Bittercon: It's so Magical to be Homeless! The Romance of Urban Fantasy

[intertext]

This is really a lot of open questions and food for thought than a fully developed thesis. It just struck me, in my - admittedly somewhat limited - experience of urban fantasy, that the "urban" in "urban" seemed to reflect a somewhat limited and romanticized view of the "street."

Just to put my thoughts into a context here, my exposure to urban fantasy rests mostly on Charles De Lint, most of whose works I have read, Emma Bull, Will Shetterly and Neil Gaiman, whose Neverwhere I include in the genre. I would, or could, also include Justine Larbalestier's "Magic" trilogy and there are one or two others that I have forgotten. Amongst Emma Bull's work, I have read and enjoyed both War for the Oaks and her and Will Shetterly's Borderland novels, and my comments and questions here relate to all of those.

Anyway, it seemed that among these works, there is a common sympathy for and interest in the marginal, the scruffy, the downtrodden. Not that this group is in any way undeserving of sympathy or interest, but it struck me that these works definitely downplay the disadvantages of life among the disadvantaged and - yes - romanticize life for the homeless and the income-deprived. What I wonder is, is this some intrinsic part of a greater literary tradition? Are the authors riffing on folk-tales, whose heroes, if not princesses, tend to be clever thieves, disadvantaged or displaced innocents and so on? In some ways, what I'm asking is whether in fact this is the opposite side of the "Fantasy of Manners" coin - Fantasy of Bohemian Manners?

Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere is the only somewhat anomalous example - its hero, if I remember, is an average guy who gets lost in a strange alternate or parallel world. And as far as that goes, I guess it's not really "about" magic or fantasy in an every-day urban setting. Does anyone write about magic among the stockbrokers? Or ER, except with magic?

Anyway - that's my pitch. Any thoughts?

Comments

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I noticed during the nineties that Elfpunk romanticized being runaways, but I think adults were reading those, not kids.

Certainly it seemed that as long as you were beautiful and had cool scruffy clothes with glitter, you'd come out just fine, and discover magic and a posse and everything.

Holly Black did a beautiful job with the grit of being on the streets in Valiant. Non romanticized, convincing.

I do think that city streets in genre can get romanticized...even aside from fantasy, the sf does it: everyone is a twenty or thirtysomething, cool, no inconvenient jobs or parents or kids, everyone has a mod bod, etc etc.

[superfoo.livejournal.com]

Oh, I just thought of another awesome book that explores this vein - your adults vs children readership reminded me of it.

The Ender's Game companion, Ender's Shadow portrays an extremely dark and violent underworld of homeless children in the beginning, and the idea of violence and war being played out by children is a disturbing theme throughout. What's the most horrific part of it is the childrens' awareness of the acts they are committing. It is highly effective when adult levels of experience are projected onto children characters. I would say that this aspect of the book really challenged the "outsiders rule" tradition. However, a few characters merely transitioned from the "disturbing violent street kid" outsider to the "highly intelligent military kid" outsider. Which was equally as disturbing, if minimally more awesome.

Sadly, the "Bean" thread of the Ender story ended up getting butchered near the final books, as Orson Scott Card made Bean turn into a giant, whiny, egotistical, boring wiener.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I remember that book. It was quite disburbing, yes.