Paul Tobin

So… why write fantasy? This was actually a big question for me, because I spent a long time screwing around with novels that I wasn’t particularly fond of, trying to write what I thought was “proper” to write… the types of novels that get featured in “Stuffy Drawing Room Discussions Quarterly” because I wanted to feel that I had accomplished something as a writer. The big change for me was when I compared what I was trying to write with what I enjoyed reading. I was writing heart-breaking slices of everyday life and then reading tales of warriors kicking dragons in the arse, and vampires holding bloody knuckle contests with ghosts, and lithe swordswomen tossing naked stableboys from their beds in order to grab up their swords when the troll busts through the wall. I was reading fiction where magic was in the mix… where others worlds were not only just beyond doorways, but there were characters and villains in the books who KNEW where those doorways were waiting, and they had the keys and the magic words to fling them wide open.

So my interests were clearly in different genres. But why was that?

We'll get back to this image. This image is why I like to write fantasy fiction.

Part of an illustration by Paolo de Francesco

The fact of the matter is… I like it when ANYTHING can happen. In mainstream fiction, slice-of-life and all that… there is a box that contains the writer and the reader, both. That box is a boundary from which we cannot break free. We cannot include ghosts, vampires, fox-women, or any hints of magic. We cannot succumb to the whim of the story. We can’t decide that the reason the barista won’t date the main character ISN’T because she’s had a horrible breakup and is slowly learning to trust again (leading to series of bad lovers because she feels more comfortable when she KNOWS she can’t trust) but rather because there is a dragon’s ghost within her, and love and lust can only be fulfilled  if that dragon is defeated by creating a mythical cup of cappuccino that transports the main character to a fantasy world, and also goes quite well with bagels or croissants.

And I like that as a reader, and I like it as a writer. I like going into a story without pre-made choices.

I like worlds like this one, where there were giants in the earth, and those giants might be awoken, and they might fuck with the story in one way, or they might fuck with it in another way, and they might not fuck with it at all. The possible doorways are endless. Every corner is a new adventure. A new possibility. One of the hurdles of fantasy, of course, is taking that boundless world and establishing boundaries. It sounds a bit contrarian, but it's important to establish rules even in a fantasy world. Does magic exist? Because if it DOES exist, then this should be established early in the story. It's no good having an entire book be confined to tales of robot gunslingers, and then, in the final chapter, having a magician come in and cast a few spells. A fantasy world has to be BELIEVABLE. And that means establishing exactly WHAT kind of boundlessness is in play. Magic? Vampires? A thief who can turn herself into a crow? Where are we at? Then, even if those boundaries are never challenged, the mere fact that ONE doorway has been opened, that ONE fence has been knocked down, allows me to flirt with other boundaries in ways that a non-fantasy novel simply wouldn't condone. But, there, in the image above... an actual sculpture that exists here in our real world, and if we were to stand next to it at night we could almost FEEL the statue moving, and the storyline putting its hand on the doorknob to another world.

The Colosso dell’Appennino, by Giambologna – outside of Florence, Italy

Oh, and here's the second part of that illustration from above. This is why I like writing fantasy. Because no matter how placid the surface, we never know what's lurking underneath.

The whole of the illustration by Paolo de Francesco