Re: Non-stereotypical elves was Re: Quick Intro

At last, someone who's put some thought into "Elves".

I remind myself of the times I was warned in Papua New Guinea about masalai -
forest spirits - who'd eat me if they caught me; and Tolkien's Quenyar are
essentially forest spirits with a touch of the Christian Church's Angels
about them.

A foul-tempered forest spirit with bad breath from eating too many human
intruders?  Well, that is a distinct possibility!

Give it some thought.

Wesley Parish

On Friday 21 February 2003 05:22 pm, you wrote:
> On Thu, 20 Feb 2003 16:06:18 -0600, Peter Clark <peter-clark@...>
>
> wrote:
> >On Thursday 20 February 2003 02:38 pm, John M. Dollan wrote:
> >> The Elves, otherwise
> >> called the Aewylin, are the ones I am having trouble with as far as
> >> removing the stereotypical Elven image.  But I have time...
> >
> >        I hate elves. Seriously. (Yes, I know they are imaginary. But I
> > hate imaginary elves.) They are always the same in modern fantasy and
> > RPGs. Wise to the point of being absolute elitist snobs. Practically
> > immortal, yet throw themselves into situations that are likely to get
> > themselves killed. (Think about it: if you were practically immortal,
> > wouldn't you be more careful?) Beautiful to the point that authors trip
> > over themselves with adjectives.
>
> The problem isn't with the elves, it's with unimaginative writers. There
> isn't anything inherent in the idea of elves that they should be the way
> you're describing them. Elfquest elves aren't much like Tolkien's elves
> aside from being (nearly) immortal. Not every elf is wise or adventurous in
> those stories, but it's probably just that the adventurous ones are the
> ones that stories get written about in the first place.
>
> Of course, there's the question of what exactly it means to be an "elf".
> Pointy ears by themselves aren't enough (as exceptions like Vulcans and
> Hylians demonstrate), and not all Elves are smaller than Humans (Tolkien's
> for instance). Long life and some degree of magical ability seems to be
> typically associated with elves. And although it might be hard to imagine,
> not all elves necessarily have a preference for dental and alveolar sounds.
>
> :-)
>
> In my world, I'm having difficulty defining exactly what an "elf" is, since
> I have a whole range of people who are all related to each other, but some
> are more "elf-like", and others are quite different. They have pointy ears
> and tend to be smaller than humans, which is about all they have in common.
> I have a handful of Elvish languages that I haven't kept up to date in
> years, but if I ever have time, I'd like to go back and revive some of
> those old projects.
>
> I think that humans are too often the center of attention, and it's at
> least nice to see non-human characters in a story, even if they're not
> always very original. I'd rather see a stereotypical elf than a
> stereotypical human. But a non-stereotypical elf is even better.
--
Mau e ki, "He aha te mea nui?"
You ask, "What is the most important thing?"
Maku e ki, "He tangata, he tangata, he tangata."
I reply, "It is people, it is people, it is people."