Warren Rochelle's Blog - Posts Tagged "valjeanne-jeffers"
Science Fiction and Fantasy: We All Know the Difference, Right: Great Traveling Fantasy Roundtable Blog, April 2013
Science Fiction and Fantasy: We All Know the Difference, Right?
From the Great Traveling Round Table of Fantasy Bloggers
The Difference Between SF and Fantasy by Carole McDonnell
Science Fiction generally falls into two categories: hard or soft. Depending on the reader’s belief in his scientific aptitude or love of hardware technologies, the SF reader can explore technological, biological, physiological sciences that are emerging, yet to come,probably possible and hypothethical.
The Fantasy writer and reader roam larger territories. Sometimes those territories are far afield from modern known science, sometimes they are mental realms, sometimes spiritual arenas,sometimes past historical and cultural lands.
The science fiction reader joins the SF writer in seeing how far the mind of man can go, often learning about and wading deep into some emerging science the author or the reader share. And often the sf reader will have the sf novel in one hand, a scientific tome in the other, and be sitting in front of the computer: facts are checkable.
The fantasy reader may read her fantasy book alongside another book — if that other book deals with some lore of some lost culture. But the fantasy reader is just as happy to venture into the unknown world of the author’s mind. All the reader asks, however, is that the novelist be true to the world he or she has created.
Whether the fantasy novel deals with European vampires, Native America shapeshifters, East Indian demi-gods,European elves, alternate realities, far off planets, Earth analogues, living,dead, non-living, eternal, godly, helpless, miniscule, mammalian, oceanic,elemental, speaking, non-speaking, beings within this galaxy, across galaxies,planetary, geophysical, or plainly and simply human, the fantasy world the author creates must be held up to the collective scrutiny of its readers.
Fantasy is game-playing of a higher order of imagination than Science fiction because the SF author is bound by and exploring the ramification of rules he has found. But the fantasy author is examining larger premise of creativity. This is not to say that science fiction is not creative but while Science fiction aims to discover and seek out rules and aspects of life that is already there, the fantasy writer aims to create whole new worlds or culture, emotion, and spirit.
No wonder, then, that fantasy comes in so many forms with so many varieties. Fantasy is extreme.
Carole McDonnell holds a BA degree in Literature from SUNY Purchase and has spent most of her years surrounded by things literary. Her writings appear in various anthologies including “So Long Been Dreaming: Post-colonialism in science fiction,” edited by Nalo Hopkinson and published by Arsenal Pulp Press; Fantastic Visions III” anthology published by Fantasist Enterprises; “Jigsaw Nation” published by Spyre publications,“Griots: A Sword and Soul anthology,” edited by Milton Davis and Charles Saunders, “Life Spices from Seasoned Sistahs: writings by mature women of color,” “Fantastic Stories of the Imagination” edited by Warren Lapine and published by Wilder Publications.
Her novel, Wind Follower was published by Wildside Books. Her other works include My Life as an Onion, Seeds of Bible Study: How NOT to Study the Bible. Her collection of short stories,Spirit Fruit: Collected Speculative Fiction, is available on kindle and also at Lulu.com Her second novel, The Constant Tower, will be published in 2013
SciFi Versus Fantasy? by Theresa Crater
I teach a class in writing speculative fiction and often use Orson Scott Card’s book How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy. In it he classifies Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern and Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Darkover series as science fiction rather than fantasy. Why? Because they take place on other planets. I say hooey.
Why? Because they have all the earmarks of fantasy. Early fantasy reinvented the medieval, mostly European. It brings Celtic, Norse and Germanic mythology to life. Now writers are expanding culturally, which is all to the good, but many fantasies still take place in a predominantly agricultural world whose cities have castles, farmer’s markets and guilds of artisans. Then there are the aristocrats and rulers along with their soldiers or knights. People move about on horseback for the most part. Or sail on ships. Fantasy is pre-industrial revolution.
Many say science fiction began with Frankenstein, although it’s still got a lot of hidden alchemy and magic in it.But the text argues between the old mistaken alchemy and the new correct chemistry. Much of the science in that text looks like dark fantasy to us now,but that was the science of the day. Science fiction is the conscience of science. It looks over the shoulders of men in their laboratories and asks,“What will happen if?” What will be the moral, social and personal price humanity pays for your discovery? It’s the same question Mary Shelley asked.
Urban fantasy has complicated the picture, but the reason it’s fantasy is that it convinces us that the possibilities science tells us are not real are real after all. Faeries exist.Vampires haunt the night. But if you add aliens, then I’ll have to say we’re back to science fiction.
Theresa Crater brings ancient temples, lost civilizations and secret societies back to life in her paranormal mysteries. The shadow government search for ancient Atlantean weapons in the fabled Hall of Records in Under the Stone Paw and fight to control ancient crystals sunk beneath the sea in Beneath the Hallowed Hill.
Her short stories explore ancient myth brought into the present day. The most recent include “The Judgment of Osiris” in Tales in Firelight and Shadow and “White Moon” in Ride the Moon.Writing as Louise Ryder, she publishes women’s fiction. God in a Box returns us to the 1970s world of feminism and Eastern philosophy. Theresa has also published poetry and a baker’s dozen of literary criticism. Currently, she teaches writing and British lit in Denver. Visit her at http://theresacrater.com.
Science Fiction and Fantasy: We All Know the Difference, Right? by Warren Rochelle
One of the first questions I ask my students in both my fantasy and science fiction lit classes is just what is the difference between these two closely related genres. After all, as Ursula LeGuin says, “Fantasy is the ancient kingdom of which science fiction is but a modern province.”
Close relations indeed, one the descendant of the other, or rather one evolving from the other, the metaphors and tropes of fantasy of sword, sorcery, the Hero and the Quest, magic, fairy kingdoms, monsters, and the rest, giving way to the metaphors and tropes of technology and the machine, of science, and other worlds and aliens.
The simplest distinction is, of course, magic and science, the impossible and the possible. Or, to cite a definition that appeared on the listserv of the SFRA (Science Fiction Research Association, whose purview is SF and fantasy), “if the story has dragons in it,it’s fantasy, but if the dragons are given an evolutionary history, it’s science fiction.” I would modify that slightly: if the story has dragons in it as one of the native fauna, it’s fantasy, but never mind that.
So, Elves, fairies, witches,wizards, magic—the impossible, fantasy. Spaceships, lasers, warp drive, aliens and mutants—the possible, science fiction.
All right. But just the other day,my individual study student this semester, Evan, turned in a blog post on Dune.First, Evan’s individual study is the writing of a science fiction novel, along with some readings and journals. I suggested Dune. After all, it is one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written. Everybody knows that, right?
Evan begged to differ: “One important thing to note about Dune is that it’s not really a science-fiction story. It’s a fantasy. It’s about a chosen prince having his kingdom stolen,then mastering the magical arts and fighting, as well as befriending the natives of his land and the super-powerful creatures that inhabit it, all to overthrow the evil emperor and reclaim his rightful place. The whole story reeks of fantasy. They have sword fights for one thing.”
Wait a minute. Many of Paul’s abilities as Kwisatz Haderach come from his genetics—he is the product of a ninety-generation breeding program, a long-awaited messiah. His prescience gets“turned on” when he takes the Water of Life, a natural by-product of the life cycle of the giant sandworm. His enhanced mental abilities are, in part,attributed to his training as a mentat, a human computer. Doesn’t that make the novel science fiction?
Not according to Evan. He argues that the novel doesn’t need to be science fiction: “The emperor’s ships could be boats on an ocean just as easily as spaceships … The sandworms are basically dragons or wyverns and Paul’s [Kwisatz Haderach] status is basically that of a wizard or a magical hero. He’s not a sci-fi hero. He doesn’t make machines,tinker, or have any real connection to technology . . . While the story does contain loose sci-fi elements, aside from a singular instance of a small drone being used and the fact that their economy relies on large spaceships, the story is simply not sci-fi. It is science-fiction flavored fantasy.”
All right. Evan does have a point and I wasn’t able to shake his conviction—not yet anyway. If we were to have this discussion again, here is what I use to counter his argument. I would point out that Paul has and does use atomic weaponry and the spice, another sandworm by-product, is harvested by machines. A force field surrounds the family castle.
I would ask if the SF hero has to make machines or be connected to technology? Not those with psychic powers,which Paul has. But, more importantly, a primary basis of the novel, its controlling metaphor, is ecology, or interconnected biological systems—here, an entire planet. The Fremen, thanks to Liet-Kynes, and his father, are superb field ecologists, and have given over their entire culture to the mission of bringing water to their desert world.
It is here, I think, that Evan’s argument that the novel is fantasy doesn’t quite work. Yes, the relationship between the two genres is clearly discernible in his analysis of Dune,particularly in how science fiction evolved from fantasy through a reimagining of familiar metaphors and symbols and devices. Science fiction is, in many ways, the modern response to the questions and themes of fantasy.
I am not suggesting that ecology can’t be a theme in fantasy; it often is, including the idea that magic itself must be saved, conserved, and renewed, if necessary. But the world-view of Dune, ultimately, is rooted in science, the possible, not the magical, the unseen, the impossible but still the imagined.
And that, I think, might be the difference between science fiction and fantasy. But I don't think I will be able to convince Evan.
Warren Rochelle has taught English at the University of Mary Washington since 2000. His short story, “The Golden Boy” (published in The Silver Gryphon) was a Finalist for the 2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for Best Short Story and his novels include The Wild Boy (2001),Harvest of Changelings (2007), and The Called (2010.
He also published a critical work on Le Guin and has academic articles in various journals and essay collections.His short story, “The Boy on McGee Street,” was recently published in Queer Fish 2 (Pink Narcissus Press, 2012). Contact him at: http://warrenrochelle.com
The Difference Between Fantasy and SF is Horses by Andrea Hosth
If your characters get about on horses, you are writing fantasy. If they travel using something mechanised,then you are writing SF. Your SF can have wizards, and spaceships which fly through hand-waving. Your story can lack any form of magic whatsoever, but if the tech level has not advanced beyond the equivalent of a horse-drawn cart, it’s still fantasy.
This is almost not an exaggeration.Reader expectation is a force which can easily overcome author intention. What you write may be fantasy, science fiction or some combination of both, but your setting is what determines whether or not a story is science fiction.
Still, if I am to take a serious stab at the question, I’ll start by considering the definition that “science fiction is what could be, while fantasy is what never could be”. Of course, this is a definition which works best if you take a strict “hard science fiction” approach to SF, since a very large portion of science fiction involve smagic-equivalent hand-waving science.
There are many definitions for fantasy, mostly revolving around some variation of “has magic”, but that is a definition which quickly falls down. I prefer to regard fantasy as “any story where the setting/world building is intended to be different to an accurate depiction of our own world”. Thus a historical novel (intended to be accurate)is not fantasy, but alternate history is fantasy, books with working magic are fantasy, stories set in the future are fantasy (because there is no possible way for them to be truly accurate). Hard or soft, sword and sorcery, magic realism – the crux of the fantasy genre is that something exists in the story which demonstrably cannot be located and pointed out as having existed in (the current agreed understanding of) our world.
Science fiction is thus a subset of fantasy, and the question becomes how it separates itself off from the broader genre. A quick perusal of the Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness shows that even the completely soft end of science fiction can still be regarded as“unambiguously science fiction” – though in this case it appears that science fiction can be science fiction purely in terms of setting, which brings us back to the horses. The TV Tropes site goes on to base science fiction firmly in the realm of a ‘what if’ story, and makes the crux of the story a ‘technological difference’.
So, science fiction is a story where there is an intentional difference to our world where the crux of the tale depends on a difference in technology/science. Even if the science is not rigorous, and cannot by any means be considered hard science fiction, it is still science fiction if the core of the story is “what if this this technology…”.
Stories which have a scientific setting, but which are not interested in that setting – where the technology is of no import to the tale but is merely a fancy dress which could be exchanged for other fantastic clothing – could perhaps be termed science fantasy. And the flip side – stories with horses and magic where the crux of the story is a technological question?
I recently discussed the question of science fiction vs fantasy in my own novels, pointing out that the magic-rich Champion of the Rose has at its core a technological question – it’s a “genetic manipulation gone wrong” story in a fantasy setting. I suppose this may be termed “fantastic science”, since it’s using a magical means to attain a scientific action.
But, on the whole, my definition is my definition. Like so many other genre questions, it becomes an “I know if when I read it” answer, with every individual’s answer having some slight variance, and most readers interested in specific sub-genres rather than the whole breadth and depth of fantasy or science fiction.
Meanwhile, I’ll be over here writing about a mechanical horse.
Vampires or Space Helmets…Fantasy or Science Fiction? by Valjeanne Jeffers
Technology and fantasy: put them together and you have a delicious synergy that’s not quite SF, not quite fantasy. Some of my favorite authors have skirted the divider between fantasy and science fiction. Octavia Butler, for example, while she is almost always described as a science fiction author blended the two quite brilliantly in books like Wild Seed and Clay’s Ark. Nalo Hopkinson also combined them with sheer genius in her novels Brown Girl in The Ring and Clay’s Ark. Nalo Hopkinson also combined them with sheer genius in her novels Brown Girl in The Ring and Midnight Robber.
The existence of technology in fantasy often results in the co-existence of “science and sorcery,” as Charles Saunders (creator of Sword and Soul) has described my Immortal series. In my novels you have werewolves and vampires—totally in control of their preternatural abilities and using said abilities to protect their universe; but still such characters are most often found in fantasy or horror genres. Yet the Immortal series also has time travel, aliens… and technology to support its futuristic setting. Such as in the excerpt from Immortal book 1:
"Karla walked across the wooden floor of her living area into a kitchenette. A press of her fingers on the first sphere of a triangular pod started coffee brewing.
