(no subject)

[skygiants]

So one of the panels I attended at Arisia was a panel on kings and class and aristocracy in fantasy. It was probably one of my favorite panels overall, and the panelists all had extremely interesting things to say, but one thing that I was hoping for that didn't really happen was any kind of discussion of the fantasy that does buck the trend and go full-on republican.

...well, okay, a lot of people brought up Terry Pratchett, but the fact that no one could think of anything besides Discworld is PRETTY TELLING, I think. And while Ankh-Morpork isn't monarchist, it's hella dictatorial, so we're setting Discworld aside for now, officially, as of this sentence.

Anyway, later that day genarti and sandrylene and I sat down and started making a list, and this is what we came up with:

- Lloyd Alexander's Westmark books
- Frances Hardinge's Fly By Night/Fly Trap and Gullstruck Island
- China Mieville's Bas Lag books
- Hiromu Arakawa's Fullmetal Alchemist
- N.K. Jemisin's The Killing Moon, but then SPOILER ALERT they get the monarchy back at the end of the sequel, so ....
- Diana Wynne Jones' Dalemark books ... sort of ....? This is really a stretch, because for all its proletarian impulses and critique of aristocracy, The Crown of Dalemark does conclude pretty emphatically with "HERE IS THE NEW DIVINELY ORDAINED MONARCH." My only justification is that if I remember correctly Dalemark does become a constitutional republic by Maewen's time, but I might just be making that up.
- Fuyumi Ono's Twelve Kingdoms also, sort of, which is even MORE of a stretch because the entire SERIES is about divinely ordained kings, it's just that it's also a really well done critique of the system ... but it's not like they can get rid of the divinely ordained kings ... yeah, as much as I love it Twelve Kingdoms shouldn't really be on here. This is how desperate we were.

There is also a subset of republican/revolutionary fantasy, which is the books where instead of revolting against kings everyone just straight up revolts against the gods:

- Philip Pullman's Golden Compass
- Anne Ursu's Cronus Chronicles, which ruined me a little for the Rick Riordan books by setting up a world in which Greek gods were real and had authority over humanity and then taking it to its logical conclusion of "AND THAT WOULD BE THE ACTUAL WORST, LET'S FIX THAT"
- Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman's Good Omens, kind of

And ... that's it? That's all we could think of. But that can't possibly be it it. Help! What are some other republican/revolutionary fantasies?

("What about stuff like the Hunger Games?" said Gen. "YA dystopia doesn't count," I said, "because it's not fantasy, it's sci-fi, and it's working off a different set of tropes." And then we argued about that for a bit, but the end result is I'm ruling out stuff like the Hunger Games. Revolution against an oppressive regime is absolutely a staple of the YA dystopia paradigm, but I think that's a different conversation.

We are also none of us all that well versed in urban fantasy, but someone on the panel pointed out, quite rightly, that like 60% of urban fantasy involves some kind of fairy court that is totally aristocratic/monarchical, and I'm pretty sure that the other 40% involves some kind of strictly hierarchical werewolf or vampire social structure with an alpha werewolf/vampire king/etc. That said, if anyone has an example of a book in which someone LEADS THE REVOLUTION against the monarchical urban fantasy fairies/hierarchical werewolves, please do feel free to throw it into the pot!)

I am also one hundred percent sure I am not the first person to discuss this topic on the Internet, so if anybody has links to other posts/lists along these lines, that would also be great.

Comments

[percysowner]

I don't read a lot of urban fantasy. The only ones I do read are by Rob Thurman they are set in present day America and there is no alpha structure, so there is no revolution against it. The Cal Leandros series has vampires and werewolves but there is no overarching structure. So there is at least one urban fantasy in a democratic society.

[skygiants]

That's a start! I'm curious if they really concern themselves with governing structures at all other than "it's the United States!" Is there, like, a Magic Council or something?

[laceblade]

I haven't yet finished Cold Steel, but I'm pretty sure a revolution's going to happen by the end of this book, making Kate Elliott's Spiritwalker Trilogy fit!

[skygiants]

Oh, I haven't read Cold Steel yet either, but it's true Kate Elliott is at least playing with some different systems of fantasy government beyond KINGS ARE GREAT. But mostly what I remember is AU Napoleon, who isn't a king ... but is also not about to usher in a democracy, either.

