New Jeff Interview on Podcast

[Student of Trinity]

It's kind of a shame, when Tolkien included such a vast amount of backstory, that so little of his backstory really bears thinking about. Once I twigged that Arwen was over 2000 years old when she met Aragorn, my mind boggled and I decided the appendices were all better left alone.

[The Mystic]

Originally Posted By: Student of Trinity

Once I twigged that Arwen was over 2000 years old when she met Aragorn

And here's another fun fact about the couple: They're actually cousins!

[Mea Tulpa]

They're not cousins. Arwen's uncle, Elros, is one of Aragorn's ancestors, but there are a LOT of generations in between him and Aragorn.

[Alorael at Large]

There's something odd when the family tree has to have dynasties as entries. Not one dynasty. Several dynasties.

 

—Alorael, who just assumes that age is very, very different for elves. Actually, that's one thing that always bothered him about Tolkien. Elves make far too little fuss about living forever. They could go ahead and perfect not just one trade but several trades. They don't, though. Odd.

[Student of Trinity]

Originally Posted By: Intension

They're not cousins. Arwen's uncle, Elros, is one of Aragorn's ancestors, but there are a LOT of generations in between him and Aragorn.

Technically this means they are first cousins a large number of times removed. I once played Scrabble with my first cousin twice removed — she was older than my grandparents.

'Removal' is bidirectional. I was also her first cousin twice removed.

[The Mystic]

Originally Posted By: Truth, Eric, and Polar Bears

—Alorael, who just assumes that age is very, very different for elves. Actually, that's one thing that always bothered him about Tolkien. Elves make far too little fuss about living forever. They could go ahead and perfect not just one trade but several trades. They don't, though. Odd.

Especially when you consider that Galadriel, by my estimates, is about 10,000 years old at the least.

[Tcheedchee]

Originally Posted By: The Legend of Imelda

[…]and Eowyn is the incredibly poorly written romance that happens on stage, much to everyone's dismay. I really think that makes her a much less interesting character than Galadriel: here she is doing all this General Jinjur type stuff, but in the end she's only happy when she gets her man.

Galadriel on the other hand overshadows her male counterparts from the start of her tale. Like Eowyn, she is the "only female to stand tall in those days" but unlike Eowyn, she does not later shrink, certainly not in comparison with her mate.[…]

Yeah, I was very disappointed about Eowyn's development. Even more about Tolkiens overall approach to the abilites and desires of women. It almost made me quit reading LOTR…

By the way – as I mentioned elsewhere in the forum – I vote for Dragons being transgender.

[Jawaj]

If we're going to talk about Tolkien's females, what about Luthien? Her story is in the Silmarillion. Like Arwen/Aragorn, she's a beautiful elf and her love interest is a human (Beren). Her father tells Beren "complete this nearly impossible task [practically a suicide mission] and I'll let you marry my daughter."

 

But Luthien is much more interesting and active than Arwen. Beren goes on his quest and gets captured, then she goes to rescue him and destroys the fortress where he's kept. Then she insists on coming with Beren to help him complete the quest her father gave him. It's an interesting story, and she's one of the most prominent First Age characters.

 

There are also a few more strong female characters from that period, such as Melian and Aerin.

[Student of Trinity]

It's worth bearing in mind that J.R.R. Tolkien was born in the 19th century. He was literally a Victorian. We can give him a lot of credit for letting Luthien sing Morgoth to sleep, given the times he lived in.

 

Unfortunately that doesn't make it much easier to read him now, when one can't help thinking that if Tolkien's works were a game, Luthien and Eowyn would be the only remotely playable female characters. And Luthien's super-lullaby power would not exactly be a blast to use, while Eowyn's only ability would be a combo move with a hobbit that does special damage against one particular boss. In a game on the scale of Middle Earth, that would amount to a token gesture towards tokenism.

[Lilith]

i'm literally a victorian

[Swimmin' Salmon]

and yet we've never, literally, held that against you

[Mea Tulpa]

Luthien = Jigglypuff?

