Who had the bigger influence on fantasy?
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Who had the bigger influence on fantasy?
Who had the bigger influence on fantasy?
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Love me some good ol' Robert, but he died too young. Wish I could see what he would have written later in his life.
>he died too young
he died exactly when he wanted to, soemthing you can't say about everyone
Howard pioneered the sword & sorcery subgenre. Tolkien codified the high fantasy subgenre.
Both took a lot of clues from Lord Dunsany.
What of Dunsany is worth reading? Read King of Elfland’s Daughter and I thought it was pretty odd. Plot and characters were weak but everything else was great. Felt like it was supposed to be a poem or something
Read the Book of Wonder and Sword of Welleran and other stories. If you enjoyed those pic related is a collection of 6 of his short story collections in one omnibus.
>Felt like it was supposed to be a poem or something
I tend to get that feel from Dunsany's work, as well. Things like Idle Days on the Yann.
>Howard pioneered
and great things came of it
>Tolkien codified
and only trash came of it
al capone
Dancun Crrump Ser
It's extremely obvious that the bulk of the fantasy that has been written in the last 60 years or so is firmly in the Tolkien camp. There are many fantasy authors with little to no influence from the pulp scene of the 1920s and 30s, but you would struggle immensely to find a single one of them that isn't deeply aware of The Lord of the Rings, its themes, its tropes, and its creatures. Personally I think REH has had more impact on fantasy games rather than in literature, but that's another topic entirely.
>Personally I think REH has had more impact on fantasy games rather than in literature, but that's another topic entirely.
It's the opposite. REH has been a huge influence on fantasy literature and film. Tolkien's influence is more in gaming.
Yeah I agree, except to the extent that you might suggest that some Fantasy authors seem to consciously avoid revealing Tolkien influence.
Not him, but Gygax with D&D effectively consolidated many common Sword and Sorcery tropes into one huge (and exceptionally popular) package. That includes Howard, Moorwiener, Lieber, Lovecraft and others (including Tolkien, if somewhat reluctantly).
OP specifically asked about Howard vs Tolkien, why be so butthurt that he didn't go out of his way to bring up Moorwiener?
>including Tolkien
Did he really took anything from Tolkien beyond a superficial take of his races?
>beyond a superficial take of his races
Halfings are more than a "superficial take," they are essentially hobbits. (As I recall, they were even called Hobbits until they got sued by the Tolkien estate.) Also, the "playable races" are a rather fundamental part of D&D. And of course, even if Gygax himself didn't really show much inspiration from Tolkien, plenty of players and subsequent content creators did.
I'm not arguing that Tolkien was more influential on D&D than the pulp authors, but it's still hard to deny that substantial influence has seeped into the RPG culture.
The large parties of D&D invading ancient caves are a lot closer to the Fellowship than they are to a lone Conan or Elric, or a pair like Lieber's guys.
Moorwiener's writing predates D&D and establishes a lot of tropes. Most of the modern elfs are basically coded as melniboneans, but not D&D elves which are very Tolkien, that's because of Moorwiener's influence on Warhammer and not related to D&D developments. Also all the interdemensional things which D&D adopted, not even talking about Chaos and Order concepts.
>D&D elves which are very Tolkien
How exctally are D&D elf Tolkien like ?
In what they lack that pre-Tolkien elves had. They don't have a glamour, they don't live in a parallel world, they don't experience time differently from mortals, don't have the defects of folklore elves like short stature, animal parts or a hollow back, they don't kidnap humans as a rule, and as a rule they're good-aligned.
so just some superficial similarities that make them a more grounded race instead of faries
also you are taking just one folkloric interpretation of elfs that make they the same as fey and ignoring all other that also influenced tolkies
>Moorwiener's writing predates D&D and establishes a lot of tropes
Yeah I know. So did Lieber, Howard, and Lovecraft. They all influenced D&D.
>That includes Howard, Moorwiener, Lieber, Lovecraft and others (including Tolkien, if somewhat reluctantly).
Don't know much about DnD, did the founders hate Tolkein or something?
>Don't know much about DnD, did the founders hate Tolkein or something?
No, just didn't find particular inspiration from it. It wasn't a practical foundation for building the kind of adventures he wanted the game to have. Picrel is an article from the creator of D&D attempting to describe the extent of Professor Tolkien's influence on his work.
(Note that D&D took on a life of its own over the years and Gygax's personal influence waned, but the article is still informative)
Is this a joke? You know the answer or you’re a Howard fan who wants to hear what you want to hear
Tolkien. But if was bad influence.
Describe and explain the bad influence.
It wasn't his fault. People thoughtlessly copying superficial aspects of his work without understanding its Christian essence isn't his wrongdoing.
Which aspects of Tolkien have been copied the most?
The races and their superficial qualities, especially dwarves and elves, are the worst offenders. But Tolkien has been copied so much that it would be easier to list aspects of his work that haven't been widely copied.
Orcs for sure. I don't think that the concept of a non-human barbarian horde who could be mowed down with no guilt existed in fantasy before Tolkien.
Most Orcs I see aren't much like Tolkien orcs at all. Warcraft and Elder Scrolls orcs are both "Noble Savage" archetypes, very different from Tolkien Orcs both in appearance and culture. I think the common, popular conception of an Orc is actually far more heavily influenced by Warcraft+Skyrim than Tolkien.
