BTW, I teach fantasy at an R1 flagship state university, and I have never used the terms "high fantasy" or "low fantasy" in the classroom. Nor have I seen it in the research I've done. It's not a particularly useful heuristic--I'd rather talk about stuff that matters like thematics of time and liminal states.

Quote from: Maltese Changeling;725780BTW, I teach fantasy at an R1 flagship state university, and I have never used the terms "high fantasy" or "low fantasy" in the classroom. Nor have I seen it in the research I've done. It's not a particularly useful heuristic--I'd rather talk about stuff that matters like thematics of time and liminal states.

That's what I thought, because that definition doesn't make any sense.

Look at Last Light of the Sun. You have not-Vikings attacking not-England and not-Wales, while the locals talk about not-Rome, not-Jerusalem and not-Constantinople (which made it really confusing to figure out which was which).

Except for the Crystal Dragon Jesus religion you could easily change the whole book to historical fiction by just swapping out some proper nouns.

Or look at Howard's fantasy stuff in general you have some stuff like Conan that's happening in that's another world (sort of) while you have stuff like Kane and some one-offs (like the one set in Sumeria) and separating them out into different genres is silly when you can do simple search and replace for proper nouns to do things like Stygia -> Egypt to convert Conan stories into historical fiction with some fantasy elements easily.

Just not a useful distinction to draw in any way.

The distinction traces via Tymn et al, and it seems to have some traction but it's not necessarily widespread in academic or professional criticism, nor is it the only taxonomy. I found some discussion in an RPGnet thread a while back: http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?474042-Conan-Is-Conan-High-Fantasy Interesting to note that the insertion of that bit in the Wikipedia entry dates from about the same time.

It may go back a bit farther beyond Tymn, maybe to Todorov.

I wish to point out that academic discussion often defines terms for local use in one article or book, and later articles will give an an overview of terminology and breakdowns, along with motivations for their use. Popularizing works may make the mistake of taking the first analysis they find and presenting that as canonical. This is no more or less valid than the way that folk usage (such as the RPG-cultural idea of high fantasy) becomes canonized.

I located an article by Lloyd Alexander from the early 70s "High Fantasy and Heroic Romance" where he refers to "high fantasy" but he doesn't use "low fantasy".

Quote from: Premier;725771I'm curious, not combative, but could you give some actual sources and citations of original academic sources that explicity claim so? Other than the ones on Wikipedia's page?

I may be an academic, but I'm not an English literature academic.
Here's what I get from a Google 'Books Search' for 'Literary High Fantasy':

The top results are all discussions of "portals to other worlds" (mostly) children's fantasy.
Some interesting discussion here

It looks to me, if that source is accurate, that the term "high fantasy" was not used until Tolkien, eg it was not affixed to Baum's "Oz", which is pretty much a secondary world, and certainly not to Burroughs' Mars (etc). But somehow for litcrits the 'high' became attached to the "made up world" bit of Tolkien, not the "epic quest vs Evil" bit. Conversely, RPGers tend to use it in the latter (IMO more sensible) sense.

Quote from: The Ent;725726I see your points and agree I guess.

I gotta admit though that my views on Forgotten Realms is different from that of most; I see it less as an epic good vs evil place and more like a "Lankhmar + Hobbit" mix place if that makes any sense. Admittedly I tend to pretend the place's high level wizards don't exist.

If I ran Forgotten Realms I would deal with Elminster by saying that at any given moment he's busy having sex with one of the Seven Sisters or that hot Drow apprentice of his.

Cause if I were Elminster, that's what I'd be doing.

JG

Back to the OP rather than the litcrit class

I think High/Epic fantasy needs

An elder race with lofty ideals and great knowlege but who are unwilling unable too few to directly influence events
A corruption of that race that act as the antagonist
A savage race in the thrall of the corrupted race that act as their foot soldiers and can relieve the heroes from the problems of mass murder and genocide
The Human/humanis race that is the protagonist race from where the fight to stop the evil will occur.


I think that maps well to
Elves
Nazgul (okay not a direct match but same base model)
Orcs
Men/hobbits

Or -
Jedi
Sith
Stormtooper
Rebel alliance

Or -
Sons of Adam
Calormen
Assorted corrupted types
Posh middle class kids from the Home Counties

Or -

insert fantasy novel


I think Epic fantasy is more concerned with themes than races
So its a Power rising up to conquer the world and someone needs to stand against it as opposed to murder hobos going round and killing things and taking their stuff.

