A Too-Simple History of Fantasy

I watched a video recently from a YouTube channel called The Second Story. The channel is run by Hilary Layne. The video was titled, "This Is Why We Never Got Another Lord of the Rings." 

In the video, Hilary tells a history of the epic fantasy genre, focusing first on Lester Del Rey and his very narrow promotion of epic fantasy, starting with Terry Brooks's Sword of Shannara, and moving forward with a very specific formula for what he would publish. From then on, Del Rey focused on this narrow niche, and she contends that this narrow view unjustly minimized other excellent writers of fantasy.

Then, she argues, that formula went stale in the 1990s, which led to the rise of a counter-movement led by Michael Moorcock (in his capacity as an editor and publisher and less so as a writer) and George R.R. Martin. From that point on, epic fantasy became dark, lewd, anti-heroic, and focused on evil and evil incentives. While you might expect this to have been a breath of fresh air, Hilary observes that this was simply another very narrow formula, and was still a very restrictive force on publishing.

Her conclusions seem to be this: It's better to avoid formulas. She's very critical of what she perceives as corporate greed. She maintains that after all this time, Lord of the Rings is still the best out there, and observes that "entertaining" is too subjective to simply apply to one single formula.

This video got a mixed response from her viewers. Many comments complained that she was ignoring a large amount of fantasy publishing that makes her narrow argument ring false. They noted that fantasy as a major genre existed long before LotR, talking about many other authors (the comments are actually a really great source for a wide variety of good authors you might want to check out!!) both before and after Tolkien. They brought up the great writer Terry Pratchett as well, and the genre of parody fantasy, which can still be pretty epic at its best. They criticized her apparent anti-capitalism laments. 

By the way, here are a few author names that showed up in the comments. Some of them I've read, some not. It seemed like a good "quarry" for readers to find authors worth checking out...

• Terry Pratchett
• Ursula le Guin
• Robert E. Howard
• Tanith Lee
• H.P. Lovecraft
• Ashton Smith
• Poul Anderson
• Jack Vance

There was some argument that some of these authors might be better classed as horror rather than fantasy, but the fantasy chops of horror authors were promoted successfully, in my estimation. Plus, walling off horror from fantasy works against Hilary's entreaty to avoid formulas.

My personal criticisms of her video were that she was lacking in entrepreneurial understanding: Obviously publishers can, should, and do publish more of what actually sells. That doesn't preclude them from looking for additional opportunities! There was nothing preventing other organizations from springing up and meeting other readers' needs.

I also observe that indie and self-publishing are great new fields to put out stories that don't fit typical molds.

Her history of fantasy was, I think, far too simplified. Her shift to Moorcock seemed like a sidestep, since Moorcock himself was an extremely prolific writer before the 1990s, and it seems silly to ignore his publications when she was arguing that very little else was selling.

She's right, of course, that Moorcock's dark fantasy can get stale, too.

Regarding her distaste for formulas, I note that formulas and exercises have value. A writer has to learn to walk before he can run. "Formula" is too broad a category: was Shakespeare formulaic for writing multi-act plays or using iambic pentameter? I would argue no!

It's worth remembering that LotR was the culmination of many, many years of work. Compare it to The Hobbit and you'll understand that even Tolkien had to grow as a writer.

I also note that it's very easy and cheap to criticize corporations for publishing slop while avoiding any criticism of authors who write slop. And that's not an attack on "slop;" it's perfectly reasonable to want to sit back with something easy and fun to read.

I think her coronation of LotR might even be a bit reductive. Is she failing to see the forest for the trees? For example, I think the way Raymond Feist does politics is an extremely interesting mix of realism and idealism... it's not the "same" as LotR even though it shares some common elements.

One other thing I worry about is overly-specific definitions. If she defines LotR as a paragon of epic fantasy, she risks defining epic fantasy in such a way that makes anything significantly different from LotR not epic fantasy. That might be why she thinks nothing of its caliber has been written since.

I think her history was rightly controversial. She was too clipped, and forgot the pulps entirely. Just because something can be broadly classified doesn't mean it's all the same. Similarly, if you make too many distinctions, you risk type-casting a story.

There is a need for publishers to serve their audiences, and they need to do what works and brings in money, or they will cease to exist.

And then, I want to emphasize that authors can and do improve over time, and they should expect to. My voice has certainly changed and developed over the last 2.5 years. There's always a pull between writing what you want to write and writing what's popular, but fortunately what's popular also changes over time. Maintaining an entrepreneurial spirit is important.

As for me, I'm going to keep writing and improving, and I hope some of you will consider reading. But even if you don't yet, maybe someday I'll convince you.