# To be (the royal we) or...you get the point.



## Nobby (Apr 19, 2013)

OK, I just would like to ask why so much fantasy fiction seems to be based on Kings and Queens, (or moreso unknowing foundling princes and princesses)

I enjoy fantasy but why is there regularly such a genealogical tilt to it? Or (and even worse, in my view) the grasping middle class desperation to claim royalty for itself. (IE horrible court advisers)

Is it because writers (more probably publishers) think that people want to be elevated to these levels?

Or is it that people just don't appreciate the "salt of the Earth"...

I think my point is that any society is unbalanced when it elevates one section to Godhood, or is this just me 


Help and talk me down!


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## Feo Takahari (Apr 19, 2013)

I think it goes with having your protagonists be stronger and faster and better than everyone else--you need some narrative excuse for this, and "royal blood" is as good an explanation as any. Kings are more likely to be viewed negatively in fantasy stories that also have more flawed and frail protagonists.

(Alternatively: because Aragorn.)


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## Filk (Apr 19, 2013)

The positions of royalty also offer easy dynamics. A lot happens in a royal court; it is hard to make one want to read about a farmer, because a farmer's menial tasks are boring (I love getting my hands in the dirt, but as writing goes it is boring). Which isn't to say that you can't find something interesting or dynamic that happens to a peasant, villain, or farmer, but a king or queen face more interesting problems on a daily basis than mending a bucket or blight on their crops. Power struggles and court intrigue make for good stories.

Perhaps writing from the perspective of a lower-class citizen is more of a challenge. How does one who is poor acquire the means to go on a grand adventure? What makes this peasant special?

I am straining my poor brain for an example of a fantasy story totally separate from any royalty and can't seem to think of anything. There's got to be something out there, though.


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## Nobby (Apr 19, 2013)

I know what you are saying, and I especially enjoyed Feo's comment (just because! Pffff! )but really, just for me, royal intrigue in recent fantasy is a touch too much soap opera...

Do you think that an ironic story that sidesteps magic swords and kicks prophecies in the nuts would be unwelcome?


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## Jamber (Apr 19, 2013)

Nobby said:


> Do you think that an ironic story that sidesteps magic swords and kicks prophecies in the nuts would be unwelcome?


A lot of the Discworld novels could be described that way. I think there's a big audience for genre satire.
One of the oldest short stories I ever read (and it still works) is Israel Zangwill's _The Queen's Triplets_ -- a funny take on quest-based fairy tales as well as regal inheritance.
cheers
Jennie


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## TheokinsJ (Apr 19, 2013)

Kings and Queens will always be in fantasy, and people have always written about them. I wouldn't say that there are many books out there with a member of royalty as the main character, most aren't. Yet I think the idea with choosing to have a character of noble birth, is that it isn't something all that often done, rather than the clichÃ© orphan-farm-boy who finds his destiny ect. Royalty also have benefits to their characterisation, and as many of the other members have said, the life of a member of royalty would be much more interesting than the life of a goat herder or a blacksmith for example, (well, depending how you write it). A Song of Ice and Fire deals with royalty very well, having conspiracies and struggles by noble families for the power of becoming king, it can be done really well and it can be really interesting to read. I'd say that it isn't overdone in books, and that I'd prefer to see a prince/princess as the main character over the clichÃ© orphan-farm-boy any day.


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## Nobby (Apr 19, 2013)

I would love to be as funny as Terry Pratchett. (My favourite line of his being about a vampire being able to rise from the dead, but not the cat...)

Oh, and don't get me started on Gaspode the wonder dog 

My silly turn of phrase notwithstanding, I sort of have a feeling for darkness where...

Well, sort of -"Big Things"- happen, around 'small' people.

It ends with my main character chasing down his deemed nemesis behind and between the lines of a (admittedly cut price)  LOTR (only slightly more realistic) battle.

Good grief, this sounds more kitchen sink than soap!

I doubt I'm bright enough for satire, I'm pushing it for sarcasm



Ach, this is hard to explain! There is humour involved in my tale, but it is dark humour.


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## Feo Takahari (Apr 19, 2013)

If you really want to ditch the kings, there's always urban fantasy.

