she was a pure genious! I love Fire and Hemlock and Howl's Moving Castle (and many other books by DWJ). I haven't read The Tough Guide properly yet, just flipped through the pages, some entries are absolutely hilarious and very recognizable - the tropes and cliches she describes are used a lot in fantasy novels
Thank you for this wonderful little video! I've read How's Moving Castle and I've seen Miyazaki's adaptation to it too, but I don't think I've read anything else from Diana Wynne Jones. I've added her Guide to Fantasy Land to my reading list, thank you so much :)
I think one of the most amazing things about DWJ is the intellectual depth of a lot of her novels, and I think that's part of why people don't know what to do with her. I found John Donne through Howl's Moving Castle, and the Childe Ballads through Fire and Hemlock. I understood Platonism through the Homeward Bounders. Her articulation of the multiverse and how that might work--and what the consequences could be--was profound. But it's like no one ever talks about this. I don't think I've ever seen anyone address that Howl is structured around a Donne poem, but it's important. It's about expectation and reality, and, more than anything, letting the narrative control you (which is almost every DWJ novel: don't let the narrative control you. And also, that charming older relative is exploiting you). DWJ drew the most insanely wild connections between ideas: If Platonic ideas could be manipulated, could the first species to figure it out turn the multiverse into a TTRPG? If so, how could we fight that? If fantasy worlds are either magic is common or magic is occult, what happens if a world is exactly in the middle and what could cause that to happen? What if Time itself required a counterweight--and who could be that weight? Not every DWJ novel quite works. She pushed a lot of boundaries. But I know that is was reading DWJ, more than anyone, maybe, that really primed me for the life of the mind when I got to college. I got Aeschylus and Prometheus Bound because I'd read Homeward Bounders to pieces. I loved poetry because of Howl and Fire and Hemlock. I had a much better sense of just how deep fantasy stories went--both in ideas, but also back in time. How narrative, like hope, is an anchor in both a good and bad way. Lord, she's under appreciated. Tough Guide is just the start (also, you didn't mention the entry on color-coding. It's the best part, imho).
I think the undercurrent of anger is pretty evident in some of Sir Terry's final works, however, it is still tempered by the humour well enough to not end up as the principal take-away. I think I just missed her work, being a teenager when she was publishing, but this book sounds like great fun for someone who particularly enjoys parody. 😁
@@ACriticalDragon Such is the fate of many a pre internet writer, Tanith Lee, CJ Cherryh, Mercedes Lackey among others. All we can do is remind people that fantasy didn't start after y2k. This book I will definitely look for, it sounds like it should be in every fantasy readers library.
Yay for Diana Wynne Jones! Howl's Moving Castle and Archer's Goon were two of my favourite books when I was a kid :) My local library had exactly three books by her: those two and The Power of Three.
This also applies to games but the fact they were serious makes it even funnier. For example, the AD&D Wilderness Survival Guide literraly had a section with charts on how to determine how much 'good sleep' a character would get. I could not make that up. To make a good parody, one really needs to understand the source material for it to work. And likely need to find this at some point to share with my gaming friends.
Re stews and steaks, it's all a matter of logistics. A steak is a modern thing, because it's an expensive slab of meat that has to be absolutely fresh. It's not a campfire dish in a pre-modern setting, where fresh meat would not be as easily available, unless it's freshly hunted game, but game is more likely to be grilled on a skewer. A stew, on the other hand, can be made from less perishable cured or salted meat, and one would need relatively little of it, making up the volume in cheap vegetables, mushrooms and wheat/barley. The thing that is wrong in cliche descriptions is that people set up camp and only then start making a stew, which as you rightly say takes a lot of time. A more plausible scenario would be to fetch water and get the stew going before going on to set up the camp, because then the food will be ready when all the other work has been done. Of course, a stew is not the only option for a pre-modern setting, but it still makes sense beyond just being a caricature on Middle Ages.
@@ACriticalDragon And all those vegetables are bulky and in some cases heavy and at the end of three days riding would be nothing but a green slurry and mashed potatoes.
