Polyhymnia wrote: ↑Tue Jul 06, 2021 7:26 am
I find it incredibly difficult to not wish myself into it all the time.
I tried reading the trilogy again, when the book by Nefastos and Astraya was published. There's something creepy and unnatural about how black and white it is, how innocent the Hobbits are, and how
evil Sauron is. I suppose it's the catholisism of Tolkien. I can't find any escapism in a book, if it's not
real, meaning ordinary people are evil, and supernatural evil must also be caused by "people" (whatever they are, elfs, dwarfs). For example in Le Guin's
Eartsea (three of which were probably the last fantasy books I read, because it's so difficult to find engaging fantasy, that doesn't feel like a child's attempt to dream back innocence), the supernatural antagonist is conjured up because of the ignorance and pride of the main character. But that's actually real, in this real world, me being the proud fool, who creates his own antagonists, so I suppose that's why it touched me. I wish I could go to a far way island, and kill my shadow (or assimilate it, or whatever) Funny, these books were written for "younger readers".
On the subject of epic fantasy (and maybe wanting to live there), in Neal Stephenson's
Fall, Or Dodge In Hell (his most recent book), a man named Dodge gets his consciousness transferred to an empty, dark, digital after-life, where nothing exist, except his own torment. After a long time alone, he gains the ability to control this
hell, and he creates an epic fantasy reality, that's then populated by other dead human's, none of whom know, that they previously were bald apes inhabiting a cynical, and nihilistic, declining civilization, or that all the still living humans outside, desperately want to join this fantasy world and forget the real world ever existed. A masterpiece.