[lacewood]

Does... organised crime count? Margaret Ronald's Spiral Hunt involves bringing down a ruling hierarchy in Boston that is basically the MAGIC MOB. So far as I recall most of said organised crime involved faceless corporate types with not much of a central king figure or hereditary basis of succession (unless I have totally failed to remember this being a thing). Spoiler alert, the magic mob is not replaced with a monarchy.

Kate Griffin's Matthew Swift urban fantasy series had the Midnight Mayor, who is typically chosen by their equivalent of corporate succession, so it's arguably a corporate/republican system (though the in-series version is an outlier to this for various reasons) There are no revolutions.

The Borribles trilogy by Michael de Larrabeiti is arguably ANARCHIST urban fantasy (the Borribles operate on a gang system, and are basically rebelling against Everything Ever)

Sadly I am completely failing to think of any non-urban fantasy examples that might remotely fit. Wow, this is amazing. As I recall, at least some of the MANY powers causing chaos in Phillip Reeve's Mortal Cities quartet had to be run on a non-monarchist system...? /clutching at straws here That's basically post-apocalyptic dystopia though.

[skygiants]

Organized crime is I think a legitimately different kind of system of government than royalty!

...unless there is a KINGPIN, wacka-wacka ba-dum bing.

I don't thiiiink there were any kings in the Mortal Engines, actually, you're right! Weren't the cities run by councils or something and then, like, a set of revolutionary bio-anarchists? I keep wanting to call them the Green Party but I don't think that's actually accurate. You are also correct that Mortal Engines is also more steampunkish sff than fantasy though ....

[sophia_sol]

Oh, interesting question. Going through my list of books read in the last few years, I'm not coming up with much that fits the bill. Hmmm, I will have to think about this some more.

(but all of a sudden I really really want to read about the french revolution in Temeraire-verse!)

[skygiants]

I don't understand why there aren't more books that are the equivalent of "French Revolution WITH DRAGONS!"

[hebethen]

One of the Circle of Magic books was set in a semirepresentatively governed state, I believe. I think the structure of the fairy world in the Artemis Fowl books was also representative government? All of Jasper Fforde's literature meta-y stuff, if it counts as fantasy, has elected government in it somewhere also, although there are some mythical figures that pop by once in a while and everyone generally defers to them if they show up. The wizards in Young Wizards aren't monarchial, no?

[skygiants]

No monarchies in Young Wizards! Actually, in another panel, there was discussion of urban fantasy (adult) vs. suburban fantasy (YA, Kids From Our World get in wacky magical hijinks), and I think that both Young Wizards and Harry Potter, which someone brought up below, would sort of fall under that. Maybe suburban fantasy doesn't have to be monarchical!

I never read Artemis Fowl, but the fact that the fairies have a representative government is actually pretty cool.

[kate_nepveu]

Does _FMA_ really count? There's still military rule at the end of it, after all.

The Kitty Norville books show how the conventional werewolf pack structure can be abusive, but four books in just replaces the leadership of that pack.

I can't remember what happens to the Arameri rule in _The Kingdom of Gods_. I should really get on re-reading that.

[oyceter]

I'm pretty sure by the end of the book, most of the other kingdoms (or a great deal of them, lead in part by Darre) are in revolt against the Arameri and basically make Shahar accept a more council-like rule, so possibly that counts?

[minkhollow]

Five out of six places in Villains By Necessity have democracy-shaped things going on! ...but whether the people actually chose that or Mizzamir forced everyone into it (for the Greater Good, of course) is up in the air, and I lean toward the latter.

Either way, the state of the government isn't the driving plot point, though I do imagine a couple of those installed democracies fall to bits post-canon, and the others take a turn toward the kind of mudslinging we see every year.

[skygiants]

I want to see more fantasy that examines the state of the government! Right now I will keep holding the Westmark books close to my heart.

[newredshoes]

I am absolutely certain that socialist/communist dwarves has been a thing I've seen or read multiple times now. Oh! I remember: one was in The Book of Lost Things, which I loathed, and the first example I saw was in The Tenth Kingdom.

[skygiants]

Whoa, that's such a weirdly specific and interesting trope! I mean, I guess the thought process is dwarves --> miners --> UNIONS --> SOCIALISM!!!!! maybe? (Dwarves --> short, weird, like gold, have big noses --> Jews --> Trotsky --> COMMUNISM!!!!!?)

