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81-512: Tähtifantasia Award is an annual prize by Helsingin science fiction seura ry for the best foreign fantasy book released in Finland . ( The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making ) Fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction which involves themes of the supernatural , magic , and imaginary worlds and creatures . Its roots are in oral traditions, which became fantasy literature and drama. From

162-461: A city in the clouds with the birds and challenges Zeus 's authority. Ovid 's Metamorphoses and Apuleius 's The Golden Ass are both works that influenced the development of the fantasy genre by taking mythic elements and weaving them into personal accounts. Both works involve complex narratives in which humans beings are transformed into animals or inanimate objects. Platonic teachings and early Christian theology are major influences on

243-446: A fatuous fool, who is easily pleased with superficial entertainment and who is unable to resolve a dispute with a little rowing maid. Sneferu must go to the extent of having a priest solve the problem. With this narration and embarrassing depiction of a king, the author of Westcar dares to criticise the kings of Egypt as such and makes the third story a sort of satire . Lepper points out that the critiques are hidden cleverly throughout. It

324-671: A feudal society hindering the modernization of China. Stories of the supernatural continued to be denounced once the Communists rose to power, and mainland China experienced a revival in fantasy only after the Cultural Revolution had ended. Fantasy became a genre of pulp magazines published in the West. In 1923, the first all-fantasy fiction magazine, Weird Tales , was published. Many other similar magazines eventually followed, including The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction ; when it

405-426: A future king's mother, the parallels between the biographies of the two ladies has garnered special attention. The role of the maidservant is evaluated as being a key figure for a modern phrasing of indoctrinations about morality and betrayal. The maidservant wants to run her mistress down and is punished by destiny . Destiny is depicted here as a crocodile who snatches the traitor. The whole purpose would be to ensure

486-564: A large audience. Lord Dunsany established the genre's popularity in both the novel and the short story form. H. Rider Haggard , Rudyard Kipling , and Edgar Rice Burroughs began to write fantasy at this time. These authors, along with Abraham Merritt , established what was known as the "lost world" subgenre, which was the most popular form of fantasy in the early decades of the 20th century, although several classic children's fantasies, such as Peter Pan and The Wonderful Wizard of Oz , were also published around this time. Juvenile fantasy

567-637: A literary resource for reconstituting the history of the Fourth Dynasty . The papyrus is now on display under low-light conditions in the Egyptian Museum of Berlin . In 1823 or 1824, British adventurer Henry Westcar apparently discovered the papyrus during travels in Egypt . For unknown reasons, he did not note the exact circumstances under which he obtained the artifact . In 1838 or 1839, German Egyptologist Karl Richard Lepsius claimed to have received

648-477: A long time ago, but fantastic at the same time. He uses quaint phrases and makes the heroes' acting stilted and ceremonious. The first three stories are written in past tense and all the kings are addressed with the salutation "justified" (Egyptian: m3ʕ ḫrw ), which was typical in Ancient Egypt when talking about a deceased king. The heroes are addressed in the second and third stories the same way. Curiously, all

729-471: A main plot element, theme , or setting . Magic, magic practitioners ( sorcerers , witches and so on) and magical creatures are common in many of these worlds. An identifying trait of fantasy is the author's use of narrative elements that do not have to rely on history or nature to be coherent. This differs from realistic fiction in that realistic fiction has to attend to the history and natural laws of reality, where fantasy does not. In writing fantasy

810-412: A new style of "fuzzy" supernatural texts. The fantastic is on the dividing line between supernatural and not supernatural, Just as during this time period the women were not respecting the boundary of inequality that had always been set for them. At the time, women's roles in society were very uncertain, just as the rules of the fantastic are never straightforward. This climate allowed for a genre similar to

891-400: A path to the water's edge where a crocodile catches her. The brother then goes to see Rededjet, who is crying over the loss of his sister. The brother starts to confess what has happened and at this point the papyrus story ends. Papyrus Westcar is of great interest to historians and Egyptologists since it is one of the oldest Egyptian documents that contains such complex text. Unfortunately,

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972-607: A single source. The Welsh tradition has been particularly influential, due to its connection to King Arthur and its collection in a single work, the epic Mabinogion . There are many works where the boundary between fantasy and other works is not clear; the question of whether the writers believed in the possibilities of the marvels in A Midsummer Night's Dream or Sir Gawain and the Green Knight makes it difficult to distinguish when fantasy, in its modern sense, first began. Although pre-dated by John Ruskin 's The King of