Actually, I just realized there's one other group of protagonists who tend not to interact with nobles: mages. Unless it's a setting where nobles ARE mages, mages tend to be completely independent of the nobility.


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## Nobby (Apr 19, 2013)

@TheokinsJ
Ow, I understand what you are saying, but do you 'get' my position! I am sick of entitlement in fantasy! Why should royalty be equated with "Heroic"! Wouldn't a sheep or pig farmer have a more practical grasp on reality than somebody whose ancestors beat the crap out of the neighbouring tough arses, so they could bully said reality into their own twisted shape?


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## Nobby (Apr 19, 2013)

Yep, replace Kings with corner loan sharks

You cheeky samurai fox thing

No, I don't think I made myself clear. My problem isn't so much with royalty, it's more to be with royalty being the Go-To of fantasy in and of itself...

Oh, and for some reason mages strike me as ambulance chasing gits


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## advait98 (Apr 20, 2013)

I think it's because royalty tends to have some sort of special powers. After reading Erec Rex, that seems to be my opinion. These days, even the poor old farm boy can wind up being the heir apparent. And they almost always have some specialness about them, which is a desirable attribute in an MC. There's always something to write about when your main characters are of noble birth, always some conflict or another. Royalty is always the highest, the pinnacle of society, and a lot of people would like writing about them. 
I don't think this is something that can be expressed in words. It's a psychological thing, I guess. Or maybe it's just what most people are used to, and they wind up writing about it. Who knows?


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## Chilari (Apr 20, 2013)

I actually blogged about this a few weeks ago. Can't link because I'm on my kindle, but a link to my homepage is in my Sig then you can find it on the right under recent posts or look in Archives. But basically, I reckon it's about storytelling focus and scale. Scale because what better way to convince the reader that something is important than have it affect a whole country? We understand how our governments' decisions impact on us and thus how someone else's government's decisions or intrigues impact on them. It's similar to how superheroes are always saving the whole world.

Storytelling focus is about using the fewest resources to tell the best story. Being concise is punchier. Drivel is dull. Royalty enables a tighter story because it gives focus and because people understand it and you don't need to explain it, as you would have to with a Spartan style diarchy. Whether royalty is good or bad in the story, it enables you to focus on one person, usually the king or queen but not always, instead of a whole council of democrats or oligarchs, thus keeping the story tight.


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## Nobby (Apr 20, 2013)

Chilari, and advait ta for the replies, you both make good points, hell everybody has 

My story, however is more _of_ the small people caught up in the intrigues and machinations of greater powers, if you see what I mean, and damn has it been difficult for me to broad-stroke the fantasy world they live in. I have a character that I love but re-reading the first couple of chapters, I realised he was just Basil Exposition, Hehe.

Chilari, do you have spooky woo-woo powers? Your last sentence gave me shivers!


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## Feo Takahari (Apr 20, 2013)

Chilari said:


> I actually blogged about this a few weeks ago. Can't link because I'm on my kindle, but a link to my homepage is in my Sig then you can find it on the right under recent posts or look in Archives. But basically, I reckon it's about storytelling focus and scale. Scale because what better way to convince the reader that something is important than have it affect a whole country? We understand how our governments' decisions impact on us and thus how someone else's government's decisions or intrigues impact on them. It's similar to how superheroes are always saving the whole world.



I'd like to comment on this, because I think it's part of a much larger issue that's affected multiple genres and media over the years. Ernest Adams said it best, describing its impact on computer games:



> "Conquer the world!" "The fate of humanity is at stake!" "Save the galaxy!" scream the boxes on the shelves down at the game software store. "No!" I'm tempted to scream back. "I don't want to! The galaxy can go stuff itself!" . . .
> 
> I don't want to rule the world. I'm not terribly interested in saving the galaxy. It's too big and impersonal a task, and it's not credible that a single individual can do it anyway. Don't ask me to. I don't feel like it.
> 
> ...


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## Nobby (Apr 20, 2013)

Now there is _my_ rub.

The joy I personally find in life is small and given the scale of all things, petty. But, I'll punch your lights out in its defence 

Foxy samurai thingy, I think I love you


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## Jess A (Apr 20, 2013)

I love stories about royalty and court intrigue and backstabbing. It's good fun. These dynamics can be explored in middle-class groups/merchants etc as well, or peasant villages for sure. But I've always loved a good castle drama. If well-written I love those ridiculous stories about orphans who discover they are nobles - not my cup of tea to write, but I like reading about it! Not ashamed to say.

