The consolation of fairy-stories, the
joy of the happy ending:
or more correctly of the good catastrophe, the sudden joyous 'turn'
(for there is no true end to any fairy tale): this joy, which is one of
the things which fairy-stories can produce supremely well, is not
essentially 'escapist', nor 'fugitive'. In its fairy-tale--or other
world--setting, it is a sudden and miraculous grace: never to be
counted on to recur. It does not deny the existence of dyscatastrophe,
of sorrow and failure; the possibility of these is necessary to the joy
of deliverance; it denies (in the face of much evidence, if you will)
universal final defeat and in so far is evangelium, giving a fleeting
glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief.
It is the mark of a good fairy-story, of the higher or more complete kind, that however wild its events, however fantastic or terrible the adventures, it can give to child or man that hears it, when the 'turn' comes, a catch of the breath, a beat and lifting of the heart, near to (or indeed accompanied by) tears, as keen as that given by any form of literary art, and having a peculiar quality.
The peculiar quality of...'joy' in successful Fantasy can...be explained as a sudden glimpse of the underlying reality or truth. It is not only a 'consolation' for the sorrow of this world, but a satisfaction, and an answer to that question, 'Is it true?' The answer to this question that I gave at first was (quite rightly): 'If you have built your little world well, yes: it is true in that world.' That is enough for the artist...But in the 'eucatastrophe' we see in a brief vision that the answer may be greater--it may be a far-off gleam or echo or evangelium in the real world.
It is the mark of a good fairy-story, of the higher or more complete kind, that however wild its events, however fantastic or terrible the adventures, it can give to child or man that hears it, when the 'turn' comes, a catch of the breath, a beat and lifting of the heart, near to (or indeed accompanied by) tears, as keen as that given by any form of literary art, and having a peculiar quality.
The peculiar quality of...'joy' in successful Fantasy can...be explained as a sudden glimpse of the underlying reality or truth. It is not only a 'consolation' for the sorrow of this world, but a satisfaction, and an answer to that question, 'Is it true?' The answer to this question that I gave at first was (quite rightly): 'If you have built your little world well, yes: it is true in that world.' That is enough for the artist...But in the 'eucatastrophe' we see in a brief vision that the answer may be greater--it may be a far-off gleam or echo or evangelium in the real world.
I don't subscribe to Tolkien's Platonic and Christian world views, but I find a deep truth in what he is saying here. He is describing the kind of reaction I had when I read Mikhail Bulgakov's masterpiece The Master and Maguerita, one of those unclassifiable works which I think, if it needs to be classified at all, belongs to the world of fantasy. Despite the grimness of Stalinist Russia, evoked in Bulgakov's novel through both black comedy and tragedy, The Master and Marguerita is a fairy story - one of the best ever written - which creates those tears, that "catch of the breath", that "beat and lifting of the heart". A contemporary master of this kind of writing is Russell Hoban, whose book The Lion of Boaz-Jachin and Jachin-Boaz creates exactly this kind of effect. It is an effect so close to tragedy that it could almost be tragic, except that it has a happy ending. This kind of happy ending is a million miles from the saccharine conclusions beloved by Hollywood producers, in which a story is tied up as neatly as a department store gift wrapping. In a real and important way, fantasy resolves nothing. The end signals, always, a new beginning; the restoration of a kingdom, in The Lord of the Rings, or the meeting at last between father and son, in The Lion of Boaz-Jachin and Jachin-Boaz. And as one moral conundrum is resolved, we are left, as in life, facing another: after the bitter struggle, after the impossible journey, the final question is how to live our lives. Gilgamesh returns empty-handed from his quest, having lost the flower of eternal youth: what he has won is the understanding of his own mortality.