Worldbuilding A to Z: P and Q

Because posting topics on the correct day is for the weak! (Just let me keep telling myself that, ok?) Don't miss my other EPIC CATCH UP POST brought to you by the letters M, N and O. Now I'm finally on schedule!

P is for Politics

How do you like the politics in your fantasy? Do you like them as the main course, served with a delicious sauce of intrigue? Do you like them as a side, like a healthy scoop of vegetables? Or maybe sent right back to the kitchen where they belong? No matter how large a part you want Politics to play in your narrative, a fully formed country (even in a fantasy world) can't exist without it. As an author, even if you don't talk about it in the story much, you should be aware of what type of government your country has and how it will affect the characters in your story.

In Akhet I will, of course, be following the Egyptian model of state with the King as its absolute ruler. From the days of Egypt's first ruling dynasty, the idea of a centralized state was central to the Egyptian way of thinking. While there was a system of government workers including advisers and administrators, regional nomarchs (see letter N), and many scribes in service to the government, it all led back to the King. All craftsmen in Egypt were also under the direct authority of the King and one could only obtain their services with royal permission. And it stayed that way for thousands of years.

One reason that this worked was the religious aspect of the Kingship. At times the King was considered to be a god himself, or the son of a god or the god's representative on earth (depending on the time period). The King was also a High Priest and, according to Egyptian belief, "lord of burial". If one turned one's back on the King one could not be buried in a tomb, an all important aspect of the Egyptian religion. Again, everything goes back to the King.

The ruling King during my WIP will certainly feel the weight of that responsibility when some of his priests rebel and cause chaos to descend on Akhet. My King will be served on the side, like a nice helping of mashed potatoes with gravy. But he won't get to take it easy. Oh no, not by a long shot.

Q is for Quintessence

Quintessence, literally "fifth element", also referred to in classical thought as "aether".

The Quintessence, or Aether, is a concept from classical philosophy that I will be employing in my fantasy world as a vehicle for magic. I will be using the Aristotelian conception of Aether which he included as the fifth element along with air, earth, fire and water. According to Aristotle:

1. Aether fills the region of the universe above the terrestrial sphere.

2. It has no qualities like the other elements (it is not cold, hot, wet or dry).

3. It is not subject to changes in substance, quantity or quality though it is subject to change of place.

4. By its nature it moves in circles around the terrestrial sphere. (The movement of the stars is explained by their position altering as the aether moves around the planet.)

5. It is unalterable and incorruptible. While it can push on "ordinary" matter, it cannot be pushed back by that matter.

Taking this fascinating concept, I am adapting it to my fantasy world thus:

1. The Aether will be the material that composes the celestial and underworld realms of the gods.

2. The gods are the gods because they are beings who are capable, unlike the "ordinary" matter of the terrestrial sphere, of touching and altering the Aether and using the Aether to touch and alter "ordinary" matter in undetectable ways. This is the source of their power.

3. Certain human beings will be able to develop the skill of using their ba (see post on the letter B) to do the same. This skill is most often exhibited by priests and other people who have deep understanding of the religious mysteries of the universe. This is their "magic".

This is the grounding for the magic system of my world. I hope you find it as interesting as I do. I think the potential is limitless and I can't wait to explore it through my stories.

B is for Ba

So yesterday I talked a bit about the complicated and very foreign idea of person-hood in Ancient Egypt. One of the most interesting aspects of the Egyptian belief on this subject is the ba. Most people tend to translate ba as "soul" because that's the easiest thing to do, but if you actually read the texts this doesn't make much sense. Louis B. Zabkar in A Study of the Ba Concept in Ancient Egyptian Literature concludes that the ba is closer to meaning a manifestation of a person or god's power. Kings are described as being "ba mighty" or "ba-full" when they are making a show of their power. And in early texts, the ba is the part of the person (always the King) that becomes manifest and joins the gods in heaven after death, it is essentially "deified".

In my "Fantasy Egypt", called Akhet, I wanted to make sense of the ba concept and use it. I have latched onto the idea of the ba being connected to "power" and am modifying it to be a part of my world's "magic system". Thus the "ba" of a person is the part of them through which they are able to reach out beyond the physical realm and participate in the cosmic drama of the universe. The ba of a person is able to touch and affect the aether that surrounds the world and thus perform feats through it that look like magic.

In my fantasy world, I am also utilizing the idea of Aristotelean "Forms" which are basically the perfect, unchanging essences of various things or ideas. For instance, all chairs, no matter how different they are, partake to some extent in the Form of chairness. The ba of a person will be the part of them that partakes of the Form of "person-hood". Since Forms are the ultimate reality, a person's ba will partake of the reality of person-hood to greater or lesser extents individually, different people will essentially be more or less "real". The strength of one's ba will determine to what extent one can perform magic-like feats.

