The Campaign Builder's Guild

Quote from: SteerpikeWhat makes derivative works of Tolkien more acceptable, at least culturally, than derivative works of the Bible?

I'd maintain they're not especially acceptable.  The vast bulk of Tolkien ripoffs are pretty awful.  Of Brooks' novels, for example, I'm a much bigger fan of his Word & Void series, the prequel to Shannara, than Shannara itself.  Like I said before, I like Tolkien, but his influence on the fantasy genre hasn't always been a good thing.

And, as LC says, allusions are different than allegory, of course.

Quote from: Elemental ElfWere there any works of fiction from the era before RPGs that had a Rat-Man species?

This is a good question... the only thing I can think of off the top of my head are the intelligent rats that dwell under Lankhmar.

Quote from: EESo, as a society, hitting upon the themes/stories/parables from the bible is viewed as weak writing but authors doing the same except with Tolkien, get a pass? What makes derivative works of Tolkien more acceptable, at least culturally, than derivative works of the Bible?

No, the key is in your term above, 'weak writing'.  It's not that Lewis is a bad writer, but his writing is transparent in it's derivation, compared to Tolkien's more refined uses and attempt to refuse the to dip into allegory.  In the same vein, most of the dozens of derivative Tolkien books have the same issues. 

Quote from: EEWill R. A. Salvatore's works be viewed as kindly as Tolkien's or disparagingly as Lewis'. There is much to admire about the Drizzt books but, at its heart, it is a story of a man who rejects his birth society and adopts the culture of another, foreign one. Will that theme eventually feel as trite as Lewis' religiousness?

My guess is the latter.
I will put a bottle of Dead Arm on it.

Quote from: EEThe legends of the Minotaur was of one such creature. Fantasy authors have long striven to make them a true species. So, in a way, that represents a lot of growth for the creature.

Speaking of RPGs and creatures, does it strike anyone else as odd that Gnolls have become so iconic, when other anthros have not? It is especially odd given how much of the fluff I have read for Gnolls by third parties really doesn't create a complex Hyena-like culture, and thus could be easily dropped into other predator Anthro Tribes (like Wolf-Men). Catfolk are a very popular species in other games, I remember fondly the Leonin from Mirrodin and the Char from Guild Wars.

Were there any works of fiction from the era before RPGs that had a Rat-Man species? Warhammer has the Skaven, D&D Wererats and Rokugan Nezumi, all of which have common disreputable/dirty/plague/thief themes (well the Nezumi are perceived to have those themes by the Rokugani but are, in truth, an inversion of them). Obviously this all harkens back to "rat" but I'm curious if there actually is a literary root that designers are drawing inspiration from (the way people do with Dwarves via Tolkien).

Not sure about the literary side, but I do recognize the urge that most of us have after a while to make some sense of the races we use and create origin stories, histories, and cultures.  As we mature in outlook and creative ability, It is very common to deepen and link with other histories and intertwine and logicize (yet another word spell check does not recognize, *sigh*) in terms of the setting as a whole.

This has frankly been a personal joy for me.  There was a certain Gnoll-heavy Ogrillite tribe the Steel Isle guys allied with that was a lot of fun, and that presented us with a lot of great gaming moments.  But more than good moments, these moments came about from having a more sophisticated understanding of the tribal cultures to create better interactions, compared to 'humanoid-evil alignment, slaughter them'  mentality.

This has been a great thread that I've barely been able to keep up with! But it seems like most of us are in the same boat. So now the big question is how do 'fix' the somewhat stagnant fantasy zeitgeist? (Assuming it needs fixing at all.)

There's a few ways that people can encourage further change in the fantasy zeitgeist.  As fantasy consumers, buying works that break with tradition and passing by books that simply reiterate well-worn tropes is a pretty direct way of influencing things, albeit an individually small one.

As a scholar, I try to explore concepts in radical fantasy and weird fiction (I've got some forthcoming publications on Mieville).  Others in the field can, of course, do likewise, instead of writing endless essays on Tolkien (editors are tired of these anyway).

As gamers, we can resist the hegemony of vanilla D&D by playing alternate games and/or playing games set in alternate, non-Tolkienian worlds.  I still play Pathfinder but one of my games is set in the Planescape universe which sort of looks like what would happen if John Milton, Charles Dickens, and Michael Moorcock dropped acid together and built a campaign setting.  The other is set in a 14th century, famished, plague-ridden, bandit-haunted fantasy version of the Holy Roman Empire full of ghosts and weird relics and ruins infested with deformed flesh-eating child-demons (ironically probably closer to what early editions of D&D likely envisioned as the implied world than current settings reflect).

As creators, we can build worlds that either do away with the standard tropes altogether or cleverly subvert them in some way.  So the former is something like Clockwork Jungle or Salacious Angel's ever-bizarre, ever-poetic work, while the latter is exemplified by stuff like Jade Stage (wait, Elves keep Goblin slaves?!).