On the other hand, I love to read about the common people - in books and in real history. What was life like? How did they survive? What trials did they face and what inner strength did they find despite being poor? 

My book has a mix. Some are connected to one of the major royal families. Others are foreigners or commoners. I've not focused much on the heirs to the throne, though - mostly the cousins. One of the young royal cousins is a real prat and a criminal. The other is an old rebel and still calls himself Duke in his new lands, though the King stripped him of lands/titles/claim to throne. Of course, if his followers choose to turn against him, he's just another man, an obstacle. He's not their leader because he was a Duke before; he's their leader mostly because he led them to freedom and offers protection in return for their loyalty. And looking centuries back at the first King of the Kingdom in particular, he was a commoner who rose to power through some serious bloodshed, overthrowing the current rulers to take over. 

I think my point here, in my tiredness, is that many take royalty for granted. Because they're royal they're utterly special and of course they have to become King or Queen or whatever. I remember a discussion some time ago on this site on that topic. Works for kids/YA fiction I think, but older readers are more discerning with that stuff, for sure. I know I am.

My other MCs are foreign or just commoners.

I also like the dynamics between nobles/commoners - Downton Abbey for example.

EDIT:

Great article Chilari (blog)!

Also forgot to add - another thing I like is seeing a commoner struggle to learn court life, noble life etc. And vice versa. A noble thrown into a situation where he or she has to learn to survive. It's fun for character building.


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## wordwalker (Apr 20, 2013)

Chilari said:


> I reckon it's about storytelling focus and scale. Scale because what better way to convince the reader that something is important than have it affect a whole country? We understand how our governments' decisions impact on us and thus how someone else's government's decisions or intrigues impact on them. It's similar to how superheroes are always saving the whole world.
> 
> Storytelling focus is about using the fewest resources to tell the best story. Being concise is punchier. Drivel is dull. Royalty enables a tighter story because it gives focus and because people understand it and you don't need to explain it, as you would have to with a Spartan style diarchy. Whether royalty is good or bad in the story, it enables you to focus on one person, usually the king or queen but not always, instead of a whole council of democrats or oligarchs, thus keeping the story tight.



Superb points.

Still, I think this kind of power is what a good writer creates with anyone's story. The MC might be cool because he's the king and has armies lining up to hit the barbarians where he says, or it might be because he's a (real) farm boy who's been joking with his brothers as he ploughs, dunked his head in a bucketful of blessedly cold water, and thought of the girl he'll see at the festival next month-- and then the barbarians ride in and threaten to level the place and _what are you gonna do?_

I've read plenty of stories like that, along with plenty about royalty. Scale and focus and familiarity are good, but everyone's story gives you the tools you need to create that kind of energy, and using them well is still the writer's job.


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## Mindfire (Apr 20, 2013)

Honestly, I think it's because deep down, we all want to be kings. We all want power, respect, and to feel special and like our decisions matter. Fantastic royalty provides the perfect avatar. Heck, one of the reasons I write fantasy (and I'm sure this is true for others) is that it's so much fun to be the god of your own personal universe.


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## Sean Cunningham (Apr 20, 2013)

I read a fantasy novel years ago (my copy is in Australia and I'm in London, so I can't check the title) that was set entirely within a rural valley. The writer made me care about the people there and built the threat credibly, so I was invested in their survival. No royalty involved.

Terry Pratchett builds the same kind of characters, threats and stakes into his witches books. The witches are concerned with the safety of the local village and its people, not the world - though the world may have a problem on their hands in trouble gets past them. He plays it as comedy, but the core concept holds up regardless.

As mentioned previously, urban fantasy is a place where you can find non-royalty. John Constantine is quite specifically a blue-collar warlock. He was even in a band once.


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## Alexandra (Apr 20, 2013)

Feo Takahari said:


> If you really want to ditch the kings, there's always urban fantasy....



