tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post7839421328806450044..comments2024-03-29T03:45:01.236-07:00Comments on TalkToYoUniverse: Do you gotta have faith?Juliette Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02879627074920760712noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post-32540871940062394372009-12-12T19:28:21.378-08:002009-12-12T19:28:21.378-08:00Very interesting thoughts, Barbara. It's defi...Very interesting thoughts, Barbara. It's definitely a rich topic. Worthy of a goodly number of stories taking it as a focus, though I don't feel best qualified to do that... I tend to include it, but find it easiest to deal with at novel length where I have time to explore it without distracting from the progress of a shorter story.Juliette Wadehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02879627074920760712noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post-23895003680096554522009-12-12T16:23:19.530-08:002009-12-12T16:23:19.530-08:00It always amazes me, given the amount of human his...It always amazes me, given the amount of human history that has been driven, shaped, and forged by religion, how little effect it has in so many fantasy and science fiction novels. Especially in a lot of classic SF, which contained (either subtly implied or blatantly stated) that mankind would "evolve" past a need for religion. Or in fantasy, where some worlds have no religion at all, or one or two vanilla flavored religions that resemble Wicca or the Catholic Church without having a lot of impact on the world and its culture.<br /><br />Whether or not an author is personally religious, it's hard to deny the fundamental impact religion has on most of humanity. Which means if an author is going to give me a world without strong religious influences, I want to know why. I want to know what it is about the world's culture or history or whatever that turned them in that developmental direction. There's so much room there for deep, fascinating stories that I feel a lot of books gloss past. Humanity, as a whole, strives always to believe in *something*, and if the aliens are divergent from humanity in such an essential way -- that's fascinating! Or should be.<br /><br />And that's not even touching on worlds where the gods are present, provable forces, where religion is a matter of measurable science more than the faith-based belief in the real world. How does that change things? <br /><br />Religion in spec fic is one of those topics I could ramble on about for hours. :)Barbara Webbhttp://gwyndolin.livejournal.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post-17391729366766258512009-12-12T14:53:06.156-08:002009-12-12T14:53:06.156-08:00Cool comment, Hayley, I like your thinking. It...Cool comment, Hayley, I like your thinking. It's interesting what you say about The Evil Force to be Destroyed. I think you do have a point... It got me thinking about Tolkien, but he doesn't really have that problem to my mind. One of the interesting things about Middle Earth, to me, is that its gods and demons are real, and there are immortals present there who have experienced them and their actions directly. The coexistence of the elves with the men who are so completely out of touch with these forces leads to interesting discrepancies. When I read Tolkien I feel like he's just touching on some things that he could have taken further (and did a little with his development of Legolas in the second book)... but he did amazingly, given that he was just about the first to do it.<br /><br />I have felt the thinness you speak of in other works I've read.Juliette Wadehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02879627074920760712noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post-41158944559389063722009-12-12T10:03:17.903-08:002009-12-12T10:03:17.903-08:00One consequence I've found occasionally in fan...One consequence I've found occasionally in fantasy when there's no religion is a sort of thin-feeling, easy world structure. It's similar to ignoring something like politics or trade. Sure, an author may not be overly political- or religious-minded, but people in general are still bound to focus on something for structure and meaning in their lives. These cases, I suppose, are examples of a lack of any world concept in place of a religion. It becomes as though the only conflict in the world is The Evil Force To Be Destroyed, and otherwise there wouldn't be any dissent, because the author just left religion out rather than bring in all its consequences.<br /><br />In my world-building, I like to latch on to some form of cultural awareness, whether or not there's religion involved, as it provides a marvelous anchor point for metaphor, swears, exclamations, and the like. It usually has something to do with the natural setting, such as orientation along the coast and the importance of the sea, or with my current wip, agricultural and livestock production. That, however, also gets subverted depending on how the protag's perceptions are oriented, but I think that's wandering away from the world concept idea :)Hayley E. Lavikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09896649083961644485noreply@blogger.com