Quote from: Steerpike

Quote from: Light DragonYou may as well ask why Socrates and Plato and why not Mencius, the Legalists, and Al-Ghazili.

These are also good and important questions!  All I'm saying is I think the reason some things become "cultural touchstones" in the first place and others don't isn't arbitrary, and is worth discussing.  Sometimes it might just be historical accident, but there are likely other factors at play.

Perhaps I am too much of an existentialist here, but I think historical accident and the snowball effect of people's own projections of their own ideas is a large part of why many things happen. (aside: would that almost Marxist thought be reconcilable with the Great Man theory of History? Is there a contradiction here where one could believe in snowball effects but also believe in the power of one person to change history? Not necessarily I would postulate... but that's off topic at the moment).

To take an extreme argument and to ignore the other arguments that probably explain parts of the truth, here's my take.

Dwarves, Orcs, etc. have meaning because people chose to give them meaning.
They have no meaning in and of themselves.
People project their own meaning onto them.
But why these monsters? And why these particular imaginings of these monsters.
People liked Tolkien's tale, so they read it and told others about it... the plot. The story, the characters. The monsters were there, but at first, there was the tale.
Then they repeated it and it grew to be hyped.
The more people talked about it, the more of a shared experience it became, like the Illiad or the Odyssey.
Then, even if the book was poor, the fact that one could share it with others who were just like you (reject kids who read comic books, etc.)... made it more important.
So then people started copying and building on its mythos.
And then DnD came and other stories.
Once those came out, these monsters who were copied by authors who knew the Lord of the Rings quite well and who wanted to cash in on that experience became the standard monsters and the standard conceptions until it spread like a virus, repeating and repeating until the people's experiences of those monsters became the important thing.
Even though the books aren't necessarily 'great' by literary standards (I would say more but I fear it will cause this topic to digress- I think we can all agree that Tolkien isn't a penman on the level of the cleverness of phrase of Faulkner or some of David Foster Wallace's non-addled pieces, though).
One popular book sets the tone and the stage. It's not necessarily because of what the monsters are, but because of what the book is- and that is popular.

Easy counter to what I state- so why Tolkien and not anyone else?
Perhaps the answer to that is Gary Gygax and roleplaying.
DnD was based in large part on Tolkien.
It allowed people to experience T's world.
And to build other worlds.
These proto-storytellers then told other stories.
Which had the same type of monsters in them. No matter how small your town, you had the same monsters. You could move and find a DnD group and it's the same monsters.

Then you have the proliferation of mass media which tends to show the same types of monsters...
and then you have your standardization, your commoditization problem.
People start seeing movies in the very late 70s and 80s with the same goblins, dwarves, etc.
And that's the way they have to look, because well, that's how they look in the most popular book that everyone's read and now that's how they look in all the myriad tacky fantasy movies of the 80s.

Lovecraft didn't have that luck. He died before TV was a thing.
He died before images were standard.

Same with Dunsany. I don't recall fritz leiber having many weird creatures in Lankhmar... and personally I found Vance unapproachable.

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I see them (along with the Riven Codex) kind of like the Silmarillion, rather than proper entries into the series in a certain sense - they're more like companion pieces. Totally incidentally, Eddings' utter disdain for Tolkien is hilarious.  No one does snark quite like Eddings...

Ah yes, how could I forget the Rivan Codex! I recall Eddings constant insults and diatribes against his fans within. He is quite an angry person. one wonders though, does his wife share his vitriol... remember she essentially co-wrote all his books, she just didn't get title credit.

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I don't disagree, though it's interesting to think about in conjunction with Tolkien, some of whose characters are brilliant and others which are pretty darn flat.  Also, of course, it depends on what you mean by "money."  If you mean, like, actual money, then Dan Brown (whose characters are uniformly awful) offers a good counterexample to this statement.  If you mean "quality," I'm more inclined to agree, though I wonder where this leaves us with people like Lovecraft or Ashton Smith, who write gorgeously atmospheric stories and novellas but whose characters are usually pretty weak.

Well, you do have me there at Dan Brown and the thriller novel writers.
If I recall properly, there are successful Character novels and successful Plot novels. Getting published, I seem to recall that almost all the recommendation books said go for character novels.

I think though that Dan Brown might offer a good example of what I state above about Tolkien as being more chance lucky than a sign of the times.
One could argue that Brown's Da Vinci code is a sign of the times... but couldn't it be a sign of the times at any time? So what purpose is that argument.
Instead, I'd argue it's a good example of marketing- just like Lord of the Rings. It caught on and got re-read and it became a thing.

Harry Potter wasn't the first child wizard... harry potter wasn't even necessarily the best written child wizard... but he replicated. He had buzz- just like emerging bands rely on buzz to win big.
The best bands don't always become stars, but the ones who can best market themselves do, because they become a thing. People project their thoughts on them and define them and when enough people do that, then they become a cultural icon and people have to refer to them as that one thing-because if they don't then others are confused. Thus did goblins and orcs become locked into one image. To define them as different from the herd is to risk confusion and alienation.

