Exploring Tolkien
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Movies are NOT Sub-Creation – On Fairy Stories, Part 4
When Tolkien talks about Fantasy, he doesn’t simply mean fiction stories set in sword-and-sorcery worlds. Fantasy is the highest form of sub-creation, the “most nearly pure form”–and the most potent. An art form that is “best left to words, to true literature.”
Michael, Dan, and I discuss this idea of Fantasy as the one form of Art that comes closest to true Enchantment. We look at:
- The difference between imagination and fantasy.
- The ideal of “Faërian Drama”.
- The problem with “modern” sensibilities in Fantasy–and how that ruins true sub-creation.
- Why films will never match the power of true sub-creation.
Then in our members-only episode (https://theonering.com/members) we:
- Did Peter Jackson’s films destroy Tolkien’s sub-creative vision?
- Can Tolkien’s faith be separated from his sub-creation? Should it?
- Is there a difference between determinative and discovery sub-creation?
- “No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.”