There is, therefore, no reason why Christians cannot accept the existence and utility of a subgenre of Christian fantasy, just as Jews routinely accept the validity of Jewish fantasy, although followers of Islam often find the idea of Arabian fantasy problematic in relation to the Quran—as evidenced by the response to Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses.
Much religious fantasy is actually anti-religious fantasy of a satirical stripe, but successful works of that kind often call forth responses; George Bernard Shaw’s account of The Adventures of the Black Girl in Her Search for God (1932) spawned numerous replies in kind, including the title piece of Brigid Brophy’s The Adventures of God in His Search for the Black Girl (1973). Many sincere believers—including clerics—have used calculated fabulations as a means of exploring the implications of their doubts and beliefs. By the same token, nonbelievers in a particular religion may well find its lexicon of ideas useful in establishing hypothetical situations that explore general issues in theology or metaphysics in a sensitive fashion.
Religious fantasy does not, therefore, necessarily demean religion, although the flexibility of mind required to participate in fantasy, as a writer or a reader, may well be corrosive of the rigidity of mind required to sustain unyielding faith. Arch-dogmatists are always likely to disapprove of it, although that has never inhibited writers like C. S. Lewis and Harry Blamires and does not prevent the production of such works as Barbara Timberlake Russell’s The Taker’s Stone (1999) and G. P.
Taylor’s Shadowmancer.
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RICE, ANNE (1941– ). U.S. writer. She became the best-selling member of a group of writers who redeemed the idea and image of the vampire from its use as an icon of horror fiction (refer to HDHL). The series comprising Interview with the Vampire (1976), The Vampire Lestat (1985), The Queen of the Damned (1988), The Tale of the Body Thief (1992), and Memnoch the Devil (1995) retains an element of horror but subordinates it to flamboyant erotic fantasy, intense existentialist fantasy, and far-ranging historical fantasy, climaxing in the last-named volume with a Miltonian exercise in theodicy that reexamines its own qualifications as literary satanism. Pandora (1998), The Vampire Ar-mand (1998), Vittorio the Vampire (1999), and Blood and Gold: The Vampire Marius (2001) are adjuncts to the series. The Mummy; or, Rameses the Damned (1989) and Servant of the Bones (1996) vary the formula by employing less versatile revenants. The timeslip fantasy Violin (1997) also features supernatural predation.
The image of the witch is subject to a similarly thoroughgoing makeover in Rice’s trilogy comprising The Witching Hour (1990), Lasher (1993), and Taltos (1994); Merrick (2000) and Blood Canticle (2003) combine her series by introducing witches to vampires. She also extrapolated a familiar fairy tale motif into explicit pornography in a trilogy bylined “A. N. Roquelaure,” comprising The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty (1983), Beauty’s Punishment (1984), and Beauty’s Release (1985).
RILEY, JUDITH MERKLE (1942– ). U.S. writer of historical fantasies. A Vision of Light (1989), set in 14th-century England, features a healing gift; In Pursuit of the Green Lion (1999) is a sequel, but the third volume in the series, [The Water-Devil], has only been published in German. In The Oracle Glass (1994), set in 17th-century France, a girl is trained as a seer by La Voisin, a leading figure in one of the most notorious French sorcery trials. The Serpent Garden (1996) features Henry VIII. In The Master of All Desires (1999), Catherine de Medici goes in search of the head of Menander the Undying, which formerly enabled Nostradamus to obtain advice from Anael, the Spirit of History.
ROBBINS, TOD (1888–1949). British writer resident in the United States during and after World War I, when he wrote fiction for the pulp magazines, much of it non-supernatural horror fiction (refer to HDHL). His fantasies include “The Whimpus” (1919), a tongue-in-cheek account of a nasty mermaid, and “Toys of Fate” (1921; aka “Toys”), an allegory
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in which a shopkeeper unwisely sells a model of his village to Mr. Fate.
The title story of Who Wants a Green Bottle? and Other Uneasy Tales (1926)—which had earlier appeared in Silent, White and Beautiful and Other Stories (1920)—is a phantasmagoria based in Scottish folklore.
“Wild Wullie the Waster” is a quieter story in a similar vein; two tales based in Irish folklore, “A Bit of a Banshee” and “A Son of Shaemas O’Shea,” are broader comedies.
