Hypothetically, because 'great warriors' in this world develop apparent superhuman physical abilities as they gain skill and experience.
Non-fantastic fantasy
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Hypothetically, because 'great warriors' in this world develop apparent superhuman physical abilities as they gain skill and experience.
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Hm. So you're sort of asking if Beowulf would be considered fantasy.
Maybe!
Genre categorization is fuzzy around the edges. When your magic isn't explicitly magic, it drifts out of fantasy. But if you're in a setting that looks pre-modern, it starts drifting back into fantasy again, even if there's not a lot of explicit magic, because "fantasy" is often closely associated with "low-tech" in people's minds. Heck, if you write a perfectly realistic (which isn't necessarily the same as gritty grimdark) story that's set in a world that looks a lot like 12th century France, but is explicitly not France but some other world, it's probably going to get classified as fantasy.
So if you have pre-modern action adventure that goes a bit beyond reality, and isn't trying to be a historical novel? Sure, it's probably going to get tagged as fantasy. Low Fantasy, maybe. If it's modern, or looks like an actual historical, it's less likely to be tagged in that manner.
Maybe!
Genre categorization is fuzzy around the edges. When your magic isn't explicitly magic, it drifts out of fantasy. But if you're in a setting that looks pre-modern, it starts drifting back into fantasy again, even if there's not a lot of explicit magic, because "fantasy" is often closely associated with "low-tech" in people's minds. Heck, if you write a perfectly realistic (which isn't necessarily the same as gritty grimdark) story that's set in a world that looks a lot like 12th century France, but is explicitly not France but some other world, it's probably going to get classified as fantasy.
So if you have pre-modern action adventure that goes a bit beyond reality, and isn't trying to be a historical novel? Sure, it's probably going to get tagged as fantasy. Low Fantasy, maybe. If it's modern, or looks like an actual historical, it's less likely to be tagged in that manner.
Er... they get stronger and stronger muscles from swinging their swords around so much, and their bodies adapt to taking wounds so they can withstand more and more punishment.
Except Beowulf has monsters in it. So do most of mine, which is why my question was mainly hypothetical - what if there were no monsters, but just superhuman humans.
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Okay, so there's nothing about that classifiable as fantasy.
If you have a reason for why that happens--i.e. some explanation for why it happens in these people but not other people, then it might be science fiction.
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Does this only apply to warriors and fighting?
Do all muscle relying professions also get stronger?
Do speed relying professions (like messengers) get faster?
Do intelligence relying professions get smarter?
Does this apply only to humans or do animals that fight also get tougher?
And is there, as jj asked, a reason why this happens?
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Hmm...I feel like I need more of an explanation as to how a petite woman is able to tear a bear's jaws apart. Actually, even if it's a muscular man, I'd still raise my eyebrows and go, "Err, really?"
Swinging their swords around everyday won't give them enough strength to do that to a bear. Even if it's fantasy, unless there is a viable explanation (such as a super strength elixir or whatever), I just don't find it believable. :/ same with the whole having your guts fall out and stitched back in and recovering in such a short time...
The question wasn't whether or not it would be believable, but whether or not a world that operated in such a manner would qualify as fantasy by virtue of having such different rules from ours. And the explanation... well read below.
So IYO, no amount of exaggerated unrealism would qualify as 'fantastic'? I find this a little odd... doesn't having magic in a setting qualify it as fantasy because it makes the world follow different rules than the real one (our own)? So why wouldn't humans following different biological laws than ours qualify the setting as a 'fantastic' one with different rules?
Hypothetically I would say it's mainly humans' physical limits that are increased in this type of setting. So yes you could have a super strong weightlifter who's not a warrior, or a super fast messenger (some warriors would super fast too depending on their style, and most of the elite ones would have at least fast reaction time). Only the most dedicated and talented ones though in both cases just like not every warrior is Beowulf.
There could possibly be some animals that are the 'alpha of alphas' in their species but for the most part, this is about humans with different biological rules than us. And the reason is they are biologically different (have greater potential for physical development) in that universe.
If it's blatant unrealism, something that obviously sets some people apart, fantasy.
