Attebery (1980) cites that fantasy
“presupposes a view of exterior reality which it goes on to contradict”. The reader’s own world should be completely
and utterly contradicted, turned upside down and challenged.
Fantasy makes no attempt to reconcile its
storyline, characters and themes “with our intellectual understanding or the
workings of the world or to make us believe that such things could under any circumstances
come true” (Attebery, 1980). By using
fantastical characters, themes and events, a fantasy writer almost
categorically declares that the storyline will be an incredible
fabrication. Therefore the reader’s mind
is immediately set up for an unfathomable reality and he can enjoy the
pleasurable escape to another world far removed from his own.
Attebery (1980) cites that fantasy “can
involve beings whose existence we know to be impossible” and revolve around
“attributes inanimate objects do not, in our experience, possess”. An example of this could be Le Guin’s A Wizard of Earthsea, a story of
wizardry, dragons, a living shadow, and magical events set in a fabricated land. To the reader, these may seem difficult to
consolidate with our Earth, however this is the genre of fantasy, where
extraordinary characters collide on the storyline with incredible events.
“Fantasy
needs consistency. Reader and writer are
committed to maintaining the illusion for the entire course of the fiction”
(Attebery, 1980). That is to say, the
storyline must have real meaning to the reader and follow a credible course
where each event relates to each other, so that the reader does not lose the
thread and become detached from the storyline.
The author must grip the reader in a state of wonderment at the world he
is wrapped up in.
Attebery (1980) cites Bettelheim (1977) on Grimm fairytales (fairytales are a sub-genre
of fantasy) “each fairy tale is a magic mirror which reflects some aspects of
our inner world”. That is to say, the reader needs to be able to draw some
social aspect from the real world in order to follow and comprehend the complexity
of and reasoning behind the storyline in its entirety.
For example, it is only upon completion of A Wizard of Earthsea that Ged’s journey
of wizardry and magical quest to find and confront the shadow turns out to be
his own personal journey through adolescence to manhood, and by facing the
shadow Ged has become a man. As each
chapter unfolds from the printed primary text, the reader is left aching to
find out more about his quest. In
conclusion, the reader realizes that Ged’s quest has been all about his journey
through adolescence to manhood and is retrospectively enlightened by the
subtext of the completed story. Ged was
“weeping like a boy” and his friend Vetch watching on sees that Ged “had
neither lost nor won but, naming the shadow of his death with his own name, had
made himself whole: a man: who, knowing his whole true self, cannot be used or
possessed by any power other than himself”.
(Le Guin , 1993)
The fantasy carries the theme (in Le Guin's case, the journey of adolescence to manhood).
The key
to fantasy is the quest that becomes the journey’s end.
References:
Attebery, B. (1980). The Fantasy Tradition in American Literature: From Irving to Le Guin. Bloomington:
Indiana University Press, 1980, 1-10
Le Guin, U. (1993). The Earthsea Quartet. London, England: Penguin Books Ltd.
Bettelheim, B. (1977). The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales (p309). New York: Vintage Books
Thanks Sam, this is well-researched and well thought out!
ReplyDeleteHow do you think the reader's world is turned upside-down by Le Guin in Earthsea? If you hadn't known that it was fantasy, at what point do you think you would have picked that up?
I think almost immediately there is a realisation that the readers journey is going to be to a land of fantasy. I guess the title gives something away, in that a wizard is a fantasy character, and that I know that Earthsea is a fictitious imaginary made up place, then the first few pages depict a map of the land with fictitious place names (actually very helpful to chart the course of Ged's travels). Even the first line of the first chapter gives something away that we are about to embark on a tale of creation rather than fact
ReplyDelete"The island of Gont, a single mountain that lifts its peak a mile above the storm-racked Northeast Sea, is a land famous for wizards."
Nice post, Sam! I agree with Karen, it definitely is well-thought. From what I can infer from your entry, Fantasy knows no limits. It sounds to me that it's quite a fun genre.
ReplyDelete