She filled a cup with chicory,walked back into the living area and pushed the second button on her remote,activating a blue panel beside the window. Jazz music filled the apartment.Like her bedroom console the unit kept time, transmitted holographic images and played tapes. Using the third button, she opened the curtains.
Thus, the Immortal novels have been described as both fantasy and science fiction novels. Use a little science and one still can be considered a Fantasy writer. Use a bit more and you’ve inched into the science fiction genre. An excerpt from Colony: A Space Opera(my novel in progress) illustrates this point:
She was born 20 years after Planet Earth’s decline. The same year IST began building the probes:lightweight spacecrafts that humans could live in for years, if need be, and that moved fast enough to break the sound barrier—traveling millions of miles within weeks.
In 2065, global warning had accelerated. The final stage in Earth’s destruction had begun. Temperatures of150 degrees scorched the planet. Tidal waves, monsoons and cyclones tore it apart. Those who could afford it moved underground. Food became the world’s most valued resource. The rest were herded under the domes.
Scientists scurried to genetically reproduce fruits and vegetables—with horrible side effects. Money still ruled the world. But money was gradually becoming worthless. That’s when the government saw the writing on the wall and created IST and the probes: spacecrafts designed for one purpose, to seek out planets capable of sustaining human life.
When a writer uses technology in fantasy, the lines between the genres are even more gloriously buried. What maybe described as science fiction by one reader/writer can just as easily be characterized as fantasy by the next. The only real rule here is to make one’s technology believable; credible; plausible. Although it doesn’t yet exist—in a kind kind of literary sleight of hand.
Pulling this off, just gives me one more reason to absolutely love speculative fiction…even if no will ever be able to figure out whether I’m a science fiction or fantasy writer. I think I prefer it that way.
Valjeanne is the author of the Immortal series, The Switch II: Clockwork (includes books I and II) and several short works of fiction.
Her fiction has appeared in Steamfunk!, Griots: A Sword and Soul Anthology, Lune Wing, Purple Mag, Genesis Science Fiction Magazine, Pembroke Magazine, Possibilties, 31 Days of Steamy Mocha, and Griots II: Sisters of the Spear (in press). She works as an editor for Mocha Memoirs Press and is also co-owner of Qand V Affordable editing.
Preview or purchase her novels at: http://www.vjeffersandqveal.com
From the Great Traveling Round Table of Fantasy Bloggers
The Difference Between SF and Fantasy by Carole McDonnell
Science Fiction generally falls into two categories: hard or soft. Depending on the reader’s belief in his scientific aptitude or love of hardware technologies, the SF reader can explore technological, biological, physiological sciences that are emerging, yet to come,probably possible and hypothethical.
The Fantasy writer and reader roam larger territories. Sometimes those territories are far afield from modern known science, sometimes they are mental realms, sometimes spiritual arenas,sometimes past historical and cultural lands.
The science fiction reader joins the SF writer in seeing how far the mind of man can go, often learning about and wading deep into some emerging science the author or the reader share. And often the sf reader will have the sf novel in one hand, a scientific tome in the other, and be sitting in front of the computer: facts are checkable.
The fantasy reader may read her fantasy book alongside another book — if that other book deals with some lore of some lost culture. But the fantasy reader is just as happy to venture into the unknown world of the author’s mind. All the reader asks, however, is that the novelist be true to the world he or she has created.
Whether the fantasy novel deals with European vampires, Native America shapeshifters, East Indian demi-gods,European elves, alternate realities, far off planets, Earth analogues, living,dead, non-living, eternal, godly, helpless, miniscule, mammalian, oceanic,elemental, speaking, non-speaking, beings within this galaxy, across galaxies,planetary, geophysical, or plainly and simply human, the fantasy world the author creates must be held up to the collective scrutiny of its readers.
Fantasy is game-playing of a higher order of imagination than Science fiction because the SF author is bound by and exploring the ramification of rules he has found. But the fantasy author is examining larger premise of creativity. This is not to say that science fiction is not creative but while Science fiction aims to discover and seek out rules and aspects of life that is already there, the fantasy writer aims to create whole new worlds or culture, emotion, and spirit.
No wonder, then, that fantasy comes in so many forms with so many varieties. Fantasy is extreme.
Carole McDonnell holds a BA degree in Literature from SUNY Purchase and has spent most of her years surrounded by things literary. Her writings appear in various anthologies including “So Long Been Dreaming: Post-colonialism in science fiction,” edited by Nalo Hopkinson and published by Arsenal Pulp Press; Fantastic Visions III” anthology published by Fantasist Enterprises; “Jigsaw Nation” published by Spyre publications,“Griots: A Sword and Soul anthology,” edited by Milton Davis and Charles Saunders, “Life Spices from Seasoned Sistahs: writings by mature women of color,” “Fantastic Stories of the Imagination” edited by Warren Lapine and published by Wilder Publications.
Her novel, Wind Follower was published by Wildside Books. Her other works include My Life as an Onion, Seeds of Bible Study: How NOT to Study the Bible. Her collection of short stories,Spirit Fruit: Collected Speculative Fiction, is available on kindle and also at Lulu.com Her second novel, The Constant Tower, will be published in 2013
SciFi Versus Fantasy? by Theresa Crater
I teach a class in writing speculative fiction and often use Orson Scott Card’s book How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy. In it he classifies Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern and Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Darkover series as science fiction rather than fantasy. Why? Because they take place on other planets. I say hooey.
Why? Because they have all the earmarks of fantasy. Early fantasy reinvented the medieval, mostly European. It brings Celtic, Norse and Germanic mythology to life. Now writers are expanding culturally, which is all to the good, but many fantasies still take place in a predominantly agricultural world whose cities have castles, farmer’s markets and guilds of artisans. Then there are the aristocrats and rulers along with their soldiers or knights. People move about on horseback for the most part. Or sail on ships. Fantasy is pre-industrial revolution.
Many say science fiction began with Frankenstein, although it’s still got a lot of hidden alchemy and magic in it.But the text argues between the old mistaken alchemy and the new correct chemistry. Much of the science in that text looks like dark fantasy to us now,but that was the science of the day. Science fiction is the conscience of science. It looks over the shoulders of men in their laboratories and asks,“What will happen if?” What will be the moral, social and personal price humanity pays for your discovery? It’s the same question Mary Shelley asked.
Urban fantasy has complicated the picture, but the reason it’s fantasy is that it convinces us that the possibilities science tells us are not real are real after all. Faeries exist.Vampires haunt the night. But if you add aliens, then I’ll have to say we’re back to science fiction.
Theresa Crater brings ancient temples, lost civilizations and secret societies back to life in her paranormal mysteries. The shadow government search for ancient Atlantean weapons in the fabled Hall of Records in Under the Stone Paw and fight to control ancient crystals sunk beneath the sea in Beneath the Hallowed Hill.
Her short stories explore ancient myth brought into the present day. The most recent include “The Judgment of Osiris” in Tales in Firelight and Shadow and “White Moon” in Ride the Moon.Writing as Louise Ryder, she publishes women’s fiction. God in a Box returns us to the 1970s world of feminism and Eastern philosophy. Theresa has also published poetry and a baker’s dozen of literary criticism. Currently, she teaches writing and British lit in Denver. Visit her at http://theresacrater.com.
Science Fiction and Fantasy: We All Know the Difference, Right? by Warren Rochelle
One of the first questions I ask my students in both my fantasy and science fiction lit classes is just what is the difference between these two closely related genres. After all, as Ursula LeGuin says, “Fantasy is the ancient kingdom of which science fiction is but a modern province.”
Close relations indeed, one the descendant of the other, or rather one evolving from the other, the metaphors and tropes of fantasy of sword, sorcery, the Hero and the Quest, magic, fairy kingdoms, monsters, and the rest, giving way to the metaphors and tropes of technology and the machine, of science, and other worlds and aliens.
The simplest distinction is, of course, magic and science, the impossible and the possible. Or, to cite a definition that appeared on the listserv of the SFRA (Science Fiction Research Association, whose purview is SF and fantasy), “if the story has dragons in it,it’s fantasy, but if the dragons are given an evolutionary history, it’s science fiction.” I would modify that slightly: if the story has dragons in it as one of the native fauna, it’s fantasy, but never mind that.
So, Elves, fairies, witches,wizards, magic—the impossible, fantasy. Spaceships, lasers, warp drive, aliens and mutants—the possible, science fiction.
All right. But just the other day,my individual study student this semester, Evan, turned in a blog post on Dune.First, Evan’s individual study is the writing of a science fiction novel, along with some readings and journals. I suggested Dune. After all, it is one of the greatest science fiction novels ever written. Everybody knows that, right?
Evan begged to differ: “One important thing to note about Dune is that it’s not really a science-fiction story. It’s a fantasy. It’s about a chosen prince having his kingdom stolen,then mastering the magical arts and fighting, as well as befriending the natives of his land and the super-powerful creatures that inhabit it, all to overthrow the evil emperor and reclaim his rightful place. The whole story reeks of fantasy. They have sword fights for one thing.”
Wait a minute. Many of Paul’s abilities as Kwisatz Haderach come from his genetics—he is the product of a ninety-generation breeding program, a long-awaited messiah. His prescience gets“turned on” when he takes the Water of Life, a natural by-product of the life cycle of the giant sandworm. His enhanced mental abilities are, in part,attributed to his training as a mentat, a human computer. Doesn’t that make the novel science fiction?
Not according to Evan. He argues that the novel doesn’t need to be science fiction: “The emperor’s ships could be boats on an ocean just as easily as spaceships … The sandworms are basically dragons or wyverns and Paul’s [Kwisatz Haderach] status is basically that of a wizard or a magical hero. He’s not a sci-fi hero. He doesn’t make machines,tinker, or have any real connection to technology . . . While the story does contain loose sci-fi elements, aside from a singular instance of a small drone being used and the fact that their economy relies on large spaceships, the story is simply not sci-fi. It is science-fiction flavored fantasy.”
All right. Evan does have a point and I wasn’t able to shake his conviction—not yet anyway. If we were to have this discussion again, here is what I use to counter his argument. I would point out that Paul has and does use atomic weaponry and the spice, another sandworm by-product, is harvested by machines. A force field surrounds the family castle.
I would ask if the SF hero has to make machines or be connected to technology? Not those with psychic powers,which Paul has. But, more importantly, a primary basis of the novel, its controlling metaphor, is ecology, or interconnected biological systems—here, an entire planet. The Fremen, thanks to Liet-Kynes, and his father, are superb field ecologists, and have given over their entire culture to the mission of bringing water to their desert world.
It is here, I think, that Evan’s argument that the novel is fantasy doesn’t quite work. Yes, the relationship between the two genres is clearly discernible in his analysis of Dune,particularly in how science fiction evolved from fantasy through a reimagining of familiar metaphors and symbols and devices. Science fiction is, in many ways, the modern response to the questions and themes of fantasy.
I am not suggesting that ecology can’t be a theme in fantasy; it often is, including the idea that magic itself must be saved, conserved, and renewed, if necessary. But the world-view of Dune, ultimately, is rooted in science, the possible, not the magical, the unseen, the impossible but still the imagined.
And that, I think, might be the difference between science fiction and fantasy. But I don't think I will be able to convince Evan.
Warren Rochelle has taught English at the University of Mary Washington since 2000. His short story, “The Golden Boy” (published in The Silver Gryphon) was a Finalist for the 2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for Best Short Story and his novels include The Wild Boy (2001),Harvest of Changelings (2007), and The Called (2010.
He also published a critical work on Le Guin and has academic articles in various journals and essay collections.His short story, “The Boy on McGee Street,” was recently published in Queer Fish 2 (Pink Narcissus Press, 2012). Contact him at: http://warrenrochelle.com
The Difference Between Fantasy and SF is Horses by Andrea Hosth
If your characters get about on horses, you are writing fantasy. If they travel using something mechanised,then you are writing SF. Your SF can have wizards, and spaceships which fly through hand-waving. Your story can lack any form of magic whatsoever, but if the tech level has not advanced beyond the equivalent of a horse-drawn cart, it’s still fantasy.
This is almost not an exaggeration.Reader expectation is a force which can easily overcome author intention. What you write may be fantasy, science fiction or some combination of both, but your setting is what determines whether or not a story is science fiction.
Still, if I am to take a serious stab at the question, I’ll start by considering the definition that “science fiction is what could be, while fantasy is what never could be”. Of course, this is a definition which works best if you take a strict “hard science fiction” approach to SF, since a very large portion of science fiction involve smagic-equivalent hand-waving science.
There are many definitions for fantasy, mostly revolving around some variation of “has magic”, but that is a definition which quickly falls down. I prefer to regard fantasy as “any story where the setting/world building is intended to be different to an accurate depiction of our own world”. Thus a historical novel (intended to be accurate)is not fantasy, but alternate history is fantasy, books with working magic are fantasy, stories set in the future are fantasy (because there is no possible way for them to be truly accurate). Hard or soft, sword and sorcery, magic realism – the crux of the fantasy genre is that something exists in the story which demonstrably cannot be located and pointed out as having existed in (the current agreed understanding of) our world.
Science fiction is thus a subset of fantasy, and the question becomes how it separates itself off from the broader genre. A quick perusal of the Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness shows that even the completely soft end of science fiction can still be regarded as“unambiguously science fiction” – though in this case it appears that science fiction can be science fiction purely in terms of setting, which brings us back to the horses. The TV Tropes site goes on to base science fiction firmly in the realm of a ‘what if’ story, and makes the crux of the story a ‘technological difference’.
So, science fiction is a story where there is an intentional difference to our world where the crux of the tale depends on a difference in technology/science. Even if the science is not rigorous, and cannot by any means be considered hard science fiction, it is still science fiction if the core of the story is “what if this this technology…”.
Stories which have a scientific setting, but which are not interested in that setting – where the technology is of no import to the tale but is merely a fancy dress which could be exchanged for other fantastic clothing – could perhaps be termed science fantasy. And the flip side – stories with horses and magic where the crux of the story is a technological question?
