Magic in Fantasy Stories

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scameter18

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I am a Catholic writer contemplating writing a fantasy story, being an avid reader of fantasy stories myself. I especially love the very Catholic Lord of the Rings. I am not trying to start an argument about the efficacy of fantasy stories. I am simply looking for people’s opinions on this matter, from a Catholic standpoint. God bless, and happy Thanksgiving. 🙂
 
The only fiction I read is generally fantasy, sci-fi/spec-fi and espionage/government novels. I read some select traditional fiction (Dostoevsky, Kafka, Pynchon, DF Wallace) sometimes, but I love my genre fantasy and sci-fi.

Now, the only difference between fantasy and sci-fi, beyond the setting, is that in Fantasy, one performs teleportation by the incanting of an eldritch code or by naming the true name of whatever, whereas in Science Fiction one performs teleportation through means of pressing a button on a console or attached to your arm containing Quantum Manipulators and Heisenberg Compensators. The effect is the same, and the in-world purpose is the same. Neither are Satanic, as no one actually believes that it translates to real life.

Fantasy and sci-fi can be used to Christian ends (LotR, Narnia, Book of the New Sun, Thomas Covenant, Andromeda), to atheistical ends (Sword of Truth, Anathem, Thomas Covenant), somewhere in-between or “generic religious” without being Christian (Wheel of Time, Mistborn, Dune, A Song of Ice and Fire, Stargate), apathetic, (Black Company, Malazan Book of the Fallen, Name of the Wind/Wise Man’s Fear, The First Law), or fictional entirely (Belgariad, Malazan Book of the Fallen), but, in the end, they’re stories, and unless one reads them as a manual to life, they’re just good fun. (Note: I bolded those which are the pre-eminent examples of the categories I laid down: indeed the Book of the New Sun is probably fiction, full stop, par excellence, or at least the best 20th-century work. Thomas Covenant can be either Christian or Atheist, depending on how it is interpreted.)

Some of these are worlds where atheists exist, even though the gods/God interfere with the world constantly, and prayers are answered quickly, visibly, and with a vengeance.
 
I agree with Khalid. I see no problem with magic in fantasy.
 
I’ll just share about some books I read in my childhood that I read over and over again and years later gave those books as gifts, and told those stories to my grandchildren.

The original “Pinochio” by Carlos Collidi, and an adaptation of “King Midas and the Golden Touch”.

Gepetto created the marionette Pinochio, and when he was finished, Pinochio kicked him in the shins. Then follows an adventurous story…his nose grows when he lies, he skips school with his friends, the Blue Fairy visited him for guidance (I saw her as our Blessed Mother.) etc.
In the end he becomes a “real boy”.

King Midas and the Golden Touch taught about greed, and the disastrous results it had for the king. He had wished for everything he touched to turn to gold so he could be the richest man in the world – how humorous and telling when he couldn’t eat food, nor smell the beautiful flowers in his garden when his wish was granted! The last straw was when he hugged his beloved daughter and she turned into a gold statue! King Midas wept and then wished the “golden touch” would go away. (It did!) 🙂
 
I guess I could choose any of the first three, in different senses.

I think it’s important that ordinary folk don’t use magic in these stories, or if they do that it’s made clear that their doing so was evil. Both Tolkien and Lewis follow that general pattern, though they both occasionally slip up in that regard. The worst of those would probably be the horrible scene in which Frodo tells Gollum that if he tried to take the ring in his last desperation he, Frodo, would put it on and order Gollum to kill himself, and Gollum would have to. It’s presented as a great, noble moment for Frodo but it seems to me it’s as bad or worse than his failure at Mount Doom.

A much more positive example would be the magician in The Magician’s Uncle, whose use of magic is presented as both evil and extremely foolish.
 
I’m always of a mixed mind when it comes to fantasy magic. However, magic coming into life as a result of pacting with spirits that do not obey God, as would be trying to draw on some natural forces in a manner bypassing God. In this particular instance, it does not matter whether such “magic” is used for good or evil as it is intrinsically evil because it is an attempt to “bypass” God.

Doesn’t mean people can’t have parabolic heroic abilities that are not available right here and now to us, common bread eaters. Basically, if the abilities were a gift from God, either as supernatural gifts (charisms of office or charisms in general) or even as natural gifts (e.g. carried in a chromosome), it would be A-OK. The “wielders” of such abilities, especially the “natural” gifts, would not necessarily need to be shining examples of perfection in every minute of their lives.

So, things like seeing in the dark could be a mutation, carried forth in DNA. Inexplicable affinity with heroic feats could be okay too. A saintly figure healing people, striking wrongdoers with storms of fire etc. wouldn’t be much different from prophets and saints, as long as the “power” were not natural to them or simply learnt but a free gift from God (associated with a calling, probably). Things like a true annointed king curing certain diseases were normal beliefs in European middle ages.

