Why Fantasy?

For a long time now I've been wondering if there isn't something a little wrong with me.  Why am I writing medieval fantasy?  And why would it be relevant to modern readers, if at all?

Is there something inherently "off" about a grown-up, middle-class, professional woman living in one of the most technologically advanced parts of the world and of human history, who spends her free time writing stories about maidens in distress, magical gryphons, and heros with swords and magical abilities?

(You know, just in case on or the other fails.  No sword? Use magic. No magic?  Use sword.)

It amazes me how popular the "The Lord of the Rings" books and movies still are, sixty years after their publication.  And Harry Potter.  And all the vampire, werewolf, etc. movies.  Why did the "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" series take off the way it did?  And oh, my goodness, did we really need another Robin Hood movie last year?  Don't get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed it but I kept asking myself "Why?"


Why is a modern, socially and intellectually enlightened audience so fascinated with tales we associate with the Dark Ages- a time steeped in poverty, violence, disease and ignorance?  Particularly the paranormal or magical aspect.  Shouldn't we be past this?  Haven't we grown up yet?  What does this say about us?

Is there something unacknowledged in modern life which we are trying to find or to escape from?  Or is it just a general love of adventure stories, well-told or well-acted, that keeps drawing us in?

That nagging feeling

Becoming a writer means that for the rest of your life, no matter what you are doing, there will be this nagging feeling that you should be writing.  You can have no rest or peace of mind until your current project is done, and even in the midst of it you'll think of one or two or ten other things to start on.
- Christine Hardy

79,602 Words

I am now at 79,602 words of my nth draft.  Since I keep going back to the beginning and starting over, this is actually only the second draft of this latter portion of the book.

Plot is key at this point - it's pretty much all tension and action.  Groan!  Why couldn't I have written a nice children's book about cute furry mice or something like that?

If you also write fantasy, in case you aren't insecure enough already, here's a excellent article at "Writing World" which I re-discovered recently:
Keeping Your Fantasy Armies a Little Less Fantastic

Author

It's a universal truth

That when the writer's muse is hiding

The primary topic she writes about

Is writing.

If the author is feeling tired,

Her characters fall asleep.

If she's been thwarted in love,

The hero is chained in a keep.

But if she is dieting

What miserable tragedies then

Will be unfurled in the fictional world

By the tip of her omnipotent pen.

~ Christine Hardy

If there's a book you really want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.  
~Toni Morrison

Authors vs. Writers

"Authors are rareified creatures, you know, who write serious fiction."
"And writers...?"
"Write books people buy," she explained, with a twinkle of mischief.

- Susanna Kearsley, Named of the Dragon

Describing Point-of-View Characters

Ray Rhamey at Flogging the Quill has a great post up on his blog about this topic. I've struggled mightily with decisions about how much to describe and how.

I've come to the conclusion that although Ray's post is right on the nose for the kind of fiction he writes (mostly suspense), the question of how much to describe does differ among genres.  Romance seems to almost require detailed physical descriptions of main characters.  Science fiction and fantasy require some description as well, since the characters are expected to be physically unusual in some way.  Other genres can leave more to the imagination, since they are more obviously ordinary humans except for some distinguishing characteristic like a unibrow or flaming red hair.

What do you think?  How do you handle the problem of describing point-of-view characters?  Or do you prefer to leave it up to the reader?  How much description do you think is expected in your genre?