I recently discussed the question of science fiction vs fantasy in my own novels, pointing out that the magic-rich Champion of the Rose has at its core a technological question – it’s a “genetic manipulation gone wrong” story in a fantasy setting. I suppose this may be termed “fantastic science”, since it’s using a magical means to attain a scientific action.
But, on the whole, my definition is my definition. Like so many other genre questions, it becomes an “I know if when I read it” answer, with every individual’s answer having some slight variance, and most readers interested in specific sub-genres rather than the whole breadth and depth of fantasy or science fiction.
Meanwhile, I’ll be over here writing about a mechanical horse.
Vampires or Space Helmets…Fantasy or Science Fiction? by Valjeanne Jeffers
Technology and fantasy: put them together and you have a delicious synergy that’s not quite SF, not quite fantasy. Some of my favorite authors have skirted the divider between fantasy and science fiction. Octavia Butler, for example, while she is almost always described as a science fiction author blended the two quite brilliantly in books like Wild Seed and Clay’s Ark. Nalo Hopkinson also combined them with sheer genius in her novels Brown Girl in The Ring and Clay’s Ark. Nalo Hopkinson also combined them with sheer genius in her novels Brown Girl in The Ring and Midnight Robber.
The existence of technology in fantasy often results in the co-existence of “science and sorcery,” as Charles Saunders (creator of Sword and Soul) has described my Immortal series. In my novels you have werewolves and vampires—totally in control of their preternatural abilities and using said abilities to protect their universe; but still such characters are most often found in fantasy or horror genres. Yet the Immortal series also has time travel, aliens… and technology to support its futuristic setting. Such as in the excerpt from Immortal book 1:
"Karla walked across the wooden floor of her living area into a kitchenette. A press of her fingers on the first sphere of a triangular pod started coffee brewing.
She filled a cup with chicory,walked back into the living area and pushed the second button on her remote,activating a blue panel beside the window. Jazz music filled the apartment.Like her bedroom console the unit kept time, transmitted holographic images and played tapes. Using the third button, she opened the curtains.
Thus, the Immortal novels have been described as both fantasy and science fiction novels. Use a little science and one still can be considered a Fantasy writer. Use a bit more and you’ve inched into the science fiction genre. An excerpt from Colony: A Space Opera(my novel in progress) illustrates this point:
She was born 20 years after Planet Earth’s decline. The same year IST began building the probes:lightweight spacecrafts that humans could live in for years, if need be, and that moved fast enough to break the sound barrier—traveling millions of miles within weeks.
In 2065, global warning had accelerated. The final stage in Earth’s destruction had begun. Temperatures of150 degrees scorched the planet. Tidal waves, monsoons and cyclones tore it apart. Those who could afford it moved underground. Food became the world’s most valued resource. The rest were herded under the domes.
Scientists scurried to genetically reproduce fruits and vegetables—with horrible side effects. Money still ruled the world. But money was gradually becoming worthless. That’s when the government saw the writing on the wall and created IST and the probes: spacecrafts designed for one purpose, to seek out planets capable of sustaining human life.
When a writer uses technology in fantasy, the lines between the genres are even more gloriously buried. What maybe described as science fiction by one reader/writer can just as easily be characterized as fantasy by the next. The only real rule here is to make one’s technology believable; credible; plausible. Although it doesn’t yet exist—in a kind kind of literary sleight of hand.
Pulling this off, just gives me one more reason to absolutely love speculative fiction…even if no will ever be able to figure out whether I’m a science fiction or fantasy writer. I think I prefer it that way.
Valjeanne is the author of the Immortal series, The Switch II: Clockwork (includes books I and II) and several short works of fiction.
Her fiction has appeared in Steamfunk!, Griots: A Sword and Soul Anthology, Lune Wing, Purple Mag, Genesis Science Fiction Magazine, Pembroke Magazine, Possibilties, 31 Days of Steamy Mocha, and Griots II: Sisters of the Spear (in press). She works as an editor for Mocha Memoirs Press and is also co-owner of Qand V Affordable editing.
Preview or purchase her novels at: http://www.vjeffersandqveal.com
Evil and the Fantastic: Great Fantasy Traveling Roundtable Blog, September 2013
This month, my fellow Fantasy Roundtable Bloggers and I discuss what many have argued is inherent and integral to fantasy literature, evil. Is evil necessary in fantasy? Is Good versus Evil an integral and essential conflict? Do heroes need villains? Here are some thoughts on those questions and others on evil and the fantastic.
Warren Rochelle
Evil and the Fantastic
As luck would have it, just last week I asked my English 379 (Fantasy Literature) students to respond to this prompt, while we were reading and discussing The Fellowship of the Ring:
Discuss evil as an element of fantasy, paying attention to how it is presented in The Fellowship of the Ring. Is evil necessary for fantastic literature? Why? Do we have to have evil to understand and appreciate good? What can we learn from evil about human nature?
Their responses were quite interesting. Below is a sample:
According to Wanda*:
“Evil is necessary for all literature, not necessarily in the form of a villain, but in some form that is counter to good. Evil is not black and white because people are not black and white. Each character in a story has flaws, has vices, and has the possibility for evil. The ring in LOTR brings out the corruptibility or weakness in each character that comes into contact with it (besides Tom), even resulting in Boromir’s death.”
Margaret argues that fantasy needs evil—or villains—to be interesting and engaging:
“Is it possible for a fantasy to exist without evil? Or more importantly, without the villain? As much as it would be a perfect utopian setting, it wouldn’t be very interesting. Imagine the Lord of the Rings without Sauron or any of Grimm’s fairytales without the wicked stepmother. The idea just doesn’t fly. But take The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the fifth Narnia book. There are a few scenes in the story where the characters are faced with temptation: a spell to become the most beautiful, a pool that turns all to gold, treasure when hoarded breeds a dragon. However, I don’t necessarily classify these as evil; at least, they don’t fall into the same category as the White Witch or the Calormenes.”
Jed insists that
“The existence of Evil is absolutely paramount in Fantasy. In it the difference between Good and Evil, which is blurred in many genres, is stark and apparent. At [its] very foundation, Fantasy is the valiant struggle of what is pure and good against that which is corrupt and evil.”
Aaron insists we see past the simplistic black and white:
“Ultimately, issues of “good” and “evil” are important elements of any story. Morality, or lack thereof, is a fundamental aspect of the human condition. Good fantasy explores this just as much as any other type of literature. There is no reason why is has to do so in a simplistic way.”
Zeno has this to say
“In the end, conflict is the essence of Fantasy; but the best stories are ones that acknowledge that “evil” is not necessarily a cut and dried force; even books in which there are forces of pure evil and good, there are situations where “good” characters must deal with their own “evil.” Evil, as an idea, is necessary to fantasy, because it provides a stable and easily recognizable theme for the conflict that any book will center around. However, the best books force us to reconsider what is evil, and how best to deal with that evil, and how to respond when, occasionally, good people do bad things, and evil people do good things.”
Arabella doesn’t think evil is essential, arguing that
“I don't think evil is a necessary element of the fantasy genre, however it is an important element of many fantastical books. Just like in any other genre, the story doesn't have to be good vs. evil. The plot doesn't need to center around an evil wizard, ruler, or fantastical creature. What fantasy does is give us the option for those type of plots, making evil an important element, although not a necessary one.
Fantasy opens up new worlds and in those worlds is the opportunity for characters to be truly evil. An opportunity, not a requirement. In the world we live in, I would argue that evil does not truly exist. Our world is categorized in shades of grey and though some may be darker or lighter than others, they are not a pure white or black. The fantasy genre can create worlds in which there is that absolute good and evil we can trust. There is often a distinct line with the good guys on one side and the villains on the other. There can be obvious criteria for those characters who make up good or evil and through these the story can be ruled by the absolutes. Evil is yet another fantastical element that can be a part of fantasy stories. It helps create boundaries and definitions of what is good and through evil the goodness of characters becomes not only more obvious, but also in a way more good. The two opposite ends of the spectrum play against each other to create the good vs. evil fantasy story to which we are accustomed.”
What conclusions, if any, can be drawn from this random sampling of the 43 students enrolled in the 2 sections of Fantasy Lit I am teaching this semester? Many, but not all of them, fall in the category of the “fantasy geek” kids who cut their teeth on Rowling, Tolkien, and a variety of role-playing games, and love, love, love Game of Thrones. They are really into this stuff. A surprising number came to Tolkien first through the movies. A goodly number want to write the great American fantasy novel, and have reams of various drafts already written.
So, is evil is a necessity in fantastic literature? Sort of, yes, no, maybe. Conflict, yes—evil, maybe. Is evil even real? Is it, as another student noted in class discussion, the absence of good? Is their youth that prevents some of them from seeing that evil can be a matter of degree, that a Dark Lord isn’t a necessary presence? That evil can both be banal and ordinary and a Balrog or a Dark Lord? That evil doesn’t always leaves scars and wounds on the body, but as well on the mind and the heart?
Conflict, as in any story, fantasy or not, is an essential plot element. In fantasy, this is often—quite often—expressed as good vs. evil. The hero must have an enemy. It is in this conflict and in this exploration of just what is good and evil that we learn what fantasy has to teach us: what it means to be human and that to be human is to be capable of both good and evil. And here, I would argue, is one of the greatest strengths of fantasy literature.
***
Warren Rochelle has taught English at the University of Mary Washington since 2000. His short story, "The Golden Boy” (published in The Silver Gryphon) was a Finalist for the 2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for Best Short Story and his novels include The Wild Boy (2001), Harvest of Changelings (2007), and The Called (2010), all published by Golden Gryphon Press. He also published a critical work on Le Guin and has academic articles in various journals and essay collections. His short fiction has been published in such journals and collections as Icarus, Collective Fallout. The Silver Gryphon, North Carolina Literary Review, Romance and Beyond, and Aboriginal Science Fiction. His short story, “The Boy on McGee Street,” was just published in Queer Fish 2. He is presently working on a novel about a gay werewolf and his godling boyfriend and a collection of gay-themed speculative fiction short stories.
For more information, please see: http://warrenrochelle.com
*All student names have been changed to protect their privacy. Each student gave written or oral permission for their work to appear here.
Deborah Ross
Evil, the Fantastic, and Making Sense Out of Pain
I don’t think it’s possible to discuss evil without talking about the literature of the fantastic. We hear people talk about “evil incarnate,” usually in reference to some person or institution that has committed particularly heinous acts, as if evil were a tangible, measurable thing that exists outside the human imagination. In real life, things are rarely that simplistic.
Certainly, history and even some current religious thought puts forth the notion of those, human or not, who are inherently evil. To this day, some people believe that snakes (or spiders or other animals) are evil (I encountered one such man in a pet store, warning his young son that the garter snake would steal his soul if he weren’t careful). Once the mentally ill (or physically ill, such as those who suffer from epilepsy) were thought to be possessed by demons. Such beliefs persist today on the fringes of mainstream Western society, although they have largely been expunged from medical and psychiatric practice. We believe that such conditions as schizophrenia and sociopathy arise from disorders of neurophysiology, even if we cannot yet pinpoint the precise etiology. Even when we do know exactly what neurotransmitters and part of the brain are involved, it is still a widespread and understandable human tendency to ascribe unexplained phenomena, whether beneficial or destructive, to supernatural agency. Even though intellectually we may understand that a mass murderer is not an incarnation of some demonic spirit, nor is he possessed by one, and even if we cannot explain why such a person is utterly lacking in empathy for other human beings, we still often use words like evil, wicked, damned, devilish, satanic, and demonic.
Humans are capable of cruelty and viciousness so extreme in degree or scope that few of us can comprehend it, let alone the motivation behind it. How can we make sense of atrocities like the Holocaust or its equivalents, historical or modern? Of the massacres in Africa, Central Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, to name but a few?
I think we can’t, not by ordinary thought. The mind numbs with the magnitude of such deliberately inflicted suffering and takes refuge in numbers, pop psychology, and political analysis. It is difficult enough to struggle with the petty unkindnesses of everyday life, the irritations, the mundane acts of thoughtlessness, the emotions like jealousy or vindictiveness. Almost everyone loses their temper with one another at one time or another, or an unhealed resentment prompts them to strike out without thinking. These acts are understandable even when we disapprove of them, because they lie within the scope of our own experience. As we seek forgiveness for ourselves, we find the means to extend it to others. While these moments, and the means of making and accepting amends, smooth our relationships, they don’t make for a very dramatic tale.
Fantastical literature, on the other hand, enlarges the sphere of reality. This could be the introduction of magical elements into the ordinary world (urban fantasy), or parallel worlds (such as Faerie or Narnia) that interact with our own, each with its own set of rules. Or completely independent worlds (Discworld, Middle Earth).
Fantastical literature is also characterized by the use of archetype and metaphor to evoke experiences for which we have no direct vocabulary. We don’t need to have personally surrendered to the Dark Side of the Force in order to understand why the temptation is at once seductive and terrifying. Nor do we need to have witnessed an atomic bomb blast to imagine the devastation of dragonfire or a wrathful volcano god/dess.
In discussing how to portray interesting, multi-dimensional villains, it’s often pointed out that these characters – antagonists to the point of view character – are often heroes in their own eyes. They don’t get up in the morning, look in the mirror, and say, “I’m going to be evil today” or “Evil! Evil! Rah-rah-rah!” The best and most frightening villains have the same capacity for greatness as do heroes, whether it is physical prowess, intellect, a wounded heart, or simple charisma, only it is applied either in the wrong manner or for the wrong ends. If a tragic hero has a fatal flaw but is nonetheless admirable, then a great villain also has his blind spots, to his ultimate ruin.
