We made it. Finally, after many delays, all of them my fault, we reach the end of Ann Swinfen’s In Defence of Fantasy with her final five-page chapter, “The Perilous Realm.” It’s a recap of what she’s accomplished in her study of fantasy as a literary genre.
She begins by observing the increasing number of fantasies published since 1945. Its popularity, she says, is grounded not in escapism, but because fantasy works as “a method of approaching and evaluating the real world” (1, p. 230). She hews closely to this assertion, not just in the epilogue but throughout the entire volume.
Since the publication of In Defence of Fantasy in 1984, the genre has developed in directions that Swinfen did not anticipate, and some of her analysis is downright quaint. Her discussion of beast tales in English as a major sub-group, along with time-travel novels, emphasizes two forms that really haven’t been prominent. Alternate histories, urban fantasy, dark fantasy, horror crossovers, game- and film-based novel series like Forgotten Realms or Star Wars — all developed into major forms and were well on their way when Swinfen was researching, but she doesn’t consider them. Perhaps she didn’t think they were worthy of evaluation. Or she hesitated going too far afield from established and respectable novels, lest she be accused of trashing the joint up. We’ll never know.
What we do know is what she has accomplished: an early serious study of fantasy as a genre. And we can pull a few important takeaways:
- Fantasy isn’t primarily concerned with Otherworlds, but with human interactions with the Other.
- Fantasy is really about reality. “All serious fantasy is deeply rooted in human experience and is relevant to human living” (1, p. 231).
- Fantasy’s primary mode of inquiry into reality serves as “creative questioning” of moral, philosophical and social dilemmas (1, p. 231 and shamelessly paraphrased)
In the heart of her book, the chapters about “Idealisms” which are the last two diaries in this series, Swinfen critiques a couple of books in detail: in philosophical and religious analysis, she considers Lewis’ Narnia series as a reprise of Christian theology; Le Guin’s Earthsea as its antithesis. In the realm of social and political critique, she calls on Richard Adams’ Watership Down and Russell Hoban’s The Mouse and His Child. In all the novels she discusses, she argues that the author’s focus is firmly on the relationship between fantasy and the real world; all fantasy comments on reality. She also claims that primary world fantasy lends itself more easily to social and political commentary, while secondary world fantasy is more concerned with religiosity and transcendence, a claim which writers working after her publication have pretty much rendered moot, as the forms developed and matured.
Finally, despite the fact that by 1984 fantasy was an established genre that was only increasing in popularity, Swinfen sees it, and contemporary and subsequent critics have agreed, as an underdog in the literary canon, fighting for legitimacy like a bastard child making a bid for inclusion in a wealthy patriarch’s will.
What emerges above all from this study, then, is that modern fantasy, far from being the escapist literature which is it sometimes labelled, is a serious form of the modern novel, often characterized by notable literary merit, and concerned both with heightened awareness of the complex nature of primary reality and with the exploration beyond empirical experience into the transcendent reality, embodied in imaginative and spiritual otherworlds. (1, p. 234)
In Retrospect
I have griped plenty about Swinfen’s use of texts, which I still can’t really account for. I doubt we’ll ever know why she picked the books she did. She does, however, do a masterful job of explicating them, of carefully teasing out meanings and themes. Her writing style is superb, which is especially welcome in a book of literary criticism (too many critics think boring = profound, which only works if you aim to befuddle your audience). She is also one of the first critics to look at fantasy as a form worthy of study and intellectual engagement. Some of her statements are dated, but considering the book was written thirty-five years ago, that’s to be expected. No one could know how the genre would grow and in which directions it would expand. Therefore, I for one am going to bid farewell to Swinfen with no small measure of gratitude for her work. She laid a foundation other writers have used as underpinnings, and we can do much worse than using her as a starting point to understand fantasy, not only as a pleasure and recreation, but as — just occasionally — a startling mirror held up to the world , a clarifying song in the distance, an uncanny look at the blood that pulses just beneath the skin of reality.
Previous Installments
Reference
1. Ann Swinfen, In Defence of Fantasy. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984.
Next week, as promised, I’ll share a few tips on Worldbuilding, and solicit your ideas. Most of what I know is through trial and error and some is gleaned from writers wiser and more experienced, and it’s all deeply fun.
Meanwhile, I owe you a couple of photos of the room that took up almost 8 weeks of my life. It’s not quite finished — the windows will be rebuilt next year; I have to make drapes and curtains; and there will eventually be a design on the lighter green frieze near the ceiling. About the latter, the walls are now too cold for the paint to take, and the stencil won’t hold long enough for me to paint it anyway. That’s for the spring, and warm weather. As is putting in the hearth for the fireplace.
All the furniture in this room are family pieces. We put them on the second floor so we don’t have to worry about them if there’s a flood. Here’s a reverse view:
It bears repeating that there were holes in the walls and I used better than 50 linear feet of patching material on the cracks. I’m writing a fuller diary for the Saturday Morning Home Repair group that details some of my continuing adventures. Right now, all I can do is look at that room and smile.