Tell me about Blue Rose

[Gentlegamer]

But if I accept your argument that one cannot write anything ever without it looking like something else, then why am I not allowed to use that same argument for why Blue Rose looks like a setting designed to be socially conscious? Nothing to see here, no allegorical political statements, just a world with a unicorn and some swords, move along, please.

Adding egalitarianism, positive potrayal of homosexuality, and pointed villainization of "organized religeon" to a genre of quasi-medieval inspiration blows its cover, in respect to the source material.

 

[WayneLigon]

Adding egalitarianism, positive potrayal of homosexuality, and pointed villainization of "organized religeon" to a genre of quasi-medieval inspiration blows its cover, in respect to the source material.

Eh, there is no 'cover' to it or the source material. The first and third trope have been used in many other fiction series. Just because it's 'quasi-midieval' doesn't mean that it can't feature some modern ideas without being anachronistic. D&D's done that for years, as have many, many other fantasy authors. That's just how things happened to work out on our world. In some other world, it's no big stretch to accept that the societies and people would accept other, different ideas; many fantasy worlds in games or in print have a different or variant tech level from pure 1200's England/France/Germany -- no reason to suppose they would not have variant social systems and beliefs as well including some that are more in line with what a modern American would think.

The Yeomanry in Greyhawk has a working, functioning democracy, but I can't remember ever hearing complaints about it, even though it's politically centuries 'ahead' of most of it's neighbors.

There is also no pointed one-sided villianization of organized religion in the game. The Aldeans themselves have an organized religion. Both the Aldeans and Jarzoni have such divergent viewpoints that it's unlikely they'll be able to come to anything other than an uneasy peace with each other. The Jarzoni have some very good reasons due to their past experiences for distrusting the Aldeans, the main one being the Aldean's use of Arcana. Most Aldeans don't villainize the Jarzoni. They even go out of their way to provide land for any Jarzoni that want to settle in Aldea, provided they can work and play well with others.

 

[takyris]

Adding egalitarianism, positive potrayal of homosexuality, and pointed villainization of "organized religeon" to a genre of quasi-medieval inspiration blows its cover, in respect to the source material.

For you.

So you'd be lumping in Conan, the Iliad, and the Three Musketeers as lousy because Conan has people being born in servitude and becoming powerful through their own work and strength instead of noble heritage, the Iliad portrays gay relationships in a non-negative way, and the Three Musketeers has an evil cardinal being devious and evil and trying to gain political power for the church?

I think what it all eventually comes down to is the fact that the mythical and often misinterpreted Average Reader does not want historically accurate fantasy. If that were true, we'd have people tossing out books in disgust every time someone popped in full plate mail in a world that didn't have rifles.

My guess, for all that it's worth, is that the Average Reader wants a fantasy novel that is an idealized fantasy version of the world they find familiar and comfortable, with swords and wizards added to taste. If you look at the early Arthurian myths, you see how they get co-opted to become more like the current people in power every time there's a power change in Britain. When the Normans took over, King Arthur suddenly had great rages -- which were stereotypical of the Norman rulers and which hadn't appeared in the mythology until then. (Also, Lancelot appeared, as a sort of French Mary Sue who more or less displaced Arthur as the cool dude in the Arthurian myths.) An old Anglo-Saxon king became a Norman-like king. Same deal when the United States rewrote large elements of Arthurian literature so that the Round Table now signified that everything was egalitarian and Arthur wanted things settled by trials and not duels -- turning it into a democracy for all intents and purposes, because that had become the thing to do.

So given that historical accuracy isn't a big deal, I don't see what's wrong with putting politics that the writer likes into the book. If the readers are entertained, then they won't care -- and if the readers don't buy the books, then market correction pretty much takes care of the problem.

None of which relates to the definition of "the well wrought tale", which seems to really mean "quasi-libertarian philosophy of killing things and taking their stuff and being ticked off about government and its unnecessary laws." Which is completely fine, although the name is a bit dodgy.

