tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34037941.post5222432581330405002..comments2023-12-16T00:29:00.782-05:00Comments on Dark Parables - Reviews from a Christian Sister: Envelope PushingCarole McDonnellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15443401088634718848noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34037941.post-12542898256286194672008-04-03T20:15:00.000-04:002008-04-03T20:15:00.000-04:00Tough Guide to Fantasyland is primarily a listing ...<I>Tough Guide to Fantasyland</I> is primarily a listing of all the shticks of "Tolkien in a Blender" done in the form of a travel guide. If you want to write the next <I>Eragon</I>, just include as many of the entries as possible.<BR/><BR/><I>Dark Lord of Derkholm</I> is a hoot; imagine a fantasy world that is obligated to host what are effectively "Live D&D Games" from our world; the locals have to do all the work and take all the casualties -- especially the poor shmuck who drew the short straw and has to be The Dark Lord this year. This year, an absent-minded professor-type wizard named Derk gets to be Sauron; when he's racked up by a dragon early on, his also-wizarding wife and kids (two human and five gryphon) have to keep all the balls in the air and things just keep going south. Mix in as many shticks as possible from <I>Tough Guide to Fantasyland</I> and you have a howler of a fantasy parody.<BR/><BR/>Incidentally, I'm one of Karina Fabian's stable of anthology authors. The one with Goth Ferrets in Space.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34037941.post-90715191360098410112008-04-03T15:31:00.000-04:002008-04-03T15:31:00.000-04:00Thanks so much, Anonymous! For both comments. I h...Thanks so much, Anonymous! For both comments. I have got to get the tough guide to fantasyland. This is the second time I've heard of it...and I still haven't gotten it. -CCarole McDonnellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15443401088634718848noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34037941.post-52387219583581845362008-04-03T14:34:00.000-04:002008-04-03T14:34:00.000-04:00But when I read American fantasy, I feel as if I a...<I>But when I read American fantasy, I feel as if I am called to abandon that culture and take on Elvish and Wicca.</I><BR/><BR/>It's called "Tolkien in a Blender", Carole. Or "Elves, Dwarves, etc". JRR Tolkien was such a seminial influence on fantasy that pretty much everybody since has stayed with what he established. Kind of like what <I>Star Trek</I> did to space-opera SF.<BR/><BR/>I understand publishers WOULD like to see more variety in fantasy, but they also want to sell, so they stick with what sells: Elves, Dwarves, and (post-Mercedes Lackey) Celtic Urban Faeries.<BR/><BR/>It got so bad Diana Wynne Jones (a student of both Tolkien and Lewis at Oxford) finally had to take to the typer or start taking hostages. Her <I>Tough Guide to Fantasyland</I> and <I>Dark Lord of Derkholm</I> are both sendups of Elves, Dwarves, etc.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34037941.post-80235586444415034712008-04-03T14:29:00.000-04:002008-04-03T14:29:00.000-04:00Who came up with this metaphor of "envelopes"?...a...<I>Who came up with this metaphor of "envelopes"?...and of "pushing envelopes"?</I><BR/><BR/>Aircraft test pilots in the 1940s, according to the book <I>The Right Stuff</I>. "Envelope" originally referred to the "performance envelope" of high-performance aircraft, the maximum performance possible for the aircraft, beyond which the plane could tear itself apara and/or crash. (<I>The Right Stuff</I> starts out with a graphic description of the results of such a fatal crash.) <BR/><BR/>"Pushing the Envelope" meant taking the new/untested aircraft right up to that limit without going over into catastrophic failure. Of course, with a new/untested aircraft you didn't know exactly where that limit would be until you pushed it and lived...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com