From: fourdufours@earthlink.net (Steve Dufour) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien,alt.religion.tolkienology Subject: Fantasy violence vs. real References: <> Lines: 148 Message-ID: Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2002 15:23:10 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.247.54.1 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net 1024932190 209.247.54.1 (Mon, 24 Jun 2002 08:23:10 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2002 08:23:10 PDT Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.freenet.de!newsfeed.news2me.com!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!ee7c4f0f!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89416 POPULAR CULTURE A real-world assist from a land of fantasy Make-believe violence helps audiences cope with the despair and anxiety of troubling times By Gerard Jones, 6/23/2002 hen I took my son to see ''The Lord of the Rings'' for the fourth time, he noticed how long it had been a part of his life. The school year was winding down, the summer blockbusters were starting to appear, and his favorite movie from winter break was still alive on a couple of screens. Then he remembered something, ''Hey! What happened to `Harry Potter'?'' For a few weeks in December, that genial fantasy of magic wands and waning evil had dominated the imaginative lives of Nicky and his peers. It had opened to mob scenes at the theaters and solid reviews. But when the hobbits left their cozy burrows to battle the lord of the rings in a world of bloodshed and apocalyptic terror, Harry Potter vanished from backyard make-believe and cineplex screens. In frightening times we like to retreat into other worlds. But ''escape'' is not enough. Hollywood in World War II produced plenty of comedies and musicals, but its most vital, and most unexpectedly popular, creations were film noir and psychological suspense works. ''Double Indemnity,'' ''Suspicion,'' and ''Cat People'' enabled Americans to suffer the fall from innocence and the seemingly inescapable passage of fear and madness. The films' sudden release of violence set viewers free to reenter their real lives with somewhat less anxiety and despair. This is a role commercial entertainment has always played: It stirs our scariest or most forbidden feelings, but in a safe and controllable place, and then provides a fictional resolution that turns those emotions away from their real objects and helps us reintegrate them calmly. In order to function, popular drama must excite the feelings that trouble us most. This is why, whenever our society is most concerned with violence, the sales of violent entertainment go up. We so abhor violence now that we are alarmed by anything that seems to celebrate it. We seize upon evidence that violent entertainment desensitizes us, disturbs us, or makes us more aggressive. A longer view of cultural history, however, suggests the opposite: Make-believe violence is an integral part of our long struggle to be less violent in reality. Over the past several generations, we in the industrialized world have been concerned with violence as never before - partly because its stakes are higher, but also because we want so badly to eradicate it. No large society has ever questioned the rightness or inevitability of violence in every sphere of life as profoundly as we have in the modern West. We have condemned or reexamined behaviors that our ancestors took for granted only a century or two ago: the beating of children, fist fights as the manly solution to conflicts, capital punishment and torture. The industrialized world, with its technology and gigantism, has made war more horrific than ever before - but war was more glorified, and more frequent, in our past. We haven't eliminated violence, but we've made it far less normal. And so we notice it more than our ancestors ever did. We call ourselves a ''violent society'' because we struggle so fervently to become less violent. The sociologist Norbert Elias described this as part of a centuries-long ''civilizing process,'' one that requires an increase in societal controls and self-control. As compensation for those new controls, it also requires public rituals that allow ''an enjoyable and controlled decontrolling of the emotions.'' As Elias demonstrated, the spread of ''civility'' through the West has been precisely paralleled by two other phenomena: the popularization of sports in which ferocity is preserved but increasingly constrained by rules and the rise of popular drama in which physical conflict destroys evil and makes the world safer. The metaphors of American football have become more violent (the cannon-armed quarterback in the shotgun slices up a defense blitzing with explosive speed) as padding has grown thicker and rules against roughness have tightened. The intensity and explicitness of entertainment violence have increased as its forms have become steadily more predictable, more private, and more controllable by the audience - from theater to movies to TV to video games. Part of the ''civilizing process'' is a gradual progression from the literal to the symbolic. We read religious texts as metaphors pointing to a greater mystery instead of insisting upon their complete historical reality. We see our ethnic identities as interesting parts of a whole heritage rather than as defining loyalties. Through entertainment, we make the same progress with violence. The blood lust and terror that we once acted out is reworked into a secular ritual that we know to be fiction. The nations most successful at producing such entertainment, the United States and Japan, wrestle mightily with our bloody heritages. Others striving to transcend militaristic legacies - Britain and Germany - are among its most avid markets. The radical religious fundamentalists who have plunged us into these terrifying times condemn entertainment and fiction as lies. They allow themselves no make-believe worlds to contain their rage, and so they are compelled to take their own fantasies literally. The societies most invested in real violence are those that trust the unrestricted imagination the least. Some people, mostly outside the norm, react badly even to fictional violence. But the most passionate consumers of violent entertainment have always been the boys and young men who are working hardest to control their passions and fit in. The ''dime novels'' that Victorian critics believed were leading children into delinquency sold best among schoolboys, office boys, and young immigrants struggling to find their way in an increasingly urbanized, organized America. The audience for ''shooter'' video games has always consisted overwhelmingly of self-constrained geeks who avoid real conflict. The more we tell young people that violence is wrong - the more we intervene in their fights, teach them conflict resolution strategies, and fret about their entertainment - the more they crave it in make-believe. The kids of the 1970s, told that toy guns were bad and allowed to watch only cartoons without conflict, embraced ''Star Wars'' like a conquered people greeting a liberating army. My son is of a generation of kids for whom shoving another child on the playground is cause for a classroom discussion, but who love to retreat in their private time into a video-game reality where they can safely beat each other to bloody pulps. It's a welcome relief for kids who spend so much time working so hard to be good. Watching Nicky and his friends play in the backyard, I see that they do much less real fighting than my peers did at their age. They find real war less glamorous. They feel less smug about hating any real ''enemy.'' But they do say, ''Let's play `Lord of the Rings,' and hack each other to pieces.'' In doing so, they take another step on our long journey to a real world without violence. Gerard Jones is the author of "Killing Monsters: Why Children Need Superheroes, Fantasy, and Make-Believe Violence." This story ran on page E1 of the Boston Globe on 6/23/2002. © Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company. ###### From: shumyum@yahoo.com (Justin Green) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien,alt.religion.tolkienology Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Date: 25 Jun 2002 09:07:46 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Lines: 15 Message-ID: <85f16397.0206250807.d8e5c04@posting.google.com> References: < > NNTP-Posting-Host: 146.203.58.222 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1025021266 26071 127.0.0.1 (25 Jun 2002 16:07:46 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 25 Jun 2002 16:07:46 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89490 fourdufours@earthlink.net (Steve Dufour) wrote in message news:... > A real-world assist from a land of fantasy > > Make-believe violence helps audiences cope with the despair and anxiety > of troubling times Wow. What a breath of fresh air. I don't agree with a fundamental premise of the article: I don't think that violence and warfare is the main reason for the popularity of Lord of the Rings. However, armed struggle is certainly _part_ of it's allure, and it's nice to see a popular analysis characterize the popularity of fantasy as simply a release instead of (as three New Times articles have done this year) stilted reactionary urgings that indicate the public at large only thinks in black and white. ###### From: "Bill O'Meally" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien References: < > <85f16397.0206250807.d8e5c04@posting.google.com> Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Lines: 33 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2600.0000 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2600.0000 Message-ID: Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 16:19:19 -0500 NNTP-Posting-Host: 65.31.185.247 X-Complaints-To: abuse@rr.com X-Trace: twister.kc.rr.com 1025039899 65.31.185.247 (Tue, 25 Jun 2002 16:18:19 CDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 16:18:19 CDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!cyclone.columbus.rr.com!cyclone3.kc.rr.com!news3.kc.rr.com!twister.kc.rr.com.POSTED!53ab2750!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89582 "Justin Green" wrote in message news:85f16397.0206250807.d8e5c04@posting.google.com... > fourdufours@earthlink.net (Steve Dufour) wrote in message news:... > > > A real-world assist from a land of fantasy > > > > Make-believe violence helps audiences cope with the despair and anxiety > > of troubling times > > Wow. What a breath of fresh air. I don't agree with a fundamental > premise of the article: I don't think that violence and warfare is > the main reason for the popularity of Lord of the Rings. However, > armed struggle is certainly _part_ of it's allure, and it's nice to > see a popular analysis characterize the popularity of fantasy as > simply a release instead of (as three New Times articles have done > this year) stilted reactionary urgings that indicate the public at > large only thinks in black and white. Tom Shippey discusses this very theme in _JRRT, Author of the Century_. He discusses popularity of fantasy (both with authors as well as audiences) as a reaction to the indescribable evil that occurred in the two world wars. I wonder if the author of the article has read this work? -- Bill "Wise fool" Gandalf, THE TWO TOWERS ###### Lines: 10 X-Admin: news@aol.com From: wilbur07@aol.com (Mark Constantino) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Date: 25 Jun 2002 21:50:53 GMT References: Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Message-ID: <20020625175053.22580.00000067@mb-ca.