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From Colours to Makeovers – Mythmakers Ask us Anything · Mythmakers

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  Hello and welcome to Mythmakers. Mythmakers is the podcast for fantasy fans and fantasy
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  creatives brought to you by the Oxford Centre for Fantasy. My name is Julia Golding. I'm
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  the director of the Centre, but I am also a writer. So today we are doing a podcast where
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  we've asked our followers to send in questions. We said ask us anything, which is always a little
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  bit worrying when you send a request like that. But we've had some questions sent into us and
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  I'm going to spend the podcast answering them. So the first part is going to be about different
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  fantasy questions. And the second part is about our exciting new project in Oxford at number 5
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  Northmore Road. But we'll leave that to the end. So looking at the questions that were sent in.
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  First of all, Carrie York, who is one of our most faithful social media followers,
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  she often takes part in our readathons. So I feel I'm getting to know Carrie a little bit.
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  She was a bit worried she didn't have a legitimate question, but she asked me if I had
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  a favourite colour. Now this might seem a bit of a strange question, but it is that question
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  which is so important to children. And it makes you wonder what it is about knowing
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  somebody's colour that is so important. And then when you think about fantasy, you think about
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  the role of colour. The first place that I go in my head is the colours to signify the four
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  different houses. So obviously you're going to be all right if you're a good red, deep red,
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  you're a good sort and you're in griffin door. If you are a cool intellectual blue,
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  then you're going to be in Ravenclaw. And if you're a slightly sort of cheerful, but maybe not
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  so brainy yellow, you're in Hufflepuff. And there's something up with the colour green, isn't there?
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  Because that sends you to Slytherin. So carrying on this thought process, I was thinking about
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  the way we associate different colours with different qualities. So for example, in Alice in
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  Wonderland, who has become associated with the blue dress, there's something about the
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  innocence, the springtime nature of that blue dress that means it's been picked up as a motif,
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  Alice of her fair hair and blue dress. And going on from that, you've got Peter Rabbit
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  with his blue coat. Again, the signifying a sort of young innocent character who gets caught in
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  fiendish traps. So you can see that asking a question about colour is not simple. And there is one
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  particular line up on colour, which is very problematic and that's the black and the white
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  version of this, which I think we're now trying to get away from because it, though obviously
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  the element of white that's being associated with a kind of purity. So I'm thinking in terms of
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  Tolkien, you get that in the white lady, Erwin, you get that associated with Galadriel. And there
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  you get black associated with the characters such as the black riders, the colours of Mordor.
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  But obviously, because we can't escape the way language has evolved and it's become associated
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  with skin colours, though that isn't where it starts off. I think as a fancy writer, you have to
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  move away from that black white basis and you see that people are doing that. So they often
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  flip it. So in the Peter Jackson films, you get the the baddest of the wizards,
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  Saravan, who's associated with white. And you get clearly trying to change the how we think of
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  the way the the orcs look so that they're coming out as sort of that kind of maggot-like white.
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  So you challenge the way that colours become associated with certain kind of characteristics.
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  So that's a very long way round to answering what's my favourite colour. And unfortunately,
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  I'm a bit of a slither in. I like green. But for me, green isn't the kind of snake-like
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  problematic slither in green. It's fresh and it's spring and it's all those different colours
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  of the leaves. I just love green. But as a sidebar, interesting, you might like to know that
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  when I was doing a series of books with Penguin a few years ago, they had a historical flavour,
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  so they were putting historical dresses on the front. And my main character wore a green dress
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  because I like green. And also there's green sleeves and all sorts of other things from the period.
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  I was told that green was not an auspicious colour. I wasn't allowed it on the front cover.
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  I wonder why. We obviously have a problem with green. Okay, so that was a very full answer to
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  that first question. We got another question from Adam Bann who asked, who is my favourite character
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  in the Silmarillion, Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit. He said, name three, each for every book.
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  So I think he means one for this, yeah, I think I've got you, Adam. So starting doing that
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  in reverse, who's my favourite character in the Hobbit? Well, Bilbo, obviously, because he's so
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  funny, he is the every man abroad, he's the one who gets a cold, he's the one who comes through,
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  he's the hero's journey. So he is my favourite character. I love the invention of some
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  quirky side characters like Smalg with his clever interrogation of the burglar. I mean,
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  they're wonderful set pieces, those. And of course, Gollum, the riddles, absolutely fabulous. But
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  in terms of my favourite, it's Bilbo. So Lord of the Rings, that's really difficult. It's a bit
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  like saying, who's your favourite child? By three children. Because I like different characters
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  for different things they do. Again, I tend to find that I love Frodo because he is the one
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  carrying the heaviest burden. And even though there's a lot of other things going on, it really is his
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  journey that is the most important. If you take him out of it, the rest of it collapses.
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  But I wonder, because also, I love the fact that Airwind is there. I love the shield maiden,
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  the one who kills the Lord of the Nair School. I mean, I love her being there. And also,
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  I love Aragon, the idea of the returning King. I've got a soft spot for all of the Hobbits.
