"Mirror, mirror, on the wall
You show the hearts and souls of all
Mirror, mirror, of the mind
Tell us the story of humankind
The Voice of Reason: Mirror, Mirror
By the voice of reason - Posted on May 6th, 2006
Tagged: Books
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This essay is a truth which ought to be spread. It reminds me of a boy, who, by years is very old, but by spirit will never age. This young boy is already more of a man than most people will ever succeed to be. All you have to do to find him is is fly to the second star to the right, and straight on 'til morning.
Brandon, you rock. Thanks for reading and commenting.
--
~I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.~
A great effort to explain the subtle fact behind fantasy.... I like fantasy than reality.......Those who ignore fantasy are the people who got lost in the struggle for living and apparently have become ignorant of their own position in this world..... For them, only our human society is the entire world, they care about what level they are in this society and things like that which I suppose as unworthy of all.....a pity.
Okay, so I will readily admit that I am not up on the current fantasy "stuff". Although I did read the entire Chronicles of Narnia and the Tolkien Trilogy in the mid 1970's while in high school.
But to me (from age 10-40) fairy-tale (Cinderella, etc) and fantasy (Xanth) helped me to escape from abusive parents and abusive ex husbands. It gave me a place where I could go when the reality of life just got too much to handle. It was either that or kill myself. And I really didn't want to do that.
But with many years of counseling from Christian and secular counselors I don't need that anymore. My husband and his family are just wonderful.
I still enjoy reading fantasy. Currently I am re-reading the Chronicles of Narnia and enjoying it far more than I did the first time.
Maybe I totally missed the point of this blog, I don't know.
Thanks and God Bless,
Lynne
The wonderful thing about literature is that means many different things to different people. For you, fantasy was escapsim, in the best way possible--the separation from the bad reality you didn't want to face helped you immensely, and that's a good thing. Sometimes, fantasy is escapsim in that sense, and it isn't a bad thing; that's why when people say it with such scorn I'm often surprised. Tolkien said that too; he asked us to consider what we're escaping from and where we're escaping to.
I don't think you need to be "up on the current fantasy 'stuff'" to understand my point here. The current fantasy stuff is in fact very superficial, shallow, and useless as a whole. My main examples of fantasy being something more and more important are The Chronicles of Narnia, The Lord of the Rings, and even Harry Potter. The point is that while fantasy can be pure escapism, it is often a mirror into our own hearts. People often see things more clearly when others, even fictional characters, are acting it out, when they're not the ones in the middle of it. These stories appeal to us for a reason, and that reason is because of archetypes--they are built out of the fundamental concepts of what it means to be human, and live on earth in the human condition.
Fantasy isn't the only genre to hold up this 'mirror' to ourselves, naturally; science fiction also does this remarkably well, and the best example in that genre is Star Trek, the original series and the next generation.
If you are enjoying the Chroncles now more than you did at first, perhaps that's an example of what I mean: as we get older and grow up we begin to see the world in different ways, and sometimes life just loses its magic; when we can look into a fantasy world like Narnia or Middle-earth and see how wonderful things are there, we can be reminded of the good things here in our "reality", too--or maybe even see the similarities between our world and the fictional realms, and understand the good things apply to both, and even that the bad can be conquered in both.
The point of this blog is to show that fantasy is neither so shallow nor so useless as many would make it out to be, whether it helps you through escapsim through tough periods in your life, allows you to perceive yourself and your "real" world in a new and better way, and/or just offers a good, solid story.
--
~I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.~