Fantasy writers tend to think big, even grandiose. Kings and queens, presidents, dukes, CEOs, crime lords, gang leaders, it really makes no difference; the antagonist must be powerful otherwise his or her threat would be miniscule and insignificant. Even a beggar king wields real power therefore the protagonist must also be powerful or be able to access or develop power in order to defeat the big bad.

Royalty didn't figure in _The Hobbit_ but Frodo and Sam could not have ruined Sauron's day without a lot of help.

Having said this my protagonist is an apprentice herbalist working in a rural community of about 4-500 people. From small stories epic tales are born.


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## Ireth (Apr 20, 2013)

Alexandra said:


> Royalty didn't figure in _The Hobbit_ but Frodo and Sam could not have ruined Sauron's day without a lot of help.



You're forgetting Thranduil, King of Mirkwood, as well as Thorin, King Under the Mountain. Also Lord Elrond of Rivendell is at least nobility, if not royalty.


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## Alexandra (Apr 20, 2013)

Ireth said:


> You're forgetting Thranduil, King of Mirkwood, as well as Thorin, King Under the Mountain. Also Lord Elrond of Rivendell is at least nobility, if not royalty.



Thorin's rank was not as intrinsic to the character as is, say, Tyrion Lannister's. Thranduil and Elrond were supporting characters, nobles yes but not key elements of the story. What made the dwarves interesting to both Bilbo and we readers was that they were adventurers and risk takers, not whether any of them had blue blood. Their quest required neither a royal presence nor seal of approval.


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## Ireth (Apr 20, 2013)

Alexandra said:


> Thorin's rank was not as intrinsic to the character as is, say, Tyrion Lannister's. Thranduil and Elrond were supporting characters, nobles yes but not key elements of the story. What made the dwarves interesting to both Bilbo and we readers was that they were adventurers and risk takers, not whether any of them had blue blood, and their quest didn't require a royal presence or seal of approval.



Maybe not, but Thranduil was a big part of the Battle of Five Armies and the events after that. And I wouldn't say Thorin's rank isn't very important -- the whole point of his quest is to take back his kingdom. It wouldn't have been the same story if he'd been just another exile from Erebor.


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## Nobby (Apr 20, 2013)

Argh! Please don't fall into circular arguments, My question, when you ripped the life and soul out of it was simple!

Do you think that you would read a story from the little people's side.


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## Alexandra (Apr 20, 2013)

Thorin may have wanted to recover his grandfather's pillaged treasure and take back his kingdom but I never got the feeling that his quest was everyone's quest. I saw, and still see, Bilbo and his crew as a group of thieves; I can almost hear Gandalf whispering to Bilbo, "So, do yu want to go and rip off a dragon?"

"Steal a dragon Gandalf, wouldn't that be very hard?" says Bilbo.

"Not steal a dragon dim, steal from a dragon... his treasure, you know?"

"Oh, wouldn't that be terribly dangerous."

"By the dwarves' beards, no," replies Gandalf, "they sleep almost all of the time."

"Almost all of the time, hmm..."


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## Alexandra (Apr 20, 2013)

Nobby said:


> Do you think that you would read a story from the little people's side.



I'm saying we have—_The Hobbit_. There must be others, but likely not many.


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## Ireth (Apr 20, 2013)

Alexandra said:


> Thorin may have wanted to recover his grandfather's pillaged treasure and take back his kingdom but I never got the feeling that his quest was everyone's quest.



Well, this was addressed in the movie, at least. Balin showed great pride in following Thorin and calling him King, and I imagine the others did as well, particularly Fili and Kili. Thorin explicitly said that their quest was to take back Erebor from Smaug, not just steal his hoard right out from under him. Erebor is their home, not just some heap of rock with gold and a big flying lizard inside. They wouldn't have taken such a risk if it were anyplace else not sacred to their kind.

EDIT: Apologies for derailing the thread. I'll shut up now.


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## Nobby (Apr 20, 2013)

@ alexandra, you know what I meant by small people 

And Ireth, don't apologise!


The pair of you...you both awe me with your knowledge and the world is so much sweeter with that....

Do I  have to kill this thread because the pair of you seem to be fighting a vendetta?


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## Alexandra (Apr 20, 2013)

I echo Ireth's apology regarding derailing this thread but I did enjoy our exchange. Another time, another place perhaps.