ROBBINS, TOM (1936– ). U.S. writer whose novels present a fantasized version of contemporary America. In the marginal Another Roadside Attraction (1971), the mummy of Jesus is the object of various quests. Jitterbug Perfume (1984), which features Pan, is more wholeheartedly fantastic than the similarly erotic Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1976) and Still Life with Woodpecker (1980). Skinny Legs and All (1990) is also flamboyant in spinning off fantasy materials from its central erotic theme. Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates (2000) features a shaman-enlightened CIA agent whose feet can no longer touch the
ground. Villa Incognito (2003) features the Japanese trickster figure Tanuki.
ROBERSON, JENNIFER (1953– ). U.S. writer in various genres. The Cheysuli series, comprising Shapechangers (1984), The Song of Homana (1985), Legacy of the Sword (1986), Track of the White Wolf (1987), A Pride of Princes (1988), Daughter of the Lion (1989), Flight of the Raven (1990), and A Tapestry of Lions (1992), is theriomorphic fantasy. The series comprising Sword-Dancer (1986), Sword-Singer (1988), Sword-Maker (1989), Sword-Breaker (1991), Sword-Born (1998), and Sword-Sworn (1999) is feminized sword and sorcery fiction.
ROBERTS, KATHERINE (1962– ). British children’s writer. The Echo-rium sequence, comprising Song Quest (1999), The Crystal Mask (2001), and Dark Quetzal (2003), features magical music. The heroine of Spellfall (2000) fights to save the soultrees of Earthaven. The Seven Fabulous Wonders series, begun with The Great Pyramid Robbery
(2001), The Babylon Game (2002), The Amazon Temple Quest (2003), The Mausoleum Murder (2004), and The Olympic Conspiracy (2004), features historical fantasy adventures.
ROBERTS, KEITH (1935–2000). British writer best known for sf (refer to HDSFL), although his first published story (1965) launched the series
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collected in Anita (1970; exp. 1990), about a teenage witch. In the mosaic Pavane (1968), an apparent alternative history of England turns out to be a post-holocaust replay masterminded by fairies; a similar chimerical amalgam is featured in the futuristic series collected in Kaeti and Company (1986), Kaeti’s Apocalypse (1986), and Kaeti on Tour (1992). Gráinne (1987) is a contemporary fantasy with strong echoes of Celtic fantasy. A few fantasies are mingled with sf stories in his collections, most prominently in The Passing of the Dragons (1977), Ladies from Hell (1979), and Winterwood and Other Hauntings (1989).
ROBERTS, NORA (1950– ). U.S. writer, very prolific in the field of genre romance, who also writes sf as “J. D. Robb.” She began diversifying into romance/suspense crossovers before edging into fantasy in the Hornblower brothers timeslip series, comprising Time Was (1989), Times Change (1990), and Time and Again (2002). The Three Sisters Island trilogy, comprising Dance upon the Air (2001), Heaven and Earth (2001), and Face the Fire (2002), features an ancient curse. The trilogy comprising Key of Light (2003), Key of Knowledge (2003), and Key of Valor (2004) describes a quest for the keys to the souls of goddesses.
Her collections of novellas include A Little Magic (2002) and A Little Fate (2004), both featuring Celtic romantic fantasies. Her best-selling status gave her a pivotal influence in moving forward the cause of paranormal romance.
ROBERTS, TANSY RAYNER (1978– ). Australian writer. The humorous fantasy series comprising Splashdance Silver (1998), Liquid Gold (1999), and various short stories, featuring Delta Void, is set in the world of Mocklore. She coedited AustrAlien Absurdities (2002) with Chuck McKenzie and is a member of the collective that publishes Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine (launched 2002).
ROESSNER, MICHAELA (1950– ). U.S. writer. W
alkabout Woman (1988) is a plea for re-enchantment describing the quest of an Australian aborigine woman to renew the dreamtime. Vanishing Point (1993) features a more elaborate quest involving alternative worlds.
The couplet comprising The Stars Dispose (1997) and The Stars Compel (1999) is a historical/astrological fantasy set in Renaissance Florence and Rome.
ROHAN, MICHAEL SCOTT (1951– ). British writer, who wrote sf before switching to fantasy in The Ice King (1986, with Allan Scott as
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“Michael Scot”; aka Burial Rites), a contemporary fantasy with Nordic intrusions. The background of the Winter of the World trilogy, comprising The Anvil of Ice (1986), The Forge in the Forest (1987), and The Hammer of the Sun (1988), resembles that of Nordic fantasy without making explicit use of it; the series continues in The Castle of the Winds (1998), The Singer and the Sea (1999), and Shadow of the Seer (2001).