1053-426: A summoned crocodile. Caretaker and crocodile are playing the role of justice , whilst king Nebka plays the role of destiny . Lepper and Liechtheim evaluate the depiction of king Nebka as being fairly positive. A strict but lawful king was ideal for the people of the author's lifetime. In the third story king Sneferu becomes a victim of the author's courage to criticize the monarchy . The author depicts Sneferu as

1134-403: A text detailing a miracle performed by a lector priest in the reign of king Djoser, possibly the famous Imhotep . The second story, told by Khafre , is set during the reign of one of Khufu's predecessors. King Nebka 's chief lector Ubaoner finds that his wife is having a love affair with a townsman of Memphis , and he fashions a crocodile in wax . Upon learning that his unfaithful wife

1215-659: A wide audience, with the success of Robert E. Howard 's Conan the Barbarian and Fritz Leiber 's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories. However, it was the advent of high fantasy , and most of all J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings , which reached new heights of popularity in the late 1960s, that allowed fantasy to truly enter the mainstream . Several other series, such as C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia and Ursula K. Le Guin 's Earthsea books, helped cement

1296-615: Is One Thousand and One Nights (Arabian Nights) , which is a compilation of many ancient and medieval folk tales. Various characters from this epic have become cultural icons in Western culture, such as Aladdin , Sinbad and Ali Baba . Hindu mythology was an evolution of the earlier Vedic mythology and had many more fantastical stories and characters, particularly in the Indian epics . The Panchatantra ( Fables of Bidpai ), for example, used various animal fables and magical tales to illustrate

1377-417: Is a palimpsest ; the unknown ancient Egyptian author obviously tried but partially failed to wipe the older text off. The clean and calligraphical handwriting shows that the author was a highly educated professional. The first story, told by an unknown son of Khufu (possibly Djedefra ), is missing everything but the conclusion, in which Khufu orders blessed offerings to king Djoser . It seems to have been

1458-454: Is a reused papyrus made of the plant Cyperus papyrus . The scroll of Westcar has been separated into three parts. During the life of Lepsius and Erman it was in two parts; it is not known when and why the scroll was separated into three fragments. The text written on the papyrus includes twelve columns in all. The first part contains on the recto (the front) columns one to three, the second part contains on its recto columns four and five and

1539-410: Is covered by a glass pane. Part three was simply placed between two glass panes and was completely glued to them. The adhesive used for this has partially lost its transparency and a whitish haze has appeared. The edges of all three parts were left free for air circulation. Because of the paper lamination during the eighteenth century, all the papyrus fragments are partially damaged; at several spots

1620-400: Is meeting her lover, he casts a spell for the figurine to come to life upon contact with water, and sets his caretaker to throw it in the stream by which the townsman enters and leaves the lector's estate undiscovered. Upon catching the townsman, the crocodile takes him to the bottom of the lake, where they remain for seven days as the lector entertains the visiting pharaoh. When he tells Nebka

1701-568: Is not surprising, since the author had to be careful—the Westcar Papyrus was possibly made available for public entertainment, or at least, for public study. In the fourth story king Khufu is difficult to assess. On one hand he is depicted as ruthless: deciding to have a condemned prisoner decapitated to test the alleged magical powers of the magician Dedi. On the other hand, Khufu is depicted as inquisitive, reasonable and generous: he accepts Dedi's outrage and his offer of an alternative for

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1782-515: Is the "mother of two kings". For a long time it had been thought that she may have borne Userkaf and Sahure, but new evidence shows that Sahure, at least, had a different mother (Queen Neferhetepes ). The implication from the Westcar Papyrus that the first three kings of the Fifth Dynasty had been siblings, seems incorrect. Since, in the Westcar Papyrus , Rededjet is connected with the role of

1863-555: The Epic of Gilgamesh . The ancient Babylonian creation epic, the Enûma Eliš , in which the god Marduk slays the goddess Tiamat , contains the theme of a cosmic battle between good and evil, which is characteristic of the modern fantasy genre. Genres of romantic and fantasy literature existed in ancient Egypt. The Tales of the Court of King Khufu , which is preserved in the Westcar Papyrus and

