“Sing, O Muse, of Gollum, of Mr. Tumnus, of Pantalaimon, of the Dementors, of the elfstones, of the black cauldron, of the Old Ones, and of the Aes Sedai”!
What would Homer and Virgil have thought of that?
The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy (2001-03) was such a success for New Line Cinema that it spawned a whole host of other British fantasy novel-based movies such as Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising, and The Golden Compass, just to name a few. Everyone in Hollywood wanted to capitalize on this trend, which continues with the sixth Harry Potter installment this summer, the third Narnia film next year, and the long-awaited movie adaptation of The Hobbit (prequel to The Lord of the Rings) slated for the year after that. The success of fantasy-literature-turned-cinema shows that these sorts of themes are not merely the denizen of nerdy teenage boys but have the power to capture anyone’s imagination. (On a sci-fi parallel, the recent unprecedented box office success of the Star Trek movie prequel also shows that even non-Trekkies can dig Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock!). Obviously, part of the reason that fantasy cinema has been so successful in the past decade is because of the technological advances in special effects. To create a photo-realistic lion to portray Aslan was essential for suspension of disbelief. It is a far cry from the cheesy stop-motion animation of, say, 1981’s Clash of the Titans (though, incidentally, a remake of that movie is set for next year, starring Liam Neeson as Zeus! Hmm, he was also the voice of Aslan… reminds me of James Earl Jones both as Darth Vader but also Mufasa from The Lion King…)
I grew up ravenously devouring fantasy literature, starting with The Chronicles of Narnia. C.S. Lewis was my introduction into a world of dragons, magic, knights, and talking creatures. And surprisingly, as a fourth grader reading these books, the Biblical allusions were not lost on me. That is true accessibility if Lewis is able to reach children with his (albeit admittedly thinly-veiled) allegory!
However, I did not stop with the Narnia series. I read Lloyd Alexander (the Chronicles of Prydain series); Susan Cooper (The Dark Is Rising sequence); Christopher Paolini (the Inheritance cycle); T.H. White (The Once and Future King and The Book of Merlyn); Piers Anthony (the Xanth, Incarnations of Immortality, and Apprentice Adept series); J.R.R. Tolkien (the Lord of the Rings trilogy); Terry Brooks (the Shannara series); Philip Pullman (His Dark Materials trilogy); and Robert Jordan (the Wheel of Time series). The last one is, by far, my favorite. And friends have suggested George R.R. Martin (A Song of Ice and Fire series), who has often been called the “American Tolkien.” That is next on my reading list!
If we want to go to the granddaddy of them all, we have to give a nod to Homer. In the Johnson House of the Torrey Honors Institute, in which students read books thematically rather than chronologically, the first semester is dedicated to the great epics. From Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey to Virgil’s Aeneid, Dante’s Divine Comedy, Spenser’s Faerie Queene, Milton’s Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained, and the anonymously authored Beowulf, these were the original “fantasy novels.” In fact, in the Johnson House, we call this first semester “On Origins” because these epic poems are considered the foundations of Western literature! These original “fantasy novels” (or some might call them mythology, or imaginative religious literature) were intended for all, not just for nerdy teenage boys, and the fact that the fantasy genre has become so accessible to a wide audience in this last decade is a positive step to returning “fantasy” to its proper place. In the past, many people would automatically dismiss any hint of magic or fantastical creatures as not serious literature, but as The Lord of the Rings was voted the greatest book of the twentieth century (by numerous polls: Waterstone’s, Britain’s Channel Four, Amazon), obviously the tide has turned. Two other novels worth reading are the recent Ilium/Olympos duology by Dan Simmons. These two are sci-fi retellings of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.
If you want to dive into fantasy literature, here are synopses, and my take, on the series I have read:
-The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien
Book 1: The Fellowship of the Ring
Book 2: The Two Towers
Book 3: The Return of the King
Tolkien wanted to write the first British mythology. Some may object that King Arthur should rightfully fill that spot, but actually the Camelot legend began with Sir Thomas Malory, a Frenchman, who wrote Le Morte d’Arthur. So really, Tolkien was the first to invent a purely British mythology. He based a lot of it off of Norse and Anglo-Saxon, as Tolkien was a philologist. This series is actually not recommended for people who have never read much fantasy, as it is dense, and inexperienced fantasy readers would get bogged down by the details. The prequel, The Hobbit, is an easy read by comparison (it was written for children), and the pre-prequel, The Silmarillion, is even more difficult than The Hobbit is easy! Though it must be said, The Silmarillion is an unbelievable masterpiece, I liked it even more than The Lord of the Rings, but it takes tremendous patience to get through. But if you can handle it, it will reap great rewards.
