I am the girl anachronism (Bitterblue)

[rachelmanija]

I recently read a fantasy novel which was set in a Europe-esque landscape, with swords and bows but (unless I'm forgetting something) no firearms. They had the printing press and herbal birth control, but no antibiotics. People knew the concept of a republic, apparently based on theoretical writings, but actual governments were hereditary

Comments

[bookelfe]

I read a fantasy novel recently where the protagonist used the term 'vacuum up [thing]', which threw me right out of the text and into hilarity.

[rachelmanija]

For some reason this makes me think of the line from The Marriage of Bette and Boo, "You don't vacuum gravy!!!"

[f4f3]

Very appropriate icon - The Princess Bride (the novel, not the movie) uses contemporary New York sensibilities all the way through - the movie isn't afraid to do this, either: "Life is pain, Princess. Anyone who says differently is trying to sell you something" being my favourite.

[rosefox]

I notice it all the time. Just read a Regency England romance in which they say "yarn" instead of "wool", and refer to sweet baked goods as "cookies"! Threw me right out.

[akamarykate]

I read a middle grade fantasy that knocked me right out of the world (medieval/early modern, European, mountainous kingdom) a few times because characters, including the peasants, had easy access to sugar and oranges in the winter, said, "Okay," and at one point, sat down to read a newspaper with a porridge breakfast. If the use of anachronisms had been consistent, I might have bought it as allegory, but there wasn't enough depth in the rest of the story to justify that stuff.

[auriaephiala]

I just finished _Bitterblue_ a few days ago, and that's a very good point you're making -- though I didn't particularly notice the sword choice myself (possibly because of only reading it late at night).

[coalescent]

I don't think either of those examples would throw me out of a book (but I haven't read Bitterblue) yet, because they don't seem to me intrinsically alien to the list of concepts and features in your first paragraph. I don't see any reason why an invented fantasy world has to enact exactly the same linguistic patterns as the equivalent historical period in our world. I mean, there is a class of phrase that is rooted in specific developments, like vacuum mentioned above, and those would seem jarring, but the people in Bitterblue presumably have the concept of mental and the concept of health, so putting them together doesn't seem unnatural. Of course you know a lot more about mental health than I do, so there may well be implausibility I don't see in the specifics that makes it much more like thi vacuum example

[rachelmanija]

I'm not at all saying that Bitterblue is bad. I'm saying that it did not read as if it was set in a non-modern world. With the exception of a few signposts, like the lack of antibiotics or the heroine's belief in her hereditary right to rule, the conceptual framework the characters were operating from was almost exactly the conceptual framework of the readers of LJ today. (Minus current technology