Quote from: Elemental_Elf
What about C. S. Lewis?

He was friends with Tolkien. Lewis created a fairly detailed fantasy world full of themes, story concepts and ideas that are similar to Tolkien's.

So why is Tolkien the bedrock of Fantasy and not Lewis? Why are we playing with Elves and Orcs instead of Lions, Mice and Fawns? 

Possibly because Gary Gygax didn't base his game around Narnia. :p.

1974 DnD
1977 Advanced DnD
1978 Lord of the Rings Movie

Late 1970s LoTR craze...

Is it just a Coincidence that the two both got big at the same time? I think not. They thrived on one another and made each other the cultural touchstones that they are.

This conjunction of events- of the ability to read, to talk about, and then to play IN the world - the shared experience of culture- is what solidified the monsters as they were. It's like the youtube with minecraft phenomenon.
Then, retailers would only sell things they understood- they understood that goblins, dwarves, etc. made money.
So you had best make your story like something they knew sold, rather than a risk.
And the images became reinforced again and again.
Historical accident.
:)

>>how do 'fix' the somewhat stagnant fantasy zeitgeist? (Assuming it needs fixing at all.)

I don't see an inherent need to fix it, nor do I see it as stagnant. We have mieville after all, and the burgeoning steampunk invasion- there are tons of steampunk books released in the past 3-4 years.

Is there anything wrong with the standard tropes? Anything can be boring if done the same way time and time again- that's what hack writing is. And if you don't buy hacks, then you're promoting different ideas. Also, do what Phoenix did and write your own novels :)

But today we see more variety in fantasy than we have seen.

In the 1980s it was tolkien copy after tolkien copy. Now we have Song of Ice and Fire and a bevy of other novels taking fantasy in different directions. A greater variety of ideas can be published now than ever before.

Also, as an aside, don't forget L. Frank Baum and Oz... that predates Tolkien and Lewis.

I'll freely admit I am not well read in the "Boy Wizard" genre of literature but I think you'd be hard pressed to find a work that is better than Harry Potter (and still appeal equally to children and adults).

Quote from: LordVreeg

Quote from: EEWill R. A. Salvatore's works be viewed as kindly as Tolkien's or disparagingly as Lewis'. There is much to admire about the Drizzt books but, at its heart, it is a story of a man who rejects his birth society and adopts the culture of another, foreign one. Will that theme eventually feel as trite as Lewis' religiousness?

My guess is the latter.
I will put a bottle of Dead Arm on it.

Perhaps Tolkien is too high of a standard but you really believe the Drizzt books will be viewed with the same disdain that people view Lewis' work?

Quote from: LordVreeg

Quote from: EEThe legends of the Minotaur was of one such creature. Fantasy authors have long striven to make them a true species. So, in a way, that represents a lot of growth for the creature.

Speaking of RPGs and creatures, does it strike anyone else as odd that Gnolls have become so iconic, when other anthros have not? It is especially odd given how much of the fluff I have read for Gnolls by third parties really doesn't create a complex Hyena-like culture, and thus could be easily dropped into other predator Anthro Tribes (like Wolf-Men). Catfolk are a very popular species in other games, I remember fondly the Leonin from Mirrodin and the Char from Guild Wars.

Were there any works of fiction from the era before RPGs that had a Rat-Man species? Warhammer has the Skaven, D&D Wererats and Rokugan Nezumi, all of which have common disreputable/dirty/plague/thief themes (well the Nezumi are perceived to have those themes by the Rokugani but are, in truth, an inversion of them). Obviously this all harkens back to "rat" but I'm curious if there actually is a literary root that designers are drawing inspiration from (the way people do with Dwarves via Tolkien).

Not sure about the literary side, but I do recognize the urge that most of us have after a while to make some sense of the races we use and create origin stories, histories, and cultures.  As we mature in outlook and creative ability, It is very common to deepen and link with other histories and intertwine and logicize (yet another word spell check does not recognize, *sigh*) in terms of the setting as a whole.

This has frankly been a personal joy for me.  There was a certain Gnoll-heavy Ogrillite tribe the Steel Isle guys allied with that was a lot of fun, and that presented us with a lot of great gaming moments.  But more than good moments, these moments came about from having a more sophisticated understanding of the tribal cultures to create better interactions, compared to 'humanoid-evil alignment, slaughter them'  mentality.

Well nothing is worse than "They bad, we good, so we kill!" mentality. It has never rung true for me. Sure some races are just evil in D&D (Demons, Devils, tainted creatures) but to run around and assume every tribe of Orcs is evil always seemed silly to me on an anthropological level. To me the battles between Orcs and Men were derived more from a place of cultural intolerance and ignorance, than anything else. Humans claim all the best farm land, leaving only the mountains and bogs to the Orcs, so of course the latter is going to develop a spiteful, raiding culture. Its just logical. That doesn't make them evil, per se, just different.