You can play murder hobo games against a High/epic fantasy setting The Good, The Bad and the Ugly makes a great stab at that as does every game of MERP set in the 4th age. You can't play a High/epic fantasy game set in a Low fantasy world. If there is no Power (lets face it usually in the East) to rise up against and no clear boundary between Good and Evil (as sides as opposed to personal ideology) you are at best playing at Arthurian Knight's Errant out to help the little guy.


The extra races found in D&D for example are in play really just aspects of human civ mad large or an excuse to min max.
If you want a world with many playable races then build a race builder for the DM and let him go to town or take the Dying earth approach (also possibly the star wars approach) and have each race as basically a one off and let the players build them and pick a few racical skills/advantages disadvantage type things on a list. Personally I woudl favour something like the random tables in the DMG for creating creatures from the lower planes just a little more anthromorphic.

Quote from: James Gillen;726043If I ran Forgotten Realms I would deal with Elminster by saying that at any given moment he's busy having sex with one of the Seven Sisters or that hot Drow apprentice of his.

Cause if I were Elminster, that's what I'd be doing.

JG

That absolutely works

Quote from: jibbajibba;726059I think High/Epic fantasy needs

An elder race with lofty ideals and great knowlege but who are unwilling unable too few to directly influence events
A corruption of that race that act as the antagonist
A savage race in the thrall of the corrupted race that act as their foot soldiers and can relieve the heroes from the problems of mass murder and genocide
The Human/humanis race that is the protagonist race from where the fight to stop the evil will occur.

(snip)

Or -
Sons of Adam
Calormen
Assorted corrupted types
Posh middle class kids from the Home Counties

Yeah, Narnia's like that isn't it

Quote from: jibbajibbaI think Epic fantasy is more concerned with themes than races
So its a Power rising up to conquer the world and someone needs to stand against it as opposed to murder hobos going round and killing things and taking their stuff.

You can play murder hobo games against a High/epic fantasy setting The Good, The Bad and the Ugly makes a great stab at that as does every game of MERP set in the 4th age. You can't play a High/epic fantasy game set in a Low fantasy world. If there is no Power (lets face it usually in the East) to rise up against and no clear boundary between Good and Evil (as sides as opposed to personal ideology) you are at best playing at Arthurian Knight's Errant out to help the little guy.

G, B & U + LotR = The Gunslinger

I'm not sure I completely agree; I agree that murder hoboes in a high fantasy setting is absolutely possible. I do think you can play total high fantasy heroes in a low fantasy setting though, allthough this is definitely more work (for the PCs...) and I think "Knight Errant types riding about righting wrongs" is fairly epic, if in a Western movie way. But then this kinda stuff becomes kinda imo/ymmv territory doesn't it.

Of course one problem here - maybe the big problem - is that "high fantasy" and "low fantasy" both can mean different things.

High Fantasy = Good vs Evil writ large, all primary colours
however, High Fantasy = setting with lots of magic stuff, as well

Low Fantasy = shades of gray, grim & gritty
however, Low Fantasy = low-magic setting, as well

For literary comparisons: Black Company - absolutely high-magic, experienced wizards are basically godlike, but also very shades of gray/grim and gritty; Gemmell's novels - definitely low-magic with supernatural stuff very rare and usually psionics-like unless demon-related, also a bit gritty, but definitely good vs evil, all primary colours; Dying Earth - high magic and high weirdness, very shades of grey/amoral. And so on...it's the same for games imo.

This is kinda a problem. Allthough not a big one, just something to keep in mind.

People have a tendency to get Low Fantasy and Dark Fantasy mixed up, imo, wich could explain some of it. Of course  post-ASoIaF this is an obvious thing what with said series being both.

Quote from: jibbajibbaThe extra races found in D&D for example are in play really just aspects of human civ mad large or an excuse to min max.
If you want a world with many playable races then build a race builder for the DM and let him go to town or take the Dying earth approach (also possibly the star wars approach) and have each race as basically a one off and let the players build them and pick a few racical skills/advantages disadvantage type things on a list. Personally I woudl favour something like the random tables in the DMG for creating creatures from the lower planes just a little more anthromorphic.

I like this idea, I like it a lot!

I'd use the hell out of a set of random race creation tables!

I like the break down of:
Elder Races
New Races that are savage
New races that are settled.

The elements of old vs new, fallen vs rising, good vs evil, are pretty common in "High Fantasy," especially since they are notable in one of the major influences for many gamers (Lord of the Rings, not to mention of course Moorock's writings and inversion of some but not all of those tropes.)

Even Sword & Sorcery has similar ones: Magic vs will/might, savage vs settled (albeit savage is considered "Better" in S&S, than settled.)

