(urth) Gummed-Up Works or Got Lives?

[Dan'l Danehy-Oakes]

Yes, and there is plenty of "high" fantasy that precedes JRRT also --
notably William Morris.

On Fri, Dec 16, 2011 at 9:01 AM, Larry Miller <decanus1284 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Dont forget that sword and sorcery also has roots in the planetary
> romances of burroughs who we know Wolfe was aware of.  There was also
> the Jirel of Joiry  and the Zothique stories that are the earliest
> sword and sorcery tales.  Or the Worm Ouroborous.  They all predate
> Tolkien.  And Conan being a cheap comic book derivative? Come on!
>
> On 12/16/11, Lee Berman <severiansola at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Dan'l Danehy-Oakes: You are absolutely correct, I meant "religious
>>> morality" and should
>>>have said so explicitly.
>>
>> Ah, well, not really. I understood but I'll confess that I just wanted an
>> excuse to
>> further discuss Tolkien with someone who knows more than I do about the
>> subject. :- )
>>
>>>Antonio Pedro Marques: The discussion was about what it looked like on the
>>> _surface_. If
>>>you only find out at the end of the story that a character seems to fit a
>>> fairy tale,
>>>then the fairytaleness isn't really part of the scenery, is it?
>>
>> Scenery! That's an interesting point. For me, it was fairly early in BotNS
>> that the S & S/
>> fairy tale aspects hit me. What came later (much later) was the recognition
>> of real religious
>> content in the story, albeit with an intensely gnostic flavor.
>>
>> For years I had wondered why Wolfe put "gnostic symbols" in the Witches
>> Tower. The problem
>> was my own limited knowledge of gnosticism. The impact of Alexander's brief
>> but mighty
>> empire on all levels of Western culture can't be ignored, including
>> religion. Our legends of
>> witches, vampires, manbeasts shapeshifting gods, monsters etc. can be traced
>> back to that time
>> period, in that part of the world.
>>
>> But anyway, does the fact that my realization of the religious aspect of
>> BotNS came later mean
>> it is not a religious story? Or even that religious trappings are not part
>> of the scenery?
>>
>>>Maybe for me s&s is a more restricted thing than for others. I think of
>>> Conan the Barbarian
>>>rather than LotR as the prototype. I'm not even sure I find LotR all that
>>> s&s, given the serious
>>>'historical' feeling I get from it, nor the Hobbit, given its (deceivingly)
>>> children's-tale style.
>>
>> Great observation and recognition Antonio. Perhaps I am not alone in having
>> assumed that LotR was
>> more of a prototype or archetype of S & S while Conan is more of a cheap
>> comic book derivative.
>> A cultural bias? Conan (like Tarzan) is a European character created by an
>> American, while LotR seems
>> somehow more authentic and refined- high brow British characters created by
>> an Englishman.
>>
>> But, a check online about Robert Howard, the creator of Conan (and who
>> pre-dates Tolkien), produces
>> this blurb:
>>
>>>With Conan and his other heroes, Howard created the genre now known as
>>> sword and sorcery, spawning
>>>a wide swath of imitators and giving him an influence in the fantasy field
>>> rivaled only by J. R. R.
>>>Tolkien and Tolkien's similarly inspired creation of high fantasy.
>>
>>
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-- 
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes