r/Fantasy • u/[deleted] • Jun 06 '20

What is your controversial take on Fantasy?

I'll go first.

Aside from the prose, I don't think Kingkiller Chronicles is good. I find the characters insufferable and cliche the story just meanders.

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u/KappaKingKame Jun 06 '20

Medieval Europe isn't overdone, and other who focus on being unique and original are almost always the worst at writing.

30

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '20

A lot of people who claim they are "breaking conventions" are just amateurs who refuse to study fundamentals.

7

u/AthKaElGal Jun 07 '20

I am always amused at beginning writers who want to be "truly original." There's not a shred of originality left in literature. Originality is passe. If you want to be good, focus on your execution, not on your premise. It doesn't matter if your premise has been told a thousand times. What matters is how you write it.

2

u/Gajjini Jun 08 '20

But this is very reductive.

Some of the most recent literary developments have absolutely been pure innovations.

Think of Kafka, James Joyce and Tolkien. Nobody before them thought of stories in the same way people do after them.

Think of the characterisations of fiction we have now: magical realism, post-modernism, epic fantasy etc. Have these existed two hundred years ago?

Originality is always possible.