The trilogy comprising Chase the Morning (1990), The Gates of Noon (1992), and Cloud Castles (1993) establishes the primary world at the core of a multiversal array of historical and legendary alternatives, whose intersections direct the protagonist through various chimerical encounters, the third including Arthurian materials; the series continues in Maxie’s Demon (1997). A Spell of Empire: The Horns of Tartarus (1992 with Scott) is a picaresque fantasy set in an alternative Europe where a northern Nibelung Empire confronts a southern
Tyrrhennian Empire. The Lord of Middle Air (1994) is a historical fantasy set in the 13th century, featuring a venture into Faerie by the reputed wizard Michael Scot (whom Rohan, like Sir Walter Scott, claims as an ancestor). Shaman (2001) is a revenge fantasy.
ROHMER, SAX (1883–1959). Pseudonym of British writer Arthur Sars-field Ward, a prolific writer of popular thrillers, most notably the long series featuring the charismatic villain Fu Manchu. His fantasies are usually horror stories (refer to HDHL) with marginal sf elements, but he frequently drew on the legacy of Arabian fantasy and Egyptian mythology, most notably in The Quest of the Sacred Slipper (1914), Brood of the Witch Queen (1918), and some of the stories in Tales of Secret Egypt (1918), The Haunting of Low Fennel (1920), and Tales of East and West (1932). A few of the exotic detective stories in The Dream Detective (1920) and some items in The Wrath of Fu Manchu and Other Stories (1973) are also fantasies. The series comprising Nude in Mink (1950, aka Sins of Sumuru), Sumuru (1951, aka Slaves of Sumuru), The Fire Goddess (1952, aka Virgin in Flames), Return of Sumuru (1954, aka Sand and Satin), and Sinister Madonna (1956) has fugitive elements of erotic fantasy. The Romance of Sorcery (1914) is a scholarly fantasy culled from Éliphas Lévi and Jules Michelet.
ROMANCE. The Old French term romanz signified the vernacular; originally used in the phrase roman courtois, the prefix roman was adopted into the description of many other genres, including the roman d’aventure
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and the roman d’antiquité; after a somewhat convoluted etymological journey it ended up as the French word for “novel.” It made its way into English via Anglo-Norman and was retained in such phrases as chivalric romance.
Romance became popular as a critical term in the 18th century, when such works as Richard Hurd’s Letters on Chivalry and Romance (1762) examined chivalric romance as a product of feudal society and construed its supernatural elements allegorically. “Realism” and “romance”
were frequently used thereafter as paired opposites, and it was in that context that romanticism became the definitive term of a movement.
Romance was almost always regarded as the more “primitive” element of the pair and realism the more “advanced”; Clara Reeve’s suggestion in The Progress of Romance (1785) that romance not only had a future but was capable of further evolution was unusual, but the fact that the argument was presented as a dialogue allowed unsympathetic readers to side with the spokesman of convention if they wished.
The implications of the English word have shifted as dramatically
and confusingly as those of its French counterpart. Ironically, it has reverted in common parlance to something more closely akin to its origin, being commonly applied to matters of courtship; the commodified genre of “romance” consists of stereotyped love stories whose fantastic nature was obscured by their exclusion of obvious supernatural intrusions until the development in the 1990s of paranormal romance.
The term’s use in fantasy criticism, however, often remains deliberately archaic.
ROMANTICISM. A movement in the arts and philosophy with reverber-ations that profoundly affected intellectual, social, and political life from the late 18th to the mid-19th century. It was originally conceived, in Germany, as the dialectical antithesis of classicism in the field of aesthetics, implying a retreat from formal constraint in order to allow the imagination freer play; as it spread, however, it came to be seen as a rebellion against the ideas, rewards, and supposed lessons of the Enlightenment, challenging the intellectual hegemony of science and reason, as well as the social hegemony of tradition. Extreme romanticism championed subjectivity against the supposed excesses of objectivity, and rhyme against the supposed excesses of reason, although its correlation with a dramatic resurgence of interest in the supernatural, folklore, mythology, and the elements of chivalric romance was essentially academic, conducted in a spirit of conscientious fabulation. It was not un-
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til romanticism became decadent that it became unrepentantly fantastic, although French romanticism was entangled from its inception with the cult of “sensibility” established by Jean-Jacques Rousseau and its apparent glorification of the “noble savage.”