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!news.stealth.net!news.stealth.net!ngpeer.news.aol.com!audrey05.news.aol.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89554 >He >discusses popularity of fantasy (both with authors as well as audiences) as >a reaction to the indescribable evil Naw. Little kids, protected and sheltered from evil greater than having to pee-pee every once in a while, still have fantasies, and elaborate ones at that. It gets childish and boring very quickly. I'm curious: how can readers stand romance novels, the kind you buy in a grocery store? ###### From: Jim Webster Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien,alt.religion.tolkienology Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 23:40:29 +0000 Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 27 Message-ID: <3D18FF69.C1EE2ECE@mindspring.com> References: < <3d194395.133840167@news.his.com> Reply-To: jsibleywebster@mindspring.com NNTP-Posting-Host: a5.f7.c9.27 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Server-Date: 26 Jun 2002 06:40:04 GMT X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.72 (Macintosh; I; PPC) X-Accept-Language: en Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.wirehub.nl!yellow.newsread.com!bad-news.newsread.com!netaxs.com!newsread.com!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!newsfeed0.news.atl.earthlink.net!news.atl.earthlink.net!news.mindspring.net!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89534 Rich Gibbs wrote: > === end quotes === > > I think that the idea of good and evil is essential to the popularity > of LotR; the violence is significant because it allows us to see a > world in which, despite the violence, good comes out ahead at the end. > > Remembering my own childhood/adolescent games as best I can, and > thinking about what I find satisfying in fantasy today, I think > Tolkien is right on the mark as far as one can read his thought from > what he wrote. > > In addition to good vs. evil is the theme of the shadow, a concept explored by Jung, which operates on a more visceral level than ethics, and which prevents us sometimes from realizing the flaws in our own tendencies to project evil onto others. Tolkien himself was not immune to such flaws, but he also recognized the inherent struggle in each of us to find what is right and good, as witness characters such as Feador, Tuor, and yes, even pathetic Gollum, whom I have always considered to be the most interesting character in the Middle-earth saga. Jim ###### User-Agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.02.2022 Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real From: Emerald Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien,alt.religion.tolkienology Message-ID: References: <> Mime-version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Lines: 34 X-Complaints-To: abuse@usenetserver.com X-Abuse-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly. NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 20:52:57 EDT Organization: WEBUSENET.com Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 21:06:10 -0400 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.imp.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!news-out.visi.com!hermes.visi.com!newsfeeds-atl2!localhost.localdomain!news.webusenet.com!e3500-atl1.usenetserver.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89575 Steve Dufour at fourdufours@earthlink.net wrote on 6/24/02 11:23 AM: > > POPULAR CULTURE > > A real-world assist from a land of fantasy > > Make-believe violence helps audiences cope with the despair and anxiety > of troubling times > > By Gerard Jones, 6/23/2002 [snip] Interesting, Steve. I'm wondering if anyone remembers or has heard of Bruno Bettleheim, who used to be at the University of Chicago, and his treatise on the function of fairy tales? There are some important differences, but Jones's piece is reminiscent of Bettleheim's premise that the scariness of many of the classic fairy tales assists young children to work through not only some harsh realities of life, but their own archetypal fantasies as well, it a way that (being removed from everyday experience) feels safe. I concur with this. But I also believe that the steady diet of graphic violence that both children and adults have been fed in numerous media venues for some time now has a desensitizing effect that is unfortunate at best and dangerous at worst. Epics such as LOTR I believe are satisfying not because of their violence but because of their morality -- their depiction of the struggle between good and evil. The unabashed assertion in epic literature that life is all about good and evil is ever refreshing in any generation, and strikes at the core of every person's search for truth and need for validation. -- Emerald Elbereth http://www.angelfire.com/fl4/emerald Seeker of the First Song, the Last Mountain, the Eternal Mirage of the Grail. ###### From: "Bill O'Meally" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien References: <20020625175053.22580.00000067@mb-ca.aol.com> Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Lines: 27 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2600.0000 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2600.0000 Message-ID: Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 21:02:17 -0500 NNTP-Posting-Host: 65.31.185.247 X-Complaints-To: abuse@rr.com X-Trace: twister.kc.rr.com 1025056877 65.31.185.247 (Tue, 25 Jun 2002 21:01:17 CDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 21:01:17 CDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!newsfeed.icl.net!