{"id":1112,"date":"2009-04-10T04:12:40","date_gmt":"2009-04-10T09:12:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/?p=1112"},"modified":"2009-04-10T04:14:17","modified_gmt":"2009-04-10T09:14:17","slug":"mcauley-on-the-essential-fortyfour-fantasy-novels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/2009\/04\/10\/mcauley-on-the-essential-fortyfour-fantasy-novels\/","title":{"rendered":"McAuley on the essential fortyfour fantasy novels"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nAs a sequel to his list of fortyeight essential science fiction titles<\/a>, Paul McAuley has now revealed a similar list<\/a> of fortyfour essential fantasy and horror titles and he’s asking for help to bring the list up to fifty. Like the other list, it is to be used in teaching a creative writing class or something like that and there’s a not quite arbitrary cutoff year of 1984. Bolded are the ones I read, struck through the ones I don’t think belong. Notice by the way that both lists start with the same book.\n<\/p>\n

\nFrankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus<\/a><\/strong> MARY SHELLEY 1818
\nTales of Mystery and Imagination EDGAR ALLAN POE 1838
\nA Christmas Carol CHARLES DICKENS 1843
\nJane Eyre CHARLOTTE BRONTE 1847
\nThe Hunting of the Snark<\/strong> LEWIS CARROLL 1876
\nDr Jekyll and Mr Hyde ROBERT LOUIS STEPHENSON 1886
\nThe Well At The World\u2019s End WILLIAM MORRIS 1896
\nDracula BRAM STOKER 1897
\nGhost Stories of an Antiquary MR JAMES 1904
\nKwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things LAFCADIO HEARN 1904
\nThe Wind in the Willows KENNETH GRAHAME 1908
\nJurgen JAMES BRANCH CABELL 1919
\nA Voyage to Arcturus DAVID LINDSAY 1920
\nThe King of Elfland\u2019s Daughter LORD DUNSANY 1924
\nThe Trial FRANZ KAFKA 1925
\nLud-in-the-Mist HOPE MIRRLEES 1926
\nOrlando VIRGINIA WOOLF 1928
\nThe Big Sleep<\/strike><\/strong> RAYMOND CHANDLER 1939
\nThe Outsider and Others HP LOVECRAFT 1939
\nGormenghast<\/strong> MERVYN PEAKE 1946
\nNight\u2019s Black Agents FRITZ LEIBER JR 1947
\nThe Sword of Rhiannon<\/strong> LEIGH BRACKETT 1953
\nConan the Barbarian ROBERT E HOWARD collected 1954
\nThe Lord of the Rings<\/a><\/strong> JRR TOLKEIN 1954-5
\nThe Once and Future King<\/strong> TH WHITE 1958
\nThe Haunting of Hill House SHIRLEY JACKSON 1959
\nThe Wierdstone of Brinsingamen ALAN GARNER 1960
\nThe Wolves of Willoughby Chase JOAN AIKEN 1962
\nSomething Wicked This Way Comes RAY BRADBURY 1963
\nThe Book of Imaginary Beings JORGE LUIS BORGES 1967
\nIce ANA CAVAN 1967
\nOne Hundred Years of Solitude GABRIEL GARCIA MARQUEZ 1967
\nEarthsea<\/a><\/strong> URSULA LE GUIN 1968-1972
\nJirel of Joiry<\/strong> CL MOORE collected 1969
\nGrendel JOHN GARDNER 1971
\nThe Pastel City M JOHN HARRISON 1971
\nCarrie STEPHEN KING 1974
\nPeace GENE WOLFE 1975
\nGloriana, or the Unfulfill\u2019d Queen MICHAEL MOORCOCK 1978
\nThe Bloody Chamber and Other Stories ANGELA CARTER 1979
\nLittle, Big JOHN CROWLEY 1981
\nThe Anubis Gates<\/strong> TIM POWERS 1983
\nThe Colour of Magic<\/strong> TERRY PRATCHETT 1983
\nMythago Wood ROBERT HOLDSTOCK 1984\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\nLike his science fiction list, this is interesting as it both shows a fairly consistent take on fantasy and horror, consistent with the earlier list, as well as some strong clues to his own influences. There’s a lot of pre-Tolkien British fantasy\/weird fiction on the list, quite a few recognised literay classics as well as a fair smattering of intelligent genry fantasy, again mostly pre-Tolkien, and finally the sort of fantasy equivalent to New Wave science fiction like Moorcock’s Gloriana<\/cite>.\n<\/p>\n

\nIt’s cutoff date means it misses a fair few important writers I would’ve put on my list (Glen Cook, Steve Brust, Mary Gentle, Steve Erikson, George R. R. Martin), as does its bias against genre fantasy (Stephen Donaldson for one). The one writer that really jumps out at me however, that fits the mood of the list is Avram Davidson, whose collection Or All the Seas with Oysters<\/cite> should be on it, as it’s an excellent collection by a master of the American fantasy tradition at the peak of his powers.\n<\/p>\n

\n(The reason I struck out The Big Sleep<\/cite> is not that it’s a bad book, but it’s neither fantasy nor horror in my opinion.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As a sequel to his list of fortyeight essential science fiction titles, Paul McAuley has now revealed a similar list of fortyfour essential fantasy and horror titles and he’s asking for help to bring the list up to fifty. Like the other list, it is to be used in teaching a creative writing class or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[137],"tags":[2464,520,517],"class_list":["post-1112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fantasy","tag-fantasy","tag-obsessive-list-making","tag-paul-mcauley"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1112"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1112\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1114,"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1112\/revisions\/1114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cloggie.org\/wissewords2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}