Different works of fantasy can have different rules of magic. I think that it is standard that trolls emerge only at night because sunlight would transform them into stone whereas this is not usually the case with giants although it is what happens to the giant Balamorg in Three Hearts And Three Lions where all Middle Worlders are vulnerable to sunlight - and dwarfs are not Middle Worlders. We learn the precise rules in each new narrative.
In a riddling contest with Balamorg, Holger invents an excellent alternative answer to "'Why does a chicken cross the road?'" (p. 76) (There was also a riddle contest in Poul Anderson's and Gordon R Dickson's Star Prince Charlie.)
Fairy gold becomes dead leaves in sunlight. Gold from the petrified Balamorg's pouch becomes radioactive because the transformation of his carbon into silicon has generated a radioactive isotope. There is "...a curse on the plunderer of a sun-stricken giant..." (p. 80) The spine of my Three Hearts... says SF. Do these scientific rationalizations transform fantasy into sf?
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And, of course, the most famous of all riddling contests in literature now has to be the battle of wits we see between Bilbo Baggins and Gollum in Tolkien's THE HOBBIT.
Truth to say I would have liked to have seen a longer riddling contest between Holger and Balamorg.
And I noticed how Holger reflected on how difficult it would be to explain to Alianora and Hugi WHY they had to leave Balamorg's petrified corpse FAST.
I would not say THREE HEARTS is science fiction. More like HARD fantasy? Or scientifantasy?
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
There is a spectrum. I certainly think of Blish's BLACK EASTER as hard fantasy and Lewis' Ransom Trilogy as soft sf.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Yes, some works can be like that: hard fantasy or soft SF. Bradbury, for example, belonged more to the fantasy/soft SF categories.
Ad astra! Sean
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