Quote from: Light Dragon
>>how do 'fix' the somewhat stagnant fantasy zeitgeist? (Assuming it needs fixing at all.)

I don't see an inherent need to fix it, nor do I see it as stagnant. We have mieville after all, and the burgeoning steampunk invasion- there are tons of steampunk books released in the past 3-4 years.

Is there anything wrong with the standard tropes? Anything can be boring if done the same way time and time again- that's what hack writing is. And if you don't buy hacks, then you're promoting different ideas. Also, do what Phoenix did and write your own novels :)

But today we see more variety in fantasy than we have seen.

In the 1980s it was tolkien copy after tolkien copy. Now we have Song of Ice and Fire and a bevy of other novels taking fantasy in different directions. A greater variety of ideas can be published now than ever before.

We're living in a real Renaissance of fiction right now due in no small part to the democratization of the internet, self publishing, eBooks and crowd sourcing. Every medium is really benefiting from this shift in how we, as a society, are able to consume the media we love.

Look at Comic books, specifically Image Comics, they are pumping out some of the most amazing books right now. One that has really struck me is East of West, which is a real treat to those who adore world building. Every page builds up this unique and interesting world that is a blend of future and wild west. A comic like this would never have been created under the big two's labels because it is the kind of story that is constructed over the long haul and takes many issues to really get going, which are two things the quick money loving companies truly dislike.

Point being, we the people now have the ability to allow creators to create that which we always yearn for but never receive from the big, risk adverse companies.

Quote from: Light DragonPeople liked Tolkien's tale, so they read it and told others about it... the plot. The story, the characters. The monsters were there, but at first, there was the tale.
Then they repeated it and it grew to be hyped.

Again, I agree that this happened.  I just think there are reasons for it.  This doesn't mean we have to impart "intrinsic meaning" to the text or its creatures.  It could have everything to do with the context in which the texts were written, for example (post-war, nostalgic, middle class, pining for moral simplicity), and what they "read into" certain texts - although I think there has to be something in the text, even if it's just the illusion of meaning, that such a reading latches onto.

The D&D theory is, in part, a good one.  Though The Lord of the Rings was already hugely popular throughout the '60s, D&D certainly helped to further sediment its tropes as part of "standard fantasy."  Still, I don't think D&D can be singled out as the reason for LotR's overall popularity and dominance.  As much as the LotR's influence is strong, lots of other authors influenced D&D who aren't nearly the figure that Tolkien is.

Quote from: Light DragonHistorical accident.

Seems to me the opposite.  You traced a nice line of influence through LotR and D&D that shows distinctly causal cultural connections, not random or accidental ones.  Again, the reason Gygax responded to LotR strongly isn't arbitrary either.

Quote from: Light Dragonpersonally I found Vance unapproachable.

This is kind of exactly my point.  There's something either in the texts or in the readers or both that responds to certain works and not others.  When I read Vance it feels like reading something written in another age, another time, more like reading a medieval romance than a modern novel.  His language is challenging, odd, bizarre.  Despite his considerable influences and his prolific literary output - and even his influence on D&D - he remains unknown to many readers while Tolkien flourishes.

Think of it this way.  If it were basically chance and pure accident that determines a works' popularity, Vance should be famous: he's written dozens and dozens of novels so, statistically, one of them should heve "made it big."  Tolkien wrote four novels, some short stories, and a bit of poetry.  The public definitely responded to something in Tolkien (or saw something of themselves in his texts) in a way they didn't to Vance.  This doesn't make Vance inferior aesthetically, but it does help to account for the cultural penetration of Tolkien over Vance.

Quote from: Light DragonInstead, I'd argue it's a good example of marketing- just like Lord of the Rings. It caught on and got re-read and it became a thing.

This strikes me as supporting the "sign of the times" thesis - broadly speaking, the historicist thesis - rather than contradicting it.  How does someone like Dan Brown gain popularity?  Through the marketing engine that is late-twentieth-century publishing (and, of course, by writing a "page-turner" - the language, again, matters).  Dan Brown's books certainly wouldn't have succeeded in other times or places!  They're far too anti-religious, for one thing, to have flown to the extent that have now in much of the ninteenth-century or earlier decades of the twentieth.  The insinuation that Christ had children with Mary Magdalene alone would have alienated large swathes of the religious reading public in other eras.

Harry Potter is another great example of a text that "fits" the cultural context of the time.  The liberal values of Harry Potter are everywhere: Hermione's agitation for the House Elves, the race politics of Muggles vs non-Muggles as well as hybrid creatures like centaurs and werewolves, the anti-authoritarian critique of the increasingly fascist Ministry of Magic, the depiction of a society giving up its freedoms in the name of security, even the struggle of the valiant but impoverished Weasleys against an unfair economic system built around old money.  All of these values are immensely resonant with the Western world from 1997-2007.  Add to this Rowling's engaging style, strong structural abilities, workmanlike but effective language, use of archetypal tropes and myths, and the edifice of modern publishing and merchandising, and the reasons for the series' success become pretty clear, I think.

