Friday, October 29, 2010

Classics Appendix N

In the original Appendix N, and in personal appendixes N from various OSR blogs, contemporary and modern fantastic literature dominates the reading list. Given the selection you'll find in a bookstore's fantasy section, that's not surprising, but I wonder what an Appendix N would include if limited to pre-1900 literature?
  • Arabian Nights
  • Beowulf
  • Voltaire's Candide
  • Chaucer's Canterbury Tales
  • Cervantes' Don Quixote
  • Stoker's Dracula
  • Grimm's Fairy Tales
  • Spenser's Faerie Queen
  • Goethe's Faust
  • Gilgamesh
  • Machen's The Great God Pan
  • Swift's Gulliver's Travels
  • Homer's Iliad
  • Dante's Inferno
  • Ovid's Metamorphoses
  • Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur
  • Homer's Odyssey
  • Edgar Allan Poe's short stories
  • Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen
  • The Song of Roland
  • Stevenson's Treasure Island
A D&D campaign drawn from this Appendix N would have a distinctive flavor, although you could find a basis for many of the traditional D&D tropes in those pages.
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6 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 29, 2010 at 12:05 PM

    Also include the pre-1900 fantasy works of:

    George MacDonald
    William Morris
    Robert Chambers
    Ambrose Bierce

    ReplyDelete
  2. migellitoOctober 29, 2010 at 1:14 PM

    I like this take on the old idea Paul! I hadn't thought of something like this. It very definitely would give a singular (and quite nice) flavour to a campaign.

    ReplyDelete
  3. PaulOctober 29, 2010 at 1:22 PM

    Yes, agreed, Geoffrey. Can't believe I forgot MacDonald, as I have a particular fondness for The Princess and the Goblin.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Jeff RientsOctober 29, 2010 at 3:39 PM

    Lucian of Samosata's True History

    ReplyDelete
  5. David The ArchmageJanuary 8, 2011 at 7:25 PM

    You reminded me of a few books I need to add to my Kindle, thank you!

    And it would be interesting to see an alternate reality version of D&D from 1900... hmmm...

    ReplyDelete
  6. PaulJanuary 8, 2011 at 7:42 PM

    @David, much might be the same, although you wouldn't have the inspirations of Vance for the magic system and Three Hearts for alignment.

    ReplyDelete

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