George MacDonald's Prophecies

You know that a fairy tale is truly superb if it tells prophecies that all come true.

This is the case in George MacDonald’s Lilith.

In Lilith, a city called Bulika is ruled by an evil princess. MacDonald’s description of this city is disturbingly familiar. It all sounds an awful lot like the United States today.

In chapter 21, the main character meets a woman who is fleeing from Bulika to save her baby’s life. She describes the princess thus:

“She does not care about her country. She sends witches around to teach the women spells that keep babies away, and give them horrible things to eat. Some say she is in league with the Shadows to put an end to the race.”

After entering Bulika, the main character has a rather interesting conversation with a woman of the city:

I asked her many questions. She told me the people never did anything except dig for precious stones in their cellars. They were rich, and had everything made for them in other towns.

“Why?” I asked.

“Because it is a disgrace to work,” she answered. Everybody in Bulika knows that!”

I asked how they were rich if none of them earned money. She replied that their ancestors had saved for them, and they never spent. When they wanted money, they sold a few of their gems.

“But there must be some poor!” I said.

“I suppose there must be, but we never think of such people. When one goes poor, we forget him. That is how we keep rich. We mean to be rich always.”

“But when you have dug up all your precious stones and sold them, you will have to spend your money, and one day you will have none left!”

“We have so many, and there are so many still in the ground, that that day will never come,” she replied.

“Suppose a strange people were to fall upon you, and take everything you have!”

“No strange people will dare; they are all horribly afraid of our princess. She it is who keeps us safe and free and rich!” (Chapter 23.)   

The first reference almost seems to be a foretelling of the deeds of population control freaks. The city of Bulika has no children; soon our country will be no different.

I found the second passage particularly intriguing. Like in the U.S., the people of Bulika no longer make anything for themselves, but buy it from other places. They are confident that their economy will never fail, and that no one will ever dare to invade.

By the way, this book was published in 1895. Could all of this be a coincidence? It’s much more likely that MacDonald had already seen signs of what the real world was becoming, and that he followed them to their natural conclusion in his story. It's all a little too close to the truth.

 This commentary, I feel, is very incomplete, so it would be great if we all discussed this book. 

The Worth of Fantasy

What good could anyone get from writing fantasy? This is an important question, for either fantasy has an end worth pursuing, or it is a waste of time. So, for anyone out there who’s interested in reading or writing fantasy, here’s my take on it based on my own experience.   

About two thanksgivings ago I promised a friend of mine that I would help her with a movie based on a fantasy story she was making up. Over the next few months we sweated over the script for the film. Unfortunately, we were unable to implement her idea due to a shortage of money, props, costumes, people, talent, etc. However, we did continue to write the story and discuss it.

Here’s what I got out of the experience. I found that when we talked it over, I always tested our ideas against those of the real world. I found myself trying to make the fantasy not just believable, but true.

This, I believe, is the whole point. Fantasy writers are supposed to base their worlds on truth, on reality. They do this by creating a mythical world that may be different in many ways from ours and yet follows all of the same moral laws. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, for example, is unlike our world; it is full of wise elves and evil orcs and magical rings. It is also like our world; the One Ring, like any evil thing, always corrupts those who use it regardless of their intentions. The moral laws are just as inflexible there as here.

Fantasy authors also have a great responsibility on their hands. The medium they are using is meant to convey truth, but it can also be used to teach falsehoods. It may be tempting to force reality to conform to fantasy, but we must not do this. Fantasy instead must conform to reality, to truth. Indeed all good fantasy conforms to reality. This is why George MacDonald said that “if you understood any world besides your own, you would understand your own much better.” (Lilith, Chapter V.)

So my conclusion is this: fantasy is well worth writing, as I have found through making it up. It is a vehicle with which to convey truth with a power that few other methods have, for not only is it true, it is also fascinating. What do people like better than an exciting, well told story about elves and dwarves and wizards and valiant men?