Quote from: Elemental ElfPerhaps Tolkien is too high of a standard but you really believe the Drizzt books will be viewed with the same disdain that people view Lewis' work?

Isn't Salvatore pretty widely disdained as it is?  Like, Salvatore has fans and all, but most of those fans recognize Salvatore's works as a kind of guilty pleasure, not as serious literary fantasy.

Frankly I think people right now have more reverence for Lewis than Salvatore, and while Lewis' works will probably still be read for a long time I doubt Salvatore's will by many.  In my mind Lewis' works are seen as flawed classics by most, while Salvatore's are seen as basically pulpy fluff.

Quote from: Elemental ElfTo me the battles between Orcs and Men were derived more from a place of cultural intolerance and ignorance, than anything else. Humans claim all the best farm land, leaving only the mountains and bogs to the Orcs, so of course the latter is going to develop a spiteful, raiding culture. Its just logical. That doesn't make them evil, per se, just different.

I applaud this attitude absolutely, although it's worth noting it definitely isn't Tolkien's, where Orcs are definitely Evil with a capital E, at an intrinsic, racial level.

Quote from: Steerpike
Again, I agree that this happened.  I just think there are reasons for it.  This doesn't mean we have to impart "intrinsic meaning" to the text or its creatures.  It could have everything to do with the context in which the texts were written, for example (post-war, nostalgic, middle class, pining for moral simplicity), and what they "read into" certain texts - although I think there has to be something in the text, even if it's just the illusion of meaning, that such a reading latches onto.

I still think that's reading too much into it. That's assigning your values and what you think the world is about when what's really happening is that a lot of individuals are making selfish decisions that advance their own existential natures. Now, these individual decisions do tend to form cultural movements that are a sign of the times- as you state a post-war, nostalgic, middle-class world, and at the heart of the 'movement' there may be an individual who is influential who holds those values. But what really matters are not the values themselves, but what matters is that the decision makers influence others- who then follow because they're simply following. They're following because their friends read the book (friendship value), they're following because they want to talk about a book (belonging value), and it is these basic (some would call them universal) values that matter rather than the values that are a sign of the times.

QuoteStill, I don't think D&D can be singled out as the reason for LotR's overall popularity and dominance.  As much as the LotR's influence is strong, lots of other authors influenced D&D who aren't nearly the figure that Tolkien is.

But those authors didn't have the readership. Lankhmar was popular, but not 'that' popular. Lovecraft indeed was coming into his renaissance, but once again- people who played DnD had pretty much all been exposed to LoTR. Had they been exposed to these other fantasy influences?

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Quote from: Light DragonHistorical accident.

Seems to me the opposite.  You traced a nice line of influence through LotR and D&D that shows distinctly causal cultural connections, not random or accidental ones.  Again, the reason Gygax responded to LotR strongly isn't arbitrary either.

It's arbitrary on the macro level- the influencers chose this idea over another. I'll agree that it may not be arbitrary on the individual level- with the starting moving forces- Gygax was charismatic, or at least his core supporters were. And that's what mattered. Personal inter-relationships rather than the core ideas themselves. A glib word is better than a 'good' idea...If you get enough people supporting a concept, then it's the one that works- and people support a concept because of personal reasons that many times have little to do with the 'meaning' of the concepts as interpreted through the lens of history.

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Harry Potter is another great example of a text that "fits" the cultural context of the time.  The liberal values of Harry Potter are everywhere: Hermione's agitation for the House Elves, the race politics of Muggles vs non-Muggles as well as hybrid creatures like centaurs and werewolves, the anti-authoritarian critique of the increasingly fascist Ministry of Magic, the depiction of a society giving up its freedoms in the name of security, even the struggle of the valiant but impoverished Weasleys against an unfair economic system built around old money.  All of these values are immensely resonant with the Western world from 1997-2007.  Add to this Rowling's engaging style, strong structural abilities, workmanlike but effective language, use of archetypal tropes and myths, and the edifice of modern publishing and merchandising, and the reasons for the series' success become pretty clear, I think.

I'll add a caveat first that when I read the books none of those signs of the times 'resonated' with or spoke to me, but I acknowledge that I am likely an outlier and I perhaps have some difficulty in understanding why others read. You make a good argument and it is true that many people read books that 'speak to them.' I don't, but many people do. I actually was not too impressed by Rowling's language or her structure. I liked her overall theme, but much of it was dull- just like the second half of the second book of the lord of the rings- rather poor reading and other than Hermione, a group of non-engaging characters- much like Ender's Game.

While your argument is good- I will counter by saying that Harry Potter worked because it's a good news story. Working mother, unemployed, writes a fantasy novel that's decent. Let's put that on the 6 O'Clock. People want to support her, they buy the books. Kids read the books, like the fact it's about someone their age going through struggles they might face in school or it's a modern fairy tale. Kids talk about the books and make it into something more than it is. They become obsessed with it and talk more- and they make it a movement... not because the book's great but because the story behind the book is great.