It would be much harder to justify cramming from books and throwing fireballs around. 😉 That too, probably, could be done depending on the description of the fantasy world. I suppose if “magic” were part of the laws of physics, doable by anybody with intelligence and learning (and/or people with e.g. certain genetic affinity), but absolutely no pacting with any spirits, then that should be okay too, I guess.
 
I’ve never seen a book of Fantasy where magic wasn’t governed by laws or physics of some sort. The more detailed, well-defined and unbreakable the laws are, generally the better the book. Mistborn is a prime example of this, where all of the “magic” (Allomancy, Feruchemy, and the evil Hemalurgy) that can be used, all of the effects and all of the different combinations, and the people that can use them, are laid out in a graph in the front of the book - that way, the author can’t use a previously unknown mega-spell as a deus ex machina.

As I said in my first place, it’s a substitute for high technology when the book is written in a different era or strange world.

Very few books (the only one that I can think of personally is Johannes Cabal, and I’ve read most fantasy books out there, at least high fantasy and sword and sorcery: I don’t read vampire books, werewolfe books, horror, HP Lovecraft, etc. - when it comes to HP Lovecraft, from what I know, those books truly are demonic*) have any sort of dealing with the devil in the sense that you’re speaking of (often, there are many gods, in a world without one God, but, as long as it’s kept separate from reality, I don’t see the difference, like the Ainur in LotR; the world is fiction, so it doesn’t have to reflect the laws or metaphysics of our world: as JRR Tolkien said, and he was a conservative in such matters, something to the effect of, “I wrote thinking of what could have been, if God had governed differently”), and those that do are generally of the most despicable character (Bauchelain and Korbal Broach, Voldemort, the Forsaken), but their misfortunes are often used as dark humor and horror (Johannes Cabal), but rarely as anti-heroes.

*Note: there are those books that some would call Fantasy, such as HP Lovecraft, Aleister Crowley, Helena Blavatsky, Elizabeth Clare Prophet, and other works associated with Gnosticism/Thelema/Theosophy are truly evil, which comes to from their being called Fantasy, but from the fact that some people believe they represent actual real-world application and false, Satanic worship and religion.

However, I would put this in the category “false religious works”, and would rank other such, such as the Book of Mormon, the Book of Moses, the Nag Hammadi Library, Hermes Trismegistus, the Book of Abraham, various Grimoires/Keys of Solomon, the Sixth and Seventh Books of Moses, the Koran, the Urantia Book, etc. in this category. I suppose they can be called Fantasy in a sense, because false religion is Fantasy, as our own most holy and true religion is fantastic, and the false religions inevitably copy it.

Even in that case, I believe that heretical antilegomena and apocryphal books written in the Biblical style by members of cults such as the Sethians, Manichees, Valentinians, etc. can be useful in a proper historical context, but for scholarly study, not for fun reading.
 
Addition to above post:

Even in that case, I believe that heretical antilegomena and apocryphal books written in the Biblical style by members of cults such as the Sethians, Manichees, Valentinians, etc. can be useful in a proper historical context, but for scholarly study, not for recreational reading (unless ancient studies is a recreation for you, as it is for me). **I say “heretical antilegomena and apocryphal books written in the Biblical style by members of cults” **to separate books such as the Gospel of the Lord, the Book of Thomas the Contender, the Gospel of Judas, the Gospel of Mary Magdalen, etc. (heretical pseudepigrapha and Gnostic works) from canonical antilegomena (2 and 3 John, Revelation, 2 Peter), and from anagignoskomena, or apocryphal but useful books (the term is used in Orthodoxy to mean the deuterocanon), such as 3 and 4 Esdras, the Psalms of Solomon, 3 and 4 Maccabees, Ethiopic Enoch, the Assumption of Moses, the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, the Prayer of Manasseh, the Apocalypse of Peter, the Epistles of Clement, the Shepherd of Hermas, the Didache, etc.
 
There is a demonic realm and demons and other servants of satan definitely exist so if we engage in writing, reading or viewing stories that focus on these topics, we are really in danger of opening doors to allow such evil influences into our life. I really feel its important to only let things into one’s life that are pure, good, wholesome and holy.

I instinctively feel that magic is a dodgy area - we have a big problem in the UK with people who are heavily into Wiccan magic. It is sold to them as something very benign and positive, but really it is one end of a spectrum the other end of which is witchcraft of the blackest kind.

So I am inclined to think that anything that encourages people to dabble in such things is inadvisable. That is one of my criticisms of the Harry Potter series of books and films.
 
