Is Medieval Fantasy a real genre of book?
I really enjoy reading fantasy novels, but usually only those that take place after the early 1600′s. I was just curious if Medieval Fantasy was a real genre, or just something I made in my head.
It would also be useful for my independent study unit. I chose a novel on King Arthur, and I need to know the genre of the novel for one of my sheets. Thanks in advance!
Oh! One other thing, are there any really good television shows or movies that match that description? Not King Arthur but Medieval Fantasy type of stuff. I already watch the Tudor’s and BBC’s Robin Hood. I was just wondering if there were any more shows like that. Oh and for movies, nothing Shakespeare. As much as I love him, his movies get tiring after the 2nd watch.
“Genre” just means “kind”. When there are a number of books that are to some degree alike, then they may be said to be the same kind of book and to constitute a genre.
The same work may belong to more than one genre. A fictional work may be said to belong to the genre of medieval stories, or fantasy stories, or medieval-fantasy stories depending on what it is about.
“Medieval Fantasy” is a genre, and is usually also applied to works like “The Lord of the Rings” which take place in a world that closely resembles medieval Europe even though it is supposed to occur before recorded history. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_fantasy
The author James Branch Cabell wrote many fantasy tales set in medieval Europe with firm dates but mostly in an imaginary region of France and with lots of magic. .See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Branch_Cabell . Also some medieval fantasy works such as the “Prose Lancelot” and the “Quest of the Holy Grail” and Sir Thomas Malory’s “Le Morte d’Arthur contain firm dates ( http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/mart/mart355.htm ). There are numerous modern fantasy stories set firmly in European history which are also fantasies. Two that spring to my mind are Poul Anderson’s “The Broken Sword” (which only has an approximate date) and James Blish’s “Doctor Mirabilis”. Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” could well be called a medieval fantasy play. An attempt to say that firmly dating a story in history makes it history is nonsense.
The recent film “King Arthur” was firmly dated within history, and contained no magic, but was also historically nonsense. One might suggest a genre which one might call “pseudo-historical” for works supposedly set in history in which the actual history is poorly portrayed.
A novel about King Arthur would be medieval fantasy if it contains magical events. Some Arthurian novels do and some Arthurian novels don’t.
The series “Merlin” on the BBC is medieval fantasy. The recent series “Robin Hood” was not. An earlier Robin Hood series called “Robin of Sherwood” was very much fantasy with lots of magic.
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