Automoderated users, Autopatrolled users, Bureaucrats, Comment administrators, Confirmed users, Forum administrators, Interface administrators, Moderators, Rollbackers, Administrators
116,608
edits
Xanth: Difference between revisions
outdated template, when?, copyedit
No edit summary |
Looney Toons (talk | contribs) (outdated template, when?, copyedit) |
||
| (5 intermediate revisions by 4 users not shown) | |||
Line 1:
{{work}}{{outdated}}
What do you get when you take a rather witty American author, create a [[Fictional Counterpart]] of the ''entire state of Florida'' (with the small change of everyone having magical powers -- a ''Magic Kingdom,'' geddit?), and fill it with various parodies of fantasy tropes (as well as literally hundreds of reader-submitted puns)?
'''Xanth''', in a nutshell.
Xanth takes place in a small Florida-shaped realm that is sealed off from the rest of Earth. On Xanth, magic is real, with its own physical laws, often based on reader-submitted (and credited) puns. Billions, and billions of puns. For example -- Pineapples? They're essentially hand grenades. Cherries (Cherry bombs) are smaller, but still dangerous. Tulips (two lips) will kiss you if you get too close. Boot Rear is a fizzy soda that, when drunk, causes you to feel a swift kick to your bottom. And beware the Catastrophe -- a plaque with the back half a cat stuck into it (a Cat-ass-trophy).
Line 10:
One important rule for Xanth is that every single native-born Xanth human [[Everyone Is a Super|has a unique "talent"]] -- a magical quirk that only they can do. This can be anywhere from [[Kaleidoscope Hair|changing their hair color]], to being able to talk to certain animals, to being able to rewind time or warp reality in their nearby vicinity. Talents are unique to the person who has them -- no two talents are the same, but some are so similar that they are more or less identical; "turn stuff blue" versus "turn stuff azure", for example.
The first book, ''A Spell for Chameleon'', was written in 1977, and the series continues to this day, recently{{when}} entering its 2nd trilogy. In typical [[Piers Anthony]] fashion, he declared the first trilogy over after the 27th book (3 Cubed, or 3^3, is 27), ''[[Pun-Based Title|Cube Route]]''. Xanth has even inspired a "fan book", a novel-length work of collaborative fiction that Piers Anthony has even mentioned positively in his official newsletter.
Xanth has long been criticized for being a novel series for young teens that does not shy away from (rather frequent) depictions of nudity and slightly sexual situations despite his character's typical younger ages, to the point that his harshest critics have called him an outright pedophile. Anthony has waved off such criticisms as being nonsense, pointing out that most teenagers do not openly talk about "naughty things" with adults but are certainly not as innocent and pure as most adults would like to think, and while his books are written for the young adult market they can be [[Getting Crap Past the Radar|read on several levels]], so whereas the youngest readers wouldn't notice anything, [[Parental Bonus|older readers might get the more subtle jokes]].
Line 18:
Despite the fanservice, Xanth attracts a large number of female readers, due in part to the extensive and imaginative world and the fact that more than half of the main characters are assertive female protagonists. Mr. Anthony has mentioned that he gets almost 4 times more [[Incredibly Lame Pun|fe-mail than male-mail]], and wonders if the market for fantasy / scifi novels for young women is as barren as conventional wisdom dictates.
As an interesting aside, Mr. Anthony talks frequently about his experiences in using the Linux operating system to write novels, which earned him an [http://interviews.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/07/14/1854209&mode=thread&tid=99 interview with Slashdot]. Another small point is the Jenny Elf character -- one of his fans' parents wrote to him to talk about her daughter being paralyzed in a car accident, she's recovered, slowly, over the years -- he wrote her into the series and spends a few pages in most novels' author notes talking about how her life has been lately. He even collected his letters to Jenny in a book -- ''[
A movie based on the first Xanth novel was scheduled for [https://web.archive.org/web/20091001042101/http://www.themovieinsider.com/m1787/xanth-a-spell-for-chameleon
----
{{tropelist}}
* [[Amazing Technicolor Population]]: "Coloured" people,
▲* [[Amazing Technicolor Population]]: "Coloured" people, Immigrants from Earth circa the civil rights movement, whose kids (due to the rule of ''pun'') grew up with every skintone under the sun.