Leading German Romantics included Johann Wolfgang von
Goethe, “Novalis,” Friedrich Schiller, Ludwig Tieck, Johann Musäus, and Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué. English romanticism, foreshadowed by James Macpherson’s invention of Ossian and by the “grave-
yard poetry” of Edward Young, was theorized by Nathan Drake, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and William Blake; Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and John Keats were among its most significant converts. The central figures of the French movement included Charles Nodier, Victor Hugo, Théophile Gautier, and—his adoption permitted because America had no movement of its own to speak of—Edgar Allan Poe.
(The unique character of American fantastic literature is partly due to the fact that imported Romantic ideas seemed irrelevant to a nation with an expanding frontier that was determinedly obliterating a world
strongly akin to the one whose allegedly tragic loss European Romanticism was lamenting).
The historical novel and its Gothic spinoff were key products of romanticism, as were collections and imitations of fairy tales. Although the Romantic movements went into a long decline after 1848, their influence was not discarded; they were the parents of decadence and symbolism and the grandparents of surrealism and expressionism. Romanticism was a component of the development of individualism, insisting that man is not entirely a political animal and that the world of private experience provides a haven where anyone may enjoy a precious freedom from the tyranny of social regulation. Fantasy, in the psychological sense, is the mechanism that exercises this freedom, and fantasy literature is a key instrument in its exercise.
ROSENBERG, JOEL (1954– ). U.S. writer. The series comprising The Sleeping Dragon (1983), The Sword and the Chain (1984), The Silver Crown (1985), The Heir Apparent (1987), The Warrior Lives (1989), The Road to Ehvenor (1991), and The Road Home (1995) begins as a portal fantasy in which role-playing gamers are drawn into their game-world, but it is gradually transfigured into a stereotypical immersive fantasy series. The setting is reycled in Not Exactly the Three Musketeers (1999), a parody of Alexandre Dumas that was followed by Not Quite Scaramouche (2000) and Not Really the Prisoner of Zenda
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(2003). Legacy (2004) and To Home and Ehvenor (2004) reverted to the original schema. D’Shai (1991) and The Hour of the Octopus (1994) are fantasy/mystery hybrids.
The Keeper of the Hidden Ways trilogy, comprising The Fire Duke (1995), The Silver Stone (1996), and The Crimson Sky (1998), is a contemporary fantasy blending Celtic and Nordic materials. Paladins (2004) is set in an alternative 17th century, in an England where Mordred defeated Arthur and founded a dynasty.
ROSENDORFER, HERBERT (1934– ). German writer. The novel translated as The Architect of Ruins (1969; tr. 1992) is an elaborate metafictional/visionary fantasy. In Letters Back to Ancient China (1983; tr.
1997), a displaced 10th-century mandarin reports his impressions of the modern world. Stephanie; or, A Previous Existence (1987; tr. 1995) is also a timeslip fantasy.
ROSICRUCIAN FANTASY. The notion of a secret doctrine known to members of a long-estabished Brotherhood of the Rosy Cross was popularized by three pamphlets, one of which—generally known as the
Fama Fraternitus (1614; tr. 1652)—is a brief biography of the magician Christian Rosenkreutz, while the second, Confessio Frateritas (1615), fills in the historical background of his magical initiation, providing a key source of inspiration for the scholarly fantasies of Éliphas Lévi and many others. The third, signed by the philosopher Johann Valentin An-dreae (who also wrote the Utopian romance Christianopolis, 1619; tr.
1916), was translated as The Heretick Romance; or, the Chymical Wedding (1616; tr. 1690); it is an archetypal alchemical romance.
The three documents exerted a powerful influence on lifestyle fantasists, renewed when the brotherhood was given literary publicity by Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s Zanoni, which gave rise to a plethora of Rosicrucian lodges in late 19th-century Paris and inspired the founding of the Order of the Golden Dawn. A. E. Waite’s The Real History of the Rosicrucians (1887) summarized the imaginary history of such lifestyle fantasies. Specific Rosicrucian imagery continues to crop up in such works as Lindsay Clarke’s The Chymical Wedding, although it has mostly been absorbed into the syncretic amalgam of creeds underlying modern occult fantasy.
The A to Z of Fantasy Literature Page 55