[Jawaj]

Luthien also used some sort of spell to destroy a fortress singlehandedly. And she can transform into animals and she can heal (though maybe not magically). So no, the lullaby would not be her only power. And actually there are female warriors mentioned in The Silmarillion, though not developed much.

[Dintiradan]

Originally Posted By: Slartucker

Luthien = Jigglypuff?

EVERYTHING IS RUINED FOREVER

[Synergy]

Huh, I never pictured Jeff at an opera.

 

My guess: the game will involve opening seven (or some number) of doors one by one in some context, slowly unfolding some sort of story or mystery. Kind of like his games already do. You finish x task and the gate opens allowing you into the next zone. This might or might not all occur inside one castle or structure. I sure hope it doesn't happen inside a cave.

 

-S-

[Mea Tulpa]

You do realize that if Luthien is Jigglypuff, Beren must be Pikachu... I guess Morgoth can be Master Hand...

[Alorael at Large]

I think Master Hand might actually have to be Ilúvatar, and that makes Middle Smash Earth Brothers a bit more theologically uncomfortable.

 

—Alorael, who holds being Victorian against Thuryl. He holds a lot of things against Thuryl.

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: Everyone

LOTR is awesome! Let's make inane references no one else will get and make us look well-read and elitist!

I would like the contents of the past page or so summarized in the context of Foundation or Star Wars or 1984, please.

[Mea Tulpa]

Um, the LOTR books are pretty much the most widely read fantasy or science fiction books in existence. Deride them all you want, but "inane references no one else will get" definitely does not apply here.

[Jawaj]

Though to be fair, it does kind of apply to The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales.

[Lilith]

more like sillymarillion am i right

[Synergy]

Was anyone else surprised when they heard Jeff's voice in the interview? I was rather expecting him to sound quite laid back and deeper-pitched, but that boy is a bundle of giddy energy! I really enjoyed the interview. Anyone who is passionate about what he loves and does is so much more enjoyable than someone just grinding out Produkt™ they don't love. It's hard to picture Jeff ever being such a person.

 

-S-

[VCH]

I think Narnia is better known.

 

Narnia is more fun too.

 

But don't let people tell you about the religious aspects of Narnia. That thoroughly ruins the stories.

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: Jawaj

Though to be fair, it does kind of apply to The Silmarillion

It was initially in reference to the Silmarillion.

Originally Posted By: EVERYTHING IS RUINED FOREVER

Um, the LOTR books are pretty much the most widely read fantasy or science fiction books in existence.

DO NOT LUMP SCIFI AND FANTASY TOGETHER. EVER. You confuse a genre that was specifically designed to pose societal questions in a format where they can be considered without the bias of the current day present with a genre designed purely to entertain, with little to no substance. It is a terrible, terrible crime.

[Sudanna]

Sci-Fi is not a holy temple of literary enlightenment, Dantius. And Fantasy is not some empty-headed, soulless drivel either.

 

http://th07.deviantart.net/fs14/300W/i/2007/093/8/a/50__s_sci_fi_B_movie_poster_by_0fish0.jpg

 

http://regularrumination.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/american_gods1.jpg

[VCH]

Any one ever read A Strange Manuscript found in a Copper Cylinder by James De Mille?

 

The above link is to a free online version or download of the book. No copyright.

[Niemand]

Quote:

DO NOT LUMP SCIFI AND FANTASY TOGETHER. EVER. You confuse a genre that was specifically designed to pose societal questions in a format where they can be considered without the bias of the current day present with a genre designed purely to entertain, with little to no substance. It is a terrible, terrible crime.

This strikes me as fairly silly. Even regardless of what you might call original purposes, there are so many authors who are now or have in the past used these genres for whatever they felt like this is incredibly blurred.