* [[Ancient Conspiracy]]: The Adult Conspiracy (to keep interesting stuff away from children).
** The Adult Conspiracy is taken so seriously that children who manage to break it gain incredible power -- one of the books has a whole miniplot before the main plot even starts where the main character has to drag her brother to a magic spring to make him forget how to swear, because...apparently everyone else is too squeamish about being cussed at to spend that much time around him.
Line 39 ⟶ 38:
* [[All Myths Are True]]: Lots of mythology references, including some silly ones -- for example, ''Summoning the Stork'' -- which is literally how babies are made in Xanth: After a ''certain ritual'', the Storks fly in a baby to the new parents.
* [[Badass Normal]]: A truly epic subversion in {{spoiler|Bink.}} Despite having a godlike talent {{spoiler|with a very intelligent mind of its own}}, combining [[Plot Armor]] with [[Gambit Roulette]] and [[Xanatos Speed Chess]], {{spoiler|Bink spent years unaware he had a talent, forced to learn to survive without one in Xanth, which was much more of a [[Death World]] in the early books.}} Thus, he was forced to develop the skill set of a [[Badass Normal]] and learned empathy for the disadvantaged, gaining the [[Power of Friendship]]. Since [[Lawful Stupid]] carries certain advantages in Xanth and [[Magnificent Bastard]] status has them everywhere, he can essentially have his cake and eat it too, allowing him to sway even {{spoiler|the Demon [[Xanth]].}} The [[Badass Normal]] skill set {{spoiler|his talent}} forced him to develop paid off when {{spoiler|the demon reversed his talent, causing it to seek Bink's destruction:}} the [[Badass Normal]] ability to protect himself from magic it forced him to develop was powerful enough to defend himself against that very same talent.
* [[Bait and Switch Tyrant]]: "Evil Magician Trent" who, when he becomes the only known possible choice for king, proves himself such a capable ruler he becomes known as "Good King Trent".
* [[Baleful Polymorph]]: Trent's talent is to transform any living creature in line of sight into any other creature. This includes turning soldiers sent to attack his army into fish and leaving them there to die {{spoiler|according to the history books, anyway.}}
* [[Blessed with Suck]]: Bink's {{spoiler|talent is that he cannot be harmed by magic. It further protects him by disguising its own existence, so that he appears to avoid harm through clumsiness, luck, or freak accidents. It doesn't care whether or not his dignity gets through unharmed, so long as he does.}}
** Trent and a few other characters like Cherie who know about the talent posit that Bink's talent is such that it can [[A God Am I|indirectly control all magic]] so that the [[Plot Armor|best possible outcome for Bink and his descendants occur]], such to the point that even the demon [[Eldritch Abomination|Xanth]], the god of the realm of Xanth, is [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|unknowingly subservient to it.]]
** A number of characters have talents that could qualify as this. The title character of ''The Dastard'', for example, had the amazing talent of coming up with bad ideas. He ended up selling his soul for a better power, but since the idea to do so came to him when he had his original power, it was of course itself a bad idea.
*** Then there's beings like the Gorgon, who must cover her face or turn anyone who sees her into stone. Absent Mindedness has also appeared as a Talent. And Dishonesty. And Bad Luck. And Making Mistakes. And Mispronunciation. And having nobody ever get your name right.
*** And being able to make any wish and get ''half'' of what you wanted. Doesn't sound so bad, right? You'd settle for half a fortune (or just wish for two of them). Well, it sucks if your first wish was to be a Wit.
* [[Blue and Orange Morality]]: Centaurs view reproduction as natural, but someone possessing a magical talent is deeply obscene. Also, the greater demons, such as X(A/N)th: explaining the concept that cooperation produces the best results over time to him is important in one of the earlier books, and he eventually adopts that strategy.
