posted
Here's a topic that has been floating around my mind for quite a while, the style of Fantasy vs SF. I come from a mostly SF background. In my 30+ years reading I'd say that I generally went for SF over fantasy 3/4 of the time. One of the big reasons for this is my general dislike of multi-volume epics. Another thing that turned me off to fantasy was that so often they followed the "quest" model, hero must get from point A to B to get object C and has many things D, E, F, etc. happen along the way. Traveling, per se, has never been that interesting to me, but that so often seems to be a huge part of many fantasy novels/series.
That said, it is ironic in the extreme that I find my WIP is a fantasy novel, and has turned into a trilogy. I have been scratching my head from the very start as to how my story seems to demand a size such that I could have no hope of getting it published in one volume.
So here's my question, what stylistic differences do you feel exist between SF and Fantasy that fantasies are typically so much wordier? I have some ideas of my own, but I want to get the learned board's response before I venture any of them (as they will most likely get slashed apart, I figure I'll let someone else get bloode first. ).
First, fantasy stories naturally lend themselves to a focus on mileu, while SF stories lend themselves to idea or event orientations.
Mileu stories usually seem to require more description. Hence more doorstopper tomes in fantasy.
Second, fantasy lives and breathes in the giant shadow of Tolkein. The protracted description he used in LotR (which was appropriate for that story) has (unfortunately) been adopted as a standard of the genre. There is some unarticulated notion that that's just how fantasy writers write, and to the extent that all fantasy writers are knowingly or unknowingly influenced by Tolkein, they do. Unfortunately. Because, unlike the LotR, most stories aren't made better for it.
[This message has been edited by J (edited December 20, 2004).]
posted
There is much derivative fantasy. But then there is much derivative science fiction. In fact, many things become derivative after an archetype is discovered.
Rendezvous With Rama AND Ringworld are great multivolume epics about going there and back again.
So it would be stereotypical to say science fiction is often about space ships shooting beams at aliens.
All fiction is fantasy, in that it didn't happen. The line between fantasy and science fiction are so blurred, I don't see a need to segregated them.
posted
I think that J has kinda pegged it. Fantasy thrives on rich description of the milieu, with particular attention to the fine points of different weapons and costumes. SF tends to focus on ideas and events, of which there are usually only a few per book and which don't need elaborate descriptions.
And since modern fantasy came into existance as a result of Lord of the Rings, it is certainly the case that it is heavily imitated even where the style doesn't fit the story being told and often when the imitator has only the faintest grasp of what is being imitated.
posted
Science Fiction generally depends on extrapolation of modern conventions and technologies, onto which characters are cast and carry out there actions. A significant portion of the text is dedicated to the extrapolated world and it's devices in relation to the closest real world equivalent. This is also why Science Fiction is so easilly dated and often does not stand the test of time. It is the rare science fiction novel that manages to balance realism (which is an important factor in Sci-Fi) with a compelling story and characters. There is a softer sci-fi genre (Star Wars, Star Trek) which is really just fantasy with sci0fi trappings, since there is no real attempt to justify or explain the science behind the world in which the story takes place. These Space Operas are really just fantasy, though they call it science, but since the science is treated effectively as magic, it is really fantasy.
Fantasy concentrates far more on the character interaction and there trials and much less on the physics of the world in which it is set.
So Sci-Fi tends to be event and setting driven.
Fantasy tends to be character driven.
Then again there are exceptions to every generalization.
OSC's Ender's Game is a Science Fiction story, but the science (at least in the first book is pretty much magic), in the subsequent books Xenocide and Children he deals more with the science (FTL travel and such) but still crafts novels that are very character driven. But the tone of the first book is more of a fantasy novel and the tone of 2 and 3 are closer to Science Fiction.
Well I've rambled enough, time for someone else to step in and build on or tear down what I've typed.
posted
If I may quote OSC in his book 'How to Write SF&F' page 82:
"Almost all fantasy and much - perhaps most- science fiction uses the Event story structure."
<Xenocide and Children he deals more with the science (FTL travel and such)>
Actaully, I don't remember any true FTL, that is actauly moving between points A and B FTL. I know they popped outside the universe and then back in at another point, instantaneously. It was all accomplished with thier computer genie, Jane. Kind of magical".