For instance, within Science Fiction I personally greatly enjoy the works of Verne, "Doc" Smith, Azimov, and Clement. Azimov really did write a lot of things that tended toward your claim of 'posing societal questions', while Smith's books are more action thrillers that read almost like comic books. Then you have Clement and Verne who wrote a good deal of what I consider science fiction in the strictest sense: fiction about science, like a trip to the moon, extrapolated from the technology of the late 1800's, or planets with very alien chemistry. There's so much variety from those four authors alone to make your claim of a clearly focused genre absurd.

Glancing at my 'fantasy' book collection, I see a lot more things that I would consider more superficial, but there's still a tremendous range: We have Salvatore whose specialty is gory fight scenes (and whose new books I've stopped even bothering to look at), but also things like Pullman's Dark Materials, which he at least uses as a platform to express some views, and Adams's "Watership Down", which does spend time posing societal questions, happening to phrase them in terms of thinking rabbits.

I don't see why you bother making a distinction.

[Sudanna]

Salvatore's fight scenes are not gory. They're detailed, but not gory.

 

You want gory, look at some Lumley.

[Niemand]

Okay granted, there are probably far worse out there, which I've never sought out. Suffice it to say that I've found that I'm not overly fond of Salavtore.

[Sudanna]

Me neither, anymore. The shameless KKK-analogue in the latest series is what made me give up.

[Dikiyoba]

Originally Posted By: Niemand

This strikes me as fairly silly. Even regardless of what you might call original purposes, there are so many authors who are now or have in the past used these genres for whatever they felt like this is incredibly blurred.

Heck, there are lots of stories out there that blend both genres together.

Dikiyoba.

[Lilith]

salvatore is cool w/me because he's a hack but he knows he's a hack and is honest about it

 

[Dantius]

Fine, you've prompted me to write an oration. So be it.

 

Originally Posted By: Phanes

Sci-Fi is not a holy temple of literary enlightenment, Dantius. And Fantasy is not some empty-headed, soulless drivel either.

 

 

I claim Sturgeon's law- 95% of scifi is crud, but 95% of everthing is crud. Just because you can produce a few examples of poor scifi (there is a LOT of this. In fact, most scifi is poor literature), does not disprove my point.

 

In fact, let's try a little experiment. Read 1984. Read Foundation. Read Starship Troopers. Read Atlas Shrugged, if it takes you a lifetime. Read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. Read Stranger from a Strange Land. Watch Battlestar Galactica. Now, for a change, read the LOTR trilogy. Read the Silmarillion. (These are, in most people's opinion, the greatest fantasy books written, yes? Good.) Tell me, how did your experience change from reading the scifi books? How did your worldview shift? How did your preconceived notions shift? Quite a bit, I would guess. The whole point of scifi, or at least good scifi, is to do this. Bad scifi just entertains. Very bad scifi does neither. Good scifi will change the way you think. Now, let's contrast this to fantasy. Bad fantasy will entertain you, or maybe not. Good fantasy will entertain you, and also maybe teach you a moral lesson while it's at it, usually along the lines of "Throw the ring into the volcano, already".

 

See the difference? Scifi is literature! It will have a lasting impact on humanity and the way we think. Do you think that We, or Brave New World, or 1984 have not affected the world? They have! They have more profoundly affected modern political discourse than any fantasy novel that you can care to name. That is the point. Scifi changes the world to suit the desires of the author. Fantasy does not, which is why the two genres are completely irreconcilable.

 

After having gone upstairs and looked at my collection, the only examples of fantasy matching my criterion for scifi are the Discworld series (satire) and the His Dark Materials trilogy(religion). A fairly strong argument could be made for both series actually being scifi, or at the very least a heavy blend incorporating elements of both. However, I could list off for quite a while with scifi.