Line 56 ⟶ 55:
* [[Contractual Immortality]]: Lampshaded. Being a Main Character of a Xanth novel (see [[Literary Agent Hypothesis]] below) ensures that one will eventually get a happy ending, because that's how magic works.
* [[Cosmic Chess Game]]
* [[Crapsack World]]: The first book goes into quite a bit of detail, generally via Trent, about how fragile human existence in Xanth is. The third and seventh books, as well as the sixth, go into more detail about what happens when there aren't [[Deus Ex Machina]] popping up all over the place, and the book focusing on Magician Humphrey is about how much work went into creating the sort-of stability that Bink grew up in.
* [[Creepy Centipedes]]: The dreaded nickelpedes. They have 500 legs and their bite can gouge out a slice of flesh the size of a U.S. nickel coin, hence the name.
* [[Crossover]]: Jenny Elf is not native to Xanth, she's actually an elf from the world of [[Elf Quest]].
Line 87 ⟶ 86:
** See [[Getting Crap Past the Radar]] above.
** In two books, it's mentioned that it's more than this. In The Color of Her Panties, when Gwenny Goblin, Che Centaur and Jenny Elf figure out the Adult Conspiracy, they mention that other contact is required, though they don't specify. In Xone of Contention, Chlorine and Nimby summon the stork the mundane way, and mention that it's the same, only slightly messier.
** Storks at the dispatch literally get a ... on their receivers. Fauns and nymphs annoy the hell out of them, because they still receive the signal, but it just comes through as .. and is a waste of everyone's valuable time.
* [[Green Thumb]]: Irene
* [[Good Is Dumb]]: The Dastard, the genius villain who carefully calculates his every move, turns good upon getting his soul back. His talent is to have stupid ideas, making him an idiot.
** He made a [[Deal with the Devil|Deal With A Demon]] for the talent of [[Time Travel]], which he used to [[Retcon]] away events that made other people more interesting so that he looked better in comparison. (For example, when he met a man with a [[Laser-Guided Amnesia]] talent, who met somebody who suggested erasing Princess Ida's knowledge of her own "it only works for people who don't know about it" talent, the Dastard [[Retcon|RetConned]] that meeting.) ''[[Misapplied Phlebotinum|Obviously]]'', [[Misapplied Phlebotinum|a better use of the Dastard's talent]] would be to ''cause'' these people to be interesting in the <s> first</s> <s> second</s> [[Time Travel Tense Trouble|first]] place, so that they're indebted to him and [[Famed in Story|tell other people about him]] and stuff like that.
** On the one hand, Bink {{spoiler|releasing the demon X(A/N)th}} is called this in-story. Of course, since this results in {{spoiler|all of his descendants having magician-level talents instead of carrying Chameleon's mutation}} among with more and more benefits over time, it seems to be one of Anthony's occassional Aesops about why the [[The Power of Trust]] is awesome and [[Lawful Stupid]] isn't necessarily.
* [[Half-Human Hybrid]]: Many. There's centaurs (half-horse), nagas (half-snake), harpies (half-vulture), mermaids (half-fish), and probably several others, too. Some of them have magic that allows them to transform into fully human and fully animal forms in addition to their normal hybrid shape.
* [[Happily Ever After]]: Lampshaded. Being a Main Character of a Xanth novel (see [[Literary Agent Hypothesis]] below) ensures that one will eventually get a happy ending, because that's how magic works.
Line 102 ⟶ 101:
* [[Inertia Is a Harsh Mistress]]: Che Centaur and his family can remove the weight from things for a short period of time, but they cannot remove inertia, and at one point he warns a female not to bounce off the walls since it will still hurt.