1944-509: The Elder Edda and the Younger Edda , includes such figures as Odin and his fellow Aesir , and dwarves , elves , dragons , and giants . These elements have been directly imported into various fantasy works. The separate folklore of Ireland, Wales, and Scotland has sometimes been used indiscriminately for "Celtic" fantasy, sometimes with great effect; other writers have specified the use of

2025-585: The Golden River (1841), the history of modern fantasy literature is usually said to begin with George MacDonald , the Scottish author of such novels as Phantastes (1858) and The Princess and the Goblin (1872); the former is widely considered to be the first fantasy novel ever written for adults. MacDonald was a major influence on both J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis . The other major fantasy author of this era

2106-589: The RPG products sold in 2005. The science fantasy role-playing game series Final Fantasy has been an icon of the role-playing video game genre (as of 2012 it was still among the top ten best-selling video game franchises ). The first collectible card game , Magic: The Gathering , has a fantasy theme and is similarly dominant in the industry. Fantasy encompasses numerous subgenres characterized by particular themes or settings, or by an overlap with other literary genres or forms of speculative fiction. They include

2187-676: The Rings film trilogy directed by Peter Jackson , and the Harry Potter films, two of the highest-grossing film series in cinematic history. Fantasy role-playing games cross several different media. Dungeons & Dragons was the first tabletop role-playing game and remains the most successful and influential. According to a 1999 survey in the United States , 6% of 12- to 35-year-olds have played role-playing games. Of those who play regularly, two thirds play D&D . Products branded Dungeons & Dragons made up over fifty percent of

2268-470: The Supernatural in the 1890s and 1920s , Lizzie Harris McCormick, Jennifer Mitchell, and Rebecca Soares describe how the social climate in the 1890s and 1920s allowed for a new era of "fantastic" literature to grow. Women were finally exploring the new freedoms given to them and were quickly becoming equals in society. The fear of the new women in society, paired with their growing roles, allowed them to create

2349-524: The Westcar Papyrus consists of twelve columns written in hieratic script. Miriam Lichtheim dates the document to the Hyksos period (eighteenth to sixteenth century BC) and states that it is written in classical Middle Egyptian . Linguist and Egyptologist Verena Lepper thinks it is possible that the Westcar Papyrus was written during the Thirteenth Dynasty . The papyrus has been used by historians as

2430-456: The absence of scientific or macabre themes, although these can occur in fantasy. In popular culture , the fantasy genre predominantly features settings that emulate Earth, but with a sense of otherness. In its broadest sense, however, fantasy consists of works by many writers, artists, filmmakers, and musicians from ancient myths and legends to many recent and popular works. Many works of fantasy use magic or other supernatural elements as

2511-505: The air of uncertainty in its narratives as described by Todorov. Jackson also introduces the idea of reading the fantastic through a psychoanalytical lens, referring primarily to Freud's theory of the unconscious, which she believes is integral to understanding the fantastic's connection to the human psyche. There are however additional ways to view the fantastic, and often these differing perspectives come from differing social climates. In their introduction to The Female Fantastic: Gender and

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2592-476: The ancient Greek traditions of Herodotus and Diodorus , who described an exaggerated, negative character image of Khufu, ignoring the paradoxical (because positive) traditions the Egyptians always taught. But other Egyptologists such as Dietrich Wildung see Khufu's order as an act of mercy : the prisoner would have received his life back if Dedi had performed his magical trick. Wildung thinks that Dedi's refusal

2673-438: The author uses worldbuilding to create characters, situations, and settings that may not be possible in reality. Many fantasy authors use real-world folklore and mythology as inspiration; and although another defining characteristic of the fantasy genre is the inclusion of supernatural elements, such as magic, this does not have to be the case. Fantasy has often been compared to science fiction and horror because they are

2754-516: The beginning of a new dynasty by making the only danger disappear. The author of the Westcar Papyrus artfully creates some kind of happy ending . Since the first translations of the Westcar Papyrus, historians and Egyptologists have disputed whether the story was finished or unfinished. Earlier evaluations seemed to show an abrupt ending after the death of the traitorous maidservant. But more recently, linguistic investigations made by Verena Lepper and Miriam Liechtheim (especially by Lepper) strengthen

2835-443: The birth of the triplets and the beginning of a new dynasty. Lepper and Liechtheim both evaluate the story as some kind of narrated moral that deals with the theme of justice and what happens to traitors . Lepper points out, that the story of Rededjet might have been inspired by the historical figure of Khentkaus I , who lived and may have ruled at the end of the Fourth Dynasty . Among the titles discovered to have been given to her