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!cyclone.columbus.rr.com!cyclone3.kc.rr.com!news3.kc.rr.com!twister.kc.rr.com.POSTED!53ab2750!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89583 "Mark Constantino" wrote in message news:20020625175053.22580.00000067@mb-ca.aol.com... > >He > >discusses popularity of fantasy (both with authors as well as audiences) as > >a reaction to the indescribable evil > > Naw. Little kids, protected and sheltered from evil greater than having to > pee-pee every once in a while, still have fantasies, and elaborate ones at > that. It gets childish and boring very quickly. > I guess the key word is "popularity". I didn't (nor did Shippey, I'm sure) mean to imply that exposure to violence is a prerequisite for writing or enjoying fantasy. -- Bill "Wise fool" Gandalf, THE TWO TOWERS ###### Lines: 19 X-Admin: news@aol.com From: wilbur07@aol.com (Mark Constantino) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Date: 26 Jun 2002 03:13:55 GMT References: Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Message-ID: <20020625231355.16961.00000840@mb-fv.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!ngpeer.news.aol.com!audrey04.news.aol.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89566 >I guess the key word is "popularity". I >didn't (nor did Shippey, I'm sure) mean to imply that exposure to violence >is a prerequisite for writing or enjoying fantasy. What does exposure to violence have to do with it? You said, "he discusses popularity of fantasy as a reaction to the indescribable evil". I just described the evil that a little kid is exposed to, and noted that the same little kid has elaborate fantasies. Therefore, nitwit, popularity of fantasy is *not* a reaction to indescribable evil. What is indescribable evil? That which hurts you day to day and you can't even identify who is doing it to you, or even why, or even suppose a logic behind it. At least my violence has purpose, logic, and motive, and physical evidence to confirm the logic behind purpose and motive. Might be against the law, even evil, but not unsolvable. Put me in solution, and quickly, for anything and everything that I've done or said that offends you. I'm certain your problems will be increased, thereby. ###### From: rgibbs@his.com (Rich Gibbs) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien,alt.religion.tolkienology Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Date: Wed, 26 Jun 2002 04:57:15 GMT Organization: DRG Associates / Technology & Telecommunications Consulting Message-ID: <3d194395.133840167@news.his.com> References: < X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.21/32.243 NNTP-Posting-Host: max1k-20.his.com X-Trace: vienna7.his.com 1025067440 max1k-20.his.com (26 Jun 2002 00:57:20 -0400) Lines: 88 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!newsfeed.icl.net!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp!news-xfer.newsread.com!netaxs.com!newsread.com!vienna7.his.com Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89519 On Tue, 25 Jun 2002 21:06:10 -0400, Emerald wrote: >Steve Dufour at fourdufours@earthlink.net wrote on 6/24/02 11:23 AM: > >> >> POPULAR CULTURE >> >> A real-world assist from a land of fantasy >> >> Make-believe violence helps audiences cope with the despair and anxiety >> of troubling times >> >> By Gerard Jones, 6/23/2002 >[snip] >Interesting, Steve. I'm wondering if anyone remembers or has heard of Bruno >Bettleheim, who used to be at the University of Chicago, and his treatise on >the function of fairy tales? There are some important differences, but >Jones's piece is reminiscent of Bettleheim's premise that the scariness of >many of the classic fairy tales assists young children to work through not >only some harsh realities of life, but their own archetypal fantasies as >well, it a way that (being removed from everyday experience) feels safe. I >concur with this. But I also believe that the steady diet of graphic >violence that both children and adults have been fed in numerous media >venues for some time now has a desensitizing effect that is unfortunate at >best and dangerous at worst. Epics such as LOTR I believe are satisfying >not because of their violence but because of their morality -- their >depiction of the struggle between good and evil. The unabashed assertion in >epic literature that life is all about good and evil is ever refreshing in >any generation, and strikes at the core of every person's search for truth >and need for validation. > > I think JRRT would have agreed with a lot that has been said in this thread. Emerald's posting stirred my memory (well, sometimes it takes a MixMaster ;-), and I went back to have a fresh look at Tolkien's essay "On Fairy Stories" [1]. Here are a few excerpts -- these are from the section in which he discusses whether fairy stories are specially applicable to children (hint: he thinks not). The portions in square brackets '[]' are footnotes in the original: === quotes === "'Is it true' is the great question children ask", Lang said. They do ask that question, I know; and it is not one to be rashly or idly answered. [Far more often have they asked me: "Was he good? Was he wicked?" That is, they were more concerned to get the Right side and the Wrong side clear.] I desired dragons with a profound desire. Of course, I in my timid body did not wish to have them in the neighbourhood, intruding into my relatively safe world, in which it was, for instance, it was possible to read stories in peace of mind, free from fear. [This is, naturally, often enough what children meean when they ask: "Is it true?" They mean: "I like this, but is it contemporary? Am I safe in my bed?"] Chesterton once remarked that the children in whose company he saw Maeterlinck's _Blue Bird_ were dissatisfied "because it did not end with a Day of Judgment, and it was not revealed to the hero and heroine that the Dog had been faithful and the Cat faithless." "For children", he said, "are innocent and love justice; while most of us are wicked and naturally prefer mercy." === end quotes === I think that the idea of good and evil is essential to the popularity of LotR; the violence is significant because it allows us to see a world in which, despite the violence, good comes out ahead at the end. Remembering my own childhood/adolescent games as best I can, and thinking about what I find satisfying in fantasy today, I think Tolkien is right on the mark as far as one can read his thought from what he wrote. Cheers, Rich [1] I am using the _Tolkien Reader_, published by Ballantine Books, 1966, ISBN 0-345-34506-1. BTW, I don't see this essay mentioned often here, but I personally find it very useful in understanding Tolkien. -- Rich Gibbs rgibbs@his.com ###### From: "Bill O'Meally" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien References: <20020625231355.16961.00000840@mb-fv.aol.com> Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real Lines: 46 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2600.0000 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2600.0000 Message-ID: Date: Wed, 26 Jun 2002 16:06:43 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 65.31.185.247 X-Complaints-To: abuse@rr.com X-Trace: twister.rdc-kc.rr.com 1025107603 65.31.185.247 (Wed, 26 Jun 2002 11:06:43 CDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 26 Jun 2002 11:06:43 CDT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!newsfeed.icl.net!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!cyclone.socal.rr.com!cyclone3.kc.rr.com!news3.kc.rr.com!twister.rdc-kc.rr.com.POSTED!53ab2750!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89621 "Mark Constantino" wrote in message news:20020625231355.16961.00000840@mb-fv.aol.com... > >I guess the key word is "popularity". I > >didn't (nor did Shippey, I'm sure) mean to imply that exposure to violence > >is a prerequisite for writing or enjoying fantasy. > > What does exposure to violence have to do with it? You said, "he discusses > popularity of fantasy as a reaction to the indescribable evil". I just > described the evil that a little kid is exposed to, and noted that the same > little kid has elaborate fantasies. Therefore, nitwit, popularity of fantasy > is *not* a reaction to indescribable evil. > > What is indescribable evil? That which hurts you day to day and you can't even > identify who is doing it to you, or even why, or even suppose a logic behind > it. > > At least my violence has purpose, logic, and motive, and physical evidence to > confirm the logic behind purpose and motive. Might be against the law, even > evil, but not unsolvable. Put me in solution, and quickly, for anything and > everything that I've done or said that offends you. I'm certain your problems > will be increased, thereby. I'm not going to summarize the entire book for you. Especially if you can't partake in a discussion without resorting first to name calling, then to mindless rambling. Shippey puts forth some very compelling arguments. Read it yourself. -- Bill "Wise fool" Gandalf, THE TWO TOWERS ###### From: fourdufours@earthlink.net (Steve Dufour) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien,alt.fan.tolkien,alt.religion.tolkienology Subject: Re: Fantasy violence vs. real References: Lines: 35 Message-ID: Date: Mon, 01 Jul 2002 04:41:27 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 63.208.132.133 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net 1025498487 63.208.132.133 (Sun, 30 Jun 2002 21:41:27 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 30 Jun 2002 21:41:27 PDT Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!newsfeed.stueberl.de!cox.net!newsfeed1.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:89755 I remember reading about Professor Bettleheim's book maybe 20 years ago. > > POPULAR CULTURE > > > > A real-world assist from a land of fantasy > > > > Make-believe violence helps audiences cope with the despair and anxiety > > of troubling times > > > > By Gerard Jones, 6/23/2002 > [snip] > Interesting, Steve. I'm wondering if anyone remembers or has heard of Bruno > Bettleheim, who used to be at the University of Chicago, and his treatise on > the function of fairy tales? There are some important differences, but > Jones's piece is reminiscent of Bettleheim's premise that the scariness of > many of the classic fairy tales assists young children to work through not > only some harsh realities of life, but their own archetypal fantasies as > well, it a way that (being removed from everyday experience) feels safe. I > concur with this. But I also believe that the steady diet of graphic > violence that both children and adults have been fed in numerous media > venues for some time now has a desensitizing effect that is unfortunate at > best and dangerous at worst. Epics such as LOTR I believe are satisfying > not because of their violence but because of their morality -- their > depiction of the struggle between good and evil. The unabashed assertion in > epic literature that life is all about good and evil is ever refreshing in > any generation, and strikes at the core of every person's search for truth > and need for validation. > -- > Emerald Elbereth > http://www.angelfire.com/fl4/emerald > Seeker of the First Song, the Last Mountain, > the Eternal Mirage of the Grail. > >