A Quest that begins in a Tavern...

[bellatrys]

...with a female Paladin disguised as a man, sent by the ghost of Merlin the magician, meeting up with a halfling Thief, both of them competing to rescue a mixed-race Warrior, who is also a descendant of Hector and Andromache of Troy (their son Astyanax was secretly saved and hidden from the Greeks along with Hector's sword, which is an Augmented

Comments

[furikku]

d) the sort of campaign I would love to be part of.

8D

[bellatrys]

I left out the bit where the halfling Rogue has a stolen Magic Ring (Invisibility and Dispell Enchantment) - wasn't sure if that would be a) too much of a reveal, b) too much of a wallbanger...

Re: 8D

[violaswamp]

...SERIOUSLY?

Yeah, it's actually Angelica's ring from the first book

[bellatrys]

which was never finished by the time of Boiardo's death, so Ariosto just made his own continuation in a similar style with much of the same canon, but adding new charas and plotlines, too. (There's apparently some controversial extra stuff that may or may not have been intended to be added in, which would have tied one of the villains and storylines he put in with the original "Song of Roland" conclusion, and may or may not have been finished, before Ariosto died - yeah, the similarities just keep stacking up, don't they?)

So anyway in Boiardo's story - you can read the first chapter for free online here - Angelica, the golden-haired princess of China and her brother Argalia (who's calling himself Umberto for reasons that don't make too much sense to me) show up out of nowhere accompanied by a bodyguard of giants, to the court of Charlemagne just like a scene out of Arthurian romance and challenge everyone to duel with Argalia for Angelica's hand. (We are not told if they are twins.) But this is all part of some cunning plot of the

[nenya_kanadka]

It sounds like an interesting story! :D

[lyorn]

b) and c) are not mutually exclusive. Setting consistency in fantasy (or historical romance) is a relatively modern idea, and every cliche was a trope once.

Many of the classics of fantasy and horror/gothic are so out there that they would be described today either as "postmodern" or "on crack".

Yes, but Orlando was cracky when it was fresh

[bellatrys]

also much with the cliches, some of them he seems - operative word "seems" - to have introduced, but I'm more and more inclined to think he just popularized them, that they were already "out there" in late medieval pop culture and what he did was take ALL of them and throw them into this giant mulligan stew, with snappy writing and a lot of humour plus Teh Sexay (and a lot more equal-opportunity than many modern creators.) And somehow it was *exactly* what Western European consumers of adventure fic wanted, right then

[fledgist]

Every cliché was once fresh and new.

The thing is...

[bellatrys]

I'm not sure a lot of Ariosto's cliches were even new back when Homer used them. But there comes this point when you kind of just have to sit back and boggle in awe at the sheer audacity of the swiping - um, "homages" - AND the exuberance with which they're all hot-glued together into this monumental...THING.

It's kind of like somebody doing one of those massive garbage sculptures, the ones made of ten thousand bottlecaps and the hood of a VW beetle and baby doll heads and lava lamps and a Cessna propeller and a smashed set of Wedgewood and somehow it all comes together and becomes this amazingly wonderful monstrosity - only in this case, the "found object art" is a fifty-foot tall Nike of Samothrace made out of old silverware and bike frames and carnival beads and a gooseneck lamp and three lawn chairs and an actual lamella from a Roman cuirass and the large size model Millennium Falcon with the flashing lights and sound effects and an Andy Warhol poster dipped in plastic...

[thoth]

z) The product of too many Hot Pockets and cans of Safeway Select.

[tlachtga]

b) the sort of insane mish-mash of cliches, anachronisms, mythology rip-offs and proper nouns improperly used that gives gaming a bad name;

Every writer steals; the question is how well it's used.

Also, good lord, how many halflings with magic rings are there?

[bellatrys]

Also, good lord, how many halflings with magic rings are there?

I'm not really familiar enough with the Matter of France to know how much we can blame on Boiardo/Ariosto, though even if they didn't come up with the Ring of Invisibility & Dispell Enchantment they certainly did mainstream the concept. (actually I suspect this is probably another mythology swipe, from the Ring of Gyges story - OI/OF as the "Legendary Journeys/Xena" of the 15th century?)

*is hit over the bonce with the hammer of awesomeness*

[deiseach]

"OI/OF as the "Legendary Journeys/Xena" of the 15th century

Re: *is hit over the bonce with the hammer of awesomeness*

[bellatrys]

I can see the critics of the day sniffing about lowest common denominator and pandering to lowbrow taste and dumbing-down and of course it's wildly popular and making money hand-over-fist but in fifty years' time who'll still be reading it?

Apparently even Tasso was too far out there - he sent *his* epic out to leading critics of the day and asked for their recommendations, and they wanted the magic out (passing the buck to the Inquisition), the far-ranging plot points out (passing the buck to Aristotle), the mushy romance out, etc. So we can safely say they must have been flipping out with each new illustrated edition of Orlando that came off the press.

Some of them must have been saying "Now, you just look Sannazaro! He's going to be the one people will still be talking about centuries from now," or "Wow, this new kid Trissino, HE knows how to write *epic*!" and continuing to be baffled when people kept on reading - and writing knockoffs - of Ariosto.

and I imagine Ariosto meant to evoke exactly the same reaction in his