[luzula]

...I got nothing.

I think this is partly why I read more SF than I do fantasy these days--it's more politically interesting. Dammit, there should be more revolutions in fantasy.

Oh, wait! I got one! Elizabeth Moon's The Legacy of Gird is all about a farmers' revolt against the aristocracy. Pity her latest books in the same world are all about the rightfully ordained king, yadda yadda.

[skygiants]

ONE HUNDRED PERCENT YES. I mean, I'm going to cling to my Trinity of YA Fantasy About Revolutions (Dalemark/Westmark/Fly-by-Night) for all they're worth, but there should be so much more!

...aheh, yeah, I'm not sure it counts if the eventual endpoint is "but then, the king!"

[aberration]

I'm not sure if this requires we know the... mechanics of it, or it not be kind of fuzzy and sloppy because Rowling just wants to make fun of it, but Harry Potter did specifically reject any royalty/monarchy for the fantasy part of its world?

(ETA: And because I'm LITERALLY USING AN ICON FROM IT, but A:TLA/LoK does eventually get a Republic.)

I'd agree on THG though, not because it's YA but yeah because it's sci-fi, and sci-fi does have a whole genre history of non-monarchical dictatorships. But I was also talking about it last night with regard to The Giver and how what I'm seeing out of that movie adaptation is basically THG knock-off (and I'm SO MAD).

[skygiants]

Yeah, I was thinking about A:TLA on the subway after I made this post! It's interesting because you still mostly have inherited monarchies, but there is one Republic that .... sort of kind of mostly works.

I was thinking about YA lit and suburban fantasy above where someone was talking about Young Wizards. It's true that the whole "there is a secret world of magical people alongside the real world!" does tend to avoid monarchies for the most part.

[dorothean]

The only thing I can think of now is Philippa Gregory's Wideacre trilogy, which is really debatable.

Disqualifiers:
- marketed as historical fiction, not fantasy
- there IS a monarchy because it's set in England
- the protagonist's connection to the land is the most magical element and it's all about hereditary land ownership -- although if I remember correctly this does get challenged in some way, and possibly even completely dismantled by the end of the trilogy (it's been a while since I read them)

Qualifiers:
- there is magic
- the first book is set in the 18th century and is all about enclosure and potential farmers' revolts (n.b. I don't remember how well Gregory wrote about this -- I read these ages before I learned about enclosure anywhere else), and not in such a way that happy ending = end of revolts, restoration of status quo

[skygiants]

Hmm, interesting! I tend to class Philippa Gregory as writing within the tropes of historical fiction rather than within the tropes of fantasy, but there's definitely crossover there.

[raven]

The Annals of the Western Shore books, by Ursula Le Guin. The only one that deals with it in great detail is Voices, but this is actually one of the reasons I love it so much: there is a central character who plays the typical fantasy role of divinely-mandated-leader-whatever, and it's a minor reveal halfway through that he was elected to the position and is serving out a ten-year term! It's actually a really wonderful book.

[skygiants]

I'VE BEEN MEANING TO READ THOSE FOREVER. I have one of them and I keep trying to remember to get the other ones out of the library and not doing so.

Also, another interesting thing: at least 3/4 of the examples that people have brought up of specifically republican second-world fantasy are YA. Teens love democracy?

[thirdblindmouse]

I haven't gotten far enough into the books to see any overthrow actually happen, but I believe republican revolt against monarchy/aristocracy is part of Charles Stross's Merchant Princes series (twice over, probably), as part of his Feelings About Fantasy Tropes. (Mind you, I think he's kind of obnoxious in his Feelings About Fantasy Tropes, but I agree with him about the weird idealization of monarchy, and I approve of his Sensible AU Travel.)

[skygiants]

I've never read any Charles Stross, but that's interesting if that's the case! I've always had him pegged in my head as an SFF writer for whatever reason.

[sdelmonte]

1. LJ has this post three times. Silly LJ.

2. While The Dresden Files has the usual fairy courts and a fairly undemocratic white council of wizards who get the job due to seniority, at least that council is open to people besides white men and it seems to have some degree of meritocracy. In addition, some wizards have formed a secret grey council that might very well overthrow the white council since the white council is problematic. By and large, though, Harry Dresden just snarks about the white council.