Quote from: Steerpike

Quote from: Elemental ElfPerhaps Tolkien is too high of a standard but you really believe the Drizzt books will be viewed with the same disdain that people view Lewis' work?

Isn't Salvatore pretty widely disdained as it is?  Like, Salvatore has fans and all, but most of those fans recognize Salvatore's works as a kind of guilty pleasure, not as serious literary fantasy.

There is a lot of disdain generated by the books but a lot of that is derived from so many people wanting to make carbon copies of Drizzt in their home campaigns. Don't get me wrong, Salvatore's work is definitely in the category of what my AP English Teacher would call "Trash Novels", meaning books that you read because you enjoy them, then throw them away. However, he has sold 15 million books in the USA alone and that has to count for something.

Intrinsically, I'm not sure how much better, from a literary standpoint, Lewis' works are from Salvatore's work. Part of me wonders if "being a classic" does not simply  involve good writing but good timing. The fact that Lewis helped define a portion of the Fantasy genre is a definite boon to him when compared to Salvatore, who was inspired by the works of Tolkien and Lewis. I would definitely be interested to see how the popularity of books would be affected if they were released earlier/later in time. Like your comment on Dan Brown, how much is becoming successful have to do with creating a good work than being released in a time in which society is ready to embrace it? Look at Lovecraft, fairly unpopular in its day but now that culture has evolved, his works have become much beloved.

Quote from: Steerpike

Quote from: Elemental ElfTo me the battles between Orcs and Men were derived more from a place of cultural intolerance and ignorance, than anything else. Humans claim all the best farm land, leaving only the mountains and bogs to the Orcs, so of course the latter is going to develop a spiteful, raiding culture. Its just logical. That doesn't make them evil, per se, just different.

I applaud this attitude absolutely, although it's worth noting it definitely isn't Tolkien's, where Orcs are definitely Evil with a capital E, at an intrinsic, racial level.

Well that's because Tolkien's Orcs were "cursed", in a similar vein to the way Warcraft's and the Elder Scrolls' Orcs were. However, in general, I don't think Orcs are associated with being cursed so much as just being barbarous and brutish now-a-days (or their curse is something that is merely background fluff or something they fight to overcome). Orcs are less capital E evil and more little e evil because their culture is misunderstood or viewed as being primitive/thugish/vile.

Speaking of how Fantasy is less and less Tokien-like, look at two of the most popular Fantasy video Game Franchises - Warcraft and Elder Scrolls. Both of them have a similar Tolkien-ish backstory but the end result is totally different. In Warcraft, the Orcs wind up becoming the de-facto good guys of the franchise as they found a multi-cultural society that believes in redemption, which is contrasted with the pig-headed racism of the Alliance races. In Tamriel, Orcs are scorned as brutes but, due to that, become a militant race of people who join the Imperial Legion in droves. In so many ways Orcs in Tamriel fill the vacuum left by the absence of Dwarves.

Quote from: Light DragonThat's assigning your values and what you think the world is about when what's really happening is that a lot of individuals are making selfish decisions that advance their own existential natures.

I think this comes down to a difference in how we see human nature as functioning.  I'm not much one for free will; I'm not especially convinced that anyone actually makes decisions as a rational, self-interested agent.  I tend to be pretty much in line with the metaphysical determinists.

I suppose I could attempt to reconcile our views by putting it this way - I think a large number of individuals at a particular point in history happened to share a particular set of values (approximately, of course, not exactly the same values), and that some of these values can be read into or reflected by The Lord of the Rings as opposed to other works of the time, such as, say, Gormenghast or The Dying Earth.  I think this had something (but certainly not everything) to do with the series' success.
 
I probably also tend to ascribe more weight to the structure and form of the texts themselves than you do, perhaps.

Quote from: Light DragonIt's arbitrary on the macro level- the influencers chose this idea over another.

I'm not convinced the choices early D&D designers made in terms of literary influences were arbitrary.  For example, they used Vance's spell system and not Tolkien's.  Why?  If it was an entirely arbitrary choice - that is, wholly random or on a whim - there would no real reason for choosing one over the other.  I think there are real reasons they chose Vance's spell system over Tolkien's: Vance's spells were far more codified and internally consistent than Tolkien's, the memorization system naturally allows for a resource-management element in the context of the roleplaying game, Vance's spells were named which inclines them for translation into a rules-set, etc.

Quote from: Light DragonBut those authors didn't have the readership. Lankhmar was popular, but not 'that' popular. Lovecraft indeed was coming into his renaissance, but once again- people who played DnD had pretty much all been exposed to LoTR. Had they been exposed to these other fantasy influences?

Right, I agree with you here.  That's what I meant: you can't really trace LotR's popularity primarily to D&D, because otherwise, by that token, all of its other source materials should also have been popularized by the game.  But perhaps I misunderstood your earlier contention?

Quote from: Light DragonYou make a good argument and it is true that many people read books that 'speak to them.' I don't, but many people do.

