# Thoughts on the medieval setting common to fantasy **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 4, 2009, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885 "2009-09-04T17:18:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/61 "2009-09-09T12:49:19Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > No, I’m saying that if they’re going to make up their own rules they have to actually make up their own rules. All of these rules don’t need to be spelled out for the reader, but it’s lazy to set a story in generic Fantasyland without ever giving any thought to how things work. Good fantasy writers think about how their fantasy world functions and what people living in such a world would be like. Their attitudes don’t need to be consistent with any real period in history, but they should be consistent with the setting. They _shouldn’t_ just be the attitudes common in the author’s own time and place if this doesn’t make sense within the setting. I just disagree that you can know better than the author what makes sense within the setting. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/62 "2009-09-09T13:28:20Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I just disagree that you can know better than the author what makes sense within the setting. What about the works of Ed Wood? I mean, you _could_ to say he was doing an exquisite job at showing a surreal, addle-brained universe, but most observers would say he just wasn’t a very good director. I mean, there’s giving the benefit of the doubt, and allowing for stylistic choices, but after a point you _have_ to be able to recognize when you’ve got a shovelfull of…well, [this](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3jfPCsKEFs). ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/63 "2009-09-09T13:46:11Z")
Nothing I’ve said says anything about whether an author or director is any good. But for us to say that we know what people in X would be like because we have a history of Y isn’t reasonable to me. We have only ever had one medieval period. We don’t know what’s inevitable and what’s not, or how changing this item over here completely alters that attitude over there. That doesn’t mean we have to agree with the author, and in rereading what I wrote it sounds like I mean we can’t disagree. I should have said instead that I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect an author to have to account for every change from “reality.” ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/64 "2009-09-09T13:47:42Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I just disagree that you can know better than the author what makes sense within the setting. I can if the author isn’t very good! Things don’t automatically make sense just because someone happened to write them down that way. I don’t need any special abilities to recognize inconsistencies or to notice when certain tricky issues are just ignored. A fantasy obviously requires some suspension of disbelief, and minor worldbuilding flaws needn’t ruin an otherwise enjoyable story. But good fantasy writers (and I could name plenty of good ones) need to think more, not less, about how their world will work than do authors writing fiction set in the ordinary modern world. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/65 "2009-09-09T13:55:08Z")
Looks like we simulposted. > [@jsgoddess](#): > > That doesn’t mean we have to agree with the author, and in rereading what I wrote it sounds like I mean we can’t disagree. I should have said instead that I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect an author to have to account for every change from “reality.” I didn’t say an author should account for every single little change from reality. I’m saying that it makes no sense for characters to have attitudes that are inconsistent with their culture. A particular character or group of characters might go against the status quo, but if members of this culture in general possess 21st century American values in a setting that closely resembles Medieval England then the author had better have a good reason for it. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/66 "2009-09-09T14:07:56Z")
I just don’t see what the contradiction is between whatever values the characters have and the shallow resemblance to any particular historical period. If it isn’t Earth, it isn’t Earth. Obviously, the closer they mirror Earth, the more assumptions the reader will make, but that doesn’t privilege those assumptions. ETA: I hope it’s clear that I just consider this a minor difference of opinion and not some Declaration of Fantasy War, complete with knights and stuff. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/67 "2009-09-09T14:12:31Z")
> [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](#): > > Longing for or interest in medieval fantasy isn’t new. In the early 1600s, Cervantes spoofed the whole genre with Don Quixote romanticizing back to the era of knighthood etc. He also murdered the whole genre, at least in Spain. Some of the genre’s most important pieces were from the late Middle Ages themselves (Tirant lo Blanc is from 1490). There’s Arturic material and epic or romantic poems, older than that, which also show a romantiziced vision… of the life their listeners were living, in a fashion not so disimilar to many current novels. When was the last time you read a “current times” novel in which horses smelled? (I know most “current” novels don’t include horses, but one of my last airport buys did, and let me assure you those horses never needed to be cleaned). ---
