So I have this very basic plot with characters in my head and I want to know if I should go fantasy or high fantasy. To me, regular fantasy has some fantasy elements but realistic ones too. High fantasy is totally made up of unreal creatures, items, people, and plot lines 100% dependent on those elements. I'm working on another novel right now and I know some of you will say I should stick to my current and worry about this later, but I can't, until this is answered.
Last edited by TigersMoon on Thu Jul 10, 2014 6:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Very, very roughly, high fantasy has an imaginary world and creatures, and an epic plot (for example the characters have to save the world type of thing). It can be entirely unreal world, or the characters can travel to it (classical example Narnia). If you have a realistic world with supernatural elements or creatures then it's low fantasy (for example the TV show Supernatural).
The exact definition varies across works and people, and it really depends on what elements are emphasized in the work. Is it magic and fantasy races or conflict and made up but not mythical nations/peoples.
You shouldn't really frame your story around a genre (even less on sub-genre because those are as subjective and unreal as it gets), just write and let the critics fight over how to classify it.
@mptigerswriter just letting you know, it's better to make brand new posts answering questions instead of editing the original one! I don't actually know you've answered my question when you simply edit the first post, because I'm looking for new replies.
To me, regular fantasy has some fantasy elements but realistic ones too. High fantasy is totally made up of unreal creatures, items, people, and plot lines 100% dependent on those elements.
I'm not sure what you mean by realistic elements? Because... you still have people, and cities, and towns, and trade, and all these building blocks of society in general that don't really change unless you put in a ton of work to make something that lacks all human elements (which becomes very problematic when you have nothing familiar to latch onto; the rule of thumb I've heard is "stranger in a familiar garden or familiar person in a strange garden", which translates to always needing something familiar for people to understand what's going on)
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo
Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
Low fantasy is set in our time or history but with fantasy elements. I write high-fantasy which is set in a different world. Think Game of Thrones and such. Usually it is set in a medieval time. It all depends whether you want to write about say vampires in New York or a small town in some made up country thats being invaded by dragons or something.
@Shiverfeather- That's such an odd definition for me, because I don't see low fantasy that way at all (despite wikipedia proving that your definition of low fantasy is correct). What you've described sounds like urban fantasy, to me.
Although one key difference in low fantasy is it doesn't really focus on magic all that much, while urban fantasy could focus more heavily on the magic side. On top of that, a world similar to our world can count as low fantasy so long as the world is somewhat familiar to us.
Low fantasy for me is basically non-epic fantasy, while high fantasy is the epic type. World never comes into play at all. Hence why I asked for a definition, because around my circle of friends "low fantasy" means non epic fantasy!
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo
Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
Fantasy takes place in another world/universe. In regular fantasy you can have anything take place within this laws of that world. So in other words, you could have shapeshifters walking right alongside a dragon, and have a helicopter land in front of them. The only thing that makes it concretely different from fiction is that it takes place somewhere else.
High fantasy on the other hand is limited to the window of time when people fought with swords, axes, and bows and arrows. However, you can throw a bunch of random creatures in there if you want to as well. It also does tend to be written in a more epic style, but it doesn't necessarily have to be. Take Tolkien's book The Hobbit there isn't really anything epic about it at all! It is written from the perspective of a hobbit! So that just goes to show you it doesn't have to be all grand and epic.
There! I've included my whole spiel! Now, it is up for you to decide whether you want to write high or regular fantasy.
One writer with one imagination makes thousands of new worlds and stories." ~ Anonymous author
@r4p17 How do you explain urban fantasy, supernatural stories, and contemporary fantasy, then? These are all stories defined by them being in the modern world with fantasy added in, often with the conspiracy theories to not alter history.
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo
Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
@r4p17, both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are high fantasy.
The POV doesn't really need to define what kind of fantasy it is. I always thought of high fantasy to be its own genre within fantasy, complete with wizards, magic, evil villains, dwarves, elves et al.
"I never saved anything for the swim back."
Do not mistake coincidence for fate. - Mr Eko
they're selling razor blades and mirrors in the street
High fantasy would be set in, usually, medieval times with Dragons and stuff. Obviously it doesn't need dragons but...If something isn't high/epic fantasy I'd say it's low. I've never used the term because low fantasy isn't really a thing. Its just a way to cover all fantasy stories that aren't high epic. Unless your story is like Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones-kings, queens, elves, archers, swordfighting, dragons and so on, I suppose you could say it was low fantasy. But then you have urban, contempory, romance and they all overlap...
Gender:
Points: 1657
Reviews: 45