I should add that I don't think many people are aware of the cultural and political forces that may be shaping their responses to a particular text.  As a species we are generally painfully unaware of the motivations for most of our actions the bulk of the time.

Quote from: Light DragonWhile your argument is good- I will counter by saying that Harry Potter worked because it's a good news story. Working mother, unemployed, writes a fantasy novel that's decent. Let's put that on the 6 O'Clock. People want to support her, they buy the books.

Totally with you here - Rowling's story forms a kind of paratext to the Harry Potter novels that added powerfully to their cache.  But her story, too, strongly appeals to particular political and cultural values.  In a different time, when a different series of values were in circulation - and in different economic climates, of course - her story wouldn't have generated the same appeal.  "Divorced mother sells books about witchcraft targeted to children" would not have flown in other centuries.  The adverse reaction to Rowling by some especially backwards Christian conservatives holds testament to this.

Quote from: Elemental ElfHowever, he has sold 15 million books in the USA alone and that has to count for something.

Right, I agree, but Dan Brown and Stephanie Meyer have sold brilliantly as well, and very few people hail them as literary geniuses.  They're certainly popular, though, and their ideas and images have achieved a great deal of cultural prevalence, there's no question there.

Quote from: Elemental ElfOrcs are less capital E evil and more little e evil because their culture is misunderstood or viewed as being primitive/thugish/vile.

It's been very interesting to see them evolve, I agree.  One could mount the argument that this transition has a lot to do with modern political correctness and an awareness of racism in media.  It's particularly  prominent in the Warcraft franchise, as you point out, as the Orcs there really transform from one extreme to the other - and I highly doubt that when the first Warcraft game was made the creators had any intention of supplying Orcs with that kind of arc.

Quote from: EEPerhaps Tolkien is too high of a standard but you really believe the Drizzt books will be viewed with the same disdain that people view Lewis' work

If Salvatore is lucky.
Lewis actually has a decent following, but we are comparing him here to his Inkling and converted partner, Prof. Tolkien.  I mean, he did have a few movies made of his stuff, and his work is good, but transparent.

Quote from: EE

Quote from: LVNot sure about the literary side, but I do recognize the urge that most of us have after a while to make some sense of the races we use and create origin stories, histories, and cultures.  As we mature in outlook and creative ability, It is very common to deepen and link with other histories and intertwine and logicize (yet another word spell check does not recognize, *sigh*) in terms of the setting as a whole.

This has frankly been a personal joy for me.  There was a certain Gnoll-heavy Ogrillite tribe the Steel Isle guys allied with that was a lot of fun, and that presented us with a lot of great gaming moments.  But more than good moments, these moments came about from having a more sophisticated understanding of the tribal cultures to create better interactions, compared to 'humanoid-evil alignment, slaughter them'  mentality.

Well nothing is worse than "They bad, we good, so we kill!" mentality. It has never rung true for me. Sure some races are just evil in D&D (Demons, Devils, tainted creatures) but to run around and assume every tribe of Orcs is evil always seemed silly to me on an anthropological level. To me the battles between Orcs and Men were derived more from a place of cultural intolerance and ignorance, than anything else. Humans claim all the best farm land, leaving only the mountains and bogs to the Orcs, so of course the latter is going to develop a spiteful, raiding culture. Its just logical. That doesn't make them evil, per se, just different.

And this is what makes the hobby tick, and actually grow.   Tolkien's work was one version of a fantasy world, and one that used a pretty strict racial alignment system.  But not every game needs that or want it. 
As we grow up, sometimes our games change, or new tastes are added on.  Alignment systems, especially racial alignments, reduce pc responsibility for their actions and rob them of a level of free will.  It's a heavy thought, but it is behind some of the changes that people make.  Just as many games get less super-heroic (sometimes), and more gritty and deadly (sometimes), many people add in more realistic ambiguity.
Again, as to my example above, the PCs in Steel Isle, when they ran into the Trine Guldana, ended up in a fight.  But the PCs allowed the Trine to surrender, formed an alliance, and ended up working together for the rest of the time.  The Trine Guldana is currently working with the Farmers of the Southern Quarter.

Quote from: SPHarry Potter is another great example of a text that "fits" the cultural context of the time.  The liberal values of Harry Potter are everywhere: Hermione's agitation for the House Elves, the race politics of Muggles vs non-Muggles as well as hybrid creatures like centaurs and werewolves, the anti-authoritarian critique of the increasingly fascist Ministry of Magic, the depiction of a society giving up its freedoms in the name of security, even the struggle of the valiant but impoverished Weasleys against an unfair economic system built around old money.  All of these values are immensely resonant with the Western world from 1997-2007.  Add to this Rowling's engaging style, strong structural abilities, workmanlike but effective language, use of archetypal tropes and myths, and the edifice of modern publishing and merchandising, and the reasons for the series' success become pretty clear, I think.

