tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post4491656423512589553..comments2024-03-18T20:22:06.331-04:00Comments on GROGNARDIA: Pulp Fantasy Library: The Sword of ShannaraJames Maliszewskihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00341941102398271464noreply@blogger.comBlogger53125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-36159803040393856502020-09-28T14:32:24.070-04:002020-09-28T14:32:24.070-04:00It's called calendar art.It's called calendar art.magickmagushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08765063371704699224noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-4419786663040877382011-08-21T22:17:10.097-04:002011-08-21T22:17:10.097-04:00For the record, Imago1 is full of crap. Brooks ful...For the record, Imago1 is full of crap. Brooks fully acknowledges his debt to Tolkien and the genesis of Sword is well-documented in his writing memoir.<br /><br />If you don't like Shannara or Brooks's work, so be it, but please don't lie about the man's intentions.Justinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04005956470306563905noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-87036703250933822252011-07-18T22:55:07.579-04:002011-07-18T22:55:07.579-04:00Never thought they were great books, but they did ...Never thought they were great books, but they did inspire my players in thinking about their characters more than Tolkein ever did. I'm not always sure it was in a good way, but they clearly modeled them on Brooks' creations.AMPhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09146014956720508804noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-75383288633670821452011-07-14T05:53:07.705-04:002011-07-14T05:53:07.705-04:00You'd think that if you were going to use the ...You'd think that if you were going to use the story of Lord of the Rings, you'd be sure to set it in space or the Old West or something.anarchisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05546197561922726279noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-70088684546419818832011-07-13T20:21:36.960-04:002011-07-13T20:21:36.960-04:00Reading this back in the day as a kid the thing th...Reading this back in the day as a kid the thing the struck me most, aside from it being a Tolkein rip-off, was how small the setting felt, especially for the page count. It felt about the size of any average US state or smaller, while Middle-Earth felt much larger, and thus more interesting, in comparison. <br /><br />I think the Hildebrant brothers' artwork and the Tolkein but- ad copy sold me on this (that and others my age reading it). At the time they'd done art for the Tolkein calendars so I already liked their art. The post-apoc stuff in SoS was interesting but barely there. I couldn't get into the setting after trying it again recently, though the airships were a nice touch (like the Mystara airship journals). I did like the bridge trilogy between his urban fantasy and the chronologically first Shannara books, The Genesis of Shannara.<br />http://www.terrybrooks.net/novels/reading-orders/Kevin Clementhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01910390681173250255noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-62172128223633850422011-07-13T13:52:17.205-04:002011-07-13T13:52:17.205-04:00Man I was really hoping you would rip into this st...<i>Man I was really hoping you would rip into this stinkwad of a book.</i><br /><br>Maybe I'm mellowing in my old age, but I just can't get worked up about the Shannara books. They're so <i>mediocre</i> in my opinion that I find it hard to be offended by them.James Maliszewskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00341941102398271464noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-80071509777897380702011-07-13T13:51:18.041-04:002011-07-13T13:51:18.041-04:00Brooks was an attorney, and was keenly aware that,...<i>Brooks was an attorney, and was keenly aware that, due to a loophole caused by the pirated Ace Books edition of The Lord of the Rings, the original version of Tolkien's book was in public domain in the US. He (and his editor, Lester del Rey) knew exactly what they could rip off and get away with.</i><br /><br>That's interesting. Can you point me toward something online or elsewhere that might help me get up to speed on this, as it's the first time I've heard this angle?James Maliszewskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00341941102398271464noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-48159982565598737632011-07-13T13:49:56.429-04:002011-07-13T13:49:56.429-04:00Sometimes you want a cheeseburger.