3. Mike Carey's Felix Castor novels have absolutely no ruling bodies at all. Felix deals with the usual authority figures like the cops, big business, big science, etc. But the books are happily devoid of any fairy courts or secret orders of monster hunters.

[skygiants]

LJ HAS A LOT OF FEELINGS ABOUT REPUBLICAN FANTASY, APPARENTLY.

Yeah, I think what we are seeing is that it's a lot easier for urban fantasy just to assume everything takes place under the aegis of Your Friendly Local Government and not really concern itself with the question.

[kd7sov]

Mistborn. (No, it doesn't actually have everything. Just most things.)

Book One is primarily concerned with the planning and execution of a rebellion against the Lord Ruler, who's ruled for a thousand years because he's the Sliver of Infinity, a piece of god. (This is true, but not in the way he or his church implies.) Book Three involves attempts to destroy the god of destruction (not, worth noting, of evil; just destruction, or more precisely Ruin).

The political structure in Alloy of Law, the sequel, isn't explored much, beyond that there are lords and something along the lines of popularly-elected senators. (Specifically, someone won one with a platform that boiled down to "I can do copper magic, so I'm immune to magical emotion manipulation.")

Warbreaker also involves rebellion against a God-King, but it isn't done by the protagonists and isn't successful.

[skygiants]

Hah, none of us could remember what happened in Mistborn and whether that ended in getting rid of the monarchy or not! So thank you for reminding us.

[rachelmanija]

Urban fantasy: Holly Black's White Cat and The Coldest Girl in Coldtown. In both, magic (or vampires) exist and are publicly known, but they're set in modern-day America which is as democratic as it is currently, anyway.

I feel like I've read a lot of werewolf/vampire urban fantasy and paranormal romance where America is much as it is now politically and the werewolves/vampires don't have kings or centralized government, but of course now I can't think of specific books. If there's any kings or queens in Marjorie Liu's books, I don't remember them at all. (I think one book has an evil mermaid queen, but she might just be a powerful witch.)

[skygiants]

Hah, yeah, I think White Cat falls under the category of "MAGICAL ORGANIZED CRIME," as mentioned above. A kind of aristocracy, but not exactly the same thing! (Am I going to make my kingpin joke again? No, I will instead reference NAPOLEONS OF CRIME.)

[azara]

Illusion by Paula Volsky is a fantasy version of the French Revolution. It's a long time since I read it, and all I remember is that the heroine was a spoiled-brat aristo and that everybody who appeared was ruthless (or dead) - pretty close to the actual French Revolution, I suppose. I can't recall whether she got as far as a Directory/Empire analogue - if it did, it was a lot less vivid than the fantasy version of the Terror.

[skygiants]

Oh, I read a Paula Volsky book once! The Great Ellipse, I think? My memory says "SO MUCH IMPERIALISM, IMPERIALISM EVERYWHERE!" but my memory may not be playing fair, and anyway it is very possible that the book you are speaking of is much better about it. And about revolution!

[adiva_calandia]

I feel like there's got to be a Tanya Huff book that fits into this category, but I don't remember enough about her high fantasy books. (I've still never read Summon the Keeper.)

Her vampires are decidedly not hierarchical, but only because they have terrifically violent territorial disputes if they're in the same area. There is a really interesting theme if kingship in her vampire books, though, because Henry I'd the bastard son (NOT "SUB," AUTO CORRECT) of Henry VIII, and he has semi-mystical princely charisma. Huff basically posits, add Pratchett does, that a lot of people are just inclined to bend at the knees to charismatic kingly types, but she also had multiple characters who reject our resent Henry using his "Prince of Men" voice at them. But ... That probably doesn't quite count.

[skygiants]

Tanya Huff was actually on this panel, so I spent a lot of time trying to remember the political structure in her Quarters books while I was listening to it! All kings, though, as far as I remember.

I don't know how I feel about mystical princely charisma!

[rymenhild]

Kushner and Sherman, The Fall of the Kings, is a head-on collision between the council of lords status quo and the restoring the monarchs plot. The council is corrupt and not really republican, but I think the book itself concludes that the city is better off with the council.

[skygiants]

I was trying to remember what the governing structure was in those books! All I could remember was ARISTOCRATS and DUELS.

[newredshoes]

Oh, wait! Isn't His Dark Materials all about overthrowing the Magisterium to create the Republic of Heaven?

