shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Feb 6, 2016 8:46:55 GMT -5
I did not know that. Fascinating. But there's still the problem that the Lord of the Rings, as a complete work, still continues from (and references) The Hobbit, a work that was its own stand-alone novel. By your criteria, that disqualifies Lord of the Rings from being a novel because "I would not consider any of those graphic novels because none of them were self-contained stories, they had spin-offs/tie-ins/x-overs in other books that were part of the story so you do not get the complete story" Lord of the Rings is a complete story. It has a beginning and an end, and can be read, understood, and appreciated without any auxiliary reading. It is set in the same world and features some characters from an earlier work of Tolkien's. But that work is not required reading. In fact, it would only have confused the reader as the two works were not consistent. Tolkien rewrote parts of The Hobbit after publishing Lord of the Rings to remove these inconsistencies. To see how well it stands on its own, look to the films. There were (believe it or not) many people who had never read any work of Tolkien whose first exposure to the characters and world were the Lord of the Rings films. That the films were somehow incomplete for not telling a tale of a hobbit's journey with some dwarves crossed the mind of I would guess no viewers new to the universe. Frodo has an adventure. He has an old wise uncle who also went on adventures in his day. This is a common framework for stories. Understanding Frodo's adventure can be appreciated without any more details of Bilbo's than were provided. Just as Bilbo's adventure could be appreciated without knowing details of the Old Took's adventures. There is not so much the question of if there are other works that form a broader picture, but to what extent the narrative presupposes those works. I tried to point this out in several examples. However, while I disagree that Lord of the Rings depends on any other work, I don't think this necessarily should be a criterion for a novel. Many novels have sequels. Speaker for the Dead, Naked Sun... I mentioned Second Foundation earlier. I think there is a concept of a "series of novels", and that is okay. I would still call Speaker for the Dead a novel.
There is a key difference with these series of novels though, and it comes in terms of how you would introduce them to someone. You would suggest they start at the beginning. Whereas you may not suggest that with many a superhero arc. You don't often hear, Dark Knight Returns is great, but first I recommend all these old Batman comics, and Superman comics, and comics where they team up. And of course you'll need Justice League and Green Arrow, oh and Joker had his own series...
So Lord of the Rings is a "novel," and the individual books are not, then? Seems counter-intuitive, but I can be persuaded to accept it. Therefore we are not being slaves to original format and are instead evaluating whether the contents stand on their own as a complete work. I still hold to my argument that artistry counts, but I accept that not everyone here is going to be onboard with that. Besides that point, I can accept what is being argued here. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 6, 2016 12:57:29 GMT -5
Well Tolkien didn't want it separated into three books, he saw it as an all in one piece entitled the Lord of the Rings, told in 6 parts or books, and wanted it published as a whole, but the publisher didn't think a book that long would sell, so divided it up as a trilogy, each containing 2 of the books rather than as 6 individual books because each book was a little too short to stand alone by their standards and sold it that way. So technically I don't consider each part (each of which contains 2 books anyways) of the trilogy as a novel, but the whole I do, and it is now sold in all-in-one editions. SO the trilogy-a serialized novel or all-in-one as a novel, sure, each one separately as a novel, no. As I said, each part of the trilogy contains 2 books of the overall story-as the Lord of the Rings is technically 6 books long. -M I did not know that. Fascinating. But there's still the problem that the Lord of the Rings, as a complete work, still continues from (and references) The Hobbit, a work that was its own stand-alone novel. By your criteria, that disqualifies Lord of the Rings from being a novel because "I would not consider any of those graphic novels because none of them were self-contained stories, they had spin-offs/tie-ins/x-overs in other books that were part of the story so you do not get the complete story" As an addendum, once he know the publisher wanted to split it up, he took control of the process and worked out where it would be divided and the titles of the parts, etc. but it still was one story/one book in his mind. And as c&c has pointed out, everything you need to know about the Hobbit to understand the LOTR is contained in the LOTR, you don't need to have read one to understand the other, and I would say that Gandalf in The Hobbit seems to be a very different character than the Gandalf of the LOTR, so for someone coming in fresh it might be more confusing to read the two separate works as if they were meant to be one. For Tolkien, the Hobbit was very much a children's tale told in the world he had constructed over the years, something to delight his own children, but Lord of the Rings was a much more adult story building on the mythology he had been building of Middle Earth and a tale much like a Ragnorak