arildno said:
Gemmel..that's the guy writing about Thunk, the Death Hammer, or someone like that?
No that's Thrudd the Barbarian, or maybe your thinking of Conan, this guys a bit better than Robert E Howard(God bless his sacred jock strap though) And the comic strip in White Dwarf Magazine although that is easily the funniest send up of fantasy I've ever seen, I mean anyone who can include Daleks and nukes in fantasy get's my vote
Shannow was a biblical character, in that he followed the old testament in a post apocalyptic world of brigand and lawless savages, Gemmel is about character, and realistic character not big man slay everyone, and get mislead by princess, who uses and abuses him ,but senselessly violent man realizes the error of his thinking through the trials of his existence, it's not your common or garden fantasy, just as PK Dick or Asimov or AC Clarke aren't your common or garden fantasy. Do androids really dream of electric sheep
OK I'll bite and go for classics that really inspired me:-
Crime and Punishment: the murderer who justifies his misdeads
Don Quioxote: the windmill slayer.( as funny as you like and positively inspiring, we're all itinerant knights at heart yes? Although usually not so delusional
)
Moby Dick: a whale of a tale(have to say the pacing was sublime, a wave crashing on a shore after it rolls across the seas is the way I'd describe the text in it's pacing)
Of Mice and Men: simple men with complicated motivations.
The Lord of the Flies: Lost the series in the form of Children I guess, "kill the pig smash him in"
The Trial: bemusing and frightening Kafkaesque derision of fascist adherence to rules.
Animal Farm: metaphore at it's finest.
Brave New World: one of those dystopian fantasies that reflects the world as it could be and thankfully isn't
The Day of the Triffids: a great expose of what would happen should the world meet a potential cataclysm
The Illiad: a fascinating read and better than the film Troy, obviously, who the hell believes Hollywood, brave attempt though given the restrictions of a modern worlds views
The Oddysey: cmon, can we get anything more fantastic and yet absorbing from the ancient world.
The Devils: perplexing array of Characters that although confusing lead to a great assumption about the way people behaved, although slightly biased against communism
OK off the top of my head, but I can't write them all. And besides fantasy was my first love, and it will be my last
I mean LotR, just the quintessential power corrupts absolute power corrupts absolutely tale.
. "Atlas Shrugged" was the first real English book I read iirc (I say "real" because some things don't count like forced readings in history class) ...maybe that's why I liked it.
