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Tolkien,The Fellowship of the Ring
The things we love destroy us every time, lad.
Martin,A Game of Thrones
No work of art can be entirely separated from its time.
And works of art that capture the public imagination tend to be even more intimately linked to their time.
MartinsA Song of Ice and Firebooks a series still unfinished by its author.
Inevitably, any fantasy epic that becomes vastly popular will be compared to J.R.R.
He also knew and admired the darker fantasy stories of Lord Dunsany.
But none of their works really deserved the title epic.
Fantasy fiction before J.R.R.T.
was still largely a parlor game, not a war game.
Perhaps the first true epic fantasy published in the modern era was E.R.
In fact, although George R.R.
Bilbo was meant to find the Ring, in which case you were also meant to have it.
And that is an encouraging thought.
But a rise in violence and discrimination against Muslims showed that pulling together was not the only story.
Its hard to deny that he was right.
The enemies were closer, and sometimes they were even friends or had been.
Nothing was entirely trustworthy, not family, not community, and certainly not the government.
Priests and teachers were now seen as potential molesters.
Presidents were no longer just wrong as far as their opponents were concerned they were actual criminal enemies.
George W. Bush was labeled a murderer and Barack Obama was called a fascist.
Political and cultural media were weaponized.
Into this new and more anxious world burst HBOsGame of Thrones.
Those who know a little history know that there were no philosophical differences behind this struggle.
In the long wake of the 9/11 attacks, America has become a troubled superpower.
Bipartisanship, collegiality, and respect seem to have left our political life for good.
Europe, awash in its own racial backlashes and economic chaos, is no better off.
Were living in aGame of Thronesworld.
The strong will destroy the weak, proclaims the Westeros philosophy, and only cunning and moral flexibility matter.
No one can be trusted completely, nor should be.
Did Martin invent this worldview?
No, no more than Tolkien invented the postwar milieu in which his work became so popular.
Tad Williams writes fantasy and science fiction, including the twoOsten Ardbook series and the virtual-reality epicOtherland.
