Literary meme

[altivo]

Something like this has been going around Facebook. I think it more interesting, though, to show both positive and negative choices.

Name 5 fictitious worlds or places in which you would like to live. Give name of the place, if it has one, the title of a work in which the place appears, and the author of the work. Give preference to works of literature, rather than film or television plays.

Do the same for 5 fictitious worlds or places in which you would definitely not want to live.

Here are my choices. I would like to live in:

1. Valdemar, the world of Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar series of novels.
2. Argaea, the world of Kyell Gold's novels Volle and Pendant of Fortune.
3. Tornor, the world of Elizabeth A. Lynn's Chronicles of Tornor trilogy.
4. The western part of North America as despicted in Richard Amory's Loon novels, and Willow Song.
5. Earthsea, the world of Ursula LeGuin's A Wizard of Earthsea and sequels.

I would not want to live in:

1. The Land of Oz as described in Gregory Maguire's Wicked and sequels.
2. Middle Earth as described in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings.
3. The world depicted in Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451.
4. The world in which Stephen King's Dark Tower series is set.
5. The universe of Orson Scott Card's Songmaster or Speaker for the Dead.

Comments

[silver-kiden.livejournal.com]

i started reading this, and the first thing to pop into my mind was valdemar :p also have to agree with argaea. hmm...then the Wheel of Time universe, robert jordan, but during the age of legends. and finally, the two worlds that Tamora Pierce wrote for, Emalon, which is the circle of magic series, and tortall, the lioness series and those related works.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I've tried a couple of times to read Jordan, but can't get into his stuff. It all seems so brutal and violent and I can't find any interest point to hold my attention.

Tamora Pierce poses a different problem for me. Her books sound very good, I like the ideas they apparently present, and I've bought several of them, yet I haven't been able to get through them. In essence, they put me to sleep. It might be the preponderance of female characters, I'm not sure.

[hellmutt.livejournal.com]

I can only think of one fictional world in which I'd like to live. But countless I'd hate. Guess I should read more widely?

I wonder how many people listed Plato's Republic...

[hellmutt.livejournal.com]

Oh, and now I notice Narnia is in neither of your lists... hmm... :)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Narnia was actually on the "yes" list, but got bumped by one of the others since there could only be five listed. ;p

Like Middle Earth, though, I'd be choosy about WHEN and WHERE in Narnia. In fact, I might choose to live in Archenland rather than Narnia proper.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

On Facebook? How many people on Facebook even know who Plato was? *snicker*

Actually, I had no difficulty coming up with places for either list. I was surprised, though, at the number of books that are among my favorites and yet I would not ever want to even visit the places in which those stories are set. Middle Earth, for instance, where I'd have to be extremely careful of the time period. Most of the time it seems to have been in terrible, painful chaos. If one chose the "good old days" of Valimar, before all the chaos struck, then one would most likely be an elf and cursed to live so long as to see it all destroyed by pride and jealousy.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Ohh I like this one, I have to do this.