Evil in fantastical literature ranges from the motivating force in such otherwise sympathetic villains to a “pure” black-and-white quality, one that is so alien to ordinary human sensibilities as to be utterly incomprehensible. We cannot know what it is, but we can know its effects – what it does to individuals, nations, and entire worlds. Black-and-white evil is in most instances a whole lot less interesting than those who come under its influence but still retain some degree of choice. That choice may be a once-and-for-all decision, informed or otherwise, or it can be the continuing possibility of turning away from the inevitable consequences, a possibility that diminishes with each step toward the abyss.
If Evil is monolithic, unmixed with any goodness, and incapable of change, then the resolution of the story conflict is reduced to either/or, yes/no, win/lose. This is not to say that such tales are less adrenaline-fueled than those that are more complex, only that there are fewer possibilities for a denouement: Evil wins and everyone dies/suffers; Good wins and the hero lives happily ever after; Good wins but the hero meets a tragic, sacrificial end. The first two may lead to an exciting climax and catharsis but are unlikely to offer the deeper emotional resonance of the third. If, on the other hand, Evil is one among many conflicting motivations, other resolutions become possible. The evil character discovers the capacity for love and sacrifices himself for a greater cause; the hero and villain form an alliance; either hero or villain crosses the gulf between them and healing ensues; the villain makes a last-ditch effort to salvage some good from the harm he has done; the possibilities become endless. All these rely on the capacity of sentient beings to choose their future actions, even when they had no power over what happened to them in the past and cannot undo what they have done. And in the course of these journeys, we ourselves gain insight into our own unhealed wounds, our festering resentments, our self-condemnation, and ultimately, our hope for redemption.
**
Deborah J. Ross began writing professionally in 1982 as Deborah Wheeler with Jaydium and Northlight and short stories in Asimov's, F & SF, Realms of FantasyY and Star Wars: Tales From Jabba's Palace. Now under her birth name, Ross, she is continuing the" Darkover" series of the late Marion Zimmer Bradley, as well as original work, including the fantasy trilogy The Seven-Petaled Shield, forthcoming from DAW. She is a member of Book View Cafe. She's lived in France, worked for a cardiologist, studied Hebrew, yoga and kung fu, plays classical piano, loves horses, and is active in the local Jewish and Quaker communities.
http://deborahjross.blogspot.com/
Carole McDonnell
Personalized Personified Evil
Evil comes in many forms. It can be subtle, like a self-loathing thought. It can be impersonal like a famine, man-made like a war. It can be global, like a swarm of alien invaders, or it can be personal where one finds one's self and only one's self turning into a fly. It can be brushing like poverty ...or falsely joyful soaring like crack cocaine or soma. It can be, invasive and occult like a cancer. It can be deceptive like a double-agent, giving wrong information...like Iago turning all our white to black…or like a demon disguising itself as an angel of light.
I'm a Christian so I guess I'll write about Personalized Personified Evil. There are so many things to hate about evil -- its pettiness, its selfishness, its delusion, its egotism. But what I have always disliked about evil is its relentlessness, its ugly, ugly will. As a Christian, I'll say it even more clearly: I hate Satan --him and his ugly, ugly will.
The relentlessness of evil is not fascinating, certainly not in daily life. Although sometimes the great villains -- as in the scifi film Terminator-- are fascinated because they have the human quality of relentlessness.
Sometimes the "evil" is a system --as in The Hunger Games or Stepford Wives or non-human --as in HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey, or TRON, or the MATRIX or an oligarchy/cult -- as with the nine-headed-hydra of Greek myth or Metropolis or Rosemary's Baby or even Deliverance or of the kind of kin/households one often finds in horror films –then the evil must be endured, made powerless, or systematically dismantled section by section. That is structural relentlessness.
Very often, however, the pattern of evil is of the pattern shown in the Bible. Evil is contained within one Person. That person has control of many systems, minions of differing hierarchy, has A) superior knowledge, B) a rationalized goal, C) the lack of care for those who must be trampled for the completion of the goal, D) total power or near-total power and E) the utter dislike of personal failure. And finally...relentlessness, which is the mental strength to commit to the goal repeatedly and to reassess and recalibrate until the goal is achieved or the evil Person is destroyed.
Jesus described the Devil as one who comes to kill, to steal, to destroy and the best Biblical representation of evil or Satan is shown in the battle between Moses and Pharaoh. The lines are drawn. A good God and an enslaved people on one side and on the other side a relentless Figure of Power who refuses to let the enslaved people go. It doesn't matter how defeated the Figure of Evil (or his minions) are -- the goal is enslavement of another.
The human characters in fantasy can be considered demonic, even though they don't represent the Devil himself. So while there are many evil characters in fantasy who come to kill, steal, and destroy, the fact is an evil character can elicit pity, identification, and fear. We fear evil in the fantastic because we recognize its immensity. We identify with the evil because we see our own flaws in them. And we pity the evil (sometimes) because we recognize that at one point or another, we were stopped by a greater power or we realized our own powerlessness.
**
Carole McDonnell is the author of the fantasy novels, Wind Follower and The Constant Tower, both published by Wildside Press.
Chris Howard
Fantastically Evil
I started out with the idea of spinning this topic away from the Saurons of the genre—the supremely bad players with vast armies of hideous soldiers and architecturally magnificent but poorly-lit fortresses, players who want to take over extensive amounts of someone else’s territory, an entire world, or some valuable plane of existence. I wanted to spin this topic toward the blended moralities in Glenn Cook, Joe Abercrombie, Brent Weeks, and others, where the main characters are not always good, and some are clearly great fans of seeing others in pain—proudly wearing their “Go Sauron” jackets when off screen.
On the other hand I know the “evil protagonist” thing is all the rage. Every fantasy and SF discussion group on Goodreads and the Amazon forums has a dozen threads on “books where there main character is evil”, or something like that.
What about the good villain—or apparently good villain? I don’t mean where the villain thinks he’s doing the right thing, because that’s pretty much what drives every complexly-written scoundrel. Power-hungry, ladder-climbing, step over the bodies of your superiors to get what you want types of characters are the mainstay. Power, money, control—these are the things that motivate so many baddies, along with a generous portion of justification for whatever they are after.
Another common theme is the bad guy or girl who must do something evil in order to survive —kill, drink blood, go all Mr. Hyde on us, or do bad things as the result of some curse. Come on, doesn’t everyone deserve to survive? Every reader can understand that kind of drive, and in many cases it’s the thoughtful appreciation (and sometimes sympathy) that shapes the reader’s reaction to the villain’s actions, usually based on the physical and emotional price paid by the afflicted character in order to fight or throw off the curse.
Still, that’s still not quite the evil I’m thinking about—or the “good” when I say “good villain.” Like many writers I spend a lot of time thinking about evil—evil people, as well as their actions and motives. First, someone tell the NSA I was just doing research. Second, here’s where I’m going:
What if the character or characters who represent evil in a story want to help develop the world instead of destroy it? What if they benefit as much as the heroes, the shopkeepers, the simple but courageous village gardeners from the worldwide advancement of magic, technology, living conditions, clean water, and green pastures? What if they are as much turned off by a giant volcano spewing reeking sulfurous clouds as any hero? What if they are against war of any kind?
I started down this path in Teller, with the principal evil character making it clear that she wants all of humanity to progress. She’s even willing to help in an underground, organized-movement sort of way—you know, duffle-bags full of cash, “removing obstacles”, and other varieties of influence in the right places. Teller is contemporary fantasy, and so the characters are living in a world with runes, rockets, and Reddit. Think of hundreds of “evil” characters around the world, nominally working together, with the common goal of getting rid of humans. Not by wiping them out—that would be messy, but by making sure that civilization either advances to the point where humans can travel to other planets—getting the majority of them offworld, or to the point where humans develop the technology to “digitize human consciousness” and go virtual—with two paths from there: withdrawal into some localized computational substrate with a small realworld footprint (e.g., “still here, but quiet and out of the way”), or by extending the range of exploration by sending “digitized human freight” to planets lightyears away and decanting the data into physical forms on the other side (e.g., “grass is always greener colonization strategy”). The baddies want our world after all—and although they really don’t get along, there is one clear and shared requirement for the take-over: they want the world in move-in condition.
I continued plotting and writing using this flavor of evil with my latest book, Salvage, where the principal evil character, Damaris, is completely open to discussions with one of the protagonists, and even hints that he’s going to invest in the character’s company Knowledgenix, which develops advanced autonomous robots. Damaris genuinely likes Jon Andreden, and wants to help him succeed.
Evil in the fantasy genre doesn’t have to mean miles of wasteland, ever-present storm clouds, minions with sharp weapons and low morale, or any mode of transportation that involves chiropteran wings—although I am a fan of some of these, especially the wings. To me, a villain who shares values with the protagonist frightens me more than any straightforward grab for money or power. It totally freaks out the heroes, too.
**
Chris Howard is just a creative guy with a pen and a paint brush, author of Seaborn (Juno Books, 2008), Salvage (Masque/Prime Books, 2013), Nanowhere (Lykeion, 2005), and a shelf-full of other books. His short stories have appeared in a bunch of zines, latest is "Lost Dogs and Fireplace Archeology" in Fantasy Magazine. His story "Hammers and Snails" was a Robert A. Heinlein Centennial Short Fiction Contest winner. He writes and illustrates the comic Saltwater Witch. His art has appeared in Shimmer, BuzzyMag, various RPGs, and on the pages of books, blogs, and other interesting places. Find out everything here: http://www.SaltwaterWitch.com
Valjeanne Jeffers
Wither the Evil and the Fantastical?
I have often contemplated the nature of evil. What is it that drives men and women to commit evil deeds? I have concluded that evil folks are made, not born. And there are many reasons that evil doers continue on their path. The quest for power. Selfishness. An abiding hatred of everyone― including themselves.
Thus, as a writer, I have found that villains with myriad layers are more interesting, realistic and more fun than one dimensional evil doers—the villain tormented by love or guilt over his own deeds. The man or woman obsessed with material gain or power. This is the stuff of which great villains are made; such as the antagonists of my Immortal series, “Tehotep” and “Z100,” the villainess of The Switch II: Clockwork. Art, after all, should imitate life.
Then too, some evil acts may be committed by folks who are not necessarily evil but who have simply made the wrong choices (whatever their motivation). I recently had an inner dialogue about one of my newest characters. I concluded that the character was not evil. But she does make choices that result in mayhem. And who among us has not made bad decisions? And in my Immortal saga and The Switch II: Clockwork (which includes books I and II), I explore these questions through my characters—none of whom are perfect—and plots.
Yet what would a science/fantasy novel be without the fantastical?
Fantastic is described as wondrous and wild; to quote a few definitions. These are perfect metaphors for a SF/fantasy villain: an evil doer with preternatural powers and with dark foreboding or evil intentions. A villain can, and should, wreak havoc with the lives of one’s heroines and heroes.
In my novels my evil doers are imbued with fantastic powers―supernatural or man-made. Of course, I've given fantastical gifts to my heroines and heroes, too. And thank goodness for this! For how could they complete their life-changing quests without them? How could the plot twists and turns take place? How could the glorious battles I envisioned, happen? The fantastic too, is a perfect metaphor for speculative fiction. For as writers we don’t want the ordinary. We don’t want the humdrum.
We want the fantastik. This is stuff of which SF/fantasy worlds are made.
In my newest novels, which I’ll release later this year, Mona Livelong: Paranormal and Colony: Ascension, I've used both the evil and the fantastic to build my worlds. Take a gander below at the excerpt for Mona Livelong: Paranormal Detective.
Sally looked closer, stretching his mouth further open with a gloved hand. She reached inside. “It looks like a key. . .How did I miss this?” Probing with her fingertips, she pulled the metal from where it was sticking just under his tongue. All at once, she jerked spasmodically.
“Sally—Sally!”
“Yes. . . I. . .” The laboratory waved before her eyes. . .
Light from a single, gas streetlamp pooled upon the empty street. Footfalls echoed behind her, unhurried, yet unrelenting in their step.
She whirled around His big, tattooed body blocked the dim light.
He was a swarthy man, with dimpled cheeks and full lips, handsome, except for his glistening gray eyes; and his smile. . . a terrible cold grin, the grimace of a killer: a sadist. . .
I hope I’ve done justice to my characters. I hope my readers will be pleased.
**
Valjeanne is the author of the SF/fantasy novels: Immortal, Immortal II: The Time of Legend, Immortal III: Stealer of Souls, and the steampunk novelsImmortal IV: Collision of Worlds and The Switch II: Clockwork (includes books I and II).
She is a graduate of Spelman College, NCCU and a member of the Carolina African American Writers' Collective. She has been published under both Valjeanne Jeffers and Valjeanne Jeffers-Thompson. Her writing has appeared in: The Obamas: Portrait of America's New First Family, from the Editors of Essence, The Ringing Ear: Black Poets Lean South, Pembroke Magazine, Revelry, Drumvoices Revue 20th Anniversary, and Liberated Muse: How I Freed My Soul Vol. I. She was also a semi-finalist for the 2007 Rita Dove Poetry Award.
Valjeanne's fiction has appeared in Steamfunk! Genesis: An Anthology of Black Science Fiction, Griots: A Sword and Soul Anthology, LuneWing, PurpleMag, Genesis Science Fiction Magazine, Pembroke Magazine, Possibilities, 31 Days of Steamy Mocha, and Griots II: Sisters of the Spear (in press). She works as an editor for Mocha Memoirs Press and is also co-owner of Q& V Affordable editing. Preview or purchase her novels at: http://www.vjeffersandqveal.com
Andrea Hosth
Evil in Fantasy
One of the biggest clichés of fantasy is the Dark Lord. Nameless, faceless and big on Mwahaha, the Dark Lord is Evil because he is Evil. His motivations include "More Evil Now,” "Evil for the Sake of Evil,” "Can I Get Some Evil with That?" and "Just Because.” Or World Domination.
