Sep-05-2010, 01:13 AM (UTC)
I think it all comes down to what people think about when they hear the word "fantasy". most people, the non-fantasy readers, would probably go to creations such as Harry Potter and Twilight, and if i were to look at those as the sole examples of the genre i would keep my distance as well.
the truth is that popular fantasy literature that manages to market itself outside of the fantasy-lovers community is mostly childish, no-too-sophisticated light novels. because of that people tend to mistake fantasy childish. it mostly comes from misunderstanding the genre as a whole, outside of what as managed to push into what we call "pop-culture". most of the GOOD fantasy books are far from "childish", and Robin Hobb is a very soft one of that, would you give a ten-year-old one of George Martin's novels?
same thing goes for everything-what is common and well known is the thing people judge the whole by. fantasy just had the misfortune to be represented by children books and shallow teen novels. Lord of the Rings is no longer as common read as it used to be and if you'd ask a person if he ever came upon The Neverending Story they are most likely to reply about the movie. This is how it's like in this era, when the most part of the human kind is shallow, and its pop-culture is made of reality shows and surgically-engineered super-models. i, as a teenager [almost 18] can see that most people in my age group hardly care for anything that's not "mainstream" [fantsy included] and the younger ones... don't even read.
the truth is that popular fantasy literature that manages to market itself outside of the fantasy-lovers community is mostly childish, no-too-sophisticated light novels. because of that people tend to mistake fantasy childish. it mostly comes from misunderstanding the genre as a whole, outside of what as managed to push into what we call "pop-culture". most of the GOOD fantasy books are far from "childish", and Robin Hobb is a very soft one of that, would you give a ten-year-old one of George Martin's novels?
same thing goes for everything-what is common and well known is the thing people judge the whole by. fantasy just had the misfortune to be represented by children books and shallow teen novels. Lord of the Rings is no longer as common read as it used to be and if you'd ask a person if he ever came upon The Neverending Story they are most likely to reply about the movie. This is how it's like in this era, when the most part of the human kind is shallow, and its pop-culture is made of reality shows and surgically-engineered super-models. i, as a teenager [almost 18] can see that most people in my age group hardly care for anything that's not "mainstream" [fantsy included] and the younger ones... don't even read.
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