 

Dune (envromentalism)

 

Neuromacer (the internet)

 

Pretty much anything Heinlein wrote (lots of stuff)

 

Most of Asimov's robot stuff(sentience/robotics)

 

The Foundation series (predestination amongst a multitude

of other things)

 

The Gods Themselves, Nemesis, and Nightfall(various things)

 

Ayn Rand(HUGE political influence)

 

George Orwell (equally large political influence)

 

Huxley (like Orwell, but differently)

 

Fahrenheit 451 (see above)

 

Yevgeny Zamyatin's (sp) We (first dystopian novel, and a thinly veiled commentary on the Bolshevik revolution)

 

Do Androids Dram of Electric Sheep (see: Blade Runner)

 

and don't forget

 

Contact, written by Carl Sagan himself (mainly here because it was written by Carl Sagan).

 

And although I should probably include stuff by whathisface, Orson Scott Card, but I find some of his views so repulsive that I really couldn't bear to put him on the above list (read his Empire and you'll know what I mean)

 

I challenge you all to assemble a list of fantasy books with an equally broad and immense range of influence on all walks of life as the scifi books above. Go ahead, do it.

[inni]

Originally Posted By: Niemand

Smith's books are more action thrillers that read almost like comic books.

however there are some very interesting comic books that are arguably better then a lot of well read "real books"
good
not so good
and recently i cant stand most science fiction as it is only fiction that makes poor references to poor science
i spit on this

[Lilith]

hey ghaldring did you ever wonder why you got banned like five times

[Alorael at Large]

You're making two different claims. One is that sci-fi is literature, and the other is that it is world- and opinion-changing.

 

The former is undeniably true, but it's also true of fantasy. Say what you will about Tolkien, the man wrote literature. So have Murakami, Mervyn Peake, Ursula K. LeGuin (on both sides of the speculative fiction fence!), and many others.

 

Are the books life-changing? I don't know, but I question your list. Heinlein and Asimov wrote fascinating takes on near- and far-future society, but their views certainly weren't moving to me. If you're bringing up Orwell, what about Animal Farm? That's fantasy. No swords, perhaps, but fantasy. Dystopia does not deep meaning make; while Fahrenheit 451 and the Martian Chronicles are fascinating stories, they're not sublime truths. I'd put Gulliver's Travels higher on the social critique scale. And the original Utopia from Thomas More, and Butler's Erewhon. And how about The Once and Future King, or more particularly the Book of Merlin? How about Borges, Italo Calvino, or Gene Wolfe?

 

—Alorael, who thinks the bigger issue is that science fiction has a long history of deep and meaningful writing along with the pulp and rayguns. High/epic fantasy is still largely confined to Tolkien and works that, however literate, are simply fantasy romps. But fantasy is not that any more than science fiction is space operas.

[Ephesos]

Originally Posted By: Niemand

This strikes me as fairly silly.

Gonna have to agree with Niemand here.

Like Alo said, the lines are more blurry than you think. Makes me think of Clarke's third law: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. For instance, even though The Martian Chronicles is set in a possible future, the technology that was advanced for when it was written is no longer as advanced relative to the present day. If that makes any sense. And as a result, it comes across as more fantastic than science-y. Yes, I said science-y, deal with it.

Anyway. This is definitely a silly argument.

[Student of Trinity]

So what actually is the difference between sci-fi and fantasy? Sure, LOTR and Foundation (say) provide paradigmatic cases for each one, but is there is or isn't there a border of any reasonable sharpness, anywhere in the long spectrum between them?

 

I think actually there is. I'll go out on a limb and say that fantasy has to have magic. I wouldn't really class Mervyn Peake's novels as fantasy, though I'm not sure how I would classify them. Gormenghast could in principle be set in Ruritania; there's nothing to say it couldn't be an obscure place in the real world. Postulating a bizarrely different society is an element common in both sci-fi and fantasy, and it runs in mainstream literature as well. So while I recognize that one reasonably could count this as a definition of fantasy, I think that if you do you'll be left with no real genre borders at all, and I feel that's not an interesting answer to my question. Hence, fantasy means magic.

 

Then sci-fi has to have science. To qualify for its hyphen, sci-fi has to have fictional science — either novel laws of nature, or imagined technological exploitations. But what is the difference between magic and science?