2916-580: The central Indian principles of political science . Chinese traditions have been particularly influential in the vein of fantasy known as Chinoiserie , including such writers as Ernest Bramah and Barry Hughart . Beowulf is among the best known of the Old English tales in the English speaking world, and has had deep influence on the fantasy genre; several fantasy works have retold the tale, such as John Gardner 's Grendel . Norse mythology , as found in

2997-409: The character description of Djoser is impossible due to the great deterioration within his story. In the second story, king Nebka plays the key role. He is depicted as a strict, but lawful judge , who doesn't allow mischief and misbehaviour to occur. The adulterous wife of the story's hero is punished by being burnt alive and her secret lover, revealed thanks to the loyal caretaker, is eaten alive by

3078-631: The circular effect that all fantasy works, even the later The Lord of the Rings , were therefore classified as children's literature . Political and social trends can affect a society's reception towards fantasy. In the early 20th century, the New Culture Movement 's enthusiasm for Westernization and science in China compelled them to condemn the fantastical shenmo genre of traditional Chinese literature. The spells and magical creatures of these novels were viewed as superstitious and backward, products of

3159-646: The convention. The first WFC was held in 1975 and it has occurred every year since. The convention is held at a different city each year. Additionally, many science fiction conventions, such as Florida's FX Show and MegaCon , cater to fantasy and horror fans. Anime conventions, such as Ohayocon or Anime Expo frequently feature showings of fantasy, science fantasy, and dark fantasy series and films, such as Majutsushi Orphen (fantasy), Sailor Moon (urban fantasy), Berserk (dark fantasy), and Spirited Away (fantasy). Many science fiction/fantasy and anime conventions also strongly feature or cater to one or more of

3240-403: The court, and upon Dedi's arrival he orders a goose, an undefined waterbird, and a bull beheaded. Dedi reattaches the heads. Khufu then questions him on his knowledge on the shrine of Thoth, and Dedi answers that he does not know the number of rooms, but he knows where they are. When Khufu asks for the wheres and hows, Dedi answers that he is not the one who can give Khufu access, but the first of

3321-469: The difference of critical traditions of each country have led to controversies such as the one led by Stanislaw Lem . Rosemary Jackson builds onto and challenges as well Todorov's definition of the fantastic in her 1981 nonfiction book Fantasy: The Literature of Subversion . Jackson rejects the notion of the fantastic genre as a simple vessel for wish fulfillment that transcends human reality in worlds presented as superior to our own, instead positing that

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3402-415: The difficult birth. The three children are born, each described as strong and healthy, with limbs covered in gold and wearing headdresses of lapis lazuli . The maidservant of Rededjet later has an argument with her mistress, receives a beating and flees, vowing to tell king Khufu what had happened. But on the way, she meets her brother and tells the story to him. Displeased, he beats her, too, and sends her on

3483-420: The early 1860s and Lepsius' name does not appear in any lists or documents. Furthermore, Lepsius never made the text of the Westcar Papyrus public; he stored the papyrus at home in his attic , where it was found after his death. These inconsistencies have led to widespread speculation; many British historians speculate that Lepsius may have stolen the papyrus. In 1886, German Egyptologist Adolf Erman purchased

3564-510: The fantastic is a liminal space , characterized by the intrusion of supernatural elements into the realistic framework of a story, accompanied by uncertainty about their existence. However, this precise definition is not the predominant one in English critical literature, and the French term fantastique is used to differentiate the French concept from the broader English term of fantastic, synonym of fantasy. The restrictive definition of Todorov and

3645-429: The fantastic represents the unspoken desire for greater societal change. Jackson criticizes Todorov's theory as being too limited in scope, examining only the literary function of the fantastic, and expands his structuralist theory to fit a more cultural study of the genre—which, incidentally, she proposes is not a genre at all, but a mode that draws upon literary elements of both realistic and supernatural fiction to create

3726-554: The fantasy publisher Tor Books , men outnumber women by 67% to 33% among writers of historical, epic or high fantasy. But among writers of urban fantasy or paranormal romance, 57% are women and 43% are men. Fantasy is studied in a number of disciplines including English and other language studies, cultural studies , comparative literature , history and medieval studies . Some works make political, historical and literary connections between medievalism and popular culture. French literature theorists as Tzvetan Todorov argues that