You can't leave meat stewing on anything as variable as a campfire. Stews also need thickening, like a reaux or some sort of starch. Stew, in the modern sense of a chuncks of meat and vegetables in a thick gravy, is slow, has multiple steps, and needs a lot of attention throughout the process. Modern backpackers who are keeping it simple eat oatmeal, dried meat, stuff like that. Add hot water, but not too much (water and fuel all represent time and work). Some sort of meat gruel, Mayne. Not a delicious stew.
Your timing is impeccable, AP! I literally started this yesterday and it is sooo fun! Some of the entries still feel pretty accurate for newer fantasy, too. For example the entry on canal cities read like a spot on description of Camorr from Lies of Locke Lamora. Some of my favorties so far were the entries on cloaks, backpacks and blankets 😂 Definitely looking forward to continue my read later today. The horse entry is so amazing. Also the bog entry. "You could loose horses here". The most interesting horses that are basically characters I have found in To Ride Hell's Chasm by Janny Wurts btw.
The Tough guide was a very funny book especially if you are familiar with sword and sorcery and various DND novels, I personally wasn't very taken with Dark Lord of Derkholm the jokes just didn't really land well. One thing I always found funny was that there was a group of authors at the time where a lot of the audience and the author were horse girls. In those books horses definitely weren't motorcycles as the audience wouldn't accept it without explaination and this sort of uneven treatment with some books focusing a lot on the horses and others using them only really as a transport method makes it very noticeable even if you know nothing about horses.
Oh, these are generalisations no doubt about it, but the thing is we all know books in which these things appear. It is such a great book, and so much fun.
Quite interesting. I've been meaning to pick this one up. The entire time in my head I was saying 'well this sort of reminds me of Terry Pratchett' and of course you had beaten me there. Particularly the first discworld book, which many almost disown, is very much a tour of fantasy. Fire and Hemlock, another by Jones, is quite interesting, and it plays with established tropes somewhat, with a sinister undercurrent. It's based largely on the ballad of Tam Lin. It's not as accessible, quite adult for a children's book (she doesn't talk down to the reader, I love that about her). There's a love interest that people criticize, but that's part of the point! Jones has beaten us there, she knows what she's doing! Great video
Absolutely not what I thought I would be complaining about. But dammit I'm a chef. If I had limited meat but had to feed more than two people I would go the stew route.
Maybe getting the horses wrong isn't that big of a deal as a reader? Far more egregious is getting the science in science fiction wrong but readers still seem to like it! I think these things are less important if one has a good story with strong writing and characters. I think one point which you alluded to in the beginning - it is really very important to read children's and YA fantasy and not just adult fantasy - there is a lot to learn from them.
I'm often disappointed when horses are treated like a burner phone. But maybe part of Fantasy physics and practice are horses are purchased like burner phones at the local Waltaveran, along with instant stew packets, high calorie gluten free Elven bread, and the dankest of hobbit weed.
she was a pure genious! I love Fire and Hemlock and Howl's Moving Castle (and many other books by DWJ). I haven't read The Tough Guide properly yet, just flipped through the pages, some entries are absolutely hilarious and very recognizable - the tropes and cliches she describes are used a lot in fantasy novels
Ha ha ha ha! Now we know how those apostrophes work! This sounds like a delightful read. Thank you for the video, P'Rofessor F'Ireballs!
Ha' ha' ha' indeed!
A friend of mine gave a great paper at ICFA on the Fantasy apostr'phe. Slightly more academic than Jones' take, but almost as funny.
@@ACriticalDragon Treat it as a fart sound, puts a whole new spin on things...
I need to get a special effects thing so I can add weird sounds for every apostrophe.
@@Paul_van_Doleweerd or, in the timeless style of Victor Borge, perhaps, a "squeeplsh" kind of sound.
Thank you for this wonderful little video! I've read How's Moving Castle and I've seen Miyazaki's adaptation to it too, but I don't think I've read anything else from Diana Wynne Jones. I've added her Guide to Fantasy Land to my reading list, thank you so much :)
Archer's Goon is another famous one by Jones, although another commenter recommended Fire and Hemlock which I have not read.