Fantasy doesn’t encourage people of even half-stable minds to dabble in the occult, any more than Aesop’s fables or science fiction does. One must be careful to not fall in to Puritanism (this coming from someone who is extremely conservative), which, when starting to ban adult’s purely fictional (and supplied as purely fictional) fantasy books, is coming close. There is no way in Hell (pun intended) that reading Lord of the Rings or Mistborn or The Malazan Book of the Fallen is a conduit for demonic influence.

There’s a difference as between night and day when the book is portrayed as non-fictional (such as various “Books of Shadows” and Wiccanist Beginner’s Guides are), along with the books I listed above, such as those that are the foundational document of a cult (Book of Mormon, Urantia Book, Koran, etc.) or those of Gnosticism, Theosophy, Ascended Masterism, etc.: the difference isn’t in the fact that they’re fictional and technically fantasy, but that they are presented as real, workable systems that are meant to be used in the real world, sometimes just minor modifications of a religion such as Christianity, and idiots fall for it. Those books that attempt to get people to practice fantasy, for lack of a better term, as if it were real, can be and are conduits of demonic influence.

Fiction that is fiction and acknowledged as fiction is different from fiction that presents itself as a foundational religious document, as those works I mentioned in my above posts and reiterated here do.

Wiccanism is a far cry from fantasy fiction. I daresay that anyone who messes with Wiccanism and Witch craft in real life knows what they’re getting in to - the occult - and I equally say that none decide to pick up Witch craft because they read Wheel of Time.

I don’t like the Harry Potter books for many reasons myself, one of the main ones being that they’re targeted at children with an un- or under-developed capacity for discernment - in which case they are actually able to cause spiritual harm.
 
I agree with Khalid. Unless you’re willfully or purposely seeking out books on Wiccan magic or witchcraft, I don’t believe that works of fiction are harmful other than possibly keeping you from sleeping at night, lol. Let’s face it, HP Lovecraft is creepy, but he was trying to be. Maybe he saw visions or dreamt of these things, but either way, he wasn’t seeking to inspire people to join the Church of Satan. I believe yes, our focus should be on higher things, most especially Jesus and the Saints, and Angels, and the things of Heaven.

Fiction is fiction, not an attempt to subdue minds or lead people astray. It is an entertainment in which our minds are temporarily allowed to journey to a different world created by an author, whether it be Fantasy, Sci-Fi, mystery, horror, or whatever.

A fantasy story without magic is like our world without God, the Angels, Saints, and Miracles. Part of the fantastical involves characters who are able to perform magical spells or feats, or have a magic relic of some kind (kind of like a Saint’s relic) that help them overcome some struggle (mostly external, but sometimes internal). It also often involves mythical creatures, such as elves, goblins, ogres, giants, fairies, etc.

Fantasy stories can be a great vehicle for the Christian/Catholic Allegory and can be used to edify and convert.

Khalid, I read the first 6 or 7 of Malzan the Fallen- up to the Bonehunters, I believe, but this series is one of those that becomes tedious because of the numerous story lines going on at the same time. It’s almost overwhelming in its scope, which seems to grow and morph with each book. I love the characters, I love the storytelling, but sometimes it becomes a bit much. There can be such a thing as too many characters and too many story lines.

I started The Wheel of Time many years ago, and haven’t gotten past the first 2 or 3 books because again, the tale just seems to branch out and go on forever. The best thing about a story is that it eventually ends. There has to be a cutoff. Harry Potter was about the perfect length for that particular tale, just as Narnia, and LOTR were for their respective tales.

Scameter18, I believe that if you write a fantasy, you need to include magic, but ask God to guide you to write a story that will uplift (in the end), inspire, and edify.

I’m a writer, myself, and I’ve had literally thousands of different ideas for stories. I’ve started and finished 2 novels that will never see the light of day (they weren’t good), written 3 short stories that I need to rewrite, and written the basic outline for a good number of books. Right now, I have 2 huge ideas floating around in my head, which have been building upon themselves for the past several years. One is a fantasy, one is a novel of the apocalypse. They are 2 very, very different stories. The fantasy will most likely be a trilogy, the novel of the apocalypse will be probably the length of Stephen King’s “The Stand” or “IT,” depending on if I ever muster the ambition to actually sit down and write the suckers.

Both are very unique ideas which haven’t yet been done in either field, but we’ll see if I ever find the time (and discipline!) to sit down and write either or both of them.

For my part, I’m sick of reading these apocalyptic stories where God is never present and terrible things are happening to all the characters without any divine intervention or assistance of any kind.

Good luck in your writing, Scameter18!