Dark Lords are generally accompanied by Minions. The minions are often nameless, faceless/masked and lack such complexities as a personality. Created to serve – or just brought up bad – they unswervingly follow orders and are rarely human enough to have a crisis of loyalty.
A Dark Lord, an unequivocal Evil with no reasons other than Evil, can still make for a compelling tale. Some of the creepiest stories I've read, the most genuinely frightening, involve a true nameless, faceless evil: implacable, impossible to reason with, and entirely lacking in easily exploitable weaknesses or Evil Overlord logic.
Despite the fact that my first attempt at a book featured a Dark Lord (Sith the Destroyer) and obedient minions (Tar'Sithans) – at least until I edited them into slightly less paper-thin cyphers – I'm not generally inclined to use "Evil because Evil" primary antagonists (though I'm happy to throw thousands of predatory monsters into my characters' paths). Instead I tend to lean toward "greedy people" and "quite reasonable people with conflicting interests". The latter are not so much "Evil" as "on the wrong side".
My greedy people drift quite close to the Faceless Evil archetype, and tend to spend most of the story off the stage. I'm generally not that interested in detailing the slippery selfishness of a person who, when everyone has enough apples to get by, decides to scheme or manipulate or outright take someone else's apples. These people often start out conscienceless, and their development is from greedy to greedier. I think they constitute a kind of Evil, just one which doesn't name itself that way.
People with conflicting interests, on the other hand, fascinate me, although I quite often can't write from their point of view. The person who steals an apple because their family is starving. And then realises that by stealing that apple, they're making someone else's family suffer. Would they still steal the next apple? How do they justify it? What if that apple becomes two, or twenty, or all? And that quick, unnoticed theft becomes a need to protect yourself from retribution, and outright damage, and people dying by deliberate act. At what point do you become Evil? Is it the first apple? Or the first awareness of damage? The irrevocable blow?
Or are people with conflicting needs simply people with conflicting needs, and right to do what to others is wrong?
I try to take care when making the other side in a story "Evil". Because if "they're Evil" is the reason, the excuse, the justification for any and all actions by those the story considers "Good,” at what point will people of that world be able to point to my characters and say: "Evil"?
**
Andrea K Höst was born in Sweden but raised in Australia. She writes fantasy and science fantasy, and enjoys creating stories which give her female characters something more to do than wait for rescue. See: www.andreakhost.com
Warren Rochelle
Evil and the Fantastic
As luck would have it, just last week I asked my English 379 (Fantasy Literature) students to respond to this prompt, while we were reading and discussing The Fellowship of the Ring:
Discuss evil as an element of fantasy, paying attention to how it is presented in The Fellowship of the Ring. Is evil necessary for fantastic literature? Why? Do we have to have evil to understand and appreciate good? What can we learn from evil about human nature?
Their responses were quite interesting. Below is a sample:
According to Wanda*:
“Evil is necessary for all literature, not necessarily in the form of a villain, but in some form that is counter to good. Evil is not black and white because people are not black and white. Each character in a story has flaws, has vices, and has the possibility for evil. The ring in LOTR brings out the corruptibility or weakness in each character that comes into contact with it (besides Tom), even resulting in Boromir’s death.”
Margaret argues that fantasy needs evil—or villains—to be interesting and engaging:
“Is it possible for a fantasy to exist without evil? Or more importantly, without the villain? As much as it would be a perfect utopian setting, it wouldn’t be very interesting. Imagine the Lord of the Rings without Sauron or any of Grimm’s fairytales without the wicked stepmother. The idea just doesn’t fly. But take The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the fifth Narnia book. There are a few scenes in the story where the characters are faced with temptation: a spell to become the most beautiful, a pool that turns all to gold, treasure when hoarded breeds a dragon. However, I don’t necessarily classify these as evil; at least, they don’t fall into the same category as the White Witch or the Calormenes.”
Jed insists that
“The existence of Evil is absolutely paramount in Fantasy. In it the difference between Good and Evil, which is blurred in many genres, is stark and apparent. At [its] very foundation, Fantasy is the valiant struggle of what is pure and good against that which is corrupt and evil.”
Aaron insists we see past the simplistic black and white:
“Ultimately, issues of “good” and “evil” are important elements of any story. Morality, or lack thereof, is a fundamental aspect of the human condition. Good fantasy explores this just as much as any other type of literature. There is no reason why is has to do so in a simplistic way.”
Zeno has this to say
“In the end, conflict is the essence of Fantasy; but the best stories are ones that acknowledge that “evil” is not necessarily a cut and dried force; even books in which there are forces of pure evil and good, there are situations where “good” characters must deal with their own “evil.” Evil, as an idea, is necessary to fantasy, because it provides a stable and easily recognizable theme for the conflict that any book will center around. However, the best books force us to reconsider what is evil, and how best to deal with that evil, and how to respond when, occasionally, good people do bad things, and evil people do good things.”
Arabella doesn’t think evil is essential, arguing that
“I don't think evil is a necessary element of the fantasy genre, however it is an important element of many fantastical books. Just like in any other genre, the story doesn't have to be good vs. evil. The plot doesn't need to center around an evil wizard, ruler, or fantastical creature. What fantasy does is give us the option for those type of plots, making evil an important element, although not a necessary one.
Fantasy opens up new worlds and in those worlds is the opportunity for characters to be truly evil. An opportunity, not a requirement. In the world we live in, I would argue that evil does not truly exist. Our world is categorized in shades of grey and though some may be darker or lighter than others, they are not a pure white or black. The fantasy genre can create worlds in which there is that absolute good and evil we can trust. There is often a distinct line with the good guys on one side and the villains on the other. There can be obvious criteria for those characters who make up good or evil and through these the story can be ruled by the absolutes. Evil is yet another fantastical element that can be a part of fantasy stories. It helps create boundaries and definitions of what is good and through evil the goodness of characters becomes not only more obvious, but also in a way more good. The two opposite ends of the spectrum play against each other to create the good vs. evil fantasy story to which we are accustomed.”
What conclusions, if any, can be drawn from this random sampling of the 43 students enrolled in the 2 sections of Fantasy Lit I am teaching this semester? Many, but not all of them, fall in the category of the “fantasy geek” kids who cut their teeth on Rowling, Tolkien, and a variety of role-playing games, and love, love, love Game of Thrones. They are really into this stuff. A surprising number came to Tolkien first through the movies. A goodly number want to write the great American fantasy novel, and have reams of various drafts already written.
So, is evil is a necessity in fantastic literature? Sort of, yes, no, maybe. Conflict, yes—evil, maybe. Is evil even real? Is it, as another student noted in class discussion, the absence of good? Is their youth that prevents some of them from seeing that evil can be a matter of degree, that a Dark Lord isn’t a necessary presence? That evil can both be banal and ordinary and a Balrog or a Dark Lord? That evil doesn’t always leaves scars and wounds on the body, but as well on the mind and the heart?
Conflict, as in any story, fantasy or not, is an essential plot element. In fantasy, this is often—quite often—expressed as good vs. evil. The hero must have an enemy. It is in this conflict and in this exploration of just what is good and evil that we learn what fantasy has to teach us: what it means to be human and that to be human is to be capable of both good and evil. And here, I would argue, is one of the greatest strengths of fantasy literature.
***
Warren Rochelle has taught English at the University of Mary Washington since 2000. His short story, "The Golden Boy” (published in The Silver Gryphon) was a Finalist for the 2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for Best Short Story and his novels include The Wild Boy (2001), Harvest of Changelings (2007), and The Called (2010), all published by Golden Gryphon Press. He also published a critical work on Le Guin and has academic articles in various journals and essay collections. His short fiction has been published in such journals and collections as Icarus, Collective Fallout. The Silver Gryphon, North Carolina Literary Review, Romance and Beyond, and Aboriginal Science Fiction. His short story, “The Boy on McGee Street,” was just published in Queer Fish 2. He is presently working on a novel about a gay werewolf and his godling boyfriend and a collection of gay-themed speculative fiction short stories.
For more information, please see: http://warrenrochelle.com
*All student names have been changed to protect their privacy. Each student gave written or oral permission for their work to appear here.
Deborah Ross
Evil, the Fantastic, and Making Sense Out of Pain
I don’t think it’s possible to discuss evil without talking about the literature of the fantastic. We hear people talk about “evil incarnate,” usually in reference to some person or institution that has committed particularly heinous acts, as if evil were a tangible, measurable thing that exists outside the human imagination. In real life, things are rarely that simplistic.
Certainly, history and even some current religious thought puts forth the notion of those, human or not, who are inherently evil. To this day, some people believe that snakes (or spiders or other animals) are evil (I encountered one such man in a pet store, warning his young son that the garter snake would steal his soul if he weren’t careful). Once the mentally ill (or physically ill, such as those who suffer from epilepsy) were thought to be possessed by demons. Such beliefs persist today on the fringes of mainstream Western society, although they have largely been expunged from medical and psychiatric practice. We believe that such conditions as schizophrenia and sociopathy arise from disorders of neurophysiology, even if we cannot yet pinpoint the precise etiology. Even when we do know exactly what neurotransmitters and part of the brain are involved, it is still a widespread and understandable human tendency to ascribe unexplained phenomena, whether beneficial or destructive, to supernatural agency. Even though intellectually we may understand that a mass murderer is not an incarnation of some demonic spirit, nor is he possessed by one, and even if we cannot explain why such a person is utterly lacking in empathy for other human beings, we still often use words like evil, wicked, damned, devilish, satanic, and demonic.
Humans are capable of cruelty and viciousness so extreme in degree or scope that few of us can comprehend it, let alone the motivation behind it. How can we make sense of atrocities like the Holocaust or its equivalents, historical or modern? Of the massacres in Africa, Central Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, to name but a few?
I think we can’t, not by ordinary thought. The mind numbs with the magnitude of such deliberately inflicted suffering and takes refuge in numbers, pop psychology, and political analysis. It is difficult enough to struggle with the petty unkindnesses of everyday life, the irritations, the mundane acts of thoughtlessness, the emotions like jealousy or vindictiveness. Almost everyone loses their temper with one another at one time or another, or an unhealed resentment prompts them to strike out without thinking. These acts are understandable even when we disapprove of them, because they lie within the scope of our own experience. As we seek forgiveness for ourselves, we find the means to extend it to others. While these moments, and the means of making and accepting amends, smooth our relationships, they don’t make for a very dramatic tale.
Fantastical literature, on the other hand, enlarges the sphere of reality. This could be the introduction of magical elements into the ordinary world (urban fantasy), or parallel worlds (such as Faerie or Narnia) that interact with our own, each with its own set of rules. Or completely independent worlds (Discworld, Middle Earth).
Fantastical literature is also characterized by the use of archetype and metaphor to evoke experiences for which we have no direct vocabulary. We don’t need to have personally surrendered to the Dark Side of the Force in order to understand why the temptation is at once seductive and terrifying. Nor do we need to have witnessed an atomic bomb blast to imagine the devastation of dragonfire or a wrathful volcano god/dess.
In discussing how to portray interesting, multi-dimensional villains, it’s often pointed out that these characters – antagonists to the point of view character – are often heroes in their own eyes. They don’t get up in the morning, look in the mirror, and say, “I’m going to be evil today” or “Evil! Evil! Rah-rah-rah!” The best and most frightening villains have the same capacity for greatness as do heroes, whether it is physical prowess, intellect, a wounded heart, or simple charisma, only it is applied either in the wrong manner or for the wrong ends. If a tragic hero has a fatal flaw but is nonetheless admirable, then a great villain also has his blind spots, to his ultimate ruin.
Evil in fantastical literature ranges from the motivating force in such otherwise sympathetic villains to a “pure” black-and-white quality, one that is so alien to ordinary human sensibilities as to be utterly incomprehensible. We cannot know what it is, but we can know its effects – what it does to individuals, nations, and entire worlds. Black-and-white evil is in most instances a whole lot less interesting than those who come under its influence but still retain some degree of choice. That choice may be a once-and-for-all decision, informed or otherwise, or it can be the continuing possibility of turning away from the inevitable consequences, a possibility that diminishes with each step toward the abyss.
If Evil is monolithic, unmixed with any goodness, and incapable of change, then the resolution of the story conflict is reduced to either/or, yes/no, win/lose. This is not to say that such tales are less adrenaline-fueled than those that are more complex, only that there are fewer possibilities for a denouement: Evil wins and everyone dies/suffers; Good wins and the hero lives happily ever after; Good wins but the hero meets a tragic, sacrificial end. The first two may lead to an exciting climax and catharsis but are unlikely to offer the deeper emotional resonance of the third. If, on the other hand, Evil is one among many conflicting motivations, other resolutions become possible. The evil character discovers the capacity for love and sacrifices himself for a greater cause; the hero and villain form an alliance; either hero or villain crosses the gulf between them and healing ensues; the villain makes a last-ditch effort to salvage some good from the harm he has done; the possibilities become endless. All these rely on the capacity of sentient beings to choose their future actions, even when they had no power over what happened to them in the past and cannot undo what they have done. And in the course of these journeys, we ourselves gain insight into our own unhealed wounds, our festering resentments, our self-condemnation, and ultimately, our hope for redemption.
**
Deborah J. Ross began writing professionally in 1982 as Deborah Wheeler with Jaydium and Northlight and short stories in Asimov's, F & SF, Realms of FantasyY and Star Wars: Tales From Jabba's Palace. Now under her birth name, Ross, she is continuing the" Darkover" series of the late Marion Zimmer Bradley, as well as original work, including the fantasy trilogy The Seven-Petaled Shield, forthcoming from DAW. She is a member of Book View Cafe. She's lived in France, worked for a cardiologist, studied Hebrew, yoga and kung fu, plays classical piano, loves horses, and is active in the local Jewish and Quaker communities.
http://deborahjross.blogspot.com/
Carole McDonnell
Personalized Personified Evil
Evil comes in many forms. It can be subtle, like a self-loathing thought. It can be impersonal like a famine, man-made like a war. It can be global, like a swarm of alien invaders, or it can be personal where one finds one's self and only one's self turning into a fly. It can be brushing like poverty ...or falsely joyful soaring like crack cocaine or soma. It can be, invasive and occult like a cancer. It can be deceptive like a double-agent, giving wrong information...like Iago turning all our white to black…or like a demon disguising itself as an angel of light.