3807-401: The first time, women started to possess more masculine or queer qualities without it becoming as much of an issue. The fantastic during this time period reflects these new ideas by breaking parallel boundaries in the supernatural. The fantastic breaks this boundary by having the readers never truly know whether or not the story is supernatural. Westcar Papyrus The surviving material of

3888-526: The following: In her 2008 book Rhetorics of Fantasy , Farah Mendlesohn proposes the following taxonomy of fantasy, as "determined by the means by which the fantastic enters the narrated world", while noting that there are fantasies that fit none of the patterns: Publishers, editors, authors, artists, and scholars with interest in the fantasy genre get together yearly at the World Fantasy Convention . The World Fantasy Awards are presented at

3969-528: The genre is inseparable from real life, particularly the social and cultural contexts within which each work of the fantastic is produced. She writes that the "unreal" elements of fantastic literature are created only in direct contrast to the boundaries set by its time period's "cultural order", acting to illuminate the unseen limitations of said boundaries by undoing and recompiling the very structures which define society into something "strange" and "apparently new". In subverting these societal norms, Jackson claims,

4050-629: The genre's popularity. The popularity of the fantasy genre has continued to increase in the 21st century, as evidenced by the best-selling status of J. K. Rowling 's Harry Potter series, Robert Jordan 's The Wheel of Time series, George R. R. Martin 's Song of Ice and Fire series, Steven Erikson 's Malazan Book of the Fallen sweeping epic, Brandon Sanderson 's The Stormlight Archive series and Mistborn series, and A. Sapkowski 's The Witcher saga. Several fantasy film adaptations have achieved blockbuster status, most notably The Lord of

4131-495: The idea that many ancient Egyptian writings were influenced by the Westcar Papyrus : column 232 contains the phrase "sleeping until dawn", which appears nearly word-for-word in the Westcar Papyrus . A further descriptive example appears in The prophecy of Neferti . As in the Westcar Papyrus, a subaltern is addressed by a king as "my brother" and the king is depicted as being accostable and simple-minded. Furthermore, both stories talk about

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4212-520: The kings are addressed with their birth name , notwithstanding that this was unusual in the author's lifetime. While deceased kings were normally called by their birth name, living kings were called by their Horus name . King Khufu is nevertheless called by his birth name in the first three stories, yet in the fourth story, he is treated as being still alive and being the main actor. And even the future kings Userkaf , Sahure , and Neferirkare Kakai are called by their birth names. Verena Lepper thinks, that

4293-415: The major categories of speculative fiction . Fantasy is distinguished from science fiction by the plausibility of the narrative elements. A science fiction narrative is unlikely, though seemingly possible through logical scientific or technological extrapolation, where fantasy narratives do not need to be scientifically possible. Authors have to rely on the readers' suspension of disbelief , an acceptance of

4374-484: The material is torn, distorted, and squashed. Some of the fibres are now lying over the inscription. All of the artifact shows large gaps and the rim of the scrolls is badly frayed. Because of the gaps, many parts of the text are now missing. The text itself is completely written in black iron gall ink and carbon black ink and divided by rubra into ten paragraphs. Between the neatly written sentences red traces of an older text are visible. It looks as if Papyrus Westcar

4455-502: The modern fantasy genre. Plato used allegories to convey many of his teachings, and early Christian writers interpreted both the Old and New Testaments as employing parables to relay spiritual truths. This ability to find meaning in a story that is not literally true became the foundation that allowed the modern fantasy genre to develop. The most well known fiction from the Islamic world

4536-404: The name of the author has been lost. The most recent translations and linguistic investigations by Miriam Lichtheim and Verena Lepper reveal interesting writing and spelling elements hidden in the text of the papyrus, which has led them to a new evaluation of the individual stories. The first story is lost due to damage to the papyrus. The preserved sentences merely reveal the main protagonist of

4617-420: The palace lake. Sneferu orders twenty beautiful oars made, and gives the women nets to drape around them as they sail. However, one of the girls loses an amulet - a fish pendant made of turquoise so dear to her that she will not even accept a substitute from the royal treasury , and until it is returned to her neither she nor any of the other women will row. The king laments this, and the chief lector folds aside

4698-462: The papyrus from Lepsius' son and left it to the Museum of Berlin. As the hieratic signs were still insufficiently investigated and translated, the Westcar Papyrus was displayed as some kind of curiosity . Since Erman's first attempt at a complete translation in 1890, the Westcar Papyrus has been translated numerous times, resulting in different outcomes. The dating of the text also varies. Papyrus Westcar