 

Arthur C. Clarke had his famous principle, that any sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic. Somewhere else I recently read a converse statement, that any sufficiently explained magic is indistinguishable from science. But I think I want to argue, from the fact that sci-fi and fantasy are still robustly classed as separate genres, that neither principle is really correct. Science and magic are different.

 

I think the difference is this: science is bigger than any character in a book; magic is not. In sci-fi you can have background figures with transcendent powers; and among your developed characters, you can have badasses with better tech or knowledge than anyone else. But neither your heroes nor your villains nor even any of their super-scarey mentors are actually able to personally affect the laws of nature. Even if some character has a technological artifact with totally arbitrary powers, it will still be clear that the device is whatever it is regardless of the character's wishes. Even if the author hasn't spelled out what is possible and what is not at the beginning of the book, the texture of the story will be shaped by the fact that what is possible is in principle predefined, and not up for grabs to the characters.

 

Magic, on the other hand, means that what is possible is a lot more fluid, and in particular can be directly affected by the wishes of some of the characters. Whatever Tolkien might have said afterwards, within his story the impression is that in principle Gandalf might be able to do any particular thing he wanted. He is limited by his personal mental or spiritual 'strength', and by his ability to remember bits of lore; but I think any reader can tell, from the general feel of the story, that he does not just have a finite bag of particular tricks, and have to wait for a suitable opportunity for one of them. He can improvise reality, at least within limits, and his personal attributes as a character are on a par with at least some of the laws of nature. You could say that the character of Gandalf is himself at least a small aspect of the natural law of Middle Earth. This is magic, not science.

 

It is of course possible to blur this line, by writing something that by my definition should be fantasy, but making all the magical effects look like traditional sci-fi bling. I think it's actually evidence on my side, that Girl Genius goes a long way in this direction, and still falls clearly on the fantasy side of the line. But you could go farther still, I guess, and perhaps confound me. On the other hand you can make up such a rigid and detailed system of magic that I'd be forced to call your work sci-fi, even though all the sprites and unicorns made everyone else call it fantasy.

 

But I think that if you did either of these things, it would be obvious that you were going to extremes just to confound a genre distinction; and genre distinctions are never hard and fast enough to prevent that. That doesn't mean they're not sound concepts, and at least for the moment I stand by my theory.

[Lilith]

So does this mean that, say, the existence of Q in Star Trek turns it into a work of fantasy rather than sci-fi?

[Alorael at Large]

Does that make Stranger in a Strange Land fantasy? It very well could be, and it certainly has nothing at all to do with science, but Heinlein fans might find that odd.

 

C.S. Friedman's Coldfire trilogy has magic proper, complete with oodles of sorcerers. It also has a Church that deliberately sets out to change the laws of reality through the power of belief. If you remove the individual sorcery, does the work become sci-fi because it operates at a level of mass power rather than individual power even though the power operates by mechanisms unlike anything realistic? And to muddy the waters further, the story is set on a planet inhabited by the descendants of Earth colonists.

 

What is Gormenghast? It's not science fiction, at least until the third book. It's also not really fantasy, although there are some rather supernatural happenings (once again, until the third book makes things odder).

 

What is a book like Jumper, which is really like the regular world except something exists that does not in the real world. In this case, teleportation. If it's a previously unknown natural phenomenon it's science fiction, but if it's described with the trappings of magic it's fantasy?

 

—Alorael, who will stick with his favorite demarcation: he'll recognize the boundary when he sees it. Or, more succinctly, they're speculative fiction and can live with being lumped together.

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: A Walk by Rainlight

What is a book like Jumper, which is really like the regular world except something exists that does not in the real world. In this case, teleportation. If it's a previously unknown natural phenomenon it's science fiction, but if it's described with the trappings of magic it's fantasy?

his point was about the abilities of the main characters relative to the world they're in rather than the nature of the specific laws governing that world

[Dintiradan]

Originally Posted By: Thuryl

So does this mean that, say, the existence of Q in Star Trek turns it into a work of fantasy rather than sci-fi?