I'm a Christian so I guess I'll write about Personalized Personified Evil. There are so many things to hate about evil -- its pettiness, its selfishness, its delusion, its egotism. But what I have always disliked about evil is its relentlessness, its ugly, ugly will. As a Christian, I'll say it even more clearly: I hate Satan --him and his ugly, ugly will.
The relentlessness of evil is not fascinating, certainly not in daily life. Although sometimes the great villains -- as in the scifi film Terminator-- are fascinated because they have the human quality of relentlessness.
Sometimes the "evil" is a system --as in The Hunger Games or Stepford Wives or non-human --as in HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey, or TRON, or the MATRIX or an oligarchy/cult -- as with the nine-headed-hydra of Greek myth or Metropolis or Rosemary's Baby or even Deliverance or of the kind of kin/households one often finds in horror films –then the evil must be endured, made powerless, or systematically dismantled section by section. That is structural relentlessness.
Very often, however, the pattern of evil is of the pattern shown in the Bible. Evil is contained within one Person. That person has control of many systems, minions of differing hierarchy, has A) superior knowledge, B) a rationalized goal, C) the lack of care for those who must be trampled for the completion of the goal, D) total power or near-total power and E) the utter dislike of personal failure. And finally...relentlessness, which is the mental strength to commit to the goal repeatedly and to reassess and recalibrate until the goal is achieved or the evil Person is destroyed.
Jesus described the Devil as one who comes to kill, to steal, to destroy and the best Biblical representation of evil or Satan is shown in the battle between Moses and Pharaoh. The lines are drawn. A good God and an enslaved people on one side and on the other side a relentless Figure of Power who refuses to let the enslaved people go. It doesn't matter how defeated the Figure of Evil (or his minions) are -- the goal is enslavement of another.
The human characters in fantasy can be considered demonic, even though they don't represent the Devil himself. So while there are many evil characters in fantasy who come to kill, steal, and destroy, the fact is an evil character can elicit pity, identification, and fear. We fear evil in the fantastic because we recognize its immensity. We identify with the evil because we see our own flaws in them. And we pity the evil (sometimes) because we recognize that at one point or another, we were stopped by a greater power or we realized our own powerlessness.
**
Carole McDonnell is the author of the fantasy novels, Wind Follower and The Constant Tower, both published by Wildside Press.
Chris Howard
Fantastically Evil
I started out with the idea of spinning this topic away from the Saurons of the genre—the supremely bad players with vast armies of hideous soldiers and architecturally magnificent but poorly-lit fortresses, players who want to take over extensive amounts of someone else’s territory, an entire world, or some valuable plane of existence. I wanted to spin this topic toward the blended moralities in Glenn Cook, Joe Abercrombie, Brent Weeks, and others, where the main characters are not always good, and some are clearly great fans of seeing others in pain—proudly wearing their “Go Sauron” jackets when off screen.
On the other hand I know the “evil protagonist” thing is all the rage. Every fantasy and SF discussion group on Goodreads and the Amazon forums has a dozen threads on “books where there main character is evil”, or something like that.
What about the good villain—or apparently good villain? I don’t mean where the villain thinks he’s doing the right thing, because that’s pretty much what drives every complexly-written scoundrel. Power-hungry, ladder-climbing, step over the bodies of your superiors to get what you want types of characters are the mainstay. Power, money, control—these are the things that motivate so many baddies, along with a generous portion of justification for whatever they are after.
Another common theme is the bad guy or girl who must do something evil in order to survive —kill, drink blood, go all Mr. Hyde on us, or do bad things as the result of some curse. Come on, doesn’t everyone deserve to survive? Every reader can understand that kind of drive, and in many cases it’s the thoughtful appreciation (and sometimes sympathy) that shapes the reader’s reaction to the villain’s actions, usually based on the physical and emotional price paid by the afflicted character in order to fight or throw off the curse.
Still, that’s still not quite the evil I’m thinking about—or the “good” when I say “good villain.” Like many writers I spend a lot of time thinking about evil—evil people, as well as their actions and motives. First, someone tell the NSA I was just doing research. Second, here’s where I’m going:
What if the character or characters who represent evil in a story want to help develop the world instead of destroy it? What if they benefit as much as the heroes, the shopkeepers, the simple but courageous village gardeners from the worldwide advancement of magic, technology, living conditions, clean water, and green pastures? What if they are as much turned off by a giant volcano spewing reeking sulfurous clouds as any hero? What if they are against war of any kind?
I started down this path in Teller, with the principal evil character making it clear that she wants all of humanity to progress. She’s even willing to help in an underground, organized-movement sort of way—you know, duffle-bags full of cash, “removing obstacles”, and other varieties of influence in the right places. Teller is contemporary fantasy, and so the characters are living in a world with runes, rockets, and Reddit. Think of hundreds of “evil” characters around the world, nominally working together, with the common goal of getting rid of humans. Not by wiping them out—that would be messy, but by making sure that civilization either advances to the point where humans can travel to other planets—getting the majority of them offworld, or to the point where humans develop the technology to “digitize human consciousness” and go virtual—with two paths from there: withdrawal into some localized computational substrate with a small realworld footprint (e.g., “still here, but quiet and out of the way”), or by extending the range of exploration by sending “digitized human freight” to planets lightyears away and decanting the data into physical forms on the other side (e.g., “grass is always greener colonization strategy”). The baddies want our world after all—and although they really don’t get along, there is one clear and shared requirement for the take-over: they want the world in move-in condition.
I continued plotting and writing using this flavor of evil with my latest book, Salvage, where the principal evil character, Damaris, is completely open to discussions with one of the protagonists, and even hints that he’s going to invest in the character’s company Knowledgenix, which develops advanced autonomous robots. Damaris genuinely likes Jon Andreden, and wants to help him succeed.
Evil in the fantasy genre doesn’t have to mean miles of wasteland, ever-present storm clouds, minions with sharp weapons and low morale, or any mode of transportation that involves chiropteran wings—although I am a fan of some of these, especially the wings. To me, a villain who shares values with the protagonist frightens me more than any straightforward grab for money or power. It totally freaks out the heroes, too.
**
Chris Howard is just a creative guy with a pen and a paint brush, author of Seaborn (Juno Books, 2008), Salvage (Masque/Prime Books, 2013), Nanowhere (Lykeion, 2005), and a shelf-full of other books. His short stories have appeared in a bunch of zines, latest is "Lost Dogs and Fireplace Archeology" in Fantasy Magazine. His story "Hammers and Snails" was a Robert A. Heinlein Centennial Short Fiction Contest winner. He writes and illustrates the comic Saltwater Witch. His art has appeared in Shimmer, BuzzyMag, various RPGs, and on the pages of books, blogs, and other interesting places. Find out everything here: http://www.SaltwaterWitch.com
Valjeanne Jeffers
Wither the Evil and the Fantastical?
I have often contemplated the nature of evil. What is it that drives men and women to commit evil deeds? I have concluded that evil folks are made, not born. And there are many reasons that evil doers continue on their path. The quest for power. Selfishness. An abiding hatred of everyone― including themselves.
Thus, as a writer, I have found that villains with myriad layers are more interesting, realistic and more fun than one dimensional evil doers—the villain tormented by love or guilt over his own deeds. The man or woman obsessed with material gain or power. This is the stuff of which great villains are made; such as the antagonists of my Immortal series, “Tehotep” and “Z100,” the villainess of The Switch II: Clockwork. Art, after all, should imitate life.
Then too, some evil acts may be committed by folks who are not necessarily evil but who have simply made the wrong choices (whatever their motivation). I recently had an inner dialogue about one of my newest characters. I concluded that the character was not evil. But she does make choices that result in mayhem. And who among us has not made bad decisions? And in my Immortal saga and The Switch II: Clockwork (which includes books I and II), I explore these questions through my characters—none of whom are perfect—and plots.
Yet what would a science/fantasy novel be without the fantastical?
Fantastic is described as wondrous and wild; to quote a few definitions. These are perfect metaphors for a SF/fantasy villain: an evil doer with preternatural powers and with dark foreboding or evil intentions. A villain can, and should, wreak havoc with the lives of one’s heroines and heroes.
In my novels my evil doers are imbued with fantastic powers―supernatural or man-made. Of course, I've given fantastical gifts to my heroines and heroes, too. And thank goodness for this! For how could they complete their life-changing quests without them? How could the plot twists and turns take place? How could the glorious battles I envisioned, happen? The fantastic too, is a perfect metaphor for speculative fiction. For as writers we don’t want the ordinary. We don’t want the humdrum.
We want the fantastik. This is stuff of which SF/fantasy worlds are made.
In my newest novels, which I’ll release later this year, Mona Livelong: Paranormal and Colony: Ascension, I've used both the evil and the fantastic to build my worlds. Take a gander below at the excerpt for Mona Livelong: Paranormal Detective.
Sally looked closer, stretching his mouth further open with a gloved hand. She reached inside. “It looks like a key. . .How did I miss this?” Probing with her fingertips, she pulled the metal from where it was sticking just under his tongue. All at once, she jerked spasmodically.
“Sally—Sally!”
“Yes. . . I. . .” The laboratory waved before her eyes. . .
Light from a single, gas streetlamp pooled upon the empty street. Footfalls echoed behind her, unhurried, yet unrelenting in their step.
She whirled around His big, tattooed body blocked the dim light.
He was a swarthy man, with dimpled cheeks and full lips, handsome, except for his glistening gray eyes; and his smile. . . a terrible cold grin, the grimace of a killer: a sadist. . .
I hope I’ve done justice to my characters. I hope my readers will be pleased.
**
Valjeanne is the author of the SF/fantasy novels: Immortal, Immortal II: The Time of Legend, Immortal III: Stealer of Souls, and the steampunk novelsImmortal IV: Collision of Worlds and The Switch II: Clockwork (includes books I and II).
She is a graduate of Spelman College, NCCU and a member of the Carolina African American Writers' Collective. She has been published under both Valjeanne Jeffers and Valjeanne Jeffers-Thompson. Her writing has appeared in: The Obamas: Portrait of America's New First Family, from the Editors of Essence, The Ringing Ear: Black Poets Lean South, Pembroke Magazine, Revelry, Drumvoices Revue 20th Anniversary, and Liberated Muse: How I Freed My Soul Vol. I. She was also a semi-finalist for the 2007 Rita Dove Poetry Award.
Valjeanne's fiction has appeared in Steamfunk! Genesis: An Anthology of Black Science Fiction, Griots: A Sword and Soul Anthology, LuneWing, PurpleMag, Genesis Science Fiction Magazine, Pembroke Magazine, Possibilities, 31 Days of Steamy Mocha, and Griots II: Sisters of the Spear (in press). She works as an editor for Mocha Memoirs Press and is also co-owner of Q& V Affordable editing. Preview or purchase her novels at: http://www.vjeffersandqveal.com
Andrea Hosth
Evil in Fantasy
One of the biggest clichés of fantasy is the Dark Lord. Nameless, faceless and big on Mwahaha, the Dark Lord is Evil because he is Evil. His motivations include "More Evil Now,” "Evil for the Sake of Evil,” "Can I Get Some Evil with That?" and "Just Because.” Or World Domination.
Dark Lords are generally accompanied by Minions. The minions are often nameless, faceless/masked and lack such complexities as a personality. Created to serve – or just brought up bad – they unswervingly follow orders and are rarely human enough to have a crisis of loyalty.
A Dark Lord, an unequivocal Evil with no reasons other than Evil, can still make for a compelling tale. Some of the creepiest stories I've read, the most genuinely frightening, involve a true nameless, faceless evil: implacable, impossible to reason with, and entirely lacking in easily exploitable weaknesses or Evil Overlord logic.
Despite the fact that my first attempt at a book featured a Dark Lord (Sith the Destroyer) and obedient minions (Tar'Sithans) – at least until I edited them into slightly less paper-thin cyphers – I'm not generally inclined to use "Evil because Evil" primary antagonists (though I'm happy to throw thousands of predatory monsters into my characters' paths). Instead I tend to lean toward "greedy people" and "quite reasonable people with conflicting interests". The latter are not so much "Evil" as "on the wrong side".
My greedy people drift quite close to the Faceless Evil archetype, and tend to spend most of the story off the stage. I'm generally not that interested in detailing the slippery selfishness of a person who, when everyone has enough apples to get by, decides to scheme or manipulate or outright take someone else's apples. These people often start out conscienceless, and their development is from greedy to greedier. I think they constitute a kind of Evil, just one which doesn't name itself that way.
People with conflicting interests, on the other hand, fascinate me, although I quite often can't write from their point of view. The person who steals an apple because their family is starving. And then realises that by stealing that apple, they're making someone else's family suffer. Would they still steal the next apple? How do they justify it? What if that apple becomes two, or twenty, or all? And that quick, unnoticed theft becomes a need to protect yourself from retribution, and outright damage, and people dying by deliberate act. At what point do you become Evil? Is it the first apple? Or the first awareness of damage? The irrevocable blow?
Or are people with conflicting needs simply people with conflicting needs, and right to do what to others is wrong?
I try to take care when making the other side in a story "Evil". Because if "they're Evil" is the reason, the excuse, the justification for any and all actions by those the story considers "Good,” at what point will people of that world be able to point to my characters and say: "Evil"?
**
Andrea K Höst was born in Sweden but raised in Australia. She writes fantasy and science fantasy, and enjoys creating stories which give her female characters something more to do than wait for rescue. See: www.andreakhost.com
October 2013: Grea Fantasy Roundtable Blog: What does it mean to be human?