4779-574: The papyrus from Westcar's niece. As Lepsius was able to read some signs of Hieratic , he recognized some of the royal cartouche names of the kings and dated the text to the Old Kingdom . There are inconsistencies about the true nature of the acquisition and the subsequent whereabouts of the Westcar Papyrus. Lepsius writes that the document was on display in the Oxford Bodleian Library , but public exhibitions have been documented there since

4860-417: The prisoner, questions the circumstances and contents of Dedi's prophecy, and rewards the magician generously. The contradictory depiction of Khufu is an object of controversy among Egyptologists and historians to this day. Earlier Egyptologists and historians in particular, such as Adolf Erman , Kurt Heinrich Sethe , and Wolfgang Helck evaluated Khufu's character as heartless and sacrilegious . They lean on

4941-570: The reason may be some kind of spelling reform that occurred in the lifetime of the author, perhaps trying to fix the spelling rule for naming a deceased king, in order to show that even the future kings in the story were long since dead during his lifetime. For this reason Verena Lepper doubts that the Westcar stories are based on documents originating from the Old Kingdom. The fourth and fifth stories are written in present tense . The unknown author moves

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5022-430: The same king, Sneferu. The Papyrus pAthen contains the phrase: "...for these are the wise who can move waters and make a river flow at their mere will and want...", which clearly refers to the wonder that the magicians Djadjaemankh and Dedi had performed in the Westcar story. Since pAthen , pBerlin 3023 and The prophecy of Neferti use the same manner of speaking and quaint phrases, complete with numerous allusions to

5103-458: The several subcultures within the main subcultures, including the cosplay subculture (in which people make or wear costumes based on existing or self-created characters, sometimes also acting out skits or plays as well), the fan fiction subculture, and the fan video or AMV subculture, as well as the large internet subculture devoted to reading and writing prose fiction or doujinshi in or related to those genres. According to 2013 statistics by

5184-465: The social structure to emerge. The fantastic is never purely supernatural, nor can the supernatural be ruled out. Just as women were not equal yet, but they were not completely oppressed. The Female Fantastic seeks to enforce this idea that nothing is certain in the fantastic nor the gender roles of the 1920s. Many women in this time period began to blur the lines between the genders, removing the binary out of gender and allowing for many interpretations. For

5265-404: The story of Dedi. The last section of the fourth story, in which the magician Dedi gives a prophecy to king Khufu, shifts to future tense for a short time, before shifting back to present tense again. This present tense is maintained until the end of the Westcar stories. Papyrus Westcar contains hidden allusions and puns to the characters of the kings Nebka, Sneferu, and Khufu. An evaluation of

5346-449: The story of the Westcar Papyrus . They also both talk about subalterns with magical powers similar to those of Dedi's. The Papyrus pBerlin 3023 contains the story, The Eloquent Peasant , in which the following phrase appears: "See, these are artists who create the existing anew, who even replace a severed head", which could be interpreted as an allusion to the Westcar Papyrus . pBerlin 3023 contains another reference that strengthens

5427-463: The story, King Djoser. The name of the hero, who is said to have performed the miracle, is completely lost, but Liechtheim and Lepper think it's possible that the Papyrus was talking about the famous architect and high lector priest, Imhotep. The second and third stories are written in a conspicuous, flowery, old-fashioned style, and the author has obviously tried to make them sound as if handed down from

5508-439: The story, and calls the crocodile up again, the king orders the crocodile to devour the townsman once and for all. Then he has the adulterous wife brought forth, set on fire, and thrown in the river. The third story, told by another son named Baufra , is set during the reign of his grandfather Sneferu . The king is bored and his chief lector Djadjaemankh advises him to gather twenty young women and use them to sail him around

5589-418: The tales of Papyrus Westcar inspired later authors to compose and write down similar tales. They refer to multiple, and somewhat later, ancient Egyptian writings in which magicians perform very similar magic tricks and make prophecies to a king. Descriptive examples are the papyri pAthen and The prophecy of Neferti . These novels show the popular theme of prophesying used during the Old Kingdom – just as in

