Well last night ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
greywash and I caught up on our Magicians watch through the end of Season 3, and then this morning at the gym they were playing one of Peter Jackson's epic Hairy Men Go On a Violent Hike Through New Zealand movies in which our all-white heroes do epic battle with an army of dark-skinned baddies on elephants, and now I'm like. Mad about a trope within the fantasy genre?? Since when?? I don't want these feelings; I was happier not caring.
For those who don't watch The Magicians, both it and the books it's based on deliberately riff on the Narnia setup where a bunch of kids from Earth stroll through a portal to a magical land where they quickly become kings and queens over a diverse array of human and non-human beings whom they had never met before, and in whose cultural norms and values they are not steeped (in Lewis, this results in the beginning of "the Golden Age of Narnia"). And like. This was never going to be a politically neutral daydream. But from the pen of a white, aggressively Christian Oxford don in NINETEEN FORTY-NINE, let's all just acknowledge that it's straight-up British Imperialist propaganda (for those who don't want to click those links: Afghani independence 1919; partial Egyptian independence 1922 (full independence would come in 1952); Statute of Westminster 1931 (which removed ability of British Parliament to enact laws in Dominion countries); India/Pakistan independence and partition 1947; Burma (now Myanmar) independence 1948; Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) independence 1948; Ireland severs ties with the Commonwealth 1949—and a WHOLE BUNCH of other independence movements in British colonies were very active, and would continue to bear fruit throughout the 20th century). It's important, I think, to look at the historical moment: this was the dream of a representative of an imperial power whose empire was in the midst of crumbling. It seems almost tautological to suggest, as I'm sure many have done before me, that the pastoral, nostalgic setup, in which It Is Decreed that (earth) humans are meant to rule over everyone else because of some kind of magically-enforced version of the Divine Right of Kingly Succession, and all will not be right in the world until they do, is deeply fucked up in a way I frankly would expect that we'd be challenging a little more explicitly in 2019.
In Season 3 of The Magicians, ( Cut for spoilers )
I don't know! I feel like it was a missed opportunity, and the show's treatment struck me as sort of sneakily "Well yes there was some unpleasantness but at least the British brought railways, democracy, and political unity to the squabbling natives" when... the actual results of British railways and Imperialist practices were violence and famines, not a "golden age." Maybe the perpetual famine in Fillory is a RESULT of Earth rule. Historically speaking, it is far more likely than not.
It's frustrating, I think, when a media source that really tries for political engagement and genre-savviness, and succeeds on several fronts as The Magicians does, falls down on an opportunity like this; and probably it's unfair to find it more disappointing than when a media source just doesn't try at all (like... Peter Jackson, you did not have to cast that baddie army as Middle Eastern, or every heroic character as white.... it would have been SO EASY NOT TO DO THAT; yet here we are). But it did make me hope that there are people out there creating fantasy narratives that really engage with anti-imperialist politics, and directly challenge this inherited notion of divinely-decreed human and/or foreign rulers over a magical land. I'm certainly not going to write them and tbh I'm probably not even going to read them because, see title: I don't really go here; but I hope they're out there, and I hope they get made into films and TV shows with big budgets and good actors. SURELY they are. Hopefully they will.
Soliciting recs in the comments for people who read more fantasy than I do, but share my frustrations. (Edit: Marlon James's Black Leopard, Red Wolf looks like it might be doing some of this, with bonus queer Black protagonists.)
greywash and I caught up on our Magicians watch through the end of Season 3, and then this morning at the gym they were playing one of Peter Jackson's epic Hairy Men Go On a Violent Hike Through New Zealand movies in which our all-white heroes do epic battle with an army of dark-skinned baddies on elephants, and now I'm like. Mad about a trope within the fantasy genre?? Since when?? I don't want these feelings; I was happier not caring. For those who don't watch The Magicians, both it and the books it's based on deliberately riff on the Narnia setup where a bunch of kids from Earth stroll through a portal to a magical land where they quickly become kings and queens over a diverse array of human and non-human beings whom they had never met before, and in whose cultural norms and values they are not steeped (in Lewis, this results in the beginning of "the Golden Age of Narnia"). And like. This was never going to be a politically neutral daydream. But from the pen of a white, aggressively Christian Oxford don in NINETEEN FORTY-NINE, let's all just acknowledge that it's straight-up British Imperialist propaganda (for those who don't want to click those links: Afghani independence 1919; partial Egyptian independence 1922 (full independence would come in 1952); Statute of Westminster 1931 (which removed ability of British Parliament to enact laws in Dominion countries); India/Pakistan independence and partition 1947; Burma (now Myanmar) independence 1948; Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) independence 1948; Ireland severs ties with the Commonwealth 1949—and a WHOLE BUNCH of other independence movements in British colonies were very active, and would continue to bear fruit throughout the 20th century). It's important, I think, to look at the historical moment: this was the dream of a representative of an imperial power whose empire was in the midst of crumbling. It seems almost tautological to suggest, as I'm sure many have done before me, that the pastoral, nostalgic setup, in which It Is Decreed that (earth) humans are meant to rule over everyone else because of some kind of magically-enforced version of the Divine Right of Kingly Succession, and all will not be right in the world until they do, is deeply fucked up in a way I frankly would expect that we'd be challenging a little more explicitly in 2019.
In Season 3 of The Magicians, ( Cut for spoilers )
I don't know! I feel like it was a missed opportunity, and the show's treatment struck me as sort of sneakily "Well yes there was some unpleasantness but at least the British brought railways, democracy, and political unity to the squabbling natives" when... the actual results of British railways and Imperialist practices were violence and famines, not a "golden age." Maybe the perpetual famine in Fillory is a RESULT of Earth rule. Historically speaking, it is far more likely than not.
It's frustrating, I think, when a media source that really tries for political engagement and genre-savviness, and succeeds on several fronts as The Magicians does, falls down on an opportunity like this; and probably it's unfair to find it more disappointing than when a media source just doesn't try at all (like... Peter Jackson, you did not have to cast that baddie army as Middle Eastern, or every heroic character as white.... it would have been SO EASY NOT TO DO THAT; yet here we are). But it did make me hope that there are people out there creating fantasy narratives that really engage with anti-imperialist politics, and directly challenge this inherited notion of divinely-decreed human and/or foreign rulers over a magical land. I'm certainly not going to write them and tbh I'm probably not even going to read them because, see title: I don't really go here; but I hope they're out there, and I hope they get made into films and TV shows with big budgets and good actors. SURELY they are. Hopefully they will.
Soliciting recs in the comments for people who read more fantasy than I do, but share my frustrations. (Edit: Marlon James's Black Leopard, Red Wolf looks like it might be doing some of this, with bonus queer Black protagonists.)