October 2013: Great Traveling Fantasy Roundtable Blog: What does it mean to be human?
Being Human
Deborah Ross
I think we Homo sapiens have been discussing what being human is and means since we developed abstract language and probably before that. At first, the driving motivation was undoubtedly how to tell what is us and not-us. This is certainly a biological imperative at the cellular level; our immune systems must tackle the question every day, attacking foreign substances like viruses, bacteria, and allergenic proteins, and it’s also why cancer is so insidious (cells with the right molecular passwords that nonetheless behave like ravening barbarians). The same distinctions hold true at the level of the individual, family/clan, and larger, political units. Whether we’re talking about communities or nations, “us” = “human” = friendly, safe, cooperative, reliable, and “them” = “something else” = dangerous, untrustworthy, competitors for limited resources. In this way, “human” tends to be exclusionary and frictions tend to narrow the scope even further.
In science fiction and fantasy, however, we tend to use the term in a inclusionary way. Often the words “human” and “person” are interchangeable. Sf/f writers and readers pioneered the suggestions that all sapient races think of themselves as people and therefore, “human,” whatever the biological differences from Homo sapiens. I had a lot of fun with a race of giant slugs in Jaydium, who insisted that mammals were incapable of “personness.” The television series Star Trek often portrayed what Earth-humans and alien-humans have in common, rather than their unbridgeable differences. (The similarities were undoubtedly caused in part by the relatively primitive makeup and special effects, leading to the joke about aliens being actors with funny foreheads.) The creators of the series also exploited the romantic appeal of the exotic to generate love stories between members of different species, a phenomenon highly unlikely to occur in nature but one that had the effect of demonstrating the shared values of sapient beings. This is an example of broadening of the use of “human” as a term to include any beings of similar intelligence and culture that we can understand and sympathize with.
The inversion of the broadening effect comes up most commonly in horror: beings that look and sound human but which lack some trait or motivation we consider so important as to be a necessary part of the definition of human: empathy, for example, or the capacity for love. A prime example of this is the vampire, who “walks among us” as if human but differs in his essential nature. The horrific aspect arises in part from his blood thirst, but even more from the betrayal of the assumption of shared humanity.
None of this addresses the question of what it is it we feel defines human as opposed to intelligent-animal, a question not restricted to writers of speculative fiction. We can look at the biological characteristics of Homo sapiens, such as opposable thumbs or a greatly developed prefrontal cortex (the region responsible for complex moral judgments and control of social behavior, among other things). We can look at behavioral traits like language, prolonged rearing of young and care for the aged, the use of fire and cooking, tool-making, and the like. But in this larger universe we live in, is it wise to judge another entity as human or nonhuman based solely on what they look like or how they act? Is a child born with crippling, distorting defects or an adult with a deforming disease not still human? What about a person who has suffered a debilitating stroke and can no longer communicate? These and many other, similar questions highlight the difficulty of defining human by observable characteristics.
Instead, we can look to experiential qualities: the capacity for love, for wonder, for kindness; the awareness of personal mortality and the “binding” of time through personal and generational transmission of memory; abstract thought, and so forth. It may well be that animals have some of these abilities but lack the means (or perhaps the inclination!) to communicate them to us. We know, for example, that many species exhibit behavior we interpret as grief, loyalty, and self-sacrifice. Certainly, cooperation is not limited to Homo sapiens, and tool- making definitely is not. So instead of emphasizing how we are different from other creatures in our world, we can focus instead on how wonderful it is that the things we value in ourselves are not exclusive to our species. Or, contrariwise, that humanity is not limited to humans.
Fantasy and What It Means to Be Human
Andrea Hosth
One of the primary preoccupations of science fiction is said to be the question of what it means to be human. Seeing ourselves through alien eyes allows us to see ourselves anew. It’s a question which is less commonly associated with fantasy, and yet the sub-genre is equally ripe for examining the question of humanity through the use of non-humans.
One of the common positions taken when depicting humans in fantasy (particularly in fantasy which uses a roleplaying game basis, but also many less structured works) is that of humans as a middle ground, a kind of neutral party capable of achieving good, but all too ready to give in to baser impulses.
Other characteristics typically awarded humanity are versatility and creativity. Humans can be all things, while other races possess extremes – age/intelligence combined with sterility. Strength mixed with a lack of imagination. Humans are portrayed as young, vigorous, spontaneous, a little naïve, courageous, capable of great love and vivid passions. It is a very common trope to have the resolution of a dire battle revolve around a human’s ability to love, or innovate, believe, or be brave to the point of stupidity. It is equally common for other races to be failing, or to “Go into the West” and leave their territories to humans territories. Who took up residence in Rivendell, once Elrond moved on? Did they drift, dowdy and out of place, among the echoes of their splendid predecessors?
This frequent positioning of humanity as a versatile and rapidly improving ‘young’ race does not appear to be a deliberate examination of what it means to be human (as seen in those novels which attempt to make a point about humanity by viewing it through alien eyes), but instead a glorification of the traits humanity currently displays. Crude and ignorant – but just because of youth! Comparatively powerless, but able to think of new solutions to old problems. Vigorous, a bit chaotic, blundering occasionally, but heading inexorably upward, natural successors to the world’s bounty.
These are the stories we write about ourselves, the flip side of the grimdark/grittygrotty species of fantasy, where the narrative itself rhapsodises about human nature as something special and true and good.
I’ll end, without further comment, with a series of quotes from Doctor Who. The Doctor is not always so complimentary, but this has been the thrust of many of the rebooted series:
" Well, you could do that. Yeah, you could do that. Of course you could. But why? Look at these people, these human beings. Consider their potential! From the day they arrive on the planet, blinking, step into the sun, there is more to see than can ever be seen, more to do than — no, hold on. Sorry, that’s The Lion King. But the point still stands. Leave them alone!" – The Christmas Invasion.
" Oh, might have spent a million years evolving into clouds of gas… and another million as downloads, but you always revert to the same basic shape: the fundamental human. End of the universe and here you are. Indomitable, that’s the word! Indomitable! Ha!" – Utopia.
" The one thing you can’t do… is stop them thinking. [He begins rising upwards angelically] Tell me the human race is degenerate now…when they can do this." – Last of the Time Lords.
“And shards of gold flecked violet split the air with sound and fury! With laughter love and tears I pressed my lips to these spirits, freed them to walk across the page,”
First Breath, Valjeanne Jeffers
What is it that drives our characters? Their humanity. And this is more important than their preternatural powers. Their strength. Or what they look like. It even takes precedence over the wondrous plots we, as writers, devise. That our characters are human and driven by the same emotions and quests that drive us as writers, and which drive our readers– even if they are sociopaths or mad men. The need for love, shelter, money. The emotions of desire, rage, melancholy…
The same qualities that make us, the writers and our readers, identify with them and love them. Or hate them.
I have created characters so loathsome that I couldn’t wait to kill them off. And others that I loved so much I used all sorts of plot machinations to keep them alive. Our characters are spirits who walk across the page: women and men who mirror our struggles.
What it means to be human
Carole McDonnell
From the beginning of time (and perhaps before time began) the question has always existed: what does it mean to be human?
Humanity lives/exists within a prescribed setting which limits knowledge, age, joy, the body, sexuality, tribe, power, authority, dominion, physical movement, movement in time.
As a writer of Christian fiction I grew up with the story of Adam and Eve which is the first encounter most Christians have with the question of What does it mean to be human. In that story, man is created but not yet settled into a specific kind of being. (And in the Christian mythos, man will not find his true “self” and “being” until the end of time when time is no more.
Adam and Eve are beings who do not die. Yet they are not really immortal. They’re in a strange nexus of creation where they are like god with (some) dominion and some knowledge. But they lack something, something God apparently thinks is not particularly important. They do not understand right and wrong.
They have consciousness but are without law or conscience. They have a blissful ignorance of evil and cannot judge/blame either themselves, others, God, or the world. For them, it is a world which is neither immoral or moral.
Despite God’s desire that they remain outside of the realm of guilt or consciousness of evil, God did make them moral beings. Their one morality: the freedom to obey or not to obey. They are aware of one thing that they lack: they do not fully understand the ramifications of evil: disease, death, cruelty, hunger, toil, meaninglessness, and the thousand ills flesh is heir to. This knowledge of death is what separates them from God, what makes them less than God.
But third agency enters the picture and challenges them to be like God. The agency tempts them with knowledge of evil, law, conscience, guilt. The humans take a wager upon themselves. It is possible that humans can understand evil and not fall into guilt. Their first response to eyes opened to evil: shame. Shme about what? Shame in their comparison to perfect God. Thus humanity falls from its own perfection as it aimed for God’s perfection.
There is so much in this story, myth, history. And all fantasy stories echo it. All these elements are found in fantasy: Humans who wish to put side emotions and become, robots who wish to be humans, humans locked way from Eden, humans betrayed by a God, humans betraying their gods, humans casting off their gods, intrusive deceiving godlike figures, humans battling death, humans defying death, humans conquering time, humans failing a task, humans striving, humans ignorant of evil, humans being dominated by the world, humans dominating the world. All the echoes are found in fantasy stories and will apparently continue until the end of time.
Carole McDonnell is the author of the Fantasy Novel , The Constant Tower
http://www.amazon.com/The-Constant-To...
Spirit Fruit: Collected Speculative Fiction an eBook available as an eBook at kindle.
What Does It Mean to be Human: Answering in Fantasy
Warren Rochelle
What does it mean to be human? This is a question I pose when I teach my science fiction lit class, foregrounding it as one of the perennial themes of the genre. I have yet to pose this same question in fantasy lit. When I was thinking about what to write for this month’s post I found myself wondering why I don’t. After all, as Le Guin says in “Prophets and Mirrors: Science Fiction as a Way of Seeing,” “the story—from Rumpelstiltskin to War and Peace—is one of the basic tools invented by the human mind, for the purpose of gaining understanding” (quoted in Language of the Night 27). So, why shouldn’t I consider fantasy as a tool for “the purpose of gaining understanding”—for understanding something about meaning human?
Science fiction often answers this question with aliens of one kind or another; how then might fantasy do so with werewolves, dragons, and elves, fairies, and witches, and other assorted magical beings? As Vulcans and Martians become ways of seeing and understanding humanity, through juxtaposition, comparison, and contrast, through reflection, and in metaphor and symbol, so these denizens of Faerie. Science fiction also will sometimes posit answers to this question when humans are taken out of the familiar—the green hills of Earth to the deserts of the Moon and Mars, the metal worlds of spaceships and space stations, to planets only imagined. When the background noise is gone—the background itself—then we can often see ourselves as we really are. So it is when we enter Faerie—the Golden Wood, the haunted house, the gingerbread cottage, Lantern Waste, or sometimes, the house next door, or in our own house. Facing the dangerous and/or unfamiliar, confronting the evil and/or the strange, often demands we be most our selves—or began learning what being that self means.
All right, let’s start with werewolves, which are of particular interest to me at the moment as I am finishing up The Werewolf and His Boy. Are werewolves human? Sometimes. If you prick them, will they not bleed? Yes, sometimes wolf blood, sometimes human. Depending on the legend used, they are at least in human form most of the time, or twenty-odd days out of the average thirty. But what I find telling is when we look into our reflection and we can, if the light is right, see into the dark recesses of our souls, the hidden places in our hearts, and there find the wolf, the beast, even without fangs or fur. Humans are animals, occasionally, we are beasts. Wrestling with the feral parts of our nature, recognizing they exist—that is part of what it means to be human.
For my werewolf, Henry Thorn, he has to sort out both what it means to be wolf and to be boy: that he both needs to run, to hit raw meat, to howl, and to cry and miss his mother and to love another human being. For Henry, this means loving Jamey, another boy—but that’s another essay. Henry also finds out more about who he is as a boy when he finds himself in a den of werewolves, amongst the beasts. Jamey needs protection and caring for—and Henry learns something more about human love, and thus about being human. It is through fantasy that I can explore the answers Henry finds as he also asks and begins to answer the question of who he is—human boy, wolf—Henry Thorn.
In what might be an iconic werewolf tale, American Werewolf in London, the question of what it means to be human—or rather, can a werewolf be human—is answered, no, or not quite, as the beast, the wolf, is far too strong, the call of the wild, or rather the disease, overwhelms the unlucky American tourist. He dies a beast. But then, our humanity is fragile—and the beast is never as far as away as we might like to think. My werewolf knows the beast is always present—and that if he remains in beast-form too long, he risks a difficult return to being human. Perhaps this tension between beast and human, with the beast sometimes the one in control, is an attempt to explain humans in mobs, or at war. Surely the beasts were the ones at My Lai, at so many Native American villages, at Auschwitz.
Fantasy, with its transformations, its wishes, its dreams and magical beings who are so very much like us and yet so very different, does present ways to explore answers to the question of what it means to be human. This doesn’t seem all that surprising as I write this, but until presented with this month’s blog theme, I hadn’t thought about it this concretely in connection to fantasy lit. Yet, as Henry Thorn, the werewolf, is clearly telling me, I have been thinking about it for quite some time. So, the next time I teach fantasy …
***
Warren Rochelle has taught English at the University of Mary Washington since 2000. His short story, “The Golden Boy” (published in The Silver Gryphon) was a Finalist for the 2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for Best Short Story and his novels include The Wild Boy (2001), Harvest of Changelings (2007), and The Called (2010), all published by Golden Gryphon Press. He also published a critical work on Le Guin and has academic articles in various journals and essay collections. His short fiction has been published in such journals and collections as Icarus, Collective Fallout. The Silver Gryphon, North Carolina Literary Review, Romance and Beyond, and Aboriginal Science Fiction. His short story, “The Boy on McGee Street,” was just published in Queer Fish 2. He is presently working on a novel about a gay werewolf and his godling boyfriend and a collection of gay-themed speculative fiction short stories.