5670-444: The theory that the Westcar text is definitely at an end after the story of the maidservant's death. Lepper points out that the crocodile sequence is repeated several times, like a kind of refrain , which is a typical element in similar stories and documents. Furthermore, Lepper argues that the papyrus has a lot of free space after the apparent ending, enough for another short story. Verena Lepper and Miriam Lichtheim postulate that

5751-401: The third part contains on the verso (the back) columns six to nine and on the recto, the final columns, ten to twelve. The papyrus textile is grainy, of greyish-yellowish colour and very fragile. Part one was fixed onto linen and placed between two glass panes. At five spots the papyrus was fixed to the glass with methyl cellulose . Part two was fixed to a cardboard and wooden plate and

5832-523: The three future kings in the womb of the woman Rededjet is. This is a prophecy detailing the beginnings of the Fifth Dynasty , starting with Userkaf . The final story breaks from the format and moves the focus to Rededjet giving birth to her three sons. Upon the day of her children's birth, Ra orders Isis , Nephthys , Meskhenet , Heket , and Khnum to aid her. They disguise themselves as musicians and hurry to Rededjet's house to help her with

5913-441: The timeline and also changes his mode of expression from "old-fashioned" into a contemporary form. He clearly distinguishes "long time passed" from "most recently" without cutting the timeline too quickly. The speech of Prince Hordjedef builds the decisive transition: Hordjedef is sick of hearing old, dusty tales that cannot be proven. He explains that a current wonder would be richer in content and more instructive, and so he brings up

5994-462: The twentieth century, it has expanded further into various media, including film , television , graphic novels , manga , animations , and video games . The expression fantastic literature is also often used to refer to this genre by the Anglophone literary critics. An archaic spelling for the term is phantasy . Fantasy is distinguished from the genres of science fiction and horror by

6075-494: The unbelievable or impossible for the sake of enjoyment, in order to write effective fantasies. Despite both genres' heavy reliance on the supernatural, fantasy and horror are distinguishable from one another. Horror primarily evokes fear through the protagonists' weaknesses or inability to deal with the antagonists. While some elements of the supernatural and the fantastic were a part of literature from its beginning, fantasy elements occur throughout ancient religious texts such as

6156-451: The water to allow the retrieval of the amulet, then folds the water back. The fourth story, told by Hordjedef , concerns a miracle set within Khufu's own reign. A townsman named Dedi apparently has the power to reattach a severed head onto an animal, to tame wild lions , and knows the number of secret rooms in the shrine of Thoth . Khufu, intrigued, sends his son to invite this wise man to

6237-589: Was William Morris , an English poet who wrote several novels in the latter part of the century, including The Wood Beyond the World (1894) and The Well at the World's End (1896). Despite MacDonald's future influence with At the Back of the North Wind (1871), Morris's popularity with his contemporaries, and H. G. Wells 's The Wonderful Visit (1895), it was not until the 20th century that fantasy fiction began to reach

6318-590: Was an allusion to the respect Egyptians showed to human life. The ancient Egyptians were of the opinion that human life should not be misused for dark magic or similar evil things. Lepper and Liechtheim suspect that a difficult-to-assess depiction of Khufu was exactly what the author had planned. He wanted to create a mysterious character. The fifth and last story tells about the heroine Rededjet (also often read as Ruddedet ) and her difficult birth of three sons. The sun god Ra orders his companions Isis, Meskhenet, Hekhet, Nephthys, and Khnum to help Rededjet, to ensure

6399-477: Was considered more acceptable than fantasy intended for adults, with the effect that writers who wished to write fantasy had to fit their work into forms aimed at children. Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote fantasy in A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys , intended for children, although his works for adults only verged on fantasy. For many years, this and successes such as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) created

6480-401: Was founded in 1949, the pulp magazine format was at the height of its popularity, and the magazine was instrumental in bringing fantasy fiction to a wide audience in both the U.S. and Britain. Such magazines were also instrumental in the rise of science fiction, and it was at this time the two genres began to be associated with each other. By 1950, " sword and sorcery " fiction had begun to find

6561-548: Was probably written in the middle of the second half of the eighteenth century BC, preserves a mixture of stories with elements of historical fiction, fantasy, and satire. Egyptian funerary texts preserve mythological tales, the most significant of which are the myths of Osiris and his son Horus . Myth with fantastic elements intended for adults were a major genre of ancient Greek literature . The comedies of Aristophanes are filled with fantastic elements, particularly his play The Birds , in which an Athenian man builds

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