poll: What has most influenced your conception of fantasy?

[Kid Charlemagne]

I lived in France for a while as a kid, so I had lots of exposure to old castles and such, which put me in a receptive mood for the mythology (Greek and Norse primarily) that started me off on the path. Then CS Lewis, the Tolkien, and LeGuin. Then I learned about D&D, and from the bibliography in the back of the DMG I learned about Lieber and Moorcock.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

What has most influenced my vision of fantasy is the Dungeons and Dragons Fantasy Role-playing Game. I started playing D&D and then I developed an interest in fantasy. Before that I mostly read science fiction.

Same here. This may be why I have such a hard time accepting changes made to D&D since AD&D 1e. AD&D 1e is my base reference for fantasy, it's the first fantasy I was exposed to that I really got into.

 

[MonsterMash]

I voted for the pulp fiction, but I'd say it was a real mixture with the Howard and Lovecraft stories, Greek myths, Moorcock, Ursula Le Guin, and the Ray Harryhausen movies like Seventh Voyage of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts.

 

[Harlock]

I am like some others in that I discovered D&D before I read the Hobbit. Since then I truly have been influenced most by what you term chivalric tales and poems. My bookshelf is full of Malory, Steinbeck, Tennyson, etc. Interestingly enough it's equally as full with Historical accounts of the middles ages, the evolution of the English language, some of what you deem Mythical, most interestingly is Beowulf in a few versions as well as classic fantasy and pulp fantasy books.

When it really comes down to it, I should pick other: History. My romance with the medieval period and in fact, all periods of history, excepting modern; and even more accurately, my love for the romantizations of those periods in epics, chivalric tales and even pulp novelizations of the likes of Ann Marston, Michael Moorcock and Glen Cook, is what has most influenced my further love for gaming after I discovered gaming.

 

[Bregh]

I voted for the pulp fiction, but I'd say it was a real mixture with the Howard and Lovecraft stories, Greek myths, Moorcock, Ursula Le Guin, and the Ray Harryhausen movies like Seventh Voyage of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts.

Same here!

 

[Sunglar]

My big influence…

I replied “Other”, because (for better or for worse) my biggest influence when I was young and creating my concept of fantasy was Dragonlance, specifically the Chronicles trilogy. Curiously I had read JRR Tolkien before but for my pre teen mind frame they all seemed too… overwrought!

Sure I’ve moved on, enjoyed many other authors and read much of the classics, but still those three books hold a dear place in my heart.

Well those are my two cents anyway…

 

[Reprisal]

I voted "Other" because the only fantasy novel I had read before I started playing RPGs was The Hobbit. Even then, it didn't have too much of an effect one me. Like others on this thread, I was affected more by video games like Faxanadu, Paladin's Quest, the Final Fantasy series, and Chrono Trigger.

My initiation into running fantasy RPGs came after I ran Shadowrun for a year or so, and as such, one could say that I've been more affected by SF long before I was ever interested in Fantasy.

I've been called an aberration amongst my more fantasy-oriented friends. To a certain degree, I don't even understand why I'm so drawn to RPGs as they are... I've neither the literary background nor the "standard" social background to explain my nigh-obsession with RPGs.

*shrug*

Much of what crafted my perception of fantasy was actually reading the D&D rulebooks and the various setting books out there.

As a result, I think I've become more enamoured by the millieu of such things rather than the characters or themes.

- Rep.

 

[s/LaSH]

I voted 'modern fiction', because I've read so much more of that than of anything else. My first exposure was Tolkein, Lewis etc, but the field continued to evolve since then, and I'm interested by all the directions it's gone. D&D, of course, is a big influence. But so too is everything else on that list. It was very hard to make a choice.

 

[Zulithe]

For me it all started with the animated version of The Hobbit. I watched it when I was 5-6yo (roughtly 1985-86) many times, my grandmother somehow aquired a laserdisc of it so I got to watch it all the time! This was the seed that started all of my love for fantasy.

I later read The Hobbit but did not develop an interst in The Lord of the Rings or Tolkien's other work until around High School. So around this time, my biggest inspiration were probably movies. The Movie LEGEND comes to mind.

Today I am inspired more than ever by Tolkien, due in no small part to the wonderful movie adaptations. I'm also inspired by Lovecraft, as others here has mentioned. I think DMs should read Lovecraft, he really knows how to portray evil and twist things around in unexpecting ways.