Some time ago on SFSignal, a number of notable authors were asked to weigh in on the question of why monarchies are so overwhelmingly chosen as the governmental systems of fantasy stories. The article is here. It's actually quite a fascinating question, so I thought I'd give a few of my own thoughts on the subject.
I find it really easy to see why monarchies are so often chosen. Not only is there a certain romanticism in our cultural hearts concerning the age when monarchies were the dominant social structure around the world, but they do give you some big advantages in storytelling. The biggest one is simplicity.
Think about it. One Dark Lord. One Good King/Queen. It gives you focus. If you decide to go into more depth, it gives you a single character to go to the hilt with. It also saves you a lot of work. The workings of a democracy - as has been abundantly demonstrated in the US - are full of characters and underlying influences that we don't always understand. Somehow recreating, or redesigning, those influences in an entirely new world would be... messy. Difficult, to say the least. Please notice that I'm not saying we shouldn't do it - but this might be one reason why we typically don't.
Another reason is that we strive to achieve a feeling of difference in our fantasy. The familiarity of democracy would need to be explicitly counteracted in any fantasy setting, so that that sense of wonder would not be lost.
Of course, there are other options. I'd love to see someone tackle a communist government sometime - Ursula LeGuin did something along those lines with Orgoreyn in The Left Hand of Darkness. Of course, I'd hope whoever took on this type of government (or any other type, for that matter) would take their job seriously and look at the actual impact of example governments in order to explore both its advantageous and disadvantageous features.
The Varin government (from my novel) might look like a monarchy at first glance, but it isn't quite. I suppose you'd call it an oligarchy with one member who is more important than the others. The Eminence is the ruler, and has a throne, but wears no crown. He also has an official Heir, but the Heir is elected by vote of the fifteen members of the Cabinet. Each of the twelve great noble families provides a candidate, and they run off against one another in several rounds if voting until only one is left. It fits with my vision of Varin inasmuch as I strive to achieve a world that seems very familiar, but is marked with major differences from our own expectations.
What kind of governments are you working with in your projects? How diverse can our concepts be? What makes a familiar system work? What makes an extremely different system work? Must we always have monarchies? Seriously?
It's something to think about.
I read through those essays and one person made a good point, in that in our own history, there really haven't been that many variations of how people rule. And monarchies have long been dominant, absolute or otherwise. Which is to say I think it's hard to create a system without stealing some of what we are familiar with.
ReplyDeleteMyself, I tend to lean towards councils, guilds, and city states like the Greek polis in what I write. The book I'm currently writing has variations of all three (plus some slum bosses thrown in). The city is part of a network of island independent city states and is run by a council who are elected alderman.
I think I find these particular structures interesting because you can play around with their make up more perhaps than a monarchy or dictatorship would allow. Councils can be merchants, or lords, or common folk. They can be held by economics, or wealth, or social position, or magic status. If you aren't looking to write a rebellion/revolution, councils (and similar structures) still allow for that tenuous political in-fighting and shaky balance between characters that you get with kingdom making, but on a more intimate scale than say, Game of Thrones.
That's certainly true, Linds, and certainly not a lot of governing models that are easy to learn about in detail. Thanks for explaining your leanings so others can consider the models you favor.
DeleteExcellent food for thought. I always enjoy reading novels with monarchies, but I do enjoy it more if there's a twist - maybe the king is just one vote on a council, for example, and not an absolute ruler. It provides for much more in the way of political intrigue, I think, and therefore can be more enjoyable to read.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Sunny! Thanks for joining the discussion.
DeleteI think you nailed the reason why right here: "I'd hope whoever took on this type of government (or any other type, for that matter) would take their job seriously and look at the actual impact of example governments in order to explore both its advantageous and disadvantageous features."
ReplyDeleteI'm working on a novel right now that centers around politics. The government uses a different kind of system, and it takes a lot of time/space in the story to establish how things work so the reader can follow. If this weren't important to the story, I'd simplify. Monarchies are easy to default to because "king" or "queen" don't require much/any explination.
MK, good for you for taking on something challenging, and thanks for your comment!
DeleteAgreed, Juliette. I'm struggling with a sort of cluster of anarchist cells in this universe I'm creating - a series of very small refuges scattered throughout the galaxy in the distante future. But the most interesting challenge I've met so far is trying to create *different* kinds of anarchism, or different kinds of self-rule that resemble anarchism but represent some sort of evolution - because nothing is static, and that is also one of the big problems in fiction in general.
ReplyDeleteAlmost every political system in stories remain prety much static, even when there is revolution (see DUNE), but there must be malcontents and several factions to deal with, not just that we can have an antagonist per se, but so that we can try (and we always try, even if we know from the beginning we will never make it) to portray things as realistically as possible.
Thanks for your comment, Fabio! I think you have a very important point with the idea of static models. Even a cursory glance at the history of many modern governments will show a lot of upheaval (even when the underlying model itself is stable). Thanks for sharing your own efforts!
DeleteThanks for your input, Juliette. Clearly I should have invited *you* to the Mind Meld in the first place. :)
ReplyDeleteI think constraints of story and characters are the major reason why Monarchies are so common, and, in addition, its something most readers can grok without much worldbuilding.
That doesn't make it right, but its explains their commonness.
Well, I'd be happy to attend sometime. As you know, I like to respond to many things I read via the blog. I certainly agree with your assessment. Thanks for commenting!
DeleteYou know, not all historical monarchies are created equally either. Consider Hamlet. For years, I puzzled over why Claudius became king after Hamlet's father instead of Hamlet. When I finally got around to looking into the question, it turns out the Danish monarchy of the time was an elected position (which actually makes Star War's Episode One's political structure look a little less silly). The Danish nobles, I think derived from ancient chieftains, would elect one of their number to be king, and Claudius (via a variety of political finagling including marrying his brother's widow) got the votes, where Hamlet was young and either not well known, or not considered due to his youth.
ReplyDeleteGeekLady, thanks for your comment! Good point about the Danish monarchy. It reminds me of the Scottish monarchy portrayed in "Brave" as well. There are certainly a lot of possible variants to work with.
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