>horde who could be mowed down with no guilt
Guilt about killing in war (or in general tbqh) was itself a recent development, and even then it wasn't enough to prevent the massive casualties of the World Wars. Romans did not appear to feel any guilt for slaughtering and enslaving their enemies.
There are some semantic issues here, specifically you're putting too much weight on the term elf. Mischievous shorties are still common in Fantasy, they're just usually called something else (gnomes, fairies, pixies, brownies, imps, goblins etc). Tolkien may have cemented the term Elf as referring to roughly human-sized, semi-define or at least virtuous archers with pointy ears from Scandinavian lore.
Tolkien Elves remain popular, particularly in gaming, because it's a very appealing archetype. They would have crowded out the more mischievous concept of "elf" no matter what name he gave them.
Even then, I don't even see "Tolkien Elves" commonly outside of videogames, anime/manga and D&D-inspired RPGs, where there's blatant demand for playable Tolkien elves. Most authors seem content to do their own world-building.
>videogames, anime/manga and D&D-inspired RPGs, where there's blatant demand for playable Tolkien elves.
and even them most are barely tokeinian at all in their portrails, behaivior or themes, only their appearance seems come from Tokein
"Worldbuilding" in general. Authors spending hundreds if not thousands of hours attempting to make up plausible fake history, languages and cultures, but forgetting that those things in themselves have no value, and they need to write an actual good story that makes use of them. Essentially a lot of people copied Tolkien's autism but not his understanding of literature.
>those things in themselves have no value
nah the story is overrated, is pretty fun and inspiring to just read about an interesting world itself and it's history
>"Worldbuilding" in general.
World building is one of the key distinctions between Fantasy and other folklore and fairy tales with supernatural elements. The world doesn't necessarily have to have to be exhaustive, with complete Tolkien-style fictional languages and all that, but's still important to the genre. It should be a realistic, plausible alternate reality with a coherent set of rules (not just arbitrary magic and monsters purely subservient to the demands of the story). It's not surprising that both authors and readers give it some extra attention.
>It should be a realistic, plausible alternate reality
no, that just boring and don't offer anything of value to the genre
I think you misunderstand the point.
Lankhmar is portrayed as a real city with real people who would exist in that world. There are monsters and magic, but Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser are portrayed like real people who inhabit that world, and they meet other denizens who behave in ways that you might expect given all the other conditions of that reality. Lieber supplies many incidental details of Fafhrd's Snow Clan-- their activities in the world, the hierarchy of women, the entertainment enjoyed by the men, and so on. Cold Corner is a specific place. The traveling show comes from a different and specific place. And so on.
This is in contrast to a story like Cinderella, a fairy tale that could happen in more or less any place.
Oh, internal consistency and verisimilitude
now I get it and agree with you
In the 20th century, Tolkien.
In the 21st century, Howard.
Howard had a greater influence on D&D than Tolkien did, and D&D had a greater influence on fantasy than anything that came before it. So, by virtue of this, Howard wins.
>D&D had a greater influence on fantasy
Just casually ignoring Moorwiener?
Moorwiener was an explicit anti-Tolkienite, which means he was still influenced by him even if was through sheer contrarianism.
Moorwiener was a reaction to Howard. So, his influence is also Howard's, at least as far as this thread is concerned.
George MacDonald
Contemporarily, a perversion of Tolkien mixed with Moorwiener and the AWFUL fantasy aesthetic sensibilities of Samwise Didier, who almost single handedly raped and butchered fantasy and science fiction artwork with his utterly cartoonish abominations.
In the early and pre-90’s era, definitely Howard, proper Tolkien, Fritz Leiber, a sprinkle of Clark Ashton Smith and a few others. The artwork was absolutely kino in that era too, because even though it was still fantastical, it was executed thoughtfully for the purpose of visual appeal and evoked a true sense of adventure.
Grrm if we're about contemporary fantasy
*contemporary western fantasy
Is there something called eastern fantasy? Last time I checked even Japanese were copying western fantasy templates with white characters. Maybe it's different in India iunno
yes, even if some aesthetic elements are similar japanese and chinese fantasies look and feel very distinct from western ones
Japanese fantasy is mostly derivative of old dragon quest whose creators were fans of D&D and other western stuff
ultimately Japanese fantasy is basically an offshoot of western fantasy.
heavy influenced, specially in it's aesthetics? Yes,
but still distinct in style, story telling, tropes...
again focusing in superficial aesthetic elements
>but in their own way
yeah, integrating they own tropes, cultural baggage, story telling style... making it clearly distinct from western fantasy, that it is starting to influence
non of you has read shit eastern or western, not even the trashier light novels or litRPGs
They literally take place in pseudo medieval Europe and characters have western names. Even Japanese are aware that they are playing with western fantasy tropes and templates but in their own way.
Tolkien. How is this even a question? LoTR (taken collectively) is easily among the top 3 most influential literary works post-WW2.
Forgot to add: Tolkien's work, aside from influencing other Fantasy writers, has also seeped into tabletop gaming, video games, and other hobbies, even music. The movie series is also full of quotable lines that float around in the lexicon to this day.
the frick does capone have to do with dragons???