12-07-2017, 07:59 PM | #61 |
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High vs low for me generally has more to to with the amount of magic that people run into in their everyday lives. LOTR is pretty low (a few swords and rings that are mostly legends, a couple wizards whose magic seems to consist of making good fireworks), Harry Potter very high (everyone in the wizarding community knows and can generally use it).
Epic can be either high or low but would have world changing events either occurring or trying to be prevented. |
12-07-2017, 08:02 PM | #62 |
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I would also put GoT in the low fantasy area at least by my definition - at least the first couple books. As I understand it there is more magic in later books, possibly related to dragons, but I don't intend to continue the series.
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12-07-2017, 10:05 PM | #63 | |
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Honestly, not that invested in the definitions, so I don't know if it would be "low" or whatever. Hitch |
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12-07-2017, 11:40 PM | #64 | |
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12-08-2017, 05:01 AM | #65 | |
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Perhaps this person could explore the revised Chung Kuo Series, by David Wingrove. (I really dislike those new covers. They're so vanilla; but that's another thread.) |
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12-08-2017, 09:14 AM | #66 | |
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12-08-2017, 09:44 AM | #67 |
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12-08-2017, 09:49 AM | #68 | |
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High Fantasy followed the classic story line of the hero quest which can be found in many of the old epic stories. Many of the early high fantasy writers tended to be well educated Englishmen who wrote on the side (Eddison, Morris and Tolkien) and thus presumably worthy of being considered literature. The low fantasy authors tended to be every day authors writing pulp to make a living, people like Howard, Fritz Leiber and Moorcock. I think that for the most part we have moved past that issue now. Many books blend the two quite a bit. It's been a long time since I've read arguments about what camp a specific author or book belongs to. |
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12-08-2017, 09:50 AM | #69 |
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12-08-2017, 09:52 AM | #70 |
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When I think of High Fantasy, the one thing that immediately comes to mind is the Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series, edited by Lin Carter, although I would not now classify them all in that category.
This is where I encountered - for the first time - many classic Fantasy authors. |
12-08-2017, 10:08 AM | #71 |
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Read, or seen/heard? If the latter, I'll assume that it's because you just don't get out much any more. The fans I run into still love to beat each other soundly about the head and shoulders over sub-classification squabbles.
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12-08-2017, 11:39 AM | #72 |
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almost anything by Brandon Sanderson....start with Mistborn: The Final Empire.
Steven Erikson's Malazan: Book of the Fallen. 10 long books, starting with Gardens of the Moon. They are about as epic as you can get. |
12-08-2017, 11:45 AM | #73 | |
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Strewth, I don't care enough to argue. I'd argue, however, (ha, gotcha), that Dune, if the "space travel" were accomplished by any other means than spaceships, falls into the category of fantasy, rather than Sci-Fi. Sure, the KH takes a serum/potion (magic!!!) and then transcends time/space/yadda, but...what's more magical than that? He most certainly has the traditional Hero's Journey. Even the Guild Navigators are magic, rather than scientific. But, were Frank alive, I know he'd object vociferously. (As did the late great Ann McCaffrey, when people called Pern, et al, S-Fantasy rather than Science Fiction.) Hitch |
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12-08-2017, 12:09 PM | #74 | |
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Like you, I don't care enough to argue about what specific books should be considered High Low Epic Urban, etc... I'm more curious about what the labels themselves imply than which books get which labels. I still don't see any real consistency in how the labels are defined/applied from fan to fan, though. I figure a fantasy book is just saddled with whichever particular sub-label is first applied to it. Whether it be by the author, the publisher or reviewer. *shrug* |
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12-08-2017, 12:27 PM | #75 | |
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Honestly, most of them seem to just decide that X is HF, or not. It's as if some friend said, "hey, you'll love this HF book," and thus, it is so anointed for eternity. I mean, look at this thread. Most of what's been said as HF, isn't. As in "world-changing events" or the "amount" of magic or this/that. {shrug}. Therefore, it's obvious that the labels aren't working. Perhaps, only librarians or cataloguers care. I'll say this, though--I've seen near fights-to-the-death over the labeling of some books, and we all know fans of this or that series/book/character/show/game (you name it) that will go to their grave fighting over whether this happened (Han Shot First!), or not, or this character is really dead, or not and so on. Hitch |
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