Q makes Star Trek camp.

Well, more camp.

[Lilith]

khan.wav

[Alorael at Large]

Okay. How does Jumper compare to genetic engineering giving crazy abilities?

 

—Alorael, who also wonders if the craziness of abilities gets taken into account. Engineered chameleon camouflage could be sci-fi, engineered fire-breathing is questionable, and teleportation is fantasy?

[Student of Trinity]

I'm afraid I haven't read any of Stranger in a Strange Land, Coldfire, or Jumper, so I don't know whether they should make me change my mind or not. But Thuryl is right, the line I'm trying to draw has nothing to do with what particular events are allowed to happen, only with how much control over them is held by major characters in the story.

 

If the answer to the question, Can Lord Winston do X? depends strongly on just precisely what X may be, you're in the sci-fi direction; if it depends only on a few broad issues, such as how big an event X is, or whether or not it involves the element of fire, then whether X happens is going to be largely a question about Lord Winston as a character, and you're going towards fantasy. But only actions X that are actually important to the story are important to my definition. A story set in cyberspace, with characters who can make anything happen in their personal virtual worlds, would be fantasy if these virtual events were the main action of the story; but if they're just chrome on a plot where the characters' powers over what really matters are sharply limited, then I'll call it sci-fi.

 

I think this power issue makes for a literary genre divide because the sci-fi side requires and allows technical constraints to play an important role in plot conflicts, while the fantasy side requires and allows conflicts to depend more purely on character issues. In principle any story can mix these two kinds of conflicts, but in practice a single story can't really encompass too many unrelated kinds of conflict, so there's a strong tendency to go mainly one way or the other. That makes for quite different kinds of stories.

 

I don't really count the Titus books as speculative fiction; just weird fiction. What's supernatural in them? All I recall is one freakish bolt of lightning, and an improbable death by owls, but neither was exactly supernatural. I don't count the third book at all; I've never re-read it and hardly remember it.

 

Star Trek is a large enough volume of disconnected stories that it doesn't have to fit all in one genre. The Q episodes are pretty fantastic, and the only thing that keeps them on the sci-fi side is the degree to which Q isn't really functioning as a character, but just as a set of challenges for the actual characters. If Q had been a main character in the series as a whole, then actually I think I would have classed TNG as fantasy. And if it had been changed in the ways it would have had to have been changed, to still be watchable with Q as a main character, then I think a lot of people would have agreed with me. I'd bet someone would have coined the term, 'space fantasy'.

[Sudanna]

Mmmm, yeah. Frankly, SoT, Nalyd thinks your definitions are a load of bull.

[Alorael at Large]

Let's take Dungeons and Dragons as an example. Let's remove the setting and just take the rules, which is already questionable, but bear with me.

 

Can you do X? If you are a wizard, maybe. Do you know the right spell? Do you have the right spell components and paraphernalia? Does the right spell exist? Can the right spell be created?

 

That's a wizard. It's fantasy. It's D&D! But replace the terms and you get a completely different picture.

 

Can an engineer do X? Does he have a blueprint or plan? Are the necessary pieces of equipment and raw materials? Does a method even exist? Can the engineer devise it?

 

That's a core piece of science-driven fiction plot. And while the difference between an individual's achievement by will and study and an individual's achievement, realized through machinery and possibly subcontracting, is real, I don't think it's necessarily as major as you make it, nor do I think it's a defining difference between fantasy and science-fiction.

 

—Alorael, who will just admit to being happier having the two terms as loose descriptors of subgenres rather than rules that can be carefully applied. This perhaps puts him in soft SF genre category. Hard SF genre is another matter entirely.