[This message has been edited by ChrisOwens (edited December 20, 2004).]
posted
Would you say that these assessments are the same for most fantasy, whether it is high fantasy as Catharine Asaro or 'magical realism' as Jonathan Carroll (in "White Apples")
Posts: 17 | Registered: Dec 2004
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posted
<Would you say that these assessments are the same for most fantasy, whether it is high fantasy as Catharine Asaro or 'magical realism' as Jonathan Carroll (in "White Apples")>
I guess that's why he gave himself an out, by saying 'almost'. Stuff like, LOTR, Runelords, Amber are all event driven. But I guess saying all fantasy is event driven may be stereotypical.
posted
If you look at scifi and fantasy, both can have the 'quest' model. I find that going from point A, to point B, and C, D, F can get old. If the characters are not good enough to hold up the story along the way. Some of the reasons for these multi-stop quests can be a bit dissapointing as well.
I played a ps2 game recently that poked fun at old RPG's as well as the 'quest' model of fantasy. The Bard's Tale, which has for a hero a bard, but not the lovable hero like most games/stories. The Bard is self centered, with a handfull of other less than desirable aspects. On more than one occasion he would ask the question most readers would like to know..."why can't I just go rescue the princess directly?" Of course the "What's in it for me?" question came up as well. I'm not saying anyone should waste their time playing games...but this one had me rolling with laughter.
Ok, back to the main topic. I have read some good fantasies that lacked the true "quest" model. Yes, there was a goal, and it involved some travel, but lacked the long traditional quest. Using failure to replace the scavenger hunt.
Why does a fantasy have to be so big it spans 3 volumes? Is each and every quest necessary? I think half the problem is that some side quests lack any real purpose. They may seem like it, but I sometimes wonder how someone can know they need the great artifact of unbelievablity to conquer the great evil about to take over the world. I would think the thief who finds himself/herself the target of the rest of the thieves guild would be more interesting. No noble quest...just someone trying to survive another day. If we start with characters, and look at things through the eyes of those characters...would the "grand noble quest" be a real option?
Of course I like stories about characters over those based on a world or setting.
posted
I wonder if there's a story in a bunch of people who are adamant that everything in the world is binary in nature, vs. those who describe everything as a trinity. There isn't much good or evil, just intense emotion over whether things are essentially at their core 2, or 3.
Posts: 366 | Registered: Sep 2006
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posted
<just intense emotion over whether things are essentially at their core 2, or 3.>
Go for it, I'd like to read it.
I've had a seed idea along those lines about a branch of matchmatics in which it was not polar, as in positive and negative, but chromodynamic. Of course there indeed may be such a branch, but I'm no mathmatician. Of course the idea never went beyond that.
Then there's sometimes used sci-fi idea where instead of two genders, there are three.
[This message has been edited by ChrisOwens (edited December 21, 2004).]
posted
Of course I may get crucified for saying this but here goes....
Fantasy writers have a tendency of adding dramatic knowledge to their characters that I can't stand. Robert Jordon is a prime example. Where the POV character identifies the history, race, customs, weaponry, dress, prejudices, and languages and even what martial art stances or movement the person makes in a normal scene such as a barn or a tavern. Most sci fi I have read (except for some star trek stuff) stears clear of this all encomapssing lectures on all the charcters minor and major. But there again Jordon is very well published and I am a nobody.
Example "Janus sat in his chair watching Baldur bring the ale. Baldur moved in the Crimathian Panther Step, the high quick walk of the Crimithian assassins. Janus could tell by the stance and the high Markarian hair piece that Baldur was a Tolbol warrior of the third class, who had fought alongside Meers the Farsighted in the Akkadian Advance of Nargul. It was..."
Frank Herbert did some of this in the Dune series but his charcter's actions were tied to reasons why they were thinking this way. In many of the fantasy books this stuff appears page after page with no reason but to provide commentary. That is one reason why I feel sci fi readers get turned off by popular fantasy.
posted
I think in many cases the difference is that fantasy books look inwards, into our human beliefs and desires, they disconnect from reality and create imagined worlds, where as sifi looks outwards- creating new realities by twisting and pushing the known limits. Readers are fortunate some writers, like OSC , combine both fantasy and sifi for more interesting and creative books. Introspection is wordier than science.
[This message has been edited by Kickle (edited December 21, 2004).]
[This message has been edited by Kickle (edited December 21, 2004).]
quote:I wonder if there's a story in a bunch of people who are adamant that everything in the world is binary in nature, vs. those who describe everything as a trinity.
