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@joelle-stone

THANK YOU NOAH

Joelle, I loved reading this, it made my day. 🙂 I’m glad we agree, we need to complain to each other about it sometime. 🙂 xD

@olivia

Thanks for the reply Olivia! I’m glad you were able to see the clear differences through my mess of a post. xD

@r-m-archer

However. As it currently stands, the word “magic” is just as often used to refer to natural-in-fantasy powers that are supernatural to the real world and therefore carries that connotation just as much as (if not more than, to most fantasy readers) its original meaning.

This was essentially the main point I was trying to make. I agree that many writers use the word magic not even knowing that it clearly denotes supernatural (and clicheness, but I won’t go into that). However, just because that’s what they might (emphasis on might) think they are doing it does not change the fact that that is not what magic means.

I also don’t think that writing “magic” in the truly supernatural sense is inherently cheesy or lazy. Miracles, supernatural intervention, and even witchcraft can be portrayed—very, very, very carefully—for thematic purpose and to convey the world in its fullness. The spiritual realm is no less real for being invisible, and the same ought to be true of a fictional world. And when used with the appropriate level of care and thought and prayer, this is anything but cheesy or lazy. I don’t think we should portray magic in a cheesy or lazy manner, because it’s a very serious thing in the real world and ought also to be a very serious thing in fiction. But I don’t think that means we ought to discontinue its portrayal altogether.

It isn’t always portrayed in a trite, cheesy manner,, but I’m so sick of scrolling through hoopla or a library or audible or goodreads and reading descriptions of books and the first things is “the magic the man possess” or the “secret sorcerer,”  so trite, so shallow, so blah. So I would say that many times it is immature and trite.

After saying all that, quality of writing is not my main reason for hating magic. Christian biblical reasons are why I truly avoid it. Perhaps I will write a post on why sometime soon, but I will say one thing in regard to your statement. Yes that spiritual world is very real, in fact, it is realer than the physical realm, but that does not mean that we should write anything about it. In fact, I believe messing with the spiritual realm in writing is a very dangerous and anti-biblical thing to do.

I would be curious how you would propose replacing the term “magic” when referring to natural-to-fantasy abilities in way that would catch on not only with writers but also with reader

I’m confused. There are several fantasy books and movies that never use the word magic but also have amazing fantastical elements in them. I do not necessarily recommend these books or movies as being perfectly okay, but Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time, and Star Wars both have what readers wrongly call magic systems, and yet the authors never call their fantastical elements magic, they are just cool things they invented in that world. This is the professional, untrite, more christian like way to do it (I’m not saying these two series are Christian, I’m just saying that if I were to write fantasy I would follow their examples by not using magic or witchcraft in my book). To clarify, what I’m saying is that there doesn’t have to be anything to replace the word magic in books. Just make up a cool fantastical ability system in your world, make up some name for it, don’t make it feel demonic, and you’re good. If you meant a name for readers to use instead of magic system, readers can call it a plethora of different things. The powers of that world, the fantastical elements, the power-system, the special abilities, the list goes on.

I’m a little confused by that quote. Care to elucidate on it for me? xD

@bclarke

That said, there are a few who do this well with their own systems – just I haven’t heard of a universal ‘fantastical ability system’ [name] that would refer to magic in our world, but a set of [natural laws] in their world.

Thanks for the reply Bronte (or Tara, what am I supposed to call you? xD)! The second part of that quoted paragraph is what I want to drill down on. Magic in our world, as I tried to communicate in my post, does not  equal natural laws in another. Fantasy is your brainchild. Magic is supernatural. Magic is the same thing in our world as it is in another, harnessing power from a spiritual or sub-natural realm. Now, I’m to talk about what you’re probably driving at in my response to Taylor, so read that if you would like. 🙂

@taylorclogston

(gah, I wrote an initial post and then a server error had the site down some time before I tried to post)

Man, I feel you so much. SE keeps doing that to me. xD

Ideologically, I have zero issue with a fantasy book operating on a different theology to our world’s, so I’m afraid I’m not with you there either.

If I’m understanding you right, you are talking about creating different religions in fantasy, such as Sanderson does in his Stormlight Archive. I have put some thought and study into this, but as of right now, I do not think that God would be pleased with us creating our own fake religions in fantasy world with their own rituals and worship styles. What I do like in fantasy is to have a Creator who is referenced, such as Eru Illvatar (Tolkien), The Creator (Robert Jordan), or Asland (Narnia). This was not really on subject though.

I’m a linguistic descriptivist more than a prescriptivist, so I don’t believe it’s right to demand almost everyone else accede to your wishes of how a word’s used in the context of the fantasy genre.

This is the argument that I anticipated when I wrote this post, I was just waiting for it to be brought up. 🙂 Before I defend my argument, let me say that there is some truth in this. Words can be hijacked and turned into slang versions of their previous selves, then those slang versions can even turn into primary versions of use. So this argument does have a point worth considering. However, as a Christan who knows the real use of the word (a use that is still used in fantasy, and in real life, just because some people don’t mean supernatural by magic in fantasy doesn’t mean they all don’t, the original use still greatly outweighs the slang version), I am not going to use a word that is directly connected and the root of a sin that Jesus and and His prophets and apostles in Old and New Testaments preached strongly against, that sin being witchcraft, sorcery, magicians, (not the modern magician style obviously), and anything having to do with messing with the spiritual realm. Since that is what magic meant for a very long time (you should study the witch trials, and the concept of magic in the middle ages and how it developed and was used and talked about in many real and un-christian like ways), and is still what it means usually today, I am not going to use that word or its counterparts. In addition to that, if I ever write the fantasy series I have in mind, I will not have any fantastical elements that feel magical or supernatural or ritualistic. Again, there is a point to words changing in use, but because of the bible and its use throughout time and in modernity, I believe it is an un-biblical thing to do.

Finally, I don’t think magic is inherently cheesy, goofy, cringy, or childish, and we’ll just have to chalk that up to differences in taste.

This was really just my own opinion (and the religions reason is the main reason I made this post, not personal taste), so I won’t argue it much, but I will say two things. Firstly, ignoring all christian values for a moment, there are plenty of writings that have magic that are not cheesy or immature, so on that isolated point you are right. Secondly, I just want to say that I’m surprised you aren’t sick of scrolling through the fantasy section of some library or goodreads online, and all the descriptions are about strange magic and secret sorcerers. It makes me sick. That’s what made me bring up this cheesy, childish, trite writing talk.