[Mea Tulpa]

Hard and fast boundaries for genres like fantasy and SF, where their better members tend to be liminal, boundary-pushing stories anyway, are not going to happen. But it's easy enough to come up with a list of tendencies. Fantasy typically involves some kind of magic and takes place in the past or in someplace resembling the past. Science fiction typically involves some kind of science and takes place in the future or in someplace resembling the future. Any tendencies beyond those become less and less essential, except for those that the genres share: they both typically involve departures from reality, they both typically require both plot and characters (not true of all forms of literature), and so on.

 

Originally Posted By: Student of Trinity

I think the difference is this: science is bigger than any character in a book; magic is not. In sci-fi you can have background figures with transcendent powers; and among your developed characters, you can have badasses with better tech or knowledge than anyone else. But neither your heroes nor your villains nor even any of their super-scarey mentors are actually able to personally affect the laws of nature. Even if some character has a technological artifact with totally arbitrary powers, it will still be clear that the device is whatever it is regardless of the character's wishes. Even if the author hasn't spelled out what is possible and what is not at the beginning of the book, the texture of the story will be shaped by the fact that what is possible is in principle predefined, and not up for grabs to the characters.

 

Magic, on the other hand, means that what is possible is a lot more fluid, and in particular can be directly affected by the wishes of some of the characters. Whatever Tolkien might have said afterwards, within his story the impression is that in principle Gandalf might be able to do any particular thing he wanted. He is limited by his personal mental or spiritual 'strength', and by his ability to remember bits of lore; but I think any reader can tell, from the general feel of the story, that he does not just have a finite bag of particular tricks, and have to wait for a suitable opportunity for one of them. He can improvise reality, at least within limits, and his personal attributes as a character are on a par with at least some of the laws of nature. You could say that the character of Gandalf is himself at least a small aspect of the natural law of Middle Earth. This is magic, not science.

I have to strongly disagree with this theory. I think it is sometimes true, and I'll even wager to say more than 50% of the time, but not much more, especially not when you are talking about really original and lively books. Middle-Earth and Narnia, I would argue, are picture perfect definitions of worlds where what is possible is predefined. Tolkien's extensive development of his world, with its deep internal consistency, and his writings on this subject and on sub-creation make this explicit. Indeed one never gets the sense in Tolkien that the many coincidences in the books are a matter of random chance, but rather that things follow a certain pattern and arrangement:

Originally Posted By: The Hobbit

'Then the prophecies of the old songs have turned out to be true, after a fashion!' said Bilbo.

 

'Of course!' said Gandalf. 'And why should not they prove true? Surely you don't disbelieve the prophecies, because you had a hand in bringing them about yourself? You don't really suppose, do you, that all your adventures and escapes were managed by mere luck just for your sole benefit? You are a very fine person, Mr Baggins, and I am very fond of you; but you are only quite a little fellow in a wide world after all!'

The difference is just that the patterns concern what must inevitably happen with the system dynamics of the cosmos, from the gods down to the hobbits, rather than what must inevitably happen with the system dynamics of the cosmos, from the unified theories and galaxies down to electricity and robots. Narnia is the same way, when you look at what really goes on with the Deep Magic and Aslan and so on.

 

Not that I think either genre is all about determinism. There is a niche for free will within the Jobbish hurricane of system dynamics:

Originally Posted By: LOTR

The two powers strove in him. For a moment, perfectly balanced between their piercing points, he writhed, tormented. Suddenly he was aware of himself again. Frodo, neither the Voice nor the Eye: free to choose, and with one remaining instant in which to do so.

[Student of Trinity]

Originally Posted By: Proximities

Can the right spell be created?

This is the critical question; the answer is always yes. Some kind of spell could do anything, and the only constraints involved are about story and character. The hardwired rules of the setting rule nothing out. That makes it magic.

[Mea Tulpa]

Except that magic can have hardwired rules that rule things out... and science fiction settings are equally capable of implying that there are no hardwired rules and anything is possible. It really seems to me that this idea that magic can do anything, but science can't, is coming from your own associations with the two and not at all from the actual literature we're talking about.