Of course, this itself is a binary distinction. If this is what the story is about, the binaries will obviously win. You could add a group of people who don't care; that's three things, and then the trinaries win.
posted
People who don't care, or unified theory zealots.
The inward outwart thing is interesting. I've been reading a book about brain hemispheres that says the right brain is more interested in fantasy. But I don't quite see how the left brain could be interested in sci fi. I don't know, maybe I'm just too dismissive of sci fi. I know it isn't all as bad as STNG.
Was Star Wars fantasy or sci fi? I mean, it had laser beams and clones, but it also had some... magic? And a princess. And a pre-technological culture that could beat storm troopers.
posted
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who think there are two kinds of people in the world, and those who don't.
Or is that there are three kinds of people in the world: those who think there are two kinds of people, those who think there are three kinds of people, and others.
Or maybe there are four kinds of people in the world: those who think there are two kinds of people, those who think there are three kinds of people, those who think there are four kinds of people, and the rest.
Perhaps there are five kinds of people in the world...
posted
OK, I see from various responses that I am not alone in my ideas for the wordiness (dare I say bloat?) in fantasy vs. SF. I agree with J and others that there is the Tolkein shadow thing. I have to say that one of my reasons in my younger years for not reading fantasy was LOTR. In my first attempt, I was unable to finish _Fellowship_ because Tolkein's overly descriptive (from my POV) prose, was just too much of a downer. (It's always been my opinion that Tolkein's "nothing is as good as it was in the old days" orientation is annoying, but I digress.) Fantasy seems to demand more description, both internally and externally. Here I totally agree with JB. This is one of the prime reasons I loathe Jordan, as he seems to have taken this to absurd levels, though Goodkind seems to be not much if any behind. Another reason for fantasy wordiness seems to be the great deal of internal and external dialogue. When I was writing my WIP I found out that if my characters did much talking that it took up pages quite rapidly. I am just finishing up reading Terry Goodkind's _Wizard's First Rule_ and I found myself repeatedly frustrated with the way he has characters hash things around their minds, and then engage in dialoge where the characters then hash stuff between each other. At times I was begging him to just, get on with whatever was going to happen.
Still, not all writers are like this. Feist doesn't seem to use so much space, and Lloyd Alexander is able to convey amazingly good fantasy in very slim volumes. I'm just trying to figure out how it works. I'm pretty much stuck with my WIP being a trilogy or a duology at minimum, but I don't want to make a habit of it.
[This message has been edited by Ergoface (edited December 22, 2004).]
posted
Star Wars is a Space Opera, which is basically a fantasy genre with pseudo science trappings.
Robert Jordan wrote 3 pretty enjoyable books (the first three WoT novels) and then began milking it for every dollar he could wring out of it. I am not sure whether he is greedy or has genuinely become lost in his bloated convoluted epic.
I still read Jordan for the same reason that people stay in a bad marriage, the foolish belief that things will get better.
posted
I tried to read the first Wheel Of Time book, but for the life of me, I couldn't get into it. Years passed, the other day at the bookstore I tried to see if anything had changed. I opened to the first page, and my eyes blurred again.
Posts: 1275 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
I've enjoyed all the ones I've actually read. Jordon may not be my role model for how to write a serious work of fiction, but his prose is enjoyable page after page, even when you get page after page of absolutely nothing of any importance happening.
Posts: 8322 | Registered: Aug 1999
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posted
I think that Starwars was put in Sci-fi is because most people don't understand the difference. They think that if something is in the future it's Sci-fi and if it's in the past it's Fantasy. Why I think Fantasy is more wordy is that fnatasy writers have more to say. Jk. I read Fantasy because I like to explore new worlds. I write becaue I like to create new worlds that I have total controll over. (Call it playing God if you wish, but who better to emulate?) Now the same could be said for SCifi but I think Scifi has different goals. To me Fantasy exists to change a person but Scifi exsists to change the world
Posts: 1895 | Registered: Mar 2004
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posted
<I think that Starwars was put in Sci-fi is because most people don't understand the difference. They think that if something is in the future it's Sci-fi and if it's in the past it's Fantasy.>
What was the opening to Star Wars again? Something like a long time ago in a galaxy far far away?
[This message has been edited by ChrisOwens (edited December 22, 2004).]
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