Ben Domenech

While we were talking about subcreation, I pulled up my copy of On Fairy Stories because I did want to make sure to go back to Tolkien's words a little bit on this.

Now, on the surface, fantasy can just be a word for the type of stories that all of us like to read, right?

And I say that as, you know, we are fans of books like Lord of the Rings.

We are fans of fantasy books.

And so on the surface, it is that.

And I think in some ways,

the way Tolkien uses the word fantasy and on fairy stories, I think in some ways it is a synonym of fairy story or fairy tale.

But I think there is a specific nuance in the word fantasy and it's,

there's a clue to it when Tolkien says in On Fairy Stories, he says, fantasy is the making or glimpsing of other worlds.

And I want to focus on, I know we were just now talking about making, I want to focus on glimpsing.

Because if you look at the etymology of the word fantasy,

Fantasy, and I'm stealing my own thunder here because I want to write a Substack post about this someday.

Maybe by the time this is out, it'll already exist.

Maybe so.

I don't know.

No guarantees.

But the word fantasy actually comes from an ancient Greek verb, phaino, phainane, which means to show or to make seen, to make visible.

And that's why I think that idea of glimpsing other worlds, fantasy is the glimpsing of other worlds.

Fantasy is the showing of other worlds.

It's the making visible of other worlds.