Quote from: Sacrosanct;725279the core: elves, dwarves, and halflings

no half races like half elf or half orc, because if you accept the concept that one species can mate with the other, than you'd also have to have half dwarf and half halfing as well.  Or half dwarf/orc, or halfling/elf, and whateever else.

Or do what I do: Assume that all humanoid/demi-human hybrids are humans. On the grounds that the creatures are either mutated humans or failed attempts to create humans.

Quote from: Elfdart;727362Or do what I do: Assume that all humanoid/demi-human hybrids are humans. On the grounds that the creatures are either mutated humans or failed attempts to create humans.

Funny thing is--I've got that setting. Some people didn't seem to notice the interesting bits...because it is intentionally High Fantasy with humans as the elder race, and everything else as their "experiments/progeny+"

Quote from: The Ent;726061

Of course one problem here - maybe the big problem - is that "high fantasy" and "low fantasy" both can mean different things.

High Fantasy = Good vs Evil writ large, all primary colours
however, High Fantasy = setting with lots of magic stuff, as well

Low Fantasy = shades of gray, grim & gritty
however, Low Fantasy = low-magic setting, as well

For literary comparisons: Black Company - absolutely high-magic, experienced wizards are basically godlike, but also very shades of gray/grim and gritty; Gemmell's novels - definitely low-magic with supernatural stuff very rare and usually psionics-like unless demon-related, also a bit gritty, but definitely good vs evil, all primary colours; Dying Earth - high magic and high weirdness, very shades of grey/amoral. And so on...it's the same for games imo.

This is kinda a problem. Allthough not a big one, just something to keep in mind.

I always try to seperate out those two aspects so you can have :

High Fantasy = Good vs Evil writ large, all primary colours
vs
Low Fantasy = shades of gray, grim & gritty

alongside

High Magic = setting with lots of magic stuff
vs
Low Magic.

Lord of the Rings, for example, would be High Fantasy, Low Magic.  Traditional RuneQuest with its assumed setting, would be Low Fantasy, High Magic, or maybe Ubiquitous Magic (as its everywhere but not high-powered).  Dying Earth, would come out as Low Fantasy, High Magic, from this.

Thoughts?

Quote from: Psychman;727766I always try to seperate out those two aspects so you can have :

High Fantasy = Good vs Evil writ large, all primary colours
vs
Low Fantasy = shades of gray, grim & gritty

alongside

High Magic = setting with lots of magic stuff
vs
Low Magic.

Lord of the Rings, for example, would be High Fantasy, Low Magic.  Traditional RuneQuest with its assumed setting, would be Low Fantasy, High Magic, or maybe Ubiquitous Magic (as its everywhere but not high-powered).  Dying Earth, would come out as Low Fantasy, High Magic, from this.

Thoughts?

I think your solution is very good.

I agree that there's a difference between magic being common and magic being powerful, and I know some have thought that the former is actually more common in "low fantasy" (but then we're talking very low-powered and/or fairytale-ish magic). Like Patricia A. McKillip's books, wich I read lots of when younger (allthough whether this is meaningfully different from "High Magic" might be a matter of opinion and taste more than anything).

I suppose one could add something about the subtlety of the magic involved.

I suppose one could also add a "weirdness" aspect. Dying Earth frex is really "weird", ditto Clark Ashton Smith's stories.

Quote from: James Gillen;726043If I ran Forgotten Realms I would deal with Elminster by saying that at any given moment he's busy having sex with one of the Seven Sisters or that hot Drow apprentice of his.

Cause if I were Elminster, that's what I'd be doing.

JG

In Ed Greenwood's own version of the Realms, that pretty much IS what he's doing.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;725423Perhaps I didn't word it very well.  If you allow half elves and half orcs (two completely different species from humans), then logically you'd also have to allow any mixed-species breed.  human/dwarf, halfling/orc, dwarf/elf, etc.  Half elves and half orcs have become a staple of many fantasy rpgs because...just because it was done that way.  For the most part.  And yet, we don't see half dwarves, halfling/orc or gnoll/elf mixes, etc as playable races in any fantasy rpg I can think of.

TSR era toyed with it now and then.
Dark Sun had half-dwarvs and I think half-giants?
Red Steel had half-Gnolls.
Lost Plateau or whatever it was called had half-kobolds.
Planescape had half demons, half-angels, half-elementals.
Forget which one had Half-Ogres...

Quote from: RPGPundit;727792In Ed Greenwood's own version of the Realms, that pretty much IS what he's doing.

He certainly does in the only "Elmisnter" novel I have.