Props.  Major props.  You nailed the cultural lock and key that Rowling Bolted onto a detailed and consistent 'coming of age' tale.  I will also say that the blending of detective 'who done it' and the back story of Tom Riddle and the Judas-like Snape all made this MUCH more than the children's book it started as.

Quote from: LDBut those authors didn't have the readership. Lankhmar was popular, but not 'that' popular. Lovecraft indeed was coming into his renaissance, but once again- people who played DnD had pretty much all been exposed to LoTR. Had they been exposed to these other fantasy influences?

you are having major 'chicken and the egg' issues.  The Causality of D&D causing the popularity but then professing that it was already more popular than the other writers is compartmentalizing the example from trhe actual, larger cultural dynamic.  Both D&D/RPGs and Tolkien benefited, while helping each synergistically, by a larger cultural movement away from SF into this era where Fantasy is the burgeoning superpower.
Which, by the way, while I like fantasy better slightly, I think is part of a horrible cultural pendulum swing in our society.  The greater reasons for this removal from reality as opposed to trying to grapple with scientifically produced possible futures frightens me anthropologically. 

Quote from: LDI'll add a caveat first that when I read the books none of those signs of the times 'resonated' with or spoke to me, but I acknowledge that I am likely an outlier and I perhaps have some difficulty in understanding why others read. You make a good argument and it is true that many people read books that 'speak to them.' I don't, but many people do. I actually was not too impressed by Rowling's language or her structure. I liked her overall theme, but much of it was dull- just like the second half of the second book of the lord of the rings- rather poor reading and other than Hermione, a group of non-engaging characters- much like Ender's Game.

While your argument is good- I will counter by saying that Harry Potter worked because it's a good news story. Working mother, unemployed, writes a fantasy novel that's decent. Let's put that on the 6 O'Clock. People want to support her, they buy the books. Kids read the books, like the fact it's about someone their age going through struggles they might face in school or it's a modern fairy tale. Kids talk about the books and make it into something more than it is. They become obsessed with it and talk more- and they make it a movement... not because the book's great but because the story behind the book is great.

LD, I don't think 95% of the people who read and enjoyed (at any level) realize when something they read is grabbing onto their cultural totems.  That is one of the points, a better author has a lighter touch with these things.  I won't argue Rowling's writing ability with you as I am not crazy with her verbiage or pacing either, but I think your analysis is too thin to hold water.  I actually think SteerPike has latched onto the major reason for her cultural penetration.

Quote from: SPI think this comes down to a difference in how we see human nature as functioning.  I'm not much one for free will; I'm not especially convinced that anyone actually makes decisions as a rational, self-interested agent.  I tend to be pretty much in line with the metaphysical determinists.

I suppose I could attempt to reconcile our views by putting it this way - I think a large number of individuals at a particular point in history happened to share a particular set of values (approximately, of course, not exactly the same values), and that some of these values can be read into or reflected by The Lord of the Rings as opposed to other works of the time, such as, say, Gormenghast or The Dying Earth.  I think this had something (but certainly not everything) to do with the series' success.
 
I probably also tend to ascribe more weight to the structure and form of the texts themselves than you do, perhaps.

Much more of a Compatibilist.  Existentialism requires responsibility for one's actions, and I am still, at heart, purely existential.  I have, however, agreed that the zeitgeist and the subconscious mind combine and actually create many of our perceptions BEFORE they are analyzed on a conscious level. 

Quote from: SPI'm not convinced the choices early D&D designers made in terms of literary influences were arbitrary.  For example, they used Vance's spell system and not Tolkien's.  Why?  If it was an entirely arbitrary choice - that is, wholly random or on a whim - there would no real reason for choosing one over the other.  I think there are real reasons they chose Vance's spell system over Tolkien's: Vance's spells were far more codified and internally consistent than Tolkien's, the memorization system naturally allows for a resource-management element in the context of the roleplaying game, Vance's spells were named which inclines them for translation into a rules-set, etc.

Ha.
Tolkien's magic was made to be inscrutable and quasi-religious. It's the biggest reason why ICE's gorgeously mapped and carefully researched Tolkien stuff flopped, that the magic system of the bastardized Rolemaster was antithetical to the feel of Tolkien's world.  And so much of Tolkien's magic was tied into items, Staffs, rods, swords, rings... Making a game out of it was going to be, um....hard.

Quote from: SPIt's been very interesting to see them evolve, I agree.  One could mount the argument that this transition has a lot to do with modern political correctness and an awareness of racism in media.  It's particularly  prominent in the Warcraft franchise, as you point out, as the Orcs there really transform from one extreme to the other - and I highly doubt that when the first Warcraft game was made the creators had any intention of supplying Orcs with that kind of arc.

I also believe it is part of the positive side of Cultural correction and Political Correctness (meant with all the New Left connotation).  I totally agree that it was totally what spurred me to make the racial adjustments as part of an overarching theme in my work.  And it was most assuredly not meant when world of warcraft started. 
And the opposite is Dragon Age's Darkspawn, a reattempt to create races that can murdered without compunction.