I think one of the most amazing things about DWJ is the intellectual depth of a lot of her novels, and I think that's part of why people don't know what to do with her. I found John Donne through Howl's Moving Castle, and the Childe Ballads through Fire and Hemlock. I understood Platonism through the Homeward Bounders. Her articulation of the multiverse and how that might work--and what the consequences could be--was profound. But it's like no one ever talks about this. I don't think I've ever seen anyone address that Howl is structured around a Donne poem, but it's important. It's about expectation and reality, and, more than anything, letting the narrative control you (which is almost every DWJ novel: don't let the narrative control you. And also, that charming older relative is exploiting you).
DWJ drew the most insanely wild connections between ideas: If Platonic ideas could be manipulated, could the first species to figure it out turn the multiverse into a TTRPG? If so, how could we fight that? If fantasy worlds are either magic is common or magic is occult, what happens if a world is exactly in the middle and what could cause that to happen? What if Time itself required a counterweight--and who could be that weight?
Not every DWJ novel quite works. She pushed a lot of boundaries. But I know that is was reading DWJ, more than anyone, maybe, that really primed me for the life of the mind when I got to college. I got Aeschylus and Prometheus Bound because I'd read Homeward Bounders to pieces. I loved poetry because of Howl and Fire and Hemlock. I had a much better sense of just how deep fantasy stories went--both in ideas, but also back in time. How narrative, like hope, is an anchor in both a good and bad way.
Lord, she's under appreciated. Tough Guide is just the start (also, you didn't mention the entry on color-coding. It's the best part, imho).
I completely agree. DWJ is great. I am a fan of her books.
I think the undercurrent of anger is pretty evident in some of Sir Terry's final works, however, it is still tempered by the humour well enough to not end up as the principal take-away.
I think I just missed her work, being a teenager when she was publishing, but this book sounds like great fun for someone who particularly enjoys parody. 😁
She is, unfortunately, often overlooked by many people.
@@ACriticalDragon Such is the fate of many a pre internet writer, Tanith Lee, CJ Cherryh, Mercedes Lackey among others. All we can do is remind people that fantasy didn't start after y2k. This book I will definitely look for, it sounds like it should be in every fantasy readers library.
Yay for Diana Wynne Jones! Howl's Moving Castle and Archer's Goon were two of my favourite books when I was a kid :) My local library had exactly three books by her: those two and The Power of Three.
I never read Archer's Goon, but I do remember the TV show based on it.
This also applies to games but the fact they were serious makes it even funnier.
For example, the AD&D Wilderness Survival Guide literraly had a section with charts on how to determine how much 'good sleep' a character would get. I could not make that up.
To make a good parody, one really needs to understand the source material for it to work. And likely need to find this at some point to share with my gaming friends.
Rules lawyers for the win...
I read this book a few years back, and it's just as brilliant as I expect of anything written by Diana Wynne Jones. Love the apostrophes. :)
Apostrophes are both the bane and the joy of fantasy names.
Very interesting, AP, sounds like a lot of fun. I recently read Howl's Moving Castle for the first time as an adult and I liked it a lot.
I am glad you did. I still have incredibly fond memories of it. The anime adaptation was interesting as well.
Re stews and steaks, it's all a matter of logistics. A steak is a modern thing, because it's an expensive slab of meat that has to be absolutely fresh. It's not a campfire dish in a pre-modern setting, where fresh meat would not be as easily available, unless it's freshly hunted game, but game is more likely to be grilled on a skewer. A stew, on the other hand, can be made from less perishable cured or salted meat, and one would need relatively little of it, making up the volume in cheap vegetables, mushrooms and wheat/barley. The thing that is wrong in cliche descriptions is that people set up camp and only then start making a stew, which as you rightly say takes a lot of time. A more plausible scenario would be to fetch water and get the stew going before going on to set up the camp, because then the food will be ready when all the other work has been done. Of course, a stew is not the only option for a pre-modern setting, but it still makes sense beyond just being a caricature on Middle Ages.
But the reason you can't get a side salad is clearly the lack of of a decent vinaigrette.
@@ACriticalDragon And all those vegetables are bulky and in some cases heavy and at the end of three days riding would be nothing but a green slurry and mashed potatoes.
@@ACriticalDragon Or French, Russian or Italian dressing as there is no France, Russia or Italy.