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## Ophiucha (Apr 20, 2013)

Nobby said:


> Do you think that you would read a story from the little people's side.



Yes.  I tend to think they have more interesting stories, and with the right plot, they could be no less epic. Peasant uprisings and whatnot. It would depend on the time period (roughly, if not on Earth) how much leeway that gives you, and certainly there is a practicality to the medieval royalty/nobility being the protagonists (namely that they had the means to ever leave their home town), but there are always ways around that and _always _more interesting stories than the same old medieval fantasy that's been written a thousand times, too.

A lot of feminist fantasy novels take place with lower class characters. The reasons for this namely being that women had a lot more power within a household when they were poor, since everybody had to give their everything just to survive. Plus, you're already dealing with one sort of 'lower class' by tackling women to begin with, so why not take on the literal lower class along with it? The same is true of a lot of political fantasy, in fact. Socialist and communist-leaning writers often write about the poor because, well, that's sort of the centre of their ideology. A fair few of China Mieville's protagonists are middle or lower class.


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## Alex Beecroft (Apr 22, 2013)

Nobby said:


> OK, I just would like to ask why so much fantasy fiction seems to be based on Kings and Queens, (or moreso unknowing foundling princes and princesses)
> 
> I enjoy fantasy but why is there regularly such a genealogical tilt to it? Or (and even worse, in my view) the grasping middle class desperation to claim royalty for itself. (IE horrible court advisers)
> 
> ...



I think it's because, in pseudo-medieval settings at least, the salt of the earth don't have a lot of leisure time to devote to more than the job that keeps them fed. They probably know a lot about cattle rearing and cabbages, predicting the weather, when it's a good time to sow crops etc, and they're likely to have such talents as fishing, poaching, whittling, animal doctoring etc, which don't necessarily lend themselves easily to quests to save the world.

Kings and aristocracy on the other hand training which enables them to assert their own will - they are trained to use weapons/armies. In the course of doing their own job, they have to be aware of what's going on in the kingdom around them and in such kingdoms as surround theirs. It's their job to defend the kingdom against whatever threatens it, and it's their job to be aware of what that might be. Also they'll have the money they need to have weapons, horses, ships, spies and enough food not to have all their attention taken up by whether they're going to starve or not. And they have the time to go on long quests without having to worry about who will milk the cows every morning while they're gone.


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## Alex Beecroft (Apr 22, 2013)

Nobby said:


> Argh! Please don't fall into circular arguments, My question, when you ripped the life and soul out of it was simple!
> 
> Do you think that you would read a story from the little people's side.



Of course, if it was interesting.

Aren't there lots of "Farm boy turns out to be the chosen one" stories out there, though? In those, the farm boy generally has to leave the farm to have his adventure. Do you mean you would like to see the characters stay on the farm and never come into contact with other social strata, or is it OK if the characters end up interacting with the aristocracy as long as the MCs grew up on the farm?


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## Jabrosky (Apr 22, 2013)

My current story's protagonists are definitely of royal descent. One of them is a queen consort for one kingdom's ruler while her half-sister is queen-regnant (that is, a ruling queen) of another kingdom.

A female friend of mine once told me that while there were plenty of stories with princesses or other rich damsels for protagonists, there were comparatively few in which the heroines were fully fledged rulers of their respective civilizations. Personally I find the idea of a female protagonist bearing responsibility over a whole kingdom really appealing.


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## Alex Beecroft (Apr 22, 2013)

Jabrosky said:


> A female friend of mine once told me that while there were plenty of stories with princesses or other rich damsels for protagonists, there were comparatively few in which the heroines were fully fledged rulers of their respective civilizations. Personally I find the idea of a female protagonist bearing responsibility over a whole kingdom really appealing.



Queens definitely do not get enough press. I'm writing a historical fantasy set in the 18th Century at the moment. My characters will be passing through the Austro-Hungarian empire ruled by Empress Marie-Theresa and going to Russia ruled by Empress Elizabeth Petrovna. Neither of whom were the classic 'evil queen' which seems to be the only way you get it in Fantasy.