Being Human
Deborah Ross
I think we Homo sapiens have been discussing what being human is and means since we developed abstract language and probably before that. At first, the driving motivation was undoubtedly how to tell what is us and not-us. This is certainly a biological imperative at the cellular level; our immune systems must tackle the question every day, attacking foreign substances like viruses, bacteria, and allergenic proteins, and it’s also why cancer is so insidious (cells with the right molecular passwords that nonetheless behave like ravening barbarians). The same distinctions hold true at the level of the individual, family/clan, and larger, political units. Whether we’re talking about communities or nations, “us” = “human” = friendly, safe, cooperative, reliable, and “them” = “something else” = dangerous, untrustworthy, competitors for limited resources. In this way, “human” tends to be exclusionary and frictions tend to narrow the scope even further.
In science fiction and fantasy, however, we tend to use the term in a inclusionary way. Often the words “human” and “person” are interchangeable. Sf/f writers and readers pioneered the suggestions that all sapient races think of themselves as people and therefore, “human,” whatever the biological differences from Homo sapiens. I had a lot of fun with a race of giant slugs in Jaydium, who insisted that mammals were incapable of “personness.” The television series Star Trek often portrayed what Earth-humans and alien-humans have in common, rather than their unbridgeable differences. (The similarities were undoubtedly caused in part by the relatively primitive makeup and special effects, leading to the joke about aliens being actors with funny foreheads.) The creators of the series also exploited the romantic appeal of the exotic to generate love stories between members of different species, a phenomenon highly unlikely to occur in nature but one that had the effect of demonstrating the shared values of sapient beings. This is an example of broadening of the use of “human” as a term to include any beings of similar intelligence and culture that we can understand and sympathize with.
The inversion of the broadening effect comes up most commonly in horror: beings that look and sound human but which lack some trait or motivation we consider so important as to be a necessary part of the definition of human: empathy, for example, or the capacity for love. A prime example of this is the vampire, who “walks among us” as if human but differs in his essential nature. The horrific aspect arises in part from his blood thirst, but even more from the betrayal of the assumption of shared humanity.
None of this addresses the question of what it is it we feel defines human as opposed to intelligent-animal, a question not restricted to writers of speculative fiction. We can look at the biological characteristics of Homo sapiens, such as opposable thumbs or a greatly developed prefrontal cortex (the region responsible for complex moral judgments and control of social behavior, among other things). We can look at behavioral traits like language, prolonged rearing of young and care for the aged, the use of fire and cooking, tool-making, and the like. But in this larger universe we live in, is it wise to judge another entity as human or nonhuman based solely on what they look like or how they act? Is a child born with crippling, distorting defects or an adult with a deforming disease not still human? What about a person who has suffered a debilitating stroke and can no longer communicate? These and many other, similar questions highlight the difficulty of defining human by observable characteristics.
Instead, we can look to experiential qualities: the capacity for love, for wonder, for kindness; the awareness of personal mortality and the “binding” of time through personal and generational transmission of memory; abstract thought, and so forth. It may well be that animals have some of these abilities but lack the means (or perhaps the inclination!) to communicate them to us. We know, for example, that many species exhibit behavior we interpret as grief, loyalty, and self-sacrifice. Certainly, cooperation is not limited to Homo sapiens, and tool- making definitely is not. So instead of emphasizing how we are different from other creatures in our world, we can focus instead on how wonderful it is that the things we value in ourselves are not exclusive to our species. Or, contrariwise, that humanity is not limited to humans.
Fantasy and What It Means to Be Human
Andrea Hosth
One of the primary preoccupations of science fiction is said to be the question of what it means to be human. Seeing ourselves through alien eyes allows us to see ourselves anew. It’s a question which is less commonly associated with fantasy, and yet the sub-genre is equally ripe for examining the question of humanity through the use of non-humans.
One of the common positions taken when depicting humans in fantasy (particularly in fantasy which uses a roleplaying game basis, but also many less structured works) is that of humans as a middle ground, a kind of neutral party capable of achieving good, but all too ready to give in to baser impulses.
Other characteristics typically awarded humanity are versatility and creativity. Humans can be all things, while other races possess extremes – age/intelligence combined with sterility. Strength mixed with a lack of imagination. Humans are portrayed as young, vigorous, spontaneous, a little naïve, courageous, capable of great love and vivid passions. It is a very common trope to have the resolution of a dire battle revolve around a human’s ability to love, or innovate, believe, or be brave to the point of stupidity. It is equally common for other races to be failing, or to “Go into the West” and leave their territories to humans territories. Who took up residence in Rivendell, once Elrond moved on? Did they drift, dowdy and out of place, among the echoes of their splendid predecessors?
This frequent positioning of humanity as a versatile and rapidly improving ‘young’ race does not appear to be a deliberate examination of what it means to be human (as seen in those novels which attempt to make a point about humanity by viewing it through alien eyes), but instead a glorification of the traits humanity currently displays. Crude and ignorant – but just because of youth! Comparatively powerless, but able to think of new solutions to old problems. Vigorous, a bit chaotic, blundering occasionally, but heading inexorably upward, natural successors to the world’s bounty.
These are the stories we write about ourselves, the flip side of the grimdark/grittygrotty species of fantasy, where the narrative itself rhapsodises about human nature as something special and true and good.
I’ll end, without further comment, with a series of quotes from Doctor Who. The Doctor is not always so complimentary, but this has been the thrust of many of the rebooted series:
" Well, you could do that. Yeah, you could do that. Of course you could. But why? Look at these people, these human beings. Consider their potential! From the day they arrive on the planet, blinking, step into the sun, there is more to see than can ever be seen, more to do than — no, hold on. Sorry, that’s The Lion King. But the point still stands. Leave them alone!" – The Christmas Invasion.
" Oh, might have spent a million years evolving into clouds of gas… and another million as downloads, but you always revert to the same basic shape: the fundamental human. End of the universe and here you are. Indomitable, that’s the word! Indomitable! Ha!" – Utopia.
" The one thing you can’t do… is stop them thinking. [He begins rising upwards angelically] Tell me the human race is degenerate now…when they can do this." – Last of the Time Lords.
“And shards of gold flecked violet split the air with sound and fury! With laughter love and tears I pressed my lips to these spirits, freed them to walk across the page,”
First Breath, Valjeanne Jeffers
What is it that drives our characters? Their humanity. And this is more important than their preternatural powers. Their strength. Or what they look like. It even takes precedence over the wondrous plots we, as writers, devise. That our characters are human and driven by the same emotions and quests that drive us as writers, and which drive our readers– even if they are sociopaths or mad men. The need for love, shelter, money. The emotions of desire, rage, melancholy…
The same qualities that make us, the writers and our readers, identify with them and love them. Or hate them.
I have created characters so loathsome that I couldn’t wait to kill them off. And others that I loved so much I used all sorts of plot machinations to keep them alive. Our characters are spirits who walk across the page: women and men who mirror our struggles.
What it means to be human
Carole McDonnell
From the beginning of time (and perhaps before time began) the question has always existed: what does it mean to be human?
Humanity lives/exists within a prescribed setting which limits knowledge, age, joy, the body, sexuality, tribe, power, authority, dominion, physical movement, movement in time.
As a writer of Christian fiction I grew up with the story of Adam and Eve which is the first encounter most Christians have with the question of What does it mean to be human. In that story, man is created but not yet settled into a specific kind of being. (And in the Christian mythos, man will not find his true “self” and “being” until the end of time when time is no more.
Adam and Eve are beings who do not die. Yet they are not really immortal. They’re in a strange nexus of creation where they are like god with (some) dominion and some knowledge. But they lack something, something God apparently thinks is not particularly important. They do not understand right and wrong.
They have consciousness but are without law or conscience. They have a blissful ignorance of evil and cannot judge/blame either themselves, others, God, or the world. For them, it is a world which is neither immoral or moral.
Despite God’s desire that they remain outside of the realm of guilt or consciousness of evil, God did make them moral beings. Their one morality: the freedom to obey or not to obey. They are aware of one thing that they lack: they do not fully understand the ramifications of evil: disease, death, cruelty, hunger, toil, meaninglessness, and the thousand ills flesh is heir to. This knowledge of death is what separates them from God, what makes them less than God.
But third agency enters the picture and challenges them to be like God. The agency tempts them with knowledge of evil, law, conscience, guilt. The humans take a wager upon themselves. It is possible that humans can understand evil and not fall into guilt. Their first response to eyes opened to evil: shame. Shme about what? Shame in their comparison to perfect God. Thus humanity falls from its own perfection as it aimed for God’s perfection.
There is so much in this story, myth, history. And all fantasy stories echo it. All these elements are found in fantasy: Humans who wish to put side emotions and become, robots who wish to be humans, humans locked way from Eden, humans betrayed by a God, humans betraying their gods, humans casting off their gods, intrusive deceiving godlike figures, humans battling death, humans defying death, humans conquering time, humans failing a task, humans striving, humans ignorant of evil, humans being dominated by the world, humans dominating the world. All the echoes are found in fantasy stories and will apparently continue until the end of time.
Carole McDonnell is the author of the Fantasy Novel , The Constant Tower
http://www.amazon.com/The-Constant-To...
Spirit Fruit: Collected Speculative Fiction an eBook available as an eBook at kindle.
What Does It Mean to be Human: Answering in Fantasy
Warren Rochelle
What does it mean to be human? This is a question I pose when I teach my science fiction lit class, foregrounding it as one of the perennial themes of the genre. I have yet to pose this same question in fantasy lit. When I was thinking about what to write for this month’s post I found myself wondering why I don’t. After all, as Le Guin says in “Prophets and Mirrors: Science Fiction as a Way of Seeing,” “the story—from Rumpelstiltskin to War and Peace—is one of the basic tools invented by the human mind, for the purpose of gaining understanding” (quoted in Language of the Night 27). So, why shouldn’t I consider fantasy as a tool for “the purpose of gaining understanding”—for understanding something about meaning human?
Science fiction often answers this question with aliens of one kind or another; how then might fantasy do so with werewolves, dragons, and elves, fairies, and witches, and other assorted magical beings? As Vulcans and Martians become ways of seeing and understanding humanity, through juxtaposition, comparison, and contrast, through reflection, and in metaphor and symbol, so these denizens of Faerie. Science fiction also will sometimes posit answers to this question when humans are taken out of the familiar—the green hills of Earth to the deserts of the Moon and Mars, the metal worlds of spaceships and space stations, to planets only imagined. When the background noise is gone—the background itself—then we can often see ourselves as we really are. So it is when we enter Faerie—the Golden Wood, the haunted house, the gingerbread cottage, Lantern Waste, or sometimes, the house next door, or in our own house. Facing the dangerous and/or unfamiliar, confronting the evil and/or the strange, often demands we be most our selves—or began learning what being that self means.
All right, let’s start with werewolves, which are of particular interest to me at the moment as I am finishing up The Werewolf and His Boy. Are werewolves human? Sometimes. If you prick them, will they not bleed? Yes, sometimes wolf blood, sometimes human. Depending on the legend used, they are at least in human form most of the time, or twenty-odd days out of the average thirty. But what I find telling is when we look into our reflection and we can, if the light is right, see into the dark recesses of our souls, the hidden places in our hearts, and there find the wolf, the beast, even without fangs or fur. Humans are animals, occasionally, we are beasts. Wrestling with the feral parts of our nature, recognizing they exist—that is part of what it means to be human.
For my werewolf, Henry Thorn, he has to sort out both what it means to be wolf and to be boy: that he both needs to run, to hit raw meat, to howl, and to cry and miss his mother and to love another human being. For Henry, this means loving Jamey, another boy—but that’s another essay. Henry also finds out more about who he is as a boy when he finds himself in a den of werewolves, amongst the beasts. Jamey needs protection and caring for—and Henry learns something more about human love, and thus about being human. It is through fantasy that I can explore the answers Henry finds as he also asks and begins to answer the question of who he is—human boy, wolf—Henry Thorn.
In what might be an iconic werewolf tale, American Werewolf in London, the question of what it means to be human—or rather, can a werewolf be human—is answered, no, or not quite, as the beast, the wolf, is far too strong, the call of the wild, or rather the disease, overwhelms the unlucky American tourist. He dies a beast. But then, our humanity is fragile—and the beast is never as far as away as we might like to think. My werewolf knows the beast is always present—and that if he remains in beast-form too long, he risks a difficult return to being human. Perhaps this tension between beast and human, with the beast sometimes the one in control, is an attempt to explain humans in mobs, or at war. Surely the beasts were the ones at My Lai, at so many Native American villages, at Auschwitz.
Fantasy, with its transformations, its wishes, its dreams and magical beings who are so very much like us and yet so very different, does present ways to explore answers to the question of what it means to be human. This doesn’t seem all that surprising as I write this, but until presented with this month’s blog theme, I hadn’t thought about it this concretely in connection to fantasy lit. Yet, as Henry Thorn, the werewolf, is clearly telling me, I have been thinking about it for quite some time. So, the next time I teach fantasy …
***
Warren Rochelle has taught English at the University of Mary Washington since 2000. His short story, “The Golden Boy” (published in The Silver Gryphon) was a Finalist for the 2004 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for Best Short Story and his novels include The Wild Boy (2001), Harvest of Changelings (2007), and The Called (2010), all published by Golden Gryphon Press. He also published a critical work on Le Guin and has academic articles in various journals and essay collections. His short fiction has been published in such journals and collections as Icarus, Collective Fallout. The Silver Gryphon, North Carolina Literary Review, Romance and Beyond, and Aboriginal Science Fiction. His short story, “The Boy on McGee Street,” was just published in Queer Fish 2. He is presently working on a novel about a gay werewolf and his godling boyfriend and a collection of gay-themed speculative fiction short stories.
