Fantasy novel and stories project a magic spell on readers , withtheir vivid worlds and complex characters . But just like any other kind ofspell , there are dissimilar types , and rule . You need a magical lexicon . So hereare 10 commonly used terms you ’ll demand to bed , that trace the differentsorts of fantasy worlds and stories .
Top simulacrum : Zippo514 on Deviant Art
1 ) Portal Fantasy
C.S. Lewis ’ Narnia is a sodding example of a “ portalfantasy , ” in which somebody goes through a gateway or portal , andwinds up in a witching world , where everything is different and howling . Wizard of Oz is another illustration , wherethe portal is not literally a portal site . Instead of encountering magic in ourworld , or starting out in the other humanity , the protagonist trip from ourworld to the magic place . Often , the portal illusion involve a heroical questof some sort .
https://gizmodo.com/walk-through-this-portal-with-me-into-another-world-5683053
grant toFarahMendelsohn , theoppositeof “ portal fantasy”is “ intrusive phantasy , ” wheresomething wizard breaks through and comes to our world . There ’s also“liminal fantasy , ” where someone does n’t quite traverse through thegateway , but just stays on the border between our creation and the world of magicand adventure , make leakages in both direction .
2 ) Secondary earth
A “ secondary world ” is a place that ’s exclusively magical , like fairyland : the sort of place where fairytale chance . When this term wascoined by J.R.R. Tolkien in his essay “ On Fairy Stories , ” secondaryworlds often admit “ lost Continent ” like Lemuria or Atlantis , orother unexplored magical places on Earth . But nowadays , when multitude talkabout lower-ranking worlds , they usually think of someplace that ’s essentially anotherplanet , like Westeros . An Earthlike planet where there are ( ordinarily ) humans anda culture that ’s vaguely recognizeable to humans , but it ’s not just analternate - account variant of Earth . Like Westeros , for instance . When you stopto think about it , it ’s kind of unmatched that there are so many Earthlike planetswhere humans live in socities that resemble European ( or sometimes Asian)history — but it ’s one of the conventions of the genre . icon : Kerembeyit / Deviant Art .
3 ) Epic Fantasy
An larger-than-life fantasy is a long storey , recite over several mass , and it unremarkably take station in a secondary existence — or at least , an epic tendsto be an “ immersive fantasy , ” which mean that you start out fullyimmersed in the magical human race from the showtime . ( In an immersive illusion , nobody goes through a portal or has magical intrude on the normal world — peoplejust live in the world where magic exist . ) An “ larger-than-life poem ” is a longnarrative poem , that features fabled heroes , and Tolkien ’s Middle - Earth sagawas seen as an endeavor to “ synthesize the epic poem that Old ( i.e. , pre - NormanConquest ) England never had , ” says scholar and authorBrian Stableford . After thesuccess of Robert Jordan and George R.R. Martin , publishers put out a long ton ofepic fantasy series in the belated 1990s and early 2000s . Image from Lin Carter , Imaginary Worlds .
Another terminus that ’s used fairly interchangeably with“epic fantasy ” is “ high fantasy ” or “ heroicfantasy , ” both of which imply something a minute fancy . accord toStableford , the term “ heroic fantasy ” was coined by “ critics whothought sword and sorcery sound too downmarket while fantasy was strugglingto asseverate its independency as a genre . ” “ High fantasy ” was coinedby Chronicles of Prydain generator LloydAlexander , to line a phantasy that takes plaza exclusively in a secondaryworld .
4 ) Sword and Sorcery
So what is “ sword and black magic , ” and why was itconsidered “ too downmarket ” when “ heroic fantasy ” wasconsidered a saleable music genre ? Basically , as Pyr Books editor and Frostborn source Lou Anders is partial of say , it ’s like dungeon & Dragons — in fact , Dungeons & Dragons andsimilar RPGs may have keep brand and sorcery alive , as a genre , while everybodywas doing epic fantasy instead . brand and sorcery is less “ heroic”than heroic fantasy , and tend to include a lot more rogues and thieves . Heroicfantasy take post in the palace , sword and sorcery takes place in the darkunderstreets of the city . Fritz Leiber ’s Fafhrd and the GrayMouser stories are classics of the genre , but early practician includeRobert E. Howard , Clark Ashton Smith , Lord Dunsany and C.L. Moore . L. SpraguedeCamp editeda 1963anthology call Swords & Sorcery , that admit all the classics .