(Side Note: Thanks to everyone for the comments and encouragement the past few days. I have not been here to respond to visit your blogs because I've been in the hospital having a baby. Now that we're home I'll be catching up. This should be an exciting month here on the blog and in real life! Thanks for stopping by.)

Elemental, my dear Watson!

When it comes to creating a magic system for a fantasy novel, it seems that many, many writers are drawn to the Classical Elements. Those would be Earth, Fire, Air, and Water. (Heart! Go Planet! Woah, I just totally dated myself.) I don't know how many stories and movies have used this type of system, but it seems to be everywhere. In early concepts for my fantasy world I used it as well. I came up with one of those "there are all these different lands and the people in the different lands have different elemental powers" ideas. Eventually I realized how unoriginal it was and I dropped it.

It has occurred to me to wonder why this theme is so prevalent. What is it about the Classical Elements that inspires people? Is it the feel of a connection to nature? Or is it the feel of power over nature? A little of both, perhaps? It's undeniable that the elemental model speaks to us on some level.

However, I made the decision to abandon it. Originality is important to me. And while I realize that originality today rests more in how you develop an idea than in the actual substance of the idea... I still think that the Classical Elements have been done so often in so many ways that it would be impossible to avoid comparisons. So I dropped all of the worldbuilding I had done so far and started from scratch.

But I still needed a "magic system" for my world. I intensely dislike stories where things are explained by simply saying, "It's magic!" but the magic its self is never explained. To me there needs to be rhyme and reason to magic in a fantasy setting. But I also dislike it when the magic feels like a game system. For me it needs to be organic and natural to the world. (Tolkien's magic is a perfect example, though most people don't understand how it works because it's only explained properly in material outside the main novels.) And since I have been developing a society based on Ancient Egypt, I had also to account for the way the Egyptians viewed magic as well as for the existence of real and very powerful gods who do get involved in the world. And honestly, I've been having trouble figuring out how to put all this together.

Enter my knight in shining armor, my husband and all the obscure stuff he reads on blogs and leaves up on his computer when he goes to work. He's a big fan of Sci Fi author Mike Flynn and reads the author's Livejournal regularly. So recently I glanced at one of the entries that was sitting there after he'd left for work and got completely sucked into it. For various reasons, Flynn started talking about Aristotle and his theories of a fifth element he called Aether. Here is some of what Flynn wrote about the Aether:

Look at it through Aristotle's eyes: it is a material sphere of some sort within which the stars are embedded, and it turns slowly on itself day in and day out.

It is:

* simple (not a compound of elements) effected by only one internal principle or cause
* ungenerable and incorruptible, incapable of growth or alteration.
* although subject to change in place, not subject to changes in substance, quantity, or quality.
* inalterable.

If aether is incorruptible, its prime matter and substantial form must be so perfectly united that the latter must actualize and thereby exhaust the potency of the former. That is, aether's prime matter is inseparable from its form, and in this sense is not really distinct from it.

If aether cannot be destroyed (or even altered qualitatively), it must somehow be intangible. It is not susceptible to the action of the tangible qualities of temperature and pressure.

If aether cannot be pressed upon by ordinary matter, then if some body were to try to press upon it, that body would cut right through the aether unhindered (which is why Michelson-Morely did not lay a glove on the Aristotelian aether.) That is, aether can "push" on ordinary matter without being "pushed back."

"While usually the thing touching is touched by what it touches--for nearly all the things we come upon move while also being moved -- still it also occurs (as we sometimes say) that only the mover may touch the moved, while the thing touched does not touch the one touching it. But because things of the same kind are moved [in return] when they move others, it seems to be necessary that [movers] be touched by what they touch. Whence if something unmoved moves another, although it will touch the thing moved, nothing [will touch] it."
De Gen. et Cor., 1.6.323a26-32

Having never read Aristotle and not being a scientifically minded person in general, I was amazed and fascinated by all this. And immediately ideas started springing to mind about how I could use this Aristotelian Aether as a basis for magic in my fantasy world. The basic idea that came to mind was this:

Aether touches, but is untouched. But what if certain people could touch it and affect it? The Aether is invisible and undetectable. If one person was able to create an effect through the Aether, a person who did not have that ability would see it as magic.

I immediately went to read more about Aristotle and his Aether. I discovered many other very interesting theories as well. Particularly, Aristotle's ideas of Potentiality and Actuality and Plato's theory of Forms. I am going to be trying to adapt all of these ideas to my fantasy world. I still have not worked out details, but I think this will lead to a very interesting and natural form of "magic system" to explore. In a way, I'm coming back to the idea of elements, since Aether was classically the fifth element after Air, Water, Fire and Earth in Greek thought. Though I don't plan to work with the other four in my system.

I am very excited about the possibilities.