for his creation, telling the end of that world's age. The tone and intended audience for the two works were very different. To that end, I think the biggest failing of the Hobbit movies by Peter Jackson is that he tried to make them of a piece, matching the tone and seriousness of the LOTR instead of telling a fun whimsical fantasy adventure meant to delight the audiences as Tolkien tried to do. But several authors (many of them fantasists) have written multiple free-standing novels set in the same world and using the same cast of characters and you are not required to read all of them to get the story in each of them. L. Frank Baum comes to mind certainly, as each of the Oz stories stands on its own as complete story, and there are others as well. You can read any of the Marlowe novels by Chandler on its own and not need to have read the others to get a full story, for example. So being able to stand on its own doesn't mean there can't be other stories with those characters or in that setting. -M |
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Post by coke & comics on Feb 6, 2016 14:24:49 GMT -5
Lord of the Rings is a complete story. It has a beginning and an end, and can be read, understood, and appreciated without any auxiliary reading. It is set in the same world and features some characters from an earlier work of Tolkien's. But that work is not required reading. In fact, it would only have confused the reader as the two works were not consistent. Tolkien rewrote parts of The Hobbit after publishing Lord of the Rings to remove these inconsistencies. To see how well it stands on its own, look to the films. There were (believe it or not) many people who had never read any work of Tolkien whose first exposure to the characters and world were the Lord of the Rings films. That the films were somehow incomplete for not telling a tale of a hobbit's journey with some dwarves crossed the mind of I would guess no viewers new to the universe. Frodo has an adventure. He has an old wise uncle who also went on adventures in his day. This is a common framework for stories. Understanding Frodo's adventure can be appreciated without any more details of Bilbo's than were provided. Just as Bilbo's adventure could be appreciated without knowing details of the Old Took's adventures. There is not so much the question of if there are other works that form a broader picture, but to what extent the narrative presupposes those works. I tried to point this out in several examples. However, while I disagree that Lord of the Rings depends on any other work, I don't think this necessarily should be a criterion for a novel. Many novels have sequels. Speaker for the Dead, Naked Sun... I mentioned Second Foundation earlier. I think there is a concept of a "series of novels", and that is okay. I would still call Speaker for the Dead a novel.
There is a key difference with these series of novels though, and it comes in terms of how you would introduce them to someone. You would suggest they start at the beginning. Whereas you may not suggest that with many a superhero arc. You don't often hear, Dark Knight Returns is great, but first I recommend all these old Batman comics, and Superman comics, and comics where they team up. And of course you'll need Justice League and Green Arrow, oh and Joker had his own series...
So Lord of the Rings is a "novel," and the individual books are not, then? Seems counter-intuitive, but I can be persuaded to accept it. Therefore we are not being slaves to original format and are instead evaluating whether the contents stand on their own as a complete work. I still hold to my argument that artistry counts, but I accept that not everyone here is going to be onboard with that. Besides that point, I can accept what is being argued here. I'm not certain that's my viewpoint. I feel strongly about format. But it's a viewpoint I can accept. |
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Post by coke & comics on Feb 6, 2016 14:28:16 GMT -5
War and Peace? Works of Dumas like Three Musketeers or Count of Monte Cristo? Uncle Tom's Cabin? Works of Dickens like Oliver Twist? EDIT: I see mrp has addressed this point. Honestly, I think I'm probably on board with what mrp says. Except perhaps the fiction point. I think what MRP says works fine if you're a literary critic or academic. You shouldn't have to be famililar with the material to decide whether it's a graphic novel or not, though... that's just not what people do. Really, the term 'graphic novel' to anyone outside this forum means 'comics in a book'.. and that's likely how it's going to stay. This seems to be the opposite of the point you were making earlier. Knowing whether something was originally serialized or not requires familiarity with the material. If you have it in a book, you may just think it's a book. We are claiming a novel is novel, whether it was serialized then collected, or published all at once in a single book. If not an expert on the topic, you could easily read Maus or From Hell and believe you are reading them in their original format. |
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Post by coke & comics on Feb 6, 2016 17:17:01 GMT -5
I let threads get mixed up a little because the other thread had some links to lists of graphic novels, and what they considered seemed relevant to the discussion.
mrp noted, correctly, that the world (magazines, book stores, etc) now uses graphic novel to mean any comics in book form. No other distinction matters. So to the world, putting Usagi Yojimbo on a list of best graphic novels makes sense.