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## Jabrosky (Apr 22, 2013)

Alex Beecroft said:


> Queens definitely do not get enough press. I'm writing a historical fantasy set in the 18th Century at the moment. My characters will be passing through the Austro-Hungarian empire ruled by Empress Marie-Theresa and going to Russia ruled by Empress Elizabeth Petrovna. Neither of whom were the classic 'evil queen' which seems to be the only way you get it in Fantasy.


Holy crud, that trend still persists?  I would have thought fantasy would have progressed beyond that by now.


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## Alex Beecroft (Apr 22, 2013)

It may be in my mind because I was watching _Once Upon A Time_ last night and thinking about _Snow White and the Huntsman_. I'm wracking my brains now to think of any books with important queens in them at all and coming up blank except for Galadriel. (Who at least isn't evil.)

Oh, Elizabeth I of England tends to feature relatively well in anything set in that period, although she's usually more of a cameo appearance than an MC.


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## Nobby (Apr 26, 2013)

Good grief! How this has evolved! 

How did this turn into a sexist royalist argument LOL

My point was, {deep breath} would anyone read about a group of people living in a fantasy world who were both male and female, but neither king nor queen?

(Nor chosen! No, not even by ancient prophecy!)


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## Alex Beecroft (Apr 27, 2013)

My answer is still "yes, but it would depend on what they were doing." If they were, for example, defending their village against a dragon, that sounds interesting and I would read it. If they were using their newly discovered magic for promoting crop growth, killing their neighbours cows and forecasting who would be their future spouse (which is historically the kind of things peasants have tried to use magic for,) then I would suspect it was likely to be a bit soap-opera-ish and probably not read it. Leaving the village to encounter the weird tribes over the hill? Yes. Leaving the village to spend three years learning to become a tanner in the village next door? Probably not.

Basically what I'm saying is that I don't care whether they're royalty or not. I just want them to be involved in an interesting plot.


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## wordwalker (Apr 27, 2013)

Alex Beecroft said:


> My answer is still "yes, but it would depend on what they were doing." If they were, for example, defending their village against a dragon, that sounds interesting and I would read it. If they were using their newly discovered magic for promoting crop growth, killing their neighbours cows and forecasting who would be their future spouse (which is historically the kind of things peasants have tried to use magic for,) then I would suspect it was likely to be a bit soap-opera-ish and probably not read it. Leaving the village to encounter the weird tribes over the hill? Yes. Leaving the village to spend three years learning to become a tanner in the village next door? Probably not.
> 
> Basically what I'm saying is that I don't care whether they're royalty or not. I just want them to be involved in an interesting plot.



Agreed... although, it isn't entirely that the plot just has to be flashy enough to be "gaming without thrones." We readers all have our own tastes in plots (dragons? yay!, spouse-forecasting? could be, cow-killing? could go all kinds of ways), and we also know that some authors are better at _making_ some kinds of plots interesting.


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## Nobby (Apr 27, 2013)

"Gaming without thrones." Ohh, you wit you 

@ Alex Beecroft.

 And of course tales focused on royalty never get "Soap-opera-ish"

I'm working on a story that is trying to point out the effects (major and minor) that the "traditional" fantasy tales seem to ignore... 

Example: Two neighbouring fiefdoms go to war. Lord So and So sends his armies to fight Lady Such and Such, so one, the other or neither of them have a shot at claiming destroying or generally mucking about with something that no doubt seems important to them- just something. The Crown? A mystical artefact of such immense power as to make petty matters of serfs meaningless? Who knows!
Surely not the poor sods getting ready for fighting! Both sides chuck armies at each other, both armies contain people who probably KNOW each other and these cannon (dragon, demon) fodder actually being people, not just markers on a jewelled game table, find an excuse to put the boot into somebody on the other side who has done their family wrong over the price of that there pig fifteen seasons back.

Add to that that both of these armies have to be fed, armed and resupplied and that presumably somebody is staying home to mind the crops and mine the ore to smelt the steel to...you get the point.

Wouldn't it get to the point where the lowliest sod with a shovel thought to himself...You know what, screw em all, I'm getting nothing out of this but a bad back.

And if you think a peasant revolt is funny, just remember this, at this point all the High and mighty Lords and Ladies have all of their horses and all of their men way over there...