Yep. That's...<i>Sometimes you want a cheeseburger.</i><br /><br>Yep. That's why, much as I personally have little interest in the book, I can't really get too worked up about it.James Maliszewskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00341941102398271464noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-44066093617570385702011-07-12T22:04:18.898-04:002011-07-12T22:04:18.898-04:00Man I was really hoping you would rip into this st...Man I was really hoping you would rip into this stinkwad of a book.Timrod https://www.blogger.com/profile/15308269015770538709noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-27748865363797207492011-07-12T19:07:15.011-04:002011-07-12T19:07:15.011-04:00Lin Carter, among many others, denounced Sword as ...<i>Lin Carter, among many others, denounced Sword as ""the single most cold-blooded, complete rip-off of another book that I have ever read."</i><br /><br />Lin Carter hadn't seen nothing yet. Still I think card had it closer to the truth calling it "artistically displeasing" and overly derivative. The book is nowhere near as wholesale a lift as Carter treated it, though that's not speaking to it's quality.<br /><br />Frank Herbert's comments on it in the same article you list say it best, I think. It clearly owes a lot, but it's not theft.Turkish Proverbhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02423061909797064886noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-85600674109771854402011-07-12T13:08:25.846-04:002011-07-12T13:08:25.846-04:00No love for this terrible book from me; many of my...No love for this terrible book from me; many of my friends, on the other hand and much to my chagrin, loved them all, even considering the series superior to the works of Tolkien.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05646247954542936623noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-32426966630533256542011-07-12T12:51:04.992-04:002011-07-12T12:51:04.992-04:00I liked it well enough as a kid, but it didn't...I liked it well enough as a kid, but it didn't wow me. To this day the ending is high on my list of "most anti-climactic final confrontations ever".<br /><br />I also liked the post-apocalyptic angle. I remember liking the thief character a lot. I also remember that this combined with Dragonlance seemed to usher in the trope of killing off the dwarf.Tomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17116795932377593506noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-32015182355676348792011-07-12T11:49:59.733-04:002011-07-12T11:49:59.733-04:00I read the first three Shannara books as a high sc...I read the first three Shannara books as a high school student, a year or two after reading LOTR. This was probably about the time the Berlin wall came a' tumblin' down. <br /><br />It's odd, but like LOTR, I read the Shannara books out of order: 2nd, 1st, 3rd - just read what I could get my hands on.<br /><br />I recall enjoying them at the time, partly because it was like a second dose of LOTR. I tried to reread them about a decade later but couldn't do it. <br /><br />Here's the thing with fantasy novels Shannara onward - how many times can you save the world from horrible evil with this magic item or that certain special someone before it becomes positively mind numbing?Sans e Nomehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17682452411312303846noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-36877921076360862262011-07-12T06:08:51.836-04:002011-07-12T06:08:51.836-04:00@imago1:
Yeah - except maybe make the scientists ...@imago1:<br /><br />Yeah - except maybe make the scientists a ninja and a wise-cracking dwarf?anarchisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05546197561922726279noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-18623703196615547612011-07-12T05:07:33.411-04:002011-07-12T05:07:33.411-04:00Read it when it came out; it was so obviously a ri...Read it when it came out; it was so obviously a rip-off of LotR that I felt pretty insulted by the author's obvious contempt for my ability to see through his clumsy re-spray. I don't really see how it can be described as "honest" in any way.<br /><br />I didn't give Brooks a second chance.Nagorahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04934827653905274555noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-80961370153239476262011-07-12T00:15:07.037-04:002011-07-12T00:15:07.037-04:00Yeah, I don't know. I've always liked the ...Yeah, I don't know. I've always liked the whole series, and frankly, if you dismiss Brooks as a Tolkien plagiarist wholesale, you haven't got a leg to stand on. Even the first book, as some have pointed out, contain pretty idiosyncratic elements like the Flynn-esque Panamon Creel, or the previously mentioned ruins of a high-rise city, inhabited by a hideous fleshy cyborg monster from before the nukepocalypse. I may have just read LotR poorly, I guess... ;-)<br /><br />After that, the books pretty rapidly start gaining a character of their own — the high-fantasy may seem stereotypical now, but there genuinely wasn't a lot of it available back then, and I think it was in many ways more innovative than it gets credit for. Notice the third book's protagonists, who have been mutated by their father's over-use of magic in the second book into possessing a pretty weird song-based magic — one sibling can sing illusions, but the other's song makes real things. In the subsequent, much newer series of... series, time and society advance in a reasonably plausible way; wars scar the landscape, and inventions change the technological situation, which is something I don't think I've ever seen in any other fictional universe of any sort.<br /><br />I think it's far more popular to bash Brooks than he really deserves, especially compared with real, earnest hack writers like McKiernan or, God forbid, Eddings, who wrote the same story four times over something like sixteen volumes. Brooks' stories have far more than that to recommend them, and to be honest, my own main peeve with them is his insistence on continually focusing on the same family, which works pretty harshly on the »fantastic verisimilitude« he expends a great deal of work on building up.