You can't leave meat stewing on anything as variable as a campfire. Stews also need thickening, like a reaux or some sort of starch.
Stew, in the modern sense of a chuncks of meat and vegetables in a thick gravy, is slow, has multiple steps, and needs a lot of attention throughout the process.
Modern backpackers who are keeping it simple eat oatmeal, dried meat, stuff like that. Add hot water, but not too much (water and fuel all represent time and work). Some sort of meat gruel, Mayne. Not a delicious stew.
Brilliant! Would love to read this and her novels.
There are a lot of fun and quite different to a lot of the current genre.
Added it to my reading list!
At least this one is manageable.
Your timing is impeccable, AP! I literally started this yesterday and it is sooo fun! Some of the entries still feel pretty accurate for newer fantasy, too. For example the entry on canal cities read like a spot on description of Camorr from Lies of Locke Lamora.
Some of my favorties so far were the entries on cloaks, backpacks and blankets 😂
Definitely looking forward to continue my read later today.
The horse entry is so amazing. Also the bog entry. "You could loose horses here". The most interesting horses that are basically characters I have found in To Ride Hell's Chasm by Janny Wurts btw.
I hope that you enjoy the rest of the book. Funny and perceptive, I think it is wonderful.
The Tough guide was a very funny book especially if you are familiar with sword and sorcery and various DND novels, I personally wasn't very taken with Dark Lord of Derkholm the jokes just didn't really land well.
One thing I always found funny was that there was a group of authors at the time where a lot of the audience and the author were horse girls. In those books horses definitely weren't motorcycles as the audience wouldn't accept it without explaination and this sort of uneven treatment with some books focusing a lot on the horses and others using them only really as a transport method makes it very noticeable even if you know nothing about horses.
Oh, these are generalisations no doubt about it, but the thing is we all know books in which these things appear. It is such a great book, and so much fun.
The palpable pull to keep my characters out of a Tavern is strong. But I will lose this fight.
Great video and recommendation!
Those talkative innkeepers... she has a great section on Inns and innkeepers.
@@ACriticalDragon The fantasy equivalent of Google on a smart-phone. Have a great weekend!
I'm definitely ordering this to help me along my writing journey!
It is a great read. Very funny. I find it nice to randomly open it up and read a couple of entries. It almost always brightens my day.
Possibly my favourite author when i was a child
I wish I had discovered her when I was younger, but they are still great now.
Awesome! Something I've never heard of. I will have to check it out. Thanks A'P' :)
You are very welcome. RPGs might not have been the inspiration but I think you will see some crossover.
@@ACriticalDragon No doubt. I have RPG interrelation bias :)
Quite interesting. I've been meaning to pick this one up. The entire time in my head I was saying 'well this sort of reminds me of Terry Pratchett' and of course you had beaten me there. Particularly the first discworld book, which many almost disown, is very much a tour of fantasy.
Fire and Hemlock, another by Jones, is quite interesting, and it plays with established tropes somewhat, with a sinister undercurrent. It's based largely on the ballad of Tam Lin. It's not as accessible, quite adult for a children's book (she doesn't talk down to the reader, I love that about her). There's a love interest that people criticize, but that's part of the point! Jones has beaten us there, she knows what she's doing!
Great video
Thanks. Pratchett is one of the obvious comparators. I am very partial to a number of the earlier works due to their direct parody of the genre.
Absolutely not what I thought I would be complaining about. But dammit I'm a chef. If I had limited meat but had to feed more than two people I would go the stew route.
What about soup?
Casserole? Goulash?
Maybe getting the horses wrong isn't that big of a deal as a reader? Far more egregious is getting the science in science fiction wrong but readers still seem to like it! I think these things are less important if one has a good story with strong writing and characters.
I think one point which you alluded to in the beginning - it is really very important to read children's and YA fantasy and not just adult fantasy - there is a lot to learn from them.
I have always tried to make the point that people should read widely.
I'm often disappointed when horses are treated like a burner phone. But maybe part of Fantasy physics and practice are horses are purchased like burner phones at the local Waltaveran, along with instant stew packets, high calorie gluten free Elven bread, and the dankest of hobbit weed.
What is worse is when dragons are just flying disposable horses...