Fantasy humor

I enjoy reading fantasy and science fiction. The last few years I have become a fan of urban fantasy. Much urban fantasy is dystopian. One definition goes: “Utopian describes a society that’s conceived to be perfect. Dystopian is the exact opposite — it describes an imaginary society that is as dehumanizing and as unpleasant as possible.” In reality, much dystopian urban fantasy is not fully dystopian. But, it does contain strong elements of a society that is at least dehumanizing and unpleasant to some.

Among those urban fantasies are a large amount of them in which magic users figure. Most of those fantasies also have non-humans of various types as part of the society. Almost all the urban fantasies share a common history that explains our previous lack of contact with magic users as a result of centuries of hiding from the non-magic public. Think in terms of Harry Potter, in which magicians hid from the muggles. Remember that as the series went on, it grew increasingly dark, unpleasant, and–yes–dehumanizing for quite a few of its magic denizens.

The reasons given for hiding from the mundanes (you know, the muggles) vary, but the main one almost always is that people of talent were persecuted and now live in fear of revealing themselves. And, let’s face it, large parts of Europe did go through a witch-killing-torturing frenzy during the 15th and 16th centuries, dropping for a while, and reemerging in the 17the century. Between 40,000 to 100,000 were killed and there are judicial records of around 12,000 known trials. It is estimated that around 75% of the victims were women. Figures of deaths around 5,000,000 are now considered false fabrications from a late 17th century early 19th century pamphlet (yes, just one pamphlet). The last execution for witchcraft in England was in 1682, while in Scotland in 1727. With some few exceptions, Continental Europe ended their killings about the same time as England. But, one can understand why the cultural memories of those horrid times would lead to fear of the mundanes leading magic users to hide.

In many other parts of the world, magic users are viewed in mixed ways. For those of you who read manga, manhwa, or manhua, or who watch cute Japanese anime such as the old Sailor Moon series, you know that Japanese culture has both good and bad magic users. The same is true with various other cultures. The Native American shaman is usually a positive figure while the Native American skin-walker (yee naaldlooshii) is clearly evil. Indian gurus and yogis can demonstrate incredible bodily control and are considered positively while Indian witches are not. However, this means that literature coming out of places like Japan, China, and Korea does not show the same hiding behavior as our Western literature. Their magic users were not necessarily automatically bad, although they did have bad magic users. Middle Eastern Muslims had their tales such as the Thousand and One Nights, their djinns, etc.

There is another feature of modern American urban fantasy, and that is a distrust for the government. So, another reason for magic users to hide is that supposedly if the government knew they existed, then the government would come after them. No, not necessarily to punish them but to forcefully recruit them. In very paranoid urban fantasy, the government wants to come after the magic users to take them to secret laboratories and do terrible things to them. If you are a comic book reader, you have seen this type of thinking in various of their comic books. For instance, the X-Men was first published in 1963. It was a comic trying to compete with the DC Universe (Superman, Batman, Supergirl, The Flash, etc.) At first, while they were hidden heroes, the government was not against them. But, eventually, most of the Marvel Universe became very dystopian with a very negative view of the universe. You see this in some of the Marvel movies out nowaday. By and large, the DC Universe has stayed away from long-term dystopia, although it has had a few years in which dystopia reigned.

One thing that is true about all the Western urban fantasy that I have read is that either the Church barely features or is considered a terrible enemy. There are some exceptions, for instance in the Jayne Yellowrock series, there are both positive and negative pictures of the Church. But, frankly, given the witch-hunting history of Europe, it is not surprising that urban fantasy writers find few ways to feature the Church in a positive way. And, if the Church has more than a passing mention it is because someone is going to shout and/or try to enforce, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” I believe it says something about our prior behavior that the main theme of The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a false accusation of witchcraft. I have not seen any positive mention of the Church in almost any science fiction, fantasy, steampunk, or urban fantasy. The few pastors or priests mentioned in a positive manner are usually rebels. And that is a sad statement about the cultural memories that there are of us.

It may surprise you that both the Harry Potter series and the Divergent series were written by people who consider themselves Christian. They are among the few exceptions to the paragraph before this one. The author of the Harry Potter series would be considered a liberal Christian while the author of the Divergent series is an Evangelical Christian. In neither of their series does the Church appear. But, what they have done is that they have each created a main character around whom all of history is going to concentrate and by whose actions future history is changed. Both have main characters that die as a self-offering for the others. You already know that Harry Potter managed to come back from the dead in a Christ-like analog after saving the magic world. I will not tell you the fate of the main character in the Divergent series, you will just have to read it.

I am convinced that the two authors skipped the Church in their books for the same reason that J.R.R. Tolkien did. They wanted to get a message across without having people immediately react to the involvement of the Church. Just like in his writings, the main characters of the Harry Potter and Divergent series goes through some intense suffering before being able to redeem his or her people.

I always appreciate it when an author sneaks a bit of humor into their writing. So let me finish these muddled thoughts on fantasy fiction with a quote from Knights Magica. Magic users have come out in public and now there are good magic users and bad magic users (plus a few neutral ones). The bad magic users all belong to the Universal Church (yes, sigh, it is a thinly-disguised Roman Catholic Church). In much urban fiction, somehow the authorities are not really able to control magic users gone wild. But, this book appreciates the power of modern technology. A very public and destructive fight has broken out between the good magic users and the bad magic users in a certain place. The destruction is starting to grow. Their shields are able to deflect typical police and National Guard offensive equipment for use in civilian areas. Finally the government has had enough.

I chuckled when I read the next passage after the fight was described. It told me that the author knew how to self-satirize her writing and the genre just a little. Let this be the finish of my muddled post.

A mage battle erupted on the outskirts of Columbus, Ohio. A TV video shot from a distance showed what appeared to be two circles, each with a number of supporting mages, throwing fireballs, lightning, and globes of energy at each other. It went on for almost an hour until missiles fired from two U.S. Air Force fighter jets put a spectacular end to things, all caught in living color from different angles by two TV stations.

One of the problems with magic fighting against conventional human technology was distance. A mage, or a mage circle, had to be able to see what they were throwing things at, and the range of a circle was maybe a mile or two at most. The jets fired their missiles from more than two miles away and twenty thousand feet up, which was a close-range shot for such a weapon.

After a few encounters such as that, the mages on both sides got a lot more discreet …

From Knights Magica by B.R. Kingsolver