If it's presented as some larger-than-life-but-otherwise-ordinary people, realism.
The characters of James Bond, Mack Bolan and Jack Reacher all do things that push reality, but the books they're in aren't considered speculative fiction. There's a whole section of publishing dedicated to larger-than-life characters in the real world, and it's not the fantasy genre.
If it's presented as some larger-than-life-but-otherwise-ordinary people, realism.
The characters of James Bond, Mack Bolan and Jack Reacher all do things that push reality, but the books they're in aren't considered speculative fiction. There's a whole section of publishing dedicated to larger-than-life characters in the real world, and it's not the fantasy genre.
Yup, I'm talking about more blatant unrealism like Beowulf where he rips the arm off a creature that carried off 30 men and swims for days on end killing sea monsters along the way, and gets bitten by a 50 (?) foot long dragon in the neck while old and still keeps fighting and takes a while to die afterwards.
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The question wasn't whether or not it would be believable, but whether or not a world that operated in such a manner would qualify as fantasy by virtue of having such different rules from ours. And the explanation... well read below.
So IYO, no amount of exaggerated unrealism would qualify as 'fantastic'? I find this a little odd... doesn't having magic in a setting qualify it as fantasy because it makes the world follow different rules than the real one (our own)? So why wouldn't humans following different biological laws than ours qualify the setting as a 'fantastic' one with different rules?
Hypothetically I would say it's mainly humans' physical limits that are increased in this type of setting. So yes you could have a super strong weightlifter who's not a warrior, or a super fast messenger (some warriors would super fast too depending on their style, and most of the elite ones would have at least fast reaction time). Only the most dedicated and talented ones though in both cases just like not every warrior is Beowulf.
There could possibly be some animals that are the 'alpha of alphas' in their species but for the most part, this is about humans with different biological rules than us. And the reason is they are biologically different (have greater potential for physical development) in that universe.
So in practical terms the people in your world do not have the same limits of training as those in our world. Whether it "qualifies" as fantasy or not then depends largely on how you present it.
If you clothe it in a fantasy setting it will look like fantasy. If you clothe it in action/adventure it will look like a James Bond / Indiana Jones / Doc Savage pulpish super agents world where there are people who are simply tougher and better as a result of training or experience.
The distinction here is what the audience has learned to accept. The pulp world is by technical definition a fantasy world because people do things beyond human capability. But the audience won't see it that way because the übermenschen of the pulps are part of our cultural heritage.
So, how do you want your story to be perceived?
Well, this is all hypothetical since most of the stuff I write does have other fantasy elements (monsters/magic) so it definitely falls into fantasy, except for the mixed martial arts/street fighting shorts which would just be exaggerated pulp action.
I was just curious to see if 'epic level warriors' alone would rate in most people's eyes as fantasy.
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No. It wouldn't. Setting matters, as does the in-story reason given for why these changes occur, if one is given.
RichardGarfinkle's comment above restates what I was trying to convey to you earlier in this thread: picking the genre has less to do with accurate classification and more to do with what target audience you want to market to. In his words, "(H)ow do you want your story to be perceived?"
I'm perplexed as to why you're curious about whether people consider a book fantasy or not, based on some minimum criteria. It doesn't strike me as an important concern. Stories slalom across genres all the time--slotting them into one particular genre is about marketing to an audience.
Well, the setting would be no more advanced than Middle Ages, and probably less advanced than that... and there would be no in-story reason given, the idea is that the world follows different biological laws than ours and everybody there already accepts them, seeing that they've never known any other universe. So it would be treated as mundane in-story and a given that 'great warriors' can reach such heights of power.
I didn't make this thread out of it being an 'important' concern so much as thinking it might be an interesting topic... I don't see what the problem is with discussing it?
Most of the fantasy genre is about worlds with different laws of reality than ours, with everyone there accepting them because they've never known any other universe. The majority of what remains is about what happens when you put someone from our universe into a world with different laws of reality. We don't mind you asking the question, but you keep trying to rephrase it as though you're making it a different question, forcing us to say the same thing over and over again. It's fantasy if you write it as fantasy. It's realism if you write it as realism.