Peace & God Bless

Frank
 
The Malazan books are beyond excellent (excepting IC Esslemont’s Night of Knives), but, if you stopped at the seventh book, that’s perfect: the last five books came out in the wrong order in America, and as such, books 8 and later made no sense if you read them in order of release. From Bonehunters, read so: (Note that IC Esslemont’s latest book is nearly as good as Erikson himself):

*Return of the Crimson Guard
*Toll the Hounds
*Stonewielder
*Dust of Dreams
*The Crippled God

The series is amazing. Not as good as the Book of the New Sun, but better than something like Wheel of Time, or A Song of Ice and Fire, which are the prototypes of what you mentioned - the author getting bogged down in minutiae. Wheel of Time would have gotten worse if Brandon Sanderson hadn’t taken over (now, after Rand saying, “I’ll conquer Illian” in the fifth book, he actually does, and when Moraine says, “Tarmon Gaidon is near” in the third book, it actually begins in the twelfth and thirteenth: Sanderson picks the pace up to what it was in the first and second books, but his writing doesn’t integrate perfectly smoothly with Jordan’s, and he doesn’t write the female characters like Nynaeve - the core of the books - as well), and A Song of Ice and Fire is getting steadily worse. I had to force myself to slog through A Dance with Dragons - nothing happens, it’s poorly written, and GRRM spent 9 years “finishing the last half of it” since A Feast for Crows (which was much better, but not nearly as good as the earlier books).

Steven Erikson does not get bogged down - it may seem so, but the threads are woven with a master’s touch. Remember the first book, Gardens of the Moon, how it seemed almost Ulysses-like in the amount of sense it didn’t make, and how undirected it seemed, and how it came together by Memories of Ice and House of Chains? And then the entire next book (Midnight Tides) flashes back to the time of the prologue of the first book (1154 by the Reckoning of Burn’s Sleep, I think), on a different continent, introducing the Holds, the Tiste Edur, and the dying empire (I forget what it was called)? I can’t do justice to even the titles of his books without rambling, and he weaves the story to make it seem like a thriller. He does use the word “potsherd” a bit much, though, but what can you expect from an anthropologist and archaeologist? I imagine that’s why he’s so excellent at inventing believable-fantastic dead civilizations in great detail.
 
Thank you all very much for the advice. I rarely get to ask questions like this to a Catholic audience, since many fantasy writers seem to be pagan or atheistic, as is the general tone of their stories. I am a lover of Tolkien’s works, and I am also a fan of Harry Potter, despite the many criticisms of it. I love the capacity of fantasy stories to be truly Faerie, as Tolkien defined it in On Faerie-Stories - frameless, without political connection to this world through allegory, yet representing timeless truth, highlighting this world through magical alterations, and using things like typology, morality, and other arts to make the Catholic worldview silent, yet very present, the world itself saturated with Catholicism. I love how fantasy stories, using these and more common fantasy tools, can create epic storylines with deep drama, meaning, character development and complex, mysterious magical systems. I love the use of heroism, yet mixed with Christian humility, self-sacrifice and God’s ultimate Providence (exemplified by the climax of LotR at Mount Doom) in a way that uplifts and makes life seem so wondrous, meaningful and truly exciting, when so often it feels very dreary and pointless to so many people.

I want to write fantasy because I love reading and watching it - I want to produce that same type of reaction in my readers (and myself!). I am just very wary of making a sub-par faerie world and story. I want it to be completely fantasy, completely what I love and what faerie should be. I have wanted to write my entire life, and I have been contemplating fantasy for years, yet I have written very little over that time span because of my indecision. If I could only figure it out, know what to do, I could write at last. Thank you all for helping my in this quest. God bless. 🙂
 
If I may also ask two more questions in this topic:
  1. Should magic in stories be used by normal humans?
  2. Can/should magic be interchangeable with technology?
 
If I may also ask two more questions in this topic:
  1. Should magic in stories be used by normal humans?
  1. Can/should magic be interchangeable with technology?
It should - for entertainment - but it should be made clear to children that it is fantasy which has nothing to do with miracles and supernatural power.
 
Thank you, that is interesting. I would also like any other replies people could give. These two questions are especially important for my writing. Thank you and God bless. 🙂
 
I chose the first option because you identified yourself as a Catholic writer. Otherwise, I would have probably gone with the second option.
 
If I may also ask two more questions in this topic:
  1. Should magic in stories be used by normal humans?
  2. Can/should magic be interchangeable with technology?
  1. I already answered this- I think it should either not be used by normal humans or if it is it should clearly be evil and foolish for them to have done so, like Digory’s uncle or the men who became the Ringwraiths.
  2. I think that’s fine if that’s what the author wants to go for, but in that case it passes more into the field of science fiction.
 
Thank you for your answers and advice. God bless. 🙂

If I may ask, what is your personal opinion about the use of modern or more advanced technology in fantasy? Basically, can fantasy and science fiction be effectively mixed in one story without it becoming convoluted?
 
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