It still comes down to "the politics that I don't like bother me when they appear in a story." Which is also fine, and probably true for almost everyone, but that's a bit different from "Stories shouldn't have be socially conscious or relate to the author's personal political viewpoint." That seems to be the point you're trying to make (and please correct me if I've misunderstood you), but the former -- you being bothered not by politics, but specifically by politics you dislike -- is what I'm actually getting from your posts.

 

[Gentlegamer]

Briefly: the Cardinal in Dumas is not a religious figure . . . he is purely political, so that comparison is not appropriate. That is like saying the play Tartuffe portrays religion in a negative light.

 

[takyris]

I'm terribly sorry, I didn't realize that the commision appointed you "Dude who gets to decide when it's important that the character is a cardinal and when it's not." My bad. I stand corrected.

So what you're saying, then, is that if the author didn't intend for the given plot element to be a big socially conscious political thing, it doesn't count?

Isn't that sort of what I wrote earlier? Your response was that certain elements blew the cover. But now, when I give an example of that, you say that there are times when it doesn't matter. How many rounds is this going to go before we settle on "I dislike fiction that includes politics I disagree with" instead of "I dislike politically motivated fiction"?

 

[buzz]

I've got BR on my Amazon wish list so I can keep an eye on it. I love Kenson's work in general, and what I've read about the mechanics has me very interested.

Yeah, what I've heard about the setting doesn't totally inspire me, but what the hey. I would probably never willingly pick up a Lackey title, but I recently read the first of Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel books, and I get the impression that that is, indeed, BR territory.

Anyway... I would not be surprised if we saw the BR mechanics applied to a more "traditional" fantasy setting at some point, if only to market to that (likely) larger segment of gamerdom that might have been put off by the "romantic fantasy" angle.

Or, who knows? It may create its own market, a la V:tM.

 

[Turjan]

Briefly: the Cardinal in Dumas is not a religious figure . . . he is purely political, so that comparison is not appropriate.

What a ridiculous statement! Of course, he was a religious leader. The fact that all leading church positions were filled with nobles with political ambitions during most of the Middle Ages and beyond does not change anything with them being the religious elite.

 

[arscott]

Briefly: the Cardinal in Dumas is not a religious figure . . . he is purely political, so that comparison is not appropriate. That is like saying the play Tartuffe portrays religion in a negative light.

Bullsht! Of course he's a religious figure.
Hell. Dumas is one of the first and most famous romantic novelists. If anything, characters like Cardinal Richelieu and Dom Claude Frollo* are part of the reason the more recent distrust of organized religion exist in the first place.


*The Villian from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, an archdeacon of the cathedral

 

[Gentlegamer]

Does Moliere's Tartuffe portray religion negatively? Therein lies my response.

I know my Machiavelli too well to be fooled by mere religious titles . . .

 

[takyris]

See, if I'd brought up Moliere's Tartuffe, this would have something to do with the conversation. As it is, it sorta seems a tiny bit like you might possibly be dodging the question.

For Richelieu himself, I consider the fact that he was a cardinal hugely important, just like the fact that Aramis becomes a Jesuit later in life is important. It illustrates the difference between someone who was involved in the religion to gain political power for himself and for the religion and someone who was involved in the religion because of a desire for spiritual improvement and an urge to help people. It's Dumas making a statement roughly akin to modern movies that display the difference between a "career politician" who is in it for the benefits and the power and privilege, and a guy who genuinely wants to help people. That's not to say that it's the world's greatest political statement, mind you -- if I'm voting for somebody, my vote weighs my trust for them ethically against my trust for them to be able to get things done for me, and working the political system is a requirement for getting things done these days, so I'm hardly an idealist.

Nevertheless, it is a social statement -- it's just a social statement that evidently doesn't bother you, either because you agree with it or because you've internalized it as something to ignore when reading fiction involving swords.