-The Chronicles of Narnia, C.S. Lewis
Book 1: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
Book 2: Prince Caspian
Book 3: The Voyage of the “Dawn Treader”
Book 4: The Silver Chair
Book 5: The Horse and His Boy
Book 6: The Magician’s Nephew
Book 7: The Last Battle
I won’t write much about this because it seems that everyone has read them, and if you haven’t read them, you should! But let me just say that I think you ought to read them in publication order (as listed above) rather than chronological order. This is the way the filmmakers are producing them too. If you read Magician’s Nephew before Lion, Witch, and Wardrobe, it sucks a lot of the suspense out of the latter, much as learning that Vader is Luke’s father in The Empire Strikes Back is totally not a surprise if you’ve already seen Episodes I, II, and III. My favorite among the seven books is probably Dawn Treader.
-The Chronicles of Prydain, Lloyd Alexander
Book 1: The Book of Three
Book 2: The Black Cauldron
Book 3: The Castle of Llyr
Book 4: Taran Wanderer
Book 5: The High King
This was one of my favorite children’s series. The 1985 Disney film based on the second book was horrible, though, so don’t judge the series based on the movie! Charming, suspenseful, and romantic, I could read this series over and over again. I think I fell in love with Princess Eilonwy when I was a boy.
-The Dark Is Rising sequence, Susan Cooper
Book 1: Over Sea, Under Stone
Book 2: The Dark Is Rising
Book 3: Greenwitch
Book 4: The Grey King
Book 5: Silver on the Tree
Another Oxford-trained fantasy novelist (along with Tolkien, Lewis, and Pullman), Cooper based this series on Arthurian legend. I was intrigued by the concept, but I don’t think she pulled it off very successfully. It was unevenly written (the third book was trivial, and the second book was the best), it didn’t always star the same characters (I was confused when I read the second book, and wondered why this was a sequel since it involved none of the same characters as the first book), and the movie that came out a few years ago (The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising) totally mangled the storyline. This series had flashes of brilliance, but overall it was a bit weird.
-The Inheritance Cycle, Christopher Paolini
Book 1: Eragon
Book 2: Eldest
Book 3: Brisingr
Book 4: untitled (forthcoming)
Paolini is amazing in that he was only fifteen years old when he wrote the first book of this cycle! No publisher was willing to take a chance on him, so he self-published and became an instant success. The first book was good, especially considering his age, but really it was a rip-off of Star Wars (young man in a remote village who doesn’t realize his destiny and powers, old man who comes to mentor him, they rescue a princess from an evil warlord by joining with a rebellion, etc). The movie was just awful. The other books are better, but he is still working on the fourth book, the conclusion of the cycle.
-The Once and Future King, T.H. White
Hilarious and fun, this is King Arthur at its entertainment best! The Disney movie The Sword in the Stone was based on this novel. I thoroughly enjoyed White’s wit and humor. Well worth reading. The sequel, The Book of Merlyn, was not a worthy successor, however. It felt more like an epilogue to its predecessor than a sequel.
-The Apprentice Adept series, Piers Anthony
Book 1: Split Infinity
Book 2: Blue Adept
Book 3: Juxtaposition
Book 4: Out of Phaze
Book 5: Robot Adept
Book 6: Unicorn Point
Book 7: Phaze Doubt
Anthony is an entertaining novelist but he just needs to temper his libido—often his sexual allusions are just unnecessary. Still, he is incredibly creative and fun. The Apprentice Adept is one of his most imaginative concepts, as he uniquely combines fantasy and science fiction. It concerns two alternate universes, one of science fiction and one of fantasy, and every person has a parallel character in the other world. No one can cross over into the other world unless their alternate dies. The main character in the book, Stiles, is able to cross between the two worlds, and he learns to assume both identities simultaneously. He comes to the conclusion that his alter ego has been murdered, and someone is out to get him as well! The fact that his would-be murderer can cross between the two worlds means that the murderer’s alter ego has also died. This is an intriguing cat-and-mouse chase involving spaceships and dragons, technology and magic, as the intended victim tries to get the best of his pursuer. This series was originally intended to be a trilogy, and the first three books are great. When Anthony expanded it to seven books, the last four just felt of inferior quality than the first three. His Xanth series is a rollicking good time of hilarious fantasy, and his seven-book Incarnations of Immortality series will appeal to anyone interested in Greco-Roman mythology as he bases it off of the characters Death, Time, Fate, War, Nature, Evil, and Good, who star as the main characters of these seven books, respectively.
-Shannara, Terry Brooks
*The original Shannara trilogy: The Sword of Shannara; The Elfstones of Shannara; The Wishsong of Shannara
*The Heritage of Shannara tetralogy: The Scions of Shannara; The Druid of Shannara; The Elf Queen of Shannara; The Talismans of Shannara
*The prequel: The First King of Shannara
*The Voyage of the Jerle Shannara trilogy: Ilse Witch; Antrax; Morgawr
*The High Druid of Shannara trilogy: Jarka Ruus; Tanequil; Straken
*The Genesis of Shannara trilogy: Armageddon’s Children; The Elves of Cintra; The Gypsy Morph
The books listed above are out of chronological order, but similar to the Narnia novels, it is recommended that you read them in this order because it is the order of publication. Technically, the Genesis of Shannara trilogy should be listed first, followed by the prequel, The First King of Shannara, and then all the rest in the order listed above, but there is a logic to this order because of how they were written. Though the Sword of Shannara was the first, and you should read it first, just be warned that it is the worst of the entire 20-book series. The first half is completely a rip-off of The Lord of the Rings, and the climax of the book is, well, anti-climactic. But Brooks steadily improves as a writer. Every book gets better and better, and today he is one of the most skilled and entertaining fantasy storytellers of all. This is a fantastic series, but you have to necessarily get through the boring first book because it serves as a foundation for the rest of the series. This series is going to be made into movies, starting with Elfstones because I think the movie producers also realized that Sword is not the best one to start with!
-Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling
Book 1: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (U.S.) aka Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (U.K.)
Book 2: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Book 3: Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban
Book 4: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Book 5: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Book 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Like The Chronicles of Narnia, I really don’t need to say much about this series. Who hasn’t read them? Highly entertaining, really each novel is just a whodunit in fantasy clothing. The literary allusions are also tremendously fun to pick out (did you know that J.K. Rowling named Cedric Diggory after Digory Kirke from The Magician’s Nephew?). I think the films have overall been pretty good adaptations too! Travel tip: I did my Masters degree at the University of Edinburgh, and if you go to a café called The Elephant House on George IV Bridge in Edinburgh, you can see where J.K. Rowling wrote her first Harry Potter novel!
-His Dark Materials trilogy, Philip Pullman
Book 1: The Golden Compass (U.S.) aka Northern Lights (U.K.)
Book 2: The Subtle Knife
Book 3: The Amber Spyglass
Philip Pullman hates Tolkien and Lewis. He cites their low quality of literature, but really I think he just hates the fact that they’re Christian. Pullman has styled himself as the anti-Tolkien, which is ironic considering that he studied at Exeter College, Oxford, the same college that J.R.R. Tolkien (and I) studied at. Pullman modeled his trilogy on (and took the title from a line in) John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Only, he reinterprets it a la William Blake who famously said that Milton was of the Devil’s party without knowing it. But Pullman knows that he’s of the Devil’s party and is quite happy to play the part! Despite Pullman’s anti-religious agenda, he is a fantastic storyteller, and his concept of daemons is especially brilliant. The first book (originally titled Northern Lights in England but changed to The Golden Compass for American audiences, much as the first Harry Potter novel changed its name for the U.S. context) is definitely the best of the trilogy but the series unfortunately gets less interesting as it goes on. Forget all the perceived dangers of witchcraft in Harry Potter, etc., the only series listed in this blog which should not be given to children or gullible people is His Dark Materials. There are two other “spin-off” books that he’s written, called Lyra’s Oxford and Once Upon a Time in the North, neither of which is worth buying. They’re super-short stories which contribute nothing to the plot of the trilogy, and really seem just like easy money-making schemes. Pullman does have a companion to the series called The Book of Dust which will be released at a future date.
-The Wheel of Time series, Robert Jordan
Prequel: New Spring
Book 1: The Eye of the World
Book 2: The Great Hunt
Book 3: The Dragon Reborn
Book 4: The Shadow Rising
Book 5: The Fires of Heaven
Book 6: Lord of Chaos
Book 7: A Crown of Swords
Book 8: The Path of Daggers
Book 9: Winter’s Heart
Book 10: Crossroads of Twilight
Book 11: Knife of Dreams
Book 12 (in three parts, forthcoming): The Gathering Storm; Shifting Winds; Tarmon Gai’don
My favorite! This is an unbelievable series, monumental in scope, and exhaustive in detail. Robert Jordan created a richly detailed world which now has a huge cult following. Each of his dozen books is almost a thousand pages long, but what he has been able to accomplish makes Tolkien seem small by comparison. His stories are absolutely mesmerizing, but he does tend to slow down frustratingly in Books 7 through 11. However, the first six books will have you entranced from beginning to end. Agonizingly for the fans, Jordan died a couple of years ago, right before he finished his twelfth and final volume of the series. Another author, Brandon Sanderson, was tapped to finish the series (though who is worthy to take up Jordan’s mantle?) based on Jordan’s notes. He realized that there is too much ground to cover, so the final book will be published in three installments. Before Peter Jackson, no one had ever attempted to make The Lord of the Rings into a live-action film because it was deemed “unfilmable.” Well, clearly Jackson has showed that not to be the case, but I truly think that The Wheel of Time is unfilmable. Not just due to the sheer volume of plot and characters, but I just can’t conceive of anybody doing the subject matter justice on celluloid.
-A Song of Ice and Fire series, George R.R. Martin
Book 1: A Game of Thrones
Book 2: A Clash of Kings
Book 3: A Storm of Swords
Book 4: A Feast for Crows
Book 5: A Dance with Dragons (forthcoming)
Book 6: The Winds of Winter (forthcoming)
Book 7: A Dream of Spring (forthcoming)
Like I said, I have not read this series yet, but whenever I ask fellow fantasy enthusiasts, they all say that Robert Jordan is the second-greatest fantasy author, but George R.R. Martin is the best. Hmm, that’s a pretty good endorsement! Martin has written four of the seven novels so far.