Terry Pratchett doesn't like JK Rowling

[reveal]

Like THAT would make it any different.

I'm sorry but I'm not taking sides on this one. Terry Pratchett can say what he wants to say about JK Rowling and Ms. Rowling can say what she wants to say about not knowing much about the fantasy genre as much as we enthusiastic fantasy fans know aside from fairy tales (even I personally do not consider them fantasy despite having witches & dwarves in the Snow White story).

If you guys want to duke it out, go ahead. But I get to punch the winners. Hehehe.

SLUG BUG ROWLING!

 

[Storm Raven]

Although, frankly, I agree with Rowlings in one respect; I took her comments on "subverting the fantasy genre" as taking some elements of the fantasy genre and doing something non-traditional with them. It was a bit of a too-grand claim to say she's doing something really unique there--I think authors have been "subverting" traditional fantasy conventions for decades, but a lot of my favorite stuff is just that type of "subverted fantasy" rather than cliched, traditional fantasy.

Really she's not doing anything particularly innovative: Susan Cooper's Dark Is Rising series hit the "kids with unusual hidden magical powers save the world" storyline a long time ago (even complete with a Dumbledore precursor and a chosen one). The only really original thing Rowling has done is marry the "English boarding school mystery" book with some highly cliched fantasy elements.

Not that I don't enjoy her stuff, I've read all of them, and enjoyed them all, but calling them original in any significant way is just silly. Saying that they "subverted" the genre is ludicrous.

 

[Desdichado]

Yep, that's exactly what I was trying to say too.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

This thread got me thinking about fantasy books I've read lately and beyond the Potter books, some Moorecock, and some Glen Cook I haven't really read anything. Too many random novel selections where I get a hundred pages into it and realize that since I've read LotR I can pretty much skip the rest of this? I think that was why I love the Black Company books so much. They were almost the anti-Tolkien.

 

[grimslade]

Pratchett vs Rowling Two authors enter: one may leave

The is a non argument. Rowling is not a fantasy luminary. She is an author who wrote some stories she thought would be interesting to kids. The stories are amazingly popular and Rowling is not much different than she was when she was writing in a coffee shop. She is much richer but I don't think she has read more fantasy in the intervening years. She seems a bit out of her depth with interviews.
The problem isn't JK Rowling. It's the asinine reporters who only read the sleeves of HP books for their sense of Fantasy. Rowling is a straw man, er, woman. THe press at large thinks Fantasy is a bunch of cliched, fairy stories. Heaven forbid a novel is critically praised and be a fantasy. They immediately reclassify it as literature exploring fantastic elements. It happened most recently with Dr. Strange and Mr. Norrell.
All this venom for JK Rowling should be pointed at the mainstream press and book reviewers. A little research and a little broader genre reading would go a long way.

Grim

 

[Zappo]

*shrug*

I have no "venom" at Rowling, and I'm quite positive that Pratchett hasn't either. However, she did say a few things about the fantasy genre that aren't true - namely, that it was stuck into "an idealised, romanticised, pseudofeudal world, where knights and ladies morris-dance to Greensleeves". This would have deserved a counter-argument by itself, since it is an opinion with a rather weak basis in reality but which carries a lot of weight because of who said it.

The fact that Rowling presents herself as the savior of fantasy, while at the same time trying to distance herself from the genre, is even more irritating. As a whole, her comments simply had to be addressed.

 

[reveal]

I have no "venom" at Rowling, and I'm quite positive that Pratchett hasn't either. However, she did say a few things about the fantasy genre that aren't true - namely, that it was stuck into "an idealised, romanticised, pseudofeudal world, where knights and ladies morris-dance to Greensleeves". This would have deserved a counter-argument by itself, since it is an opinion with a rather weak basis in reality but which carries a lot of weight because of who said it.

The fact that Rowling presents herself as the savior of fantasy, while at the same time trying to distance herself from the genre, is even more irritating. As a whole, her comments simply had to be addressed.

But she didn't actually say that. The author of article was the one who said "t looks backward to an idealized, romanticized, pseudofeudal world, where knights and ladies morris-dance to Greensleeves."

In fact, the only thing that Rowling is quoted as saying about the fantasy genre was the "subvert the genre" comment. Everything else about the fantasy genre was written by the author and not as a quote from Rowling.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Artists.

I'll read/appreciate their art. But I've learned to let the art speak for itself -- and pay precious little attention to what the artist says about it. I could care less why/how/what for Tolkein/Pratchett/Rowling writes or means -- its what the writing means to me that matters. The artist is to close to his/her work to have any sense of perspective on it.

 

[ssampier]

Seems somewhat silly to me... isn't the point of literature starting to write one story and end up writing another?

 

[Hammerhead]

But she didn't actually say that. The author of article was the one who said "t looks backward to an idealized, romanticized, pseudofeudal world, where knights and ladies morris-dance to Greensleeves."

In fact, the only thing that Rowling is quoted as saying about the fantasy genre was the "subvert the genre" comment. Everything else about the fantasy genre was written by the author and not as a quote from Rowling.

I read a lot of books, particularily scifi or fantasy, and I am unable to think of a single fantasy book I've read that was published less than thirty years ago that is remotely described as an idealized, romanticized, pseudofeudal world. King, Martin, Keyes, Gaiman, Brust, Cook, all to name a few. The author of that Time article could write everything he knows about the fantasy genre on the back of a postage stamp using a crayon.

However, it's clear that Pratchett and Rowling need to settle their differences in a katana death duel atop Big Ben, after laying waste to the surrounding neighborhoods in their thirst for the other's blood.