1. How has fantasy as a genre been defined?

2. Find at least five formative definitions in Attebery (1980).

3. According to Attebery, Can the genre legitimately be defined by examples?

4. How do English and American
constructions of fantasy diverge, according to Attebery?

5. How is science fiction different from
fantasy, according to Le Guinn (http://www.ursulakleguin.com/ PlausibilityinFantasy.html)?

6. Can you identify any common fantasy meta-narratives from your own reading/viewing? What
are some archetypes (e.g. common character types)of fantasy fiction?

7. Note while you are
reading A Wizard of Earthsea Le Guinn’s depiction of race and gender. Is there anything
surprising in this? Why?

8. In what ways does Tax (2002) suggest Earthsea may still be relevant today?

Just for the record i have to say that i love the fantasy genre, high - low i'm not fussed. It is the whole world of 'possibility' that is enticing.
So as for question one, well that is a tricky one because their is much disagreement on the topic. Because of this i think the differences between high and low are critical to a better understanding. High fantasy being a fully realised other world and Low Fantasy a world that borders on our own that characters can cross over. According to Attebery (1980)"Fantasy is a game of sorts, and it demands that one play whole-heartedly, accepting for the moment all rules and turns of the game" (Attebury, p. 3).
To better understand this quote I think of the importance of the reader believing in the 'power of a ring' If a person believes that a ring is just a bit of metal they will not get the premise of the Lord of the Rings series.
In addition while on the subject of definning fantasy i love the quote in the critical reader by Attebury "no important work of fantasy written after Tolkien is free of his influence" (Attebury, 8). Tolkiens work was monumental and mammouth, I don't think there can be any definition or article that doesn't credit Tolkien in some way.

Hi Rachel,
I think one definition of the fantasy that have been given by Atterbery (1980) “Any narrative which includes a significant part of its make-up some violation of what the author clearly believes to be natural law- that is fantasy.” According to him, the writer can do this by different ways like: involving some imaginary creatures in his story, such as dragon, or by spinning around magical object, such as, rings or mobility, also by going on events, such as two people painlessly exchanging their heads. So when the writer includes these impossible creatures, objects, and events in his story accompanied with persuasive ways to make the reader in some point to believe that this may come true then his story is a fantasy story. For example, in the “AWizard of Earthsea” Le Guinn constructs his story around a special boy who has a magical power by birth “Gen” and who fights “dragons” in some stage of his life. The dragon is included in story without any hesitation from the writer about the dragon reality. Atterbery (1980) makes distinction between the fantasy and science fiction by distinguishing the way they treat these impossible characters, events and objects. In fantasy the writer try to persuade the reader that is coming to be true with his confident way, while in science fiction the writer try to explain scientifically how it may become possible. To illustrate, we know that the dragon is imaginary creature, but the way that Le Guinn introduces it in “ a Wizard of Earthsea” as its existence is a reality and doesn’t need to be explained makes his story a fantasy. In a case of a science fiction, the things will be different. A few years ago, I remember a movie that spin around a battle between humankind and a dragons, however, the story explains how those dragons becomes reality. One of the story characters finds accidentally a strange egg and by putting it under a certain circumstance, it hatched producing two dragons who quickly become more and more making the human life as a hell. This story called a science fiction because it explains the way that makes this imaginary creature exists.

Hi Saja,
Great description of the differences between science fiction and fantasy. Just a quick question in regards to the movie that you saw, were you convinced by the writers desciption of how dragons came about? was it convincing or in the back of your head did you think, nah dragons are not real and that explanation doesn't cut it.

I love the concept of archetypes and how many fantasy stories have characters who possess similar character traits. According to Hunter, (2007) "Homer's works establish literary archtypes such as the hero archtype that is represented by Odysseus. This archtype and others serve as a template for many works of literature through the centuries including modern childrens literature such as the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter" (Hunter, pg. 27).
In addition to Frodo and Harry there is also Ged from the wizard of EarthSea. One aspect that is applicable to all hero archetypes is a degree of predestination.

Following on the topic of Archetypes, wikipedia states that "According to Jung archetypes are innate, universal prototypes for ideas and maybe used to interpret observations" (Wikipedia, 2008). I think one way to explain this would be how even as children we could recoginise different archtypes, without knowing the technical terms. The most obvious being the hero archetype, everyone knows who the hero is to be in a storyline and what is expected of them, and just as Jung explained even kids will make predictions based on previous observations.
Another archetype that i enjoy is the wise old man archtype. These are men who are full of experience and wisdom having lived a full life and probably a hero in their younger days. These men tutor and train up the heros imparting of their knowledge. Some famous wise old man archtypes are Gandalf, Dumbledore and Ogion from the wizard of earthsea.

Hi Rachel
Firstly, I’m going to answer your question. For me I know that both fantasy and science fiction are not true and have a huge number of imagination events and characters. However, I enjoy the fantasy more than the science fiction, because science fiction makes me scared and worry for sometime of what I watch may come true, but after a while, of course, my mind refuses this idea. In relation to question six, in addition to what you mentioned I would add another fantasy fiction I enjoyed it as a child and still I enjoy watching it is “Sindibad” or “Sinbad” the Arabic version, I think it’s a kind of fantasy fiction which nourish the children imagination and encourage them to be good. Therefore, I think my fan-fiction would be about “Sindibad-The man of the seas”.

Regarding question 7, I think there are many reference of race and gender depiction in “A Wizard of Earthsea”. For example, one of the race depiction is her referencing that people who speak “Hardic language” is better than those who speak “Kargad” or other languages, they have power and the true magic is worked only by them” But magic, true magic, is worked only by those beings who speak the Hardic tongue of Earthsea, or the Old Speech from which it grew” P.50
Another race depiction is her reference to the skin colour, dark and white people, for example in page 145 when Ged describes his friend’s sister “She was perhaps fourteen years old, dark like her brother, but very slight and slender”, as we see the use of word “but” implies that her dark colour is not good feature. In relation to the gender depiction, he refers in many occasions that women don’t have power as men, for example his aunt as a witch are able to achieve only limited amount of spells, the school of magic only for boys, also the witch of that isle who brought before him to see the little sick boy, she calls him “Lord Wizard” and also the writer describes her knowledge as a limited, also, on page 144 Vetch introduce his sister “This is my sister, the youngest of us, prettier that I am as you see, but much less clever”, so it is the same stereotype, women are prettier than men but less clever. What is surprise me is the gender depiction because the writer is woman. However, she is American and race depiction is might be expected from them.

Saja,
I think you did a great analysis of gender and race. You found some great examples within the text, however i disagree with one of them. When Ged is discribing his friend Vetch's sister and says "dark like her brother, but very slight and slender" (pg. 145). I don't think LeGuin is making a comment about race with a negative connotation, i feel the use of the word 'but'is used as a contrast indicating that Vetch must be on the heavy side (ie. fat to not be politically correct). Whereas his sister is skinny.
Another depiction of race that i really liked was the way in which Le Guin introduced Vetch "Shovelled in his food" (p.43), "was very dark of skin not ...(like) most folk of the archipelago" (p. 44), "manners were not polished" (p.44) i felt like all these examples were pointing to the fact that Vetch was different from the norm, less civilised, yet Le Guin follows it up with "he felt a certain liking for him" (p.44).