Most of us are well aware of the real-world fantasies that are considered non-genre fantasy, thanks. The borders between genre fantasy, pulp fiction and action-adventure are full of this stuff and always have been. To us it's not a discussion, it's a retread of the same old ground - and if you want to get published, Marketing will tell you which shelf it's going on.
Most of us are well aware of the real-world fantasies that are considered non-genre fantasy, thanks. The borders between genre fantasy, pulp fiction and action-adventure are full of this stuff and always have been. To us it's not a discussion, it's a retread of the same old ground - and if you want to get published, Marketing will tell you which shelf it's going on.
I watched Machete a year or two ago. The titular character pulls out a guy's intestine and uses it to Tarzan swing from an upper floor and crash through the window of a lower one. That said, I would find it bizarre if that movie was shelved in the fantasy section.
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I think if I picked up a book marked "fantasy" and all it had was some woman who can take a punch, I'd be sorely disappointed. I do assume, however, that the cover blurb will say something about the lack of fantastical elements.
Are you still operating in the same world your "Rose" character was in back when you posted stories at Baen's Bar?
That was low fantasy and straight up Sword and Sorcery.
Despite the fact Rose was more like Superman than Conan, it wasn't a superhero story.
That was low fantasy and straight up Sword and Sorcery.
Despite the fact Rose was more like Superman than Conan, it wasn't a superhero story.
I'm not referring to Rose or any other character I've written extensively as most of them share their world with other fantastic elements.
It's been mentioned a few times that I'm talking about a hypothetical situation where the other fantasy elements aren't around and the superhuman humans are it.
How so? They're different questions. The first question is about a somewhat unrealistic female fighter in a modern setting, the second about blatantly superhuman warriors in a pre-modern one. I'm thinking that at some point, the latter can't be 'written as realism' in a way readers would accept as being such.
I'm not asking about 'marketing' though. I'm asking if people as readers would intuitively think of a pre-modern world (in the second question) with superhuman warriors as fantasy or not.
The question is basically 'if Beowulf's monsters were replaced with mundane animals, would Beowulf's story by virtue of having such superhuman prowess qualify as fantasy to you?'
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And the answer is 'It could go either way'.
You're asking us to set points and limits. You want to know where the line is, where the edge is, where the border is. In something like geography, that's doable. It's solid, tangible, concrete. You can pin things to it and as long as nothing moves them they'll still be roughly where you left them when you come back.
Writing isn't like that.
There are people in my street who think it's perfectly feasible that some giant bloke in a toga created it and us in six days and had a kip on the seventh, a few thousand years ago. There are people in my street who think it spun together by natural processes billions of years ago, and that life is some sort of strange but interesting accident. There are people in my street who believe neither of the above, and people who don't care because it's totally immaterial to them, and that's just in one street in a random corner of the UK.
They are the ones who define what they think of as pure fantasy and pure realism. They are all your potential reader, and your reader is a multitude. Each one of them brings their own preconceptions and their own knowledge to your work, each one of them will have their own idea of what is possible and impossible, and each one of them is willing to suspend at least some of their disbelief if you present it engagingly enough.
The only thing you can influence is how you write it, because what the reader thinks is determined by every individual for themselves alone.
But I'm not asking anyone to set points and limits for all readers though. I think this thread might have been interpreted to have a higher concept than it does, and maybe I phrased the question poorly... my basic questions are:
1) For you, as a reader, is there some point when sheer unrealism qualifies a story as fantastic?
and
2) If yes, what is that point? For example, is 'teenage girl rips apart bear jaws and sews her shredded guts back in' fantastic? And if not, then is 'army guy works out and gets so strong he takes out an enemy fighter jet by throwing a jeep at it' fantastic?
I'm just looking for people's personal opinions on what the limits are and not a universal definition.
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Liosse de Velishaf
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...throwing a whole jeep high enough to catch a fighter jet?
So IYO is there any point at which unrealism passes the border of the fantastic?
So IYO is there any point at which unrealism passes the border of the fantastic?
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