Great analysis! I’ve thought much about this question as well since hearing Tolkien’s claim that stageplay cannot render fantasy. While I do think there’s some personal preference at work, it’s interesting that the example he picks is Macbeth. Shakespearean plays — at least in the Elizabethan tradition — had almost no props whatsoever. When Macbeth stumbles out of the chambers covered in blood, it was almost certainly left to the audience to imagine that blood.
Based on the thoughts of Lewis and Barfield (associates and fellow Inklings), I wonder if there are two things going on:
1. To Tolkien, vision has a reifying effect in contrast to the abstract nature of the written word. If I write about a bloody, floating dagger then your imagination sets to work on daggers, but if it’s a prop then you must imagine THAT dagger because it’s done for you. Plenty of people will never picture Aragorn and not picture Viggo.
2. Likewise to Tolkien, imagination is a skill that visual media does not allow the participant to exercise.
I'm inclined to differ with Tolkien on one point. I think that effective readers--the same people who can use their imagination to conjure up the action in a fantasy novel in the theater of their minds--can also sometimes conjure around the visual elements in a movie. Perhaps the effects occasionally fall short or can't compete with what the imagination could produce. But they don't necessarily prevent the imagination from working unless they are truly awful.
As an audience, new effects technologies have perhaps actually spoiled us, making us always demand the most elaborate--and expensive--effects. The result is that it's harder the moves and TV shows in the fantasy genre to do well commercially even if they are popular. Netflix is a good illustration, as it kills off fantasy series more rapidly than those in other genres--because the effects budgets are bigger.
I'll admit that I'm probably in the minority on this issue, but I might rather see more well-acted and well-written productions with somewhat more basic special effects than far fewer with blockbuster effects, mesmerizing as they sometimes are.
Oh, and another thing: Tchaikovsky wrote the ballet *The Sleeping Princess* rather than *The Sleeping Beauty* because nothing could ensure that the prima ballerina would be beautiful, but she could be declared a princess by fiat.
One interesting film is *The Thief of Bagdad* -- the original, the silent one featuring Doug Fairbanks Sr. The very limits of the quality of the film help the simple, artfully deployed FX.
Great analysis! I’ve thought much about this question as well since hearing Tolkien’s claim that stageplay cannot render fantasy. While I do think there’s some personal preference at work, it’s interesting that the example he picks is Macbeth. Shakespearean plays — at least in the Elizabethan tradition — had almost no props whatsoever. When Macbeth stumbles out of the chambers covered in blood, it was almost certainly left to the audience to imagine that blood.
Based on the thoughts of Lewis and Barfield (associates and fellow Inklings), I wonder if there are two things going on:
1. To Tolkien, vision has a reifying effect in contrast to the abstract nature of the written word. If I write about a bloody, floating dagger then your imagination sets to work on daggers, but if it’s a prop then you must imagine THAT dagger because it’s done for you. Plenty of people will never picture Aragorn and not picture Viggo.
2. Likewise to Tolkien, imagination is a skill that visual media does not allow the participant to exercise.
Very well-supported analysis!
I'm inclined to differ with Tolkien on one point. I think that effective readers--the same people who can use their imagination to conjure up the action in a fantasy novel in the theater of their minds--can also sometimes conjure around the visual elements in a movie. Perhaps the effects occasionally fall short or can't compete with what the imagination could produce. But they don't necessarily prevent the imagination from working unless they are truly awful.
As an audience, new effects technologies have perhaps actually spoiled us, making us always demand the most elaborate--and expensive--effects. The result is that it's harder the moves and TV shows in the fantasy genre to do well commercially even if they are popular. Netflix is a good illustration, as it kills off fantasy series more rapidly than those in other genres--because the effects budgets are bigger.
I'll admit that I'm probably in the minority on this issue, but I might rather see more well-acted and well-written productions with somewhat more basic special effects than far fewer with blockbuster effects, mesmerizing as they sometimes are.
Oh, and another thing: Tchaikovsky wrote the ballet *The Sleeping Princess* rather than *The Sleeping Beauty* because nothing could ensure that the prima ballerina would be beautiful, but she could be declared a princess by fiat.
One interesting film is *The Thief of Bagdad* -- the original, the silent one featuring Doug Fairbanks Sr. The very limits of the quality of the film help the simple, artfully deployed FX.