battle axes
- long ships with dragon's heads
- long epic poems
- fjords
- names like Erik Bloodaxe
Don't use silly spelling
One thing that did irritate me about Hobb was her spelling of the dragon's name: Icefyre. What is it with fantasy writers that they need to change I's to Y's (and vice versa)? And anyone who spells "fairy" "faerie" needs to be shot with a faerie dart. You are not Edmund Spenser, and you don't live in the sixteenth century. At the other extreme, don't go so far from traditional English spelling that the reader is left with no idea of how to pronounce the characters' names. Please think about the phonology of your mythical languages, rather than typing consonants and apostrophes at random. If I see more than two weird names on the back of a book, I put it back on the shelf.
Forget that you ever read The Lord of the Rings
Another thing that makes me put a book back on the shelf is when the blurb says "comparable to Tolkien at his best".** If your publisher feels obliged to exaggerate your writerly skill to this extent, it probably means your book is so unoriginal, they can only think of comparing it to The Lord of the Rings because, well, it's got elves and stuff. Elves, orcs, halflings and the other stock characters are fine for Dungeons and Dragons scenarios, but usually spell death for a novel. Either make up your own mythology from scratch, or do as Tolkien did and rewrite folklore, not other people's fantasy worlds.
* There again, most fiction of any variety is dross, and I'd still rather read dross which has sword-fights in it than dross about ordinary people wrestling with the ordinary problems of their ordinary lives.
** This raises the question of who Tolkien was compared to. Fortunately I have the answer: the original blurb for The Lord of the Rings compared it to Spenser's Faerie Queene. This shows how original Tolkien was - the only author they could think of comparing to died several centuries ago.
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interesting
Date: 2005-10-31 03:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-10-31 04:04 pm (UTC)The economic factor was one that I hadn't really given much thought to, but I've an idea kicking around in the back of my mind (it was spawned by a dream--don't you love those kinds?) and had a problem that I couldn't pinpoint. I see now that it's the economy. THANK YOU!
no subject
Date: 2005-10-31 06:04 pm (UTC)Then of course there's the smallfolk running to the holdfast in their smallclothes and drinking half-a-hundred trenchers of moon tea.
An author who I think does a good job with this stuff is Katherine Kurtz. At least once you get past the first trilogy (Deryni X, Deryni Y, Deryni Z).
no subject
Date: 2005-10-31 08:10 pm (UTC)You're right about Martin's irritating linguistic habits. I'd forgotten the "Ser" bit.
no subject
Date: 2005-10-31 08:18 pm (UTC)Still, I commend your friend for at least trying to write a novel. I just snipe from the sidelines, having never written a work of fiction longer than a short story.
no subject
Date: 2005-10-31 08:48 pm (UTC)Last night I had a beer with a guy who thinks Robert Jordan is the Best Ever.
I couldn't sit htere and listen to that -- I told him I thought the books were derivative crappy (and predictable) soap-operas after the second book, and that whenever I'd pick it up I'd start reading and feel like "didn't I already read this?".
So it makes me happy to read your comments here and
no subject
Date: 2005-10-31 09:19 pm (UTC)The Deryni trilogy was written first and sets up a lot of concepts & background. It's also the worst, although by the third book it's not bad.
The Camber trilogy was written second, takes place 80 years earlier, and is considerably better (the third book, Camber The Heretic, being imnsho one of the great works of medievalist fantasy). But it doesn't explain the concepts & background except in an author's introduction which is replete with spoilers.
Then there are two more trilogies, one following Deryni and one following Camber, each of which is on average better than the trilogy it follows. And some stand-alone books that can just be ignored.
So yeah, it's a mess. If you are still at all interested in trying it, I'd say start with the Camber books, and read the intro or not depending on how you feel about spoilers.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 02:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 03:17 am (UTC)I agree with you that the overuse of magic makes every plot twist the author's fiat. A realistic world should smack more of evolution than intelligent design.