And perhaps that is the right definition. Accept common parlance.
If it fits on a shelf: graphic novel.
My impression is the history of the term goes something like:
*Many people think of comics as for kids.
*An occasional comic not for kids becomes popular enough that some non-comics readers read it (Maus, Watchmen).
*They think of it as different from a comic (being better than a comic or two they recall from childhood), and think of it as a graphic novel
*People in marketing encourage this terminology, and use it to sell comics to people too cool for comics.
*Escalation happens. Comics called graphic novels sell better, so start calling everything graphic novels. (Hence the credits to the Walking Dead TV series describe it as based on graphic novels, and don't use the word comics)
*Now everything is a graphic novel.
In the small world of comics readers, we thought in terms of comics, trade paperbacks, and OGNs. But that terminology now seems dated, and was never great to begin with.
And here we are.
Perhaps there should really be several questions. How does the world use these terms? (I think we've answered that). How should the comics world use them? How should we use them on this forum? And if you prefer to do your own thing, what words will you use?
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Feb 6, 2016 17:56:20 GMT -5
So essentially no Science Fiction from before 1965 is a novel. Alrighty then. Wow! I think few of them are. Much more often, there are two or three short stories meant for the same universe that a writer adds a bit to in order to make it have enough flow to pretend to be a novel. That's not the same as a story written as a novel, though. And really, anything from that era that one might consider as a novel is really barely (or not) long enough in most cases... they usually clock in at under 200 pages. Except that what you're saying not the rule by any means. It stands true for some, but by no means even most. Most SF novels that predate at least the mid-60s were serialized before they were published as books. That didn't change even if they were written as a single novel, as most of them were. Patch up jobs which combined short stories into novels, a la, Foundation are the exception rather than the rule. |
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Post by wildfire2099 on Feb 6, 2016 19:22:04 GMT -5
You think? I feel like far more of the ones I've read are 'patch jobs', as you say, then actual novels. I'm just going from personal experience, though, not any deep knowledge or anything.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 6, 2016 19:25:23 GMT -5
I'd definitely consider these graphic novels - they are graphic versions of the written novels.  |
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Feb 6, 2016 19:36:33 GMT -5
So essentially no Science Fiction from before 1965 is a novel. Alrighty then. Wow! And really, anything from that era that one might consider as a novel is really barely (or not) long enough in most cases... they usually clock in at under 200 pages. A single spaced page equates to 450-500 words. A novel is considered to be 60,000 plus words A book consisting of 150 pages or more easily fits into a novel's parameters for length A short novel but officially a novel. A novella is considered to be 45-60,000 words |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Feb 6, 2016 23:59:49 GMT -5
You think? I feel like far more of the ones I've read are 'patch jobs', as you say, then actual novels. I'm just going from personal experience, though, not any deep knowledge or anything. Heinlein's non-juveniles up to Stranger in a Strange Land were all serialized and were written as single novels. Asimov: The Lije Bailey novels and the Empire novels. Virtually all of Burroughs' books were written as novels but were serialized. Publishers simply didn't publish science fiction novels unless they'd been serialized first until the 60s. Heinlein's juveniles were a huge exception. |
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Post by usagigoya on Feb 7, 2016 3:37:51 GMT -5
Just to throw in my two Rin worth about Usagi Yojimbo in the great Graphic Novel debate, I just want to say that I consider Usagi Yojimbo: Yokai and Usagi Yojimbo: Senso to be graphic novels.
Yokai was actually marketed as an "original graphic novel" while Senso just "feels" like a graphic novel to me even though it was published in installments as a mini-series.
