/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.15649218]

Why do fantasy authors keep taking stuff from LOTR but not the books that inspired the series?

[Anonymous No.15649227]

I saw X and clapped!

[Anonymous No.15649239]

>>15649218
Actually most modern fantasy authors take from Wheel of Time and other books that took from LotR, but they don't really take from LotR directly.

Also, don't underestimate the influence of video games and tabletop games on nerds. A lot of faggots have shit like Orcs or Mithril in their books, not because of Tolkien but because they first saw it in Runescape or WoW, MTG, and shit like that.

[Anonymous No.15649268]

>>15649239
I feel sad for him, he wanted to revive ancient traditions but he only ended up non-directly inspiring a shallow consumerist culture that shits all over those traditions and doesn’t thank them for it

[Anonymous No.15649277]

>>15649268
Don’t worry there are those who can appreciate Tolkien and the ancient works AND not be retarded consumers.

[Anonymous No.15649285]

>>15649268
He's probably the most ripped off author of the last century. And so much of what followed was fucking cringe.

[Anonymous No.15650274]

Didn't Tolkien himself steal from the Finns?

[Anonymous No.15650476]

Does anyone else think that the fact that so many modern fantasy authors are hardcore atheists is part of the problem with modern fantasy?

I feel like if you want to properly write fantastical literature, with magic and strangeness and powerful spiritual forces, you need to be somewhat spiritual yourself. Tolkien, of course, was a devout Catholic and had a really powerful love of the Divine. But I feel like just SOME spiritual sense, ANY spiritual sense, is what you need to write really good fantasy, because you need to be able to properly conceptualize something above and beyond the material. That's what makes for really good magic. Ursula K. LeGuin was deeply interested in Taoism and Buddhism, and Gene Wolfe was a Catholic convert, and both of them wrote really good fantasy, too.

Whereas it seems like so many modern fantasy writers are just dull materialists with no transcendent idea of reality, and their fantasy suffers as result. They don't have a grasp of the mysticism that would necessarily suffuse any world where magic was real, where gods and fairies and spirits and other such things are real.

[Anonymous No.15650485]

>>15650274
DELETE THIS

[Anonymous No.15650654]

>>15650274
He was heavily inspired by the Kalevala.

[Anonymous No.15650976]

>>15650476
A pretty dumb take, anon, ngl
The problem is that any fantasy writer who is not an American writing about fireballs and dragons and shit gets called "Magical realism". And god forbid if they occasionally write non-genre stuff. Surely, you must ONLY write genre fiction to be a genre author...

[Anonymous No.15650983]

>>15649239
Christ, what kind of ultra-shit-tier genre books have you been reading?

[Anonymous No.15651133]

>>15649239
>Actually most modern fantasy authors take from Wheel of Time and other books that took from LotR, but they don't really take from LotR directly.
Hit the nail on the head, The Wheel of Time and Dragonlance were very influential (for better and for worse) and sold like gangbusters.

>Also, don't underestimate the influence of video games and tabletop games on nerds.
I'm kinda amazed at the longevity and influence that Dungeons & Dragons continues to have on fantasy, but considering how mainstream nerd culture has gotten maybe I shouldn't be so surprised.

[Anonymous No.15651285]

>>15650976
Your take is way dumber than his. Yours is barely even a take.

[Anonymous No.15651292]

>>15649218
lotr and dune inspired by lsd or mushrooms.

[Anonymous No.15651304]

>>15651285
Of course it is not a take, it is the trivial truth

[Anonymous No.15652090]

>>15649218
That always happens in these sub genres, it happened to science fiction, it happened to anime, it happened to historical fiction, and it'll happen to whatever comes next.

[Anonymous No.15652198]

>>15650274
DELETE! FINLAND HAS NO HISTORY!

t Finnish Heritage Agency

[Anonymous No.15652242]

>>15649218
because that's how contemporary fantasy works.
first-second wave get their ideas from classics, new wave got their ideas from the first wave and other literary fiction, contemporary fantasy got their ideas from the outcomes of those waves and products of those waves such as video games, comics, tv shows, etc. they have no link with literature, they are for an audience which hears/sees not reads.

[Anonymous No.15652244]

>>15650476
Religious can't write non manichean stories for shit. They are litteraly garbage tier writer and Tolkien is the living proof of it.
You can have the best, most detailed universe on your hand if you can't write characters with nuanced personnalities and ambitions you're forever kiddy author material

[Anonymous No.15652261]

>>15650476
SanderHACK is a Mormon. Your argument is invalid.

[Anonymous No.15652280]

>>15652261
How? The mormon holy books are literally entry-level highschool science fiction; not exactly high mysticism.

[Anonymous No.15652312]

>>15652280
what about mystic underpants?

[Anonymous No.15652578]

>>15652244
Ever read Tolstoy?

[Anonymous No.15652685]

>>15652578
russians are based so it doesn't count

[Anonymous No.15652814]

>>15652244
Someone hasn't read Brideshead Revisited

[Anonymous No.15653700]

Can this be a pseudo sffg? I finished LotR a few months again and frankly I'm too scared to start new fantasy because I won't be as awed. I had the mignon and I don't want to go back to the McDouble .-t American