<br /><br />Oh, and by the way: if memory serves, he wrote <i>Sword</i> while still in high school. I don't know about you guys, but for my part, I did not do my least derivative work back then. ;-)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-57939402796749674912011-07-11T23:07:17.286-04:002011-07-11T23:07:17.286-04:00Talking about "the honesty of a good pastiche...Talking about "the honesty of a good pastiche" in relation to Terry Brooks -- that's a new one. Brooks was an attorney, and was keenly aware that, due to a loophole caused by the pirated Ace Books edition of The Lord of the Rings, the original version of Tolkien's book was in public domain in the US. He (and his editor, Lester del Rey) knew exactly what they could rip off and get away with.<br /><br />Lin Carter, among many others, denounced Sword as "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sword_of_Shannara#Sword_and_The_Lord_of_the_Rings" rel="nofollow">"the single most cold-blooded, complete rip-off of another book that I have ever read</a>."Allen Varneyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10751693785863649469noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-88820099860118265732011-07-11T22:04:43.940-04:002011-07-11T22:04:43.940-04:00I loved the Sword of Shannara. I was about 13-14 ...I loved the Sword of Shannara. I was about 13-14 when I first read it and it left a lasting image. <br />In fact im playing a dwarf in a game currently and called him Hendel! haha.<br />Only really read the first trillogy. I kind of lost interest in whichever one it was that involved though I did love the troll and weapons master characters(whose names I cant remember)Aaronhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13940306487312423592noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-33876482313947198262011-07-11T21:51:25.027-04:002011-07-11T21:51:25.027-04:00I admit to a soft spot for SoS. Yeah, even my juni...I admit to a soft spot for SoS. Yeah, even my junior-or-pre-teen self realized it was lifted whole-cloth from LoTR but it was the kind of thing I would have written myself if I'd have been able. Come to think of it I remember handing in an English assignment around that time that featured a boy in a post-apocalyptic world facing off against a giant mutated cyborg insect (a scene lifted, from memory, straight from SoS).<br />So I look on it with some affection, although I couldn't muster any interest past the first trilogy. For some reason I've always been far less forgiving with Donaldson, I'm not sure why.<br /><br />Maybe it was the Hildebrandt artwork? Or maybe it was that I came to Donaldson a few short years later when I (thought I) knew so much more about the world ;)charles mark fergusonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13385121479729236749noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-67210714261415033952011-07-11T21:18:37.111-04:002011-07-11T21:18:37.111-04:00I liked his Landover books (at least the first few...I liked his Landover books (at least the first few before they got a bit grimdark) but was never a big fan of shanara. Even the apocalyptic element didn't feel well included to me. Mind you, I can't say I thought they were horrible, but then I didn't grow up in the era of virtually no fantasy they first came out in.Turkish Proverbhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02423061909797064886noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-9309311211600847192011-07-11T20:16:45.005-04:002011-07-11T20:16:45.005-04:00Yeah, until I rewrite At the Mountains of Madness ...Yeah, until I rewrite At the Mountains of Madness as On the Peaks of Insanity and sell it for a jillion bucks. ;)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-38455777354952791892011-07-11T20:13:53.183-04:002011-07-11T20:13:53.183-04:00imago1: Wow, hadn't read that. Assuming what y...imago1: Wow, hadn't read that. Assuming what you say is true, it alters my opinion a bit. Nevertheless, I guess he had the last laugh, eh? He's rich and we're just working stiffs. /shakes fist angrilyChainsawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13795026553408942707noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-10029786443648022011-07-11T20:07:33.316-04:002011-07-11T20:07:33.316-04:00Sword of Shannara was the worst published fantasy ...Sword of Shannara was the worst published fantasy book I had ever read, right up until I came across Stephen Lawhead's earliest-published fantasy novels. (His later ones are often quite good, but the ha-ha-ha hee-hee-hee villain one was not ready for prime time and horribly edited. His first publisher did him a disservice there.)<br /><br />So yeah, I bite my tongue a lot around Brooks' fans. I don't want to insult their taste, especially since it was usually one of the first adult books they read, but... it's a stinkeroo.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-70007914098244536312011-07-11T19:44:39.661-04:002011-07-11T19:44:39.661-04:00"I don't think Brooks thought he was fool..."I don't think Brooks thought he was fooling anyone."<br /><br />Then you haven't read his impassioned self defense of an afterword that is in one of the later reprints. He is very sensitive about the dismissal of SoS as derivative hackwork at best, and plagiarism lite at worst.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7487871339000666216.post-78661086571939848862011-07-11T18:18:43.703-04:002011-07-11T18:18:43.703-04:00It was fine then and it's fine now, particular...It was fine then and it's fine now, particularly if you accept it as more of an homage to LotR than a sneaky rip-off. I mean, even 10-year old me recognized the parallels. I don't think Brooks thought he was fooling anyone. <br /><br />Truth be told, I preferred the Wishsong of Shannara because Garret Jax was like a ninja and we LOVED, LOVED, LOVED ninjas.<br /><br />It's a cheeseburger, not a filet mignon - and that's fine. Sometimes you want a cheeseburger.Chainsawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13795026553408942707noreply@blogger.com