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HelpRe: Names from Game of Thrones; suitable for a real person?
in reply to a message by the dying daylight
I believe the article about George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire that you are referencing was a review of the series, not something that Martin himself put out. Martin is obviously not the first author to employ grey-scale morality, but it is an interesting feature of a high fantasy type series. I certainly don't think that all readers of a Song of Ice and Fire would "rag on" Tolkein's Lord of the Rings; on the contrary, I think many readers enjoy both series. Tolkein is clearly a pioneer of the fantasy epic.
Also, interestingly enough, A Song of Ice and Fire has already been around for more than 20 years.
Also, interestingly enough, A Song of Ice and Fire has already been around for more than 20 years.
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Hmmm, yes, maybe. It's never, ever been a thing up to now in the U.K and has a near non-existent following in non-Anglophone communities I'm accustomed to, so I wouldn't know if it was new or not and I made an assumption. I was too lazy to wiki. It's still an existent and continuing series, and I don't reckon you can aptly judge the long-term fanbase potential when an author is still putting stuff out and thus naturally feeding his fan-base, if that makes any sense at all. It sounds nasty, but the real proof is if it continues after the series has ended or the author suffered an existence failure - if old fans still reread and new fans are continuously attracted to the series, a la Tolkein, then it speaks for itself, but many such series truly do fizzle out. I mean, look at Terry Goodkind for one. He did kind of shoot himself in the foot by using his series as a soapbox and relentlessly pursuing weird black and white biased morality (just... weird) and weird jingoistic support for the Iraq/Afghan wars, in poorly veiled parallels, but it was a pretty long-lived series and support for the first books was pretty lively... and now I think it's ended or might as well have done and nobody talks them about them, ever, and if they do it's all blasé and passed tense. Then again, his weird shouty politics has made the whole thing awkward, and he probably killed it with the evil chicken bit, but I still think that's kinda the pattern of fantasy and sci-fi.
Philip K. Dick? He wrote Do Androids dream of Electric Sheep?, the book which Blade Runner was very loosely based on (obv). Both the film and the book were huuuuuuuuge (again, obv), the former more than the latter but it must have fed people picking up the book. That still has some pretty hefty impact and pop culture references, but you have to admit it's aged and diminished a bit in itself (book and film), and that was, what, late sixties and early eighties respectively?
Philip K. Dick? He wrote Do Androids dream of Electric Sheep?, the book which Blade Runner was very loosely based on (obv). Both the film and the book were huuuuuuuuge (again, obv), the former more than the latter but it must have fed people picking up the book. That still has some pretty hefty impact and pop culture references, but you have to admit it's aged and diminished a bit in itself (book and film), and that was, what, late sixties and early eighties respectively?
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Has it?
Wikipedia says the first novel was published in 1996, which makes it 16 this year, so definitely not more than 20. Unless there was a predecessor to the novels, which I don't know about. Though, with (at least) two novels left in the series, I do think it'll break that 20 year mark. Whether it has more staying power, I don't know.
Wikipedia says the first novel was published in 1996, which makes it 16 this year, so definitely not more than 20. Unless there was a predecessor to the novels, which I don't know about. Though, with (at least) two novels left in the series, I do think it'll break that 20 year mark. Whether it has more staying power, I don't know.
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My mistake...
Oh, I was mistaken. The publish date was indeed 1996...Martin began work on the series in 1991, and for some reason that was the date that stuck in my head. I was so sure I didn't even check! Oops!
I don't know if it'll have staying power beyond the last novel and a few years beyond that. It seems to fit into a nice niche in fantasy, gritty and not too far-fetched. It's not the same revolutionizing classic that Lord of the Rings is, but I think it could remain relevant and popular within the fantasy genre.
Oh, I was mistaken. The publish date was indeed 1996...Martin began work on the series in 1991, and for some reason that was the date that stuck in my head. I was so sure I didn't even check! Oops!
I don't know if it'll have staying power beyond the last novel and a few years beyond that. It seems to fit into a nice niche in fantasy, gritty and not too far-fetched. It's not the same revolutionizing classic that Lord of the Rings is, but I think it could remain relevant and popular within the fantasy genre.
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