How about something like "The Last Unicorn"? Something that doesn't try to be monumental, that flows dreamlike, something with some lightness and humor, with a few winking anachronisms thrown in. (Unfortunately, Tolkein veered away from that path once you got past his "origin of Golf" in The Hobbit.)
My mother wrote a fantasy novel, Time Among the Roussalkas (Roussalkas are river creatures in Russian folk tales--dramatized in Dvorak's opera). But it was never published.
You win at the internet.
Date: 2005-11-01 07:19 am (UTC)This is precisely the sort of question that needs to be asked more often.
And anyone who spells "fairy" "faerie" needs to be shot with a faerie dart
Definitely, the punishment should always be commensurate with the crime.
P.S.
Date: 2005-11-01 07:21 am (UTC)Re: P.S.
Date: 2005-11-01 09:11 am (UTC)Re: P.S.
Date: 2005-11-01 01:36 pm (UTC)Re: P.S.
Date: 2005-11-01 02:35 pm (UTC)Re: P.S.
Date: 2005-11-01 05:18 pm (UTC)So I'm taking this as consent to be quoted, btw. Observe
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 05:33 pm (UTC)Great list, but one quick question: Fantasy implies a suspension of belief. If the movement of the characters or other plot points is more important than spending several chapters establishing a world (since establishing one gradually without being forceful in your explanation is suprisingly difficult), shouldn't ignoring several of these rules, mainly about economy and form cultures, be possible and even prudent? If the reader is indeed used to Fantasy novels, even bad ones, and the suspension of belief, should logic play as large a role as it should otherwise?
Re: P.S.
Date: 2005-11-01 05:34 pm (UTC)They can be the most devoted readers and make the most absurd usage of your ideas and creations. An upside/downside situation if ever I knew one.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 05:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 05:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 05:46 pm (UTC)Those swords were heavy; most men who don't work out at the gym couldn't wield them effectively, let alone the willowy warrior women beloved of fantasy writers.
Well, if you're talking about two-handed broadswords, the type that reach three-and-half plus feet, only a tall brawny woman could handle that. But a one or one-and-a-half hander? I play with those all the time, and I'm only average height with little upper body strength. What it came down to was training - now, Twiggy wouldn't have a chance at weilding the sucker, but a girl with some meat on her bones and a couple months of training? Quite possibly.
Heh, sorry. Medievalist and reenacting group's historian here :)
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 06:30 pm (UTC)(here via
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 06:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 06:37 pm (UTC)I agree with you that the first three chapters shouldn't all be background; if I get 50 pages into a book and nothing's happened, I get a bit annoyed! (LotR is a killer for that, actually, and I almost gave up the first time I read it.)
I think a fantasy world should be self-consistent. Belief is much easier to suspend than logic, and if an author can get you into their world then it needs to all work within whatever 'laws of physics' they're using ... otherwise you get 'Wait! That doesn't work!' moments and you lose the connection.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 06:45 pm (UTC)Very well said.
Two comments: Pinching from certain cultures -- I agree with you on principle, but part of why I enjoy Eddings' books so much is because he has built his peoples so blatantly (and I think deliberately) on Earth equivalents. His Chereks, for example, are pretty much Vikings in everything that counts (looks, habits, language, what have you), but with just a few adjustments that make them still interesting. Same for the desert cultures in the Deryni books; obviously based on Arabs, but not quite a total mirror.
I guess it all lies in how well an author can write ...
Secondly, "silly spellings". Again, I'm prepared to say a big WORD on your comments, but very few authors have Tolkien's linguistic skill to create names and so on for various ethnicities. Changing the spelling of a name/word just slightly can convey "alienness" (especially in a fantasy/sf setting) quite well, IMO, while still making the name/word pronouncable and/or recognizable to one's audience.
Using strange spellings for no other reason than one can, however ... gah.
*goes off to put article into memories*
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 06:46 pm (UTC)The ones that follow Deryni are better than Deryni, but not as good as the Camber stuff.