I feel that all the rest of the Usagi Yojimbo books are just compilations, even the ones containing book length stories like Dragon Bellow Conspiracy, Grasscutter 1 or 2, or Mother of Mountains. |
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Post by wildfire2099 on Feb 7, 2016 10:14:19 GMT -5
You think? I feel like far more of the ones I've read are 'patch jobs', as you say, then actual novels. I'm just going from personal experience, though, not any deep knowledge or anything. Heinlein's non-juveniles up to Stranger in a Strange Land were all serialized and were written as single novels. Asimov: The Lije Bailey novels and the Empire novels. Virtually all of Burroughs' books were written as novels but were serialized. Publishers simply didn't publish science fiction novels unless they'd been serialized first until the 60s. Heinlein's juveniles were a huge exception. I didn't know Asimov's stuff was serialized...I mean, obviously I, Robot (which isn't really a novel).. but the Bailey novels I thought were written and produced as novels. Most the Heinlein I've read was when I was alot younger and didn't notice about that sorta thing. I'll take your word for it  |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Feb 7, 2016 13:49:34 GMT -5
Heinlein's non-juveniles up to Stranger in a Strange Land were all serialized and were written as single novels. Asimov: The Lije Bailey novels and the Empire novels. Virtually all of Burroughs' books were written as novels but were serialized. Publishers simply didn't publish science fiction novels unless they'd been serialized first until the 60s. Heinlein's juveniles were a huge exception. I didn't know Asimov's stuff was serialized...I mean, obviously I, Robot (which isn't really a novel).. but the Bailey novels I thought were written and produced as novels. Most the Heinlein I've read was when I was alot younger and didn't notice about that sorta thing. I'll take your word for it Yep. Caves of Steel first appeared in the Oct-Dec 1953 issues of Galaxy Science Fiction. The Naked Sun Oct-Dec 1956 issues of Astounding. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress in the Dec. 65 - April '66 issues of If Magazine. Not trying to beat a dead horse...but for an SF novel to not be initially serialized prior to the mid-60s was a rarity. |
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Feb 7, 2016 14:34:42 GMT -5
Slam's got it right. The SF genre was treated shabbily by the major publishers until later in the 60s. With few exceptions they were only interested in publishing short story collections or previously published material from the SF digests. An SF author would have found it almost impossible to get a new novel published and the only way to go about it was to break up the story into increments and shop it around to Astounding, Galaxy, Amazing or F&SF magazines.
I should try to research those exceptions. Kurt Vonnegut comes to mind who I consider an SF writer in the 60s. Philip Dick had a very hard time getting his novels published and when they did they very quickly went out of print. Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 was published but since he had work bought for upscale magazines like Redbook or Playboy, publishers no longer classified him as strictly an SF writer. I guess Vonnegut fell into that category as well.
Anyway, novels were being written but had to chopped into pieces for readers to find them |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Feb 7, 2016 14:50:04 GMT -5
Slam's got it right. The SF genre was treated shabbily by the major publishers until later in the 60s. With few exceptions they were only interested in publishing short story collections or previously published material from the SF digests. An SF author would have found it almost impossible to get a new novel published and the only way to go about it was to break up the story into increments and shop it around to Astounding, Galaxy, Amazing or F&SF magazines.
I should try to research those exceptions. Kurt Vonnegut comes to mind who I consider an SF writer in the 60s. Philip Dick had a very hard time getting his novels published and when they did they very quickly went out of print. Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 was published but since he had work bought for upscale magazines like Redbook or Playboy, publishers no longer classified him as strictly an SF writer. I guess Vonnegut fell into that category as well.
Anyway, novels were being written but had to chopped into pieces for readers to find them Bradbury and Heinlein were instrumental in getting SF out of the gutter. But it was in a roundabout way and largely through short fiction that they did it. They were really the first two SF (and with Bradbury I mean that in the nominal sense) to break out of the pulps/digests and publish in the slicks (Colliers, Saturday Evening Post, Redbook, etc.). That showed there was a mainstream market for SF and lead to the ability to get novels published without serialization first. |
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