[skygiants]

It is! I have it listed up there under "revolts AGAINST THE GODS," which is a subset of the genre I actually kind of love (as distinct from my feelings about His Dark Materials itself, which are complicated.) Hell yeah, overthrow sucky systems of the universe and make new ones!

[shati]

Are you specifically looking for fantasy non-monarchal governments where the government is fictional? Magical? Either? Because urban fantasy often also has the actual government of the city it's set in, but ... that's not ... okay there is a magical e at the end here I can't delete, fuck phone typing. Anyway. OH I GOT IT!

[skygiants]

More the former than the latter, yes! The latter is more a side project. I would especially like to see more second world fantasy in which NOBODY TURNS OUT TO BE SECRETLY THE KING!

[lannamichaels]

Thanks for those book recs. I was at that panel and was very curious about that. Fantasy republican governments are highly relevant to my interests. ;)

[skygiants]

Oh, awesome! Then you may have guessed I was the person in the audience who was like "CAN ANYONE THINK OF EXAMPLES OF REPUBLICAN FANTASY? :D"

[opusculasedfera]

There definitely isn't a lot of it, and most of what I can think of is urban fantasy that's just using modern political systems (e.g. McKinley's Sunshine, where the US govt is still standing and mostly recogniseable, despite vampires and demons and suchlike.)

There's a revolution in Amanda Downum's The Drowning City, but I don't think it goes all the way to the top, it's more a shifted balance of municipal power in a monarchical state. (She does write excellent politics, but there's usually hereditary rule at the back of it, even if it's realistically non-absolute.) In Hiromi Goto's The Water of Possibility, I believe the story ends with a more communal society being established, though one with family hierarchies, but it's also YA. and not very explicitly political. Candas Jane Dorsey's Black Wine contains both a variety of societies, some of which are democratic or socialist, and a revolution against monarchy, though it's not totally clear by the end of the book how successful they've been at fixing the social structure. Holly Lisle's Fire in the Mist has some cities that don't appear to have hereditary leaders, though she's vague about their political systems except for mentions of mayors and councils and that kind of thing.

If there's a trend here, I'd have to say it's cities being allowed to be more democratic than nations, which is probably another one of those tropes that comes from fantasy being assumed to be set in somewhere awfully like medieval Europe.

[skygiants]

I have read none of these things and they all sound interesting, so thank you for mentioning them! I agree, I think fantasy has more democratic cities than states. Maybe just because writers have to admit that being the king of a city sounds ... kind of silly.

[rushthatspeaks]

There's an intensely weird thing in Steven Brust's Dragaera books where there is a metaphysical thing which determines which group is in charge, and most of the time these groups have a monarchical setup where there is an imperial throne and heirs and reigning families, but when one particular group is in charge that group institutes a republic. And then it goes back to a monarchy when the metaphysics changes again. Members of the republic-desiring group are in rebellion against the monarchy during one of the times in which the books are set, but it's pretty clear that it won't work because they're rebelling against the government when they'd need to be trying to overturn the metaphysical thing.

I have never seen another set of books in which there is just this occasional nonviolent switch from monarchy to republic and back, though. Dragaerans are strange people.

One of the major plot points of Gemma Files' Hexslinger books is that an Aztec deity would like to establish a divine kingship over most of America, and many other people would rather found a magical representative democracy, which they in fact eventually do. It's not the same democracy as the U.S., which is present in the eastern chunk of the continent, because magic-users have issues which mean they need to do some things differently, but it is a democracy.

[skygiants]

Wow, I can't say I've ever heard of anything like that, either. How interesting! You know, it strikes me I've also never encountered the DIVINELY MANDATED REPUBLIC, which would be kind of a fascinating twist.

I haven't read the Hexslinger books, but the first one is on my Kindle to be read at some point in the near future!

[gramarye1971]

I suppose that the Gurren Lagann anime would count in some respects, since the protagonists fight to overthrow the Spiral King who has forced humanity to live underground for countless years, and when they succeed they all become part of the new world government (which seems to be run more on a council line than a straight-up monarchy, even if there is a titular head).

[skygiants]

I haven't seen Gurren Lagann, but it sounds like it might well fit! I was trying to think of other anime/manga that might work along the FMA lines, but I couldn't think of any really -- although it has just struck me that Angel Sanctuary is a classic "revolution against THE GODS!!!!" story...