5 ) Urban Fantasy
essentially , it ’s a phantasy level that take place in the city — often , a modern metropolis , rather than a Medieval or straightlaced one . This city isoften in “ our ” world — and in fact , I ’ve heard “ urbanfantasy ” used as a tachygraphy for “ an immersive phantasy that takesplace on Earth rather than on a secondary world . ” If it takes place in NewYork or London , it ’s an Urban Fantasy .
But in fact , a peck of the tropes of urban fantasy , such as ahero living in a society that include lamia and witches among normalpeople , often take seat now in small towns or suburb — recollect The Vampire Diaries ’ Mystic Falls . Sosome people have indicate that we commence using the term “ suburbanfantasy ” or “ rural fantasy ” to name these — or just admitthat “ urban fantasy ” does n’t have to be urban .
6 ) Folklore
Long before Tolkien or Lord Dunsany , there were magicalstories being passed down through the unwritten tradition — including “ form from major to small-scale such as epics , myths , legends , fairytales , fables , proverbs , riddles , songs , jokes , contumely , and toasts tonursery rhymes , ” asJulieCarthyputs it . Every culture has folklore , and it supply the base for alot of phantasy storytelling — there are fairytales , such as the Brothers Grimmwent around pile up and synthesizing . And there are fables , which arestories for children with a clear moral lesson at the end . And sept - tales orfolk - legends , which drift to be material stories about something that happenedlocally , in the past . These stories give us a lot of motifs that stick withfantasy fibber , from the troublesome giant to the wicked stepmother .
7 ) Magic Realism
charming realism ( or “ magical realism ” ) usuallyrefers to literary fiction where magic is part of everyday life , and there ’s atouch of the surreal about the storytelling . Magic is n’t something separate anddifferent from everything else , but just an propagation of the real earthly concern . According to Stableford , the terminal figure was first used to line the poetry ofPablo Neruda , but became wide known with the popularity of Gabriel GarciaMarquez ’s novel One Hundred Years ofSolitude . Many of the most famous practitioners of charming realism are LatinAmerican , although the condition has been used to refer to other authors — forexample , Kelly Link ’s dreamlike storytelling is often referred to as“magic realism . ”
- Gothic
In a nutshell , medieval fantasy contain a lot of supernaturalhorror element , such as ghosts or vampire or other monsters — but there’salso an element of love story , such as a romanticist hero . Plus a decaying , ruined , formerly - grand circumstance and a good sense of encroaching despair . Gothic phantasy isalso sometimes called “ dark phantasy , ” specially if it takes place ina petty world . Gothic literature does n’t need to include fantasticalelements — for lesson , Southern Gothic lit , as pen by WilliamFaulkner and Eudora Welty , includes element of the grotesque without anysupernatural element . But a vulgar denominator in mediaeval fable is the senseof apprehensiveness , and the danger of succumb to madness . mental image : Elise Kroese .
9 ) The New Weird
Back in the day , supernatural repugnance fabrication was oftenreferred to as “ gothic ” phantasy — but if it got weird enough , likethe stories of H.P. Lovecraft , then it was call “ weird fiction . ”Basically , horrific narration of strange brute and somewhat inexplicableencounters , with a fantastic boundary to them . And in the past 20 years , peoplehave started mouth about a genre called the “ New Weird , ” whichblends together science fable , illusion and horror with a distinctly literaryedge to it . People were prove to jumpstart this subgenre in the 1990s — butit received its foundational text in 2000 , when China Miévillepublished Perdido Street Station , anovel set in a junior-grade world featuring bizarre creatures , an arcane scienceand a horrifying arc . Since then , editor in chief Ann and Jeff VanderMeer havechampioned the thought of the New Weird , publishingan anthology of storiesthat take Lovecraftian motif into a morestylistically ambitious direction . There ’s some overlap between “ NewWeird ” fabrication and “ Slipstream , ” which is a condition for genre - blendingstorytelling with literary ambitions .
10 ) Grimdark
late , you learn a lot of citizenry talking about“grimdark ” fantasy . This is , essentially , fancy that carry place ina secondary world that ’s saturnine and jumpy and excessively wild . Featuringanti - heroes or virtuously gray heroes , and a batch of brutality . masses point toauthors like Richard K. Morgan and Joe Abercrombie as model of the Modern waveof “ grimdark ” composition . Over here , Morgan reacts to “ grimdark ” as being a dyslogistic term that includesnot only his work and Abercrombie ’s , but also George R.R. Martin ’s Westerosnovels . I ’m not sure if “ grimdark ” is always used pejoratively , butthere are sure enough many of us who like that variety of thing and apply the labelapprovingly .
Sources : BrianStableford , Farah Mendelsohn , JenniliisaSalminen , JulieCarthyandAnne - KathrinHöfel
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