simont | Strange dreams

A reasonably well known cliché among fantasy novels where the fantasy world is accessed from the real one seems to be that at the end of the series some action is taken which seals the two worlds forever apart (perhaps to stop the publishers continuing to demand sequels), and those real-world inhabitants who have memories of the fantasy world gradually find those memories fading and eventually seeming like no more than a childish fantasy, or a dream.

(I can't actually bring to mind the name of any novel which did this, off the top of my head, but it feels like the sort of thing which wouldn't surprise me in the least if it happened at the end of any given book.)

Last night I had a dream involving a fantasy world, accessed from the real one through a doorway. At the very end of the dream I performed a magical action which closed off the two worlds from one another and turned the doorway into a cupboard – making sure to keep a couple of physical souvenirs so I'd remember it had really happened and not come to believe it was all a dream, because I knew that usually happened in this situation in books.

Then I woke up, and now (of course) I immediately believe it was all a dream. I suppose I must have lost those souvenirs down the back of the sofa or something.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It happens in, among others, Susan Cooper's Dark is Rising sequence, so you're quite right. It's something I always *hated* about fantasy when I was young - and indeed still do. If it was me, I'd rather remember forever (with whatever attendant pain that might involve) than have something like that just taken away from me.

And I'm sorry you lost your souvenirs. *half-smile*

Interestingly it doesn't happen in the Narnia books, IIRC - at least in Lion, Witch & Wardrobe the Professor turns out to remember his own trip to Narnia very clearly..

But by the Last Battle Susan thinks it was all lets-pretend.

And there is a tendancy in Narnia for Aslan to turn round and say "Aha! You're not getting back this way", even though they worlds arn't sealed apart. In fact, given that Narnia is utterly destroyed in the last book, that's a pretty drastic perminently sealing apart, in at least some ways.

In His Dark Materials (Phillip Pullman), of course, they do remember after the worlds are sealed... and I was going to go on, but then it gets spoilerish.

It'll be interesting to see where he takes it if he does decide to write a second trilogy. </musing aloud>

I think I wish my dreams made that much sense. :p

I go through phases of having vivid, internally logical and really interesting and fun dreams, and other phases of having nothing worth remembering at all or confusing mishmashes of completely nonsensical drivel that cause me to wake up and mutter "what the hell was that all about then?". These phases can last for months at a time, so every time I have a fun dream I can at least hope it might be a harbinger of months of fun dreams to come :-)

It'll be interesting to see where he takes it if he does decide to write a second trilogy.

The knife has been shown to be mendable once, and the pieces were explicitly all carefully collected after the second breaking...

Philip Pullman's already been cited... Narnia, too, to an extent, uses it, in that the wardrobe refuses to work as a doorway for certain characters as they grow older - I think the Professor in The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe says he's tried in the past after being able to get into Narnia, but never had it work again. Or something. They remember, at least, what it was like. (Except Susan, who becomes too grown up to remember it properly.)

Mmm. Narnia did spring to mind, but as you say only Susan really counts as an amnesiac, and the strong implication is that she only forgot because she didn't really want to remember.

perhaps to stop the publishers continuing to demand sequels

*snort* very wisely spoken, O sage and onions. Have you read 'The Tough Guide to Fantasyland'?

O sage and onions

I'm sure there's a joke to be made here about stuffed shirts. Hmm.

Have you read 'The Tough Guide to Fantasyland'?

No, but it sounds quite fun, and what DWJ I have read I've enjoyed.

Strange dreams

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