"Why Magic in a Story Should Make Sense" up at Fantastic Worlds

[jordan179]

N. K. Jemisin argues, in "But, but, but - WHY does magic have to make sense?"

http://nkjemisin.com/2012/06/but-but-but-why-does-magic-have-to-make-sense/

that magic in a story shouldn't have to make sense, because

This is magic we’re

Comments

[jordan179]

Right. Even where you might expect a deus ex machina -- in mythology -- the appearances of gods, monsters etc. is usually given some rational explanation, as in "God cursed him because he was wicked" or "the monster afflicted the city because the king had offended Poseidon," or something of the sort.

I was thinking about this in connection with siege spells: the Bible not only explicitly says that God can bring down cities (note the fate of Jericho), but both Old and New Testaments then spend long amounts of verbiage exploring the implications of this concept -- that a city to be secure must be in good standing with God. Likewise, Tolkien's more powerful beings could smash ordinary vertical fortifications, with the result that the really strong fortresses were shielded by magic (Barad-dur) or were gigantic subterranean bunker-complexes with multiple vallations (Angband). Even mortal-built Minas Tirith of Gondor employed multiple walls in order to resist siege engines and presumably also siege spells.

Of course, Tolkien was an artillerist in World War One and a medievalist in professional life, and hence it's not surprising that he considered the details both of building strong forts and of knocking them down :)

[polaris93]

Ironically enough, the original use of the deus ex machina was that of classic Greek tragedians, whose culture assumed that the Gods were behind everything notable in human existence that occurred. Having the God appear in the last act to give the closing speech that tied everything up in a neat package made sense to their audiences, because of the general assumption about the roles of the Gods in all aspects of human life. Once we stopped believing that, however, the deus ex machina no longer made sense, and instead became a cheap out that reduces a story to mere wish fulfillment or senseless quasi-religious maundering, not worth reading. So the value of the deus ex machina varies from a positive value, as in classical Greek culture, to a negative one, as in modern Western culture, depending upon our underlying assumptions about the Gods and Their relationship with humanity. If the reader believes that God or the Gods don't exist and/or don't participate in our lives, the deus ex machina in a story goes over like a lead balloon filled with cement. Otherwise, there's a place for the deus ex machina, as long as it's handled correctly in a story (think of the Bible, which is beloved of and believed in by millions of people; that's the defining example of a situation in which the deus ex machine is used to good effect in a story).