* [[Innocent Fanservice Girl]]: Most of the [[Half-Human Hybrid|Half Human Hybrids]] don't wear clothing, and as a whole, nudity isn't treated as a big deal in the setting. Lampshaded by a woman who chose to become a Centaur to live with her beau: She's still getting used to the whole "no shirt" thing, but she's doing her best to fit in -- with the ''Centaurs'', that is. Most of the main female characters end up naked at least once in any given book, with little emotion given to it other than annoyance.
** On the other hand, panties on a woman will [[Heroic BSOD|Freak Out]] any male who sees them.
* [[Intentionally Awkward Title]]: ''The Color of Her Panties'' -- to say nothing about the various [[Punny Name|PunnyNamed]] titles.
** ''Isle of View'' is another example, with Anthony warning about the possible awkwardness of saying it out loud to strangers in the Author's Note.
Line 147 ⟶ 146:
* [[The Phoenix]]: The legendary Simurgh—a giant bird who lives on Mount Parnassus. She has seen the universe remade three times and lived through it.
* [[Power Creep, Power Seep]]: Originally, magicians were rare enough that the Council had to accept the Evil Magician as King: they didn't have a ''choice'' {{spoiler|not when Bink's talent was determined to remain a secret}}. Time-travel confirms that there tended to be two or three magicians at most at any given time, and they often kept the competition for the crown down by eliminating the competition. However, after Bink's meeting with the demon [[Xanth]], it ensured that {{spoiler|all of Bink's descendants would have magician-level talents.}} Since then, other magicians have come out of the woodwork {{spoiler|like a centaur whose talent would likely never have been noticed if it wasn't needed to rescue Bink}} and people involved with the family like Irene have gained power-ups. Quite a lot of people that are not acknowledged as magicians in the later books have talents that in previous eras would have qualified them not just as magicians, but as the most dangerous and powerful type of magician, those who could control the magic of other people and artifacts, multiplying their power {{spoiler|like the creator of the Deathstone and Bink.}}
* [[Power of Friendship]]: Practically weaponized by Bink. Saves his life at the end of the first book, among other examples.
* [[The Power of Trust]]: Trent giving Bink and Chameleon his sword as he slept in the first book convinced them that he wasn't evil. In the same way, Bink released Xanth because it was the right thing to do, hoping that the demon wouldn't just leave and destroy Xanth's way of life. {{spoiler|X(A/N)th does return because of this, and blesses Bink's descendants with magician-level talents, changing Xanth forever.}}
* [[Power Perversion Potential]]: Hypnosis, reality warping, scrying, shapeshifting, control over your own clothing. If you can't think of any use for those, you haven't been reading the books closely enough. Then there are powers like undressing women with your eyes or making people bare. Barring an attack by evil garments, I doubt these powers will get much legitimate use.
** Don't forget the fact that one character's canonical magic talent is "Sex Appeal".
Line 193 ⟶ 192:
* [[Writer on Board]]: When the "Colored People" accidentally arrived in Xanth they were specifically treated as equals, and several pages are spent talking about this. (They're still called "colored people" -- but now those colors include blue, green, red, yellow, pink, etc., etc...)
** Mr. Anthony's views on sexuality (it's not bad, and it springs into our minds a lot sooner than 18 or even 16 years old) and nudity ("Some time we'll have to discuss why the sight of a naked woman as God made her should be considered to harm a child, but that's another issue") appear as a subtext in nearly every book. Even "worse" with the nonhuman characters, who, almost as a rule, [[Innocent Fanservice Girl|have little or no nudity taboo]].
*** A further writer on board thing deals with how his centaurs reject magic as obscene. This is then directly compared to humans rejecting nudity and bodily functions as obscene. (In Book 2 - The Source of Magic - for those who are about to say "WHEN?")
* [[You Can't Fight Fate]]: This is essentially how {{spoiler|Bink's}} talent works - no matter how you try to use {{spoiler|magic}} against him, bizarre circumstances will prevent him from being hurt.
Line 199 ⟶ 198:
[[Category:Long Running Book Series]]
[[Category:Fantasy Literature]]
[[Category:Xanth]]▼
[[Category:Literature]]
| |||