**Author:** ![Staale\_Nordlie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Staale\_Nordlie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Staale_Nordlie)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/68 "2009-09-09T14:17:51Z")
> [@magnusblitz](#): > > I’ve yet to see a magic system which couldn’t be relatively easily defeated/outdone by guns. (Probably one of the reasons the Harry Potter books bother me, it’s a bit of a stretch to believe that no one in the Wizarding world would have just gotten a Glock and solved all their Voledemort problems). ([Strip by Norwegian cartoonist Mads Eriksen](http://i37.tinypic.com/11lo56g.jpg).) ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/69 "2009-09-09T14:38:21Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I just don’t see what the contradiction is between whatever values the characters have and the shallow resemblance to any particular historical period. If it isn’t Earth, it isn’t Earth. Obviously, the closer they mirror Earth, the more assumptions the reader will make, but that doesn’t privilege those assumptions. Reading earlier posts in this thread, I sometimes got the impression that people thought fantasy novels had to be set in some particular time and place in this world’s history. So maybe it needs to be pointed out that fantasy can be, and often is, set in a whole nother world where notions of “historical accuracy” don’t apply. If the author is creating his/her own world, he/she gets to make the “rules” for that world. Still, it is true that many of these alternate worlds are medieval-European in flavor, and that people ride horses instead of cars or camels, and fight with swords instead of rifles. This can be because the author is mindlessly copying other fantasy or following a formula, or it may be for worthier, more organic reasons. ---
**Author:** ![sciurophobic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cab0a1/32.png) [@sciurophobic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sciurophobic)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/70 "2009-09-09T15:02:34Z")
[Tom Holt](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Holt) combines modern office satire with [dragon slaying](http://www.amazon.com/Better-Mousetrap-Tom-Holt/dp/1841495042/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1252508478&sr=8-2). ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/71 "2009-09-09T15:09:36Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I just don’t see what the contradiction is between whatever values the characters have and the shallow resemblance to any particular historical period. If it isn’t Earth, it isn’t Earth. Obviously, the closer they mirror Earth, the more assumptions the reader will make, but that doesn’t privilege those assumptions. Do you really not understand why it’s strange for characters in a setting unlike 21st century America to have 21st century American values? It doesn’t matter if the fantasy setting resembles a specific historic era or not, it could be something totally original, but if it doesn’t resemble modern America in significant ways then the characters shouldn’t act like modern Americans. Saying “Oh, but it’s a fantasy world” doesn’t explain why characters would behave like just like people from the author’s own time and place – quite the contrary. > [@](#): > > \*ETA: I hope it’s clear that I just consider this a minor difference of opinion and not some Declaration of Fantasy War, complete with knights and stuff. \*That’s good to hear, although my personal army of chainmail bikini-wearing Amazon warriors might be disappointed. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/72 "2009-09-09T15:12:48Z")
> [@](#): > > I’ve yet to see a magic system which couldn’t be relatively easily defeated/outdone by guns. It always seemed to be a cheat when Avatar defeats Blackwolf by pulling out a gun and blasting his evil brother (Avatar was supposed to be the _good_ wizard) in Ralph Bakshi’s **Wizards**. [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076929/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076929/) ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/73 "2009-09-09T15:41:44Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > Do you really not understand why it’s strange for characters in a setting unlike 21st century America to have 21st century American values? It doesn’t matter if the fantasy setting resembles a specific historic era or not, it could be something totally original, but if it doesn’t resemble modern America in significant ways then the characters shouldn’t act like modern Americans. Saying “Oh, but it’s a fantasy world” doesn’t explain why characters would behave like just like people from the author’s own time and place – quite the contrary. We don’t know other worlds so we don’t know how people on other worlds would act. They might all ride ponies and talk like Valley Girls. If they don’t have something like Christianity, lots of assumptions get thrown out the window. In short, why not? There’s no way to rerun our history to figure out what was necessary or sufficient for certain cultural beliefs, so we can’t know what would have happened if you drop this aspect or change that one. And even if we did, fantasy worlds are still not ours. They have magic, which means their physics isn’t even the same as ours, and once the physics goes, all hell breaks loose! ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/74 "2009-09-09T17:54:47Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > We don’t know other worlds so we don’t know how people on other worlds would act. Having a different world as a setting isn’t an excuse for an author to write any kind of half-baked, inconsistent nonsense that happens to float into his or her head. > [@](#): > > \*In short, why not? There’s no way to rerun our history to figure out what was necessary or sufficient for certain cultural beliefs, so we can’t know what would have happened if you drop this aspect or change that one. \*We don’t have to know what really would have happened if the world were different in order to recognize that some things just don’t make sense. As I said before, I’m fine with authors making their own rules. But making your own rules involves actually making rules, not mixing together a collection of generic Fantasyland cliches and modern American social attitudes without considering how any of it would work. I’m not going to throw all critical thought out the window just because I’m reading a fantasy novel, and a good fantasy writer wouldn’t want me to. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/75 "2009-09-09T19:04:33Z")
I believe it’s official. This one is going to require thumb wrestling. Thumb wrestling TO THE DEATH! ---
**Author:** ![SSgtBaloo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ac91a4/32.png) [@SSgtBaloo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SSgtBaloo)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/76 "2009-09-09T20:04:16Z")
> [@Tristan](#): > > I like it, but I don’t think it’ll be optioned for a movie anytime soon. Does anyone still make short subjects? > [@MrDibble](#): > > In one of my worlds, gunpowder is the same composition as red dragon pheremones. You know how moths will fly miles for a female’s scent? Now imagine instead, 5 or 6 randy male red dragons rock up…and find an alchemist rather than a female. Hilarity (brief & blazing) ensues everytime. There are never any survivors for miles around. The formula is now more proscribed and regulated than, say, modern nuclear weapons are. That’s diabolical! I _LOVE_ it!! 😃 > [@Lamia](#): > > Do you really not understand why it’s strange for characters in a setting unlike 21st century America to have 21st century American values? Dude, it’s _fantasy!_ Specifically, pseudo-medieval fantasy. Suspend your disbelief or read something else (unless the story itself is so horribly bad that nothing can save it, in which case, why would you _want_ to read it anyway?) It’s like some folks decrying the lack of “realism” in the Superheroic genre. Dude, if somebody is strong enough to lift a 747 with his bare hands, I suspect the laws of nature are sufficiently different to allow for him to do so without accidentally ripping two handfuls of airplane off or sinking into the tarmac because he’s concentrating the burden of said airplane on his own two feet, considerably smaller then the A/C’s landing gear footprint. > [@Lamia](#): > > That’s good to hear, although my personal army of chainmail bikini-wearing Amazon warriors might be disappointed. 😉 Oh! I want a a personal army of chainmail bikini-wearing Amazon warriors too! Where do I sign up? Seriously, one of my favorite “fantasy” movies was [Cast a Deadly Spell](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cast_a_Deadly_Spell). I’m _still_ waiting to see the sequel (it’s kind of hard to find). ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2009, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/77 "2009-09-09T22:09:20Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I believe it’s official. This one is going to require thumb wrestling. Thumb wrestling TO THE DEATH! No, TO THE PAIN! I’m not sure exactly what that would involve in a thumb wrestling context, but this thread has gone on too long not to have a _Princess Bride_ quote. Which, to get back to your OP, reminds me of another reason why medievalesque fantasy settings are popular – the characters get to wear cool clothes. Some authors have even been known to get a wee bit carried away on that subject…coughRobertJordancoughcough. ---
**Author:** ![SSgtBaloo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ac91a4/32.png) [@SSgtBaloo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SSgtBaloo)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2009, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885/78 "2009-09-11T22:06:57Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > No, TO THE PAIN! > > I’m not sure exactly what that would involve in a thumb wrestling context, but this thread has gone on too long not to have a _Princess Bride_ quote. Thank you for providing such a vital public service! 😉 _We now return you to your regularly-scheduled thread._ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-on-the-medieval-setting-common-to-fantasy/508885.md?page=3)