Ooof. Out of breath 

Does that sound worth reading LOL


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## Alex Beecroft (Apr 28, 2013)

It sounds a little bit too much like real life/historical fiction for my tastes. (This is not a put down - I feel the same way about Game of Thrones, and it's blatantly obvious from how many people love that that _I'm_ the one out of step on that front.) But nevertheless it sounds like too much real life realpolitic, not enough flashy awesome magic and saving-the-world to be my sort of thing.

Which is not to say that it wouldn't be other peoples' thing, because I'm sure it would. And it would be an angle that I'd never seen done before.

On a parallel track, I'm in the process of writing a story about the adventures of a group of Viking women, once their menfolk have sailed off to mug foreigners. After all, there's no guarantee that being left alone in the village is the same as being left in a safe place. People do have a tendency to think of the adventures of the 'heroes' and forget about the support personnel who make it possible.


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## Nobby (May 4, 2013)

Yes! AB you have sort of a similar idea, I apologise, for my previous post, I tend to get overly socio-political in my outlook in my cups... I think it comes from being a true punk clash/ style council fan, when I was younger... just about two years after it was actually considered cool...


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## Alex Beecroft (May 5, 2013)

Nobby said:


> Yes! AB you have sort of a similar idea, I apologise, for my previous post, I tend to get overly socio-political in my outlook in my cups... I think it comes from being a true punk clash/ style council fan, when I was younger... just about two years after it was actually considered cool...



*g* I remember all that. I was a rocker at the time, although to be honest prog-rock, more than anything else. You'll still catch me listening to Hawkwind at the weekends. But yes, I'm now involved in Folk, which is also good evidence for the belief that a peasants' revolt would turn out pretty brutally for everyone. All that seething helpless anger, with both sides being terrified and contemptuous of each other, and a thousand years of oppression to make up for in however long it would take for the upper echelons to notice and respond with their own brutality and fear.


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## Nobby (May 11, 2013)

The horrible truth is that comfort breeds lazy thinking in anyone no matter what background they belong to...sigh...
It's back to wanting to be the biggest fish in the pond you are born to. But the absolute worst in every group tends to rise to prominence...if you add Ego to the mix (royalty, union, crook or commoner) you end up with a poisonous brew...I should think to myself it's just a story, I should really just relax ...but I can't


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## Chessie (May 12, 2013)

Interesting thread, I like it. Nobby, your question is one I can relate with. Although I love kings, queens, dragons (especially) mages, etc...not all fantasy has to be this way. I think the reason royalty shows up in fantasy so much is because the medieval setting cannot exist without the history of crowns. As writers, we take history and twist it around until we get a cool setting for our story and the reality of the Dark Ages was that it was ruled by royalty. 

I liked GOT (only read the first book, haven't watched the tv show) and thought, although slow, it was a well done portrayal of cut-throat antics over a throne. I have no interest in writing about royalty, preferring a smaller scale to my WIP. The story focuses on the survival of a particular family (with a line of shamanistic magics) but its not "she turns into a hero and saves the world and then in turn rules the world". 

There's enough of that out there, just leave me to my smaller scaled story about a protagonist trying to survive from spiritual persecution (that's my ball game). I think fantasy stories can be just as amazing without tossing in a throne.


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## Alex Beecroft (May 12, 2013)

Nobby said:


> I should think to myself it's just a story, I should really just relax ...but I can't



Well, if it was 'just' a story, with no relevance to reality at all, it probably wouldn't be worth telling or reading. I think this is part of why non-writers seem to regard writers with some kind of awe - the writer's shamanistic responsibility to venture into the underworld and make sense out of what they find there. Go forth and give meaning to the world, young man


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## Nobby (May 23, 2013)

The thread that refuses mortality...and it isn't even about popular culture 

Thanks Chester (I can't add that 'ama', my fingers just claw ) I think that persecution of any type in any fiction is always attractive, so long as you don't make it so black and white as to be blinding, if you see what I mean. Or as wishy washy as to be all grey...and...worthy...

AB... Sheesh, young man LOL

I once said I wanted to be a writer at school (many moons ago, admittedly) and I was told by my work experience adviser that "If you want to lie, why not train in law?"

Telling him he was in the wrong vocation didn't make me popular there 

This may or may not be apocryphal...

BTW I hope you guys appreciate how much I am getting from this thread!


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