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  So you can see Adam, I'm really struggling because I like all the characters. But in terms of
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  an author, let's answer it that way. I think the character I love most is actually Gollum,
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  because I think talking was one of the first to do that very clever thing of someone who has the
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  split mind. I hesitate to call it schizophrenic because that's obviously a real mental illness with
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  a proper diagnosis. But he has this divided personality. There is a very interesting 19th century
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  novel called The Confessions of a Justified Sinner. Well, I think it's by James Hogg. It has in an
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  adult Gothic novel way, has in another interested divided personality and you've got the Jacqueline
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  hide, of course. But what I love about Gollum is that he is almost redeemable.
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  And there's something about that almost which makes him fascinating and engages the sympathy
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  of the reader. Okay, so I'm going to say Gollum. That's really hard, though. And finally,
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  the Silmarillion. Now, I think the Silmarillion doesn't have the same, the reasons I like characters
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  in the Silmarillion are probably because of the other things I know about them. So whenever I read
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  it, I always look for that golden thread that is characters I love like seeing the mentions of
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  the wizards or seeing the mention of Galadriel following it through. And I find some of the chapters
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  in the Silmarillion really sad, desperately sad. So I suppose the one that I like the most is the
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  Berrin and Lothian story because it does have an uptick at the end. So I will choose Berrin.
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  Or am I going to choose Lothian? I'm going to choose Lothian. Yes, I will choose Lothian because she
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  is in a way a fairy tale hero who goes on a quest to the dungeons to find her lover. She is the
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  obvious in the underworld. And there's all sorts of reversals going on there. So my favorite character
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  is Lothian in the Silmarillion. But that was really hard because I have so many favorites. So
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  Adam, you put me through it in there. And the third question we got sent in was from Abigail
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  Pope. And her question was, what's your fantasy preference? Is it high fantasy urban fantasy
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  or children's? Just to explain those terms for people who may not immediately know what she's
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  talking about. High fantasy is the kind of high concept things like Lord of the Rings.
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  I suppose things like Game of Thrones would fit into that. Urban fantasy, they're the sort of
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  well, as it at the name suggests, tends to be set in a recognizable city. I've actually
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  interviewed a few authors who write in this genre. So you've got things like the Kate Daniels
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  series by Elena Andrews, the Mercy Thompson series and so on. And then of course,
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  children's is children's. So what is my fantasy preference? I think that I have different,
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  so my old time favorite, of course, it falls in the high fantasy because that's Lord of the Rings.
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  And I have many favorites in the children's. But I think for in terms of what do I read for
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  relaxation, I tend to veer towards urban fantasy very often because they make me laugh. And I like
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  the side like that it puts on human relationships because what fantasy does of course is it kind of
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  puts a frame around issues that you recognize and gives it a fantasy frame, but you can still see
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  what's working on working underneath. So your adversary might be aware of, but we know that
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  you can still see the dynamics of that, how they relate to every day,
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  tension in the workplace or whatever. So I think at the moment, my preference for relaxation
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  reading is urban fantasy. And part of that is because every time I try a high fantasy book,
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  I'm always hoping it's going to be as good as Lord of the Rings. And so far, it never has been.
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  So if anyone out there is listening and feel safe, found a fantasy series which matches to that,
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  let me know because I'm always on the lookout and I will quickly shift my preference if I find
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  something that blows my socks off in the same way as reading Lord of the Rings did when I was younger.
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  Okay, so that's the general questions, but we did have lots of questions about the initiative
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  for the makeover at number five, Northmore Road. So just to give a bit of background to this,
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  this came out of obviously our attempt to buy Tolkien's house, which we didn't manage. But as a
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  local person, I already knew other people who lived in the street. It is one of the most expensive
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  roads in the country. You know, it's just very large houses, but I do have very good friends of
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  the centre who live in the street. And they said, well, why not come and do the same thing,
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  but here just a few short distance away so that people can come and follow their interest in Tolkien
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  and the other inklings from an Oxford base in the very same street as Tolkien, surrounded by things
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  that are part of the narrative of the Tolkien world. And then carry on to do their own creative
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  work or scholarship. So that's what we're doing. And it's a wonderful opportunity.
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  Means that we don't own a house there. So we are, we have guests in the house doing this so that
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  you can come and stay close to the place where your favourite author wrote probably some of your
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  favourite books. So the question we had from Carolyn is does that mean if we do, if we have the house
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  that when we do our in person courses, we won't be staying anymore in Oxford colleges.
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  It depends on how many people want to come to a course. If we get small numbers, we will be in
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  the house because they can accommodate that. If we have more people wanting to come on a course,
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  then we'll book into some of the colleges. So Carolyn, that can be something we can discuss if you
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  decide to come one year. We've got a question here from at, well, isn't, I'm trying to work out
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  how you say this. It looks like made in Estet, you know who you are. And the question there is,
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  will there be a little garden? There is a garden at the house, certainly the front garden,
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  the lovely front garden. So that is, there will be lots of reliefy spaces for people staying there.
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  And she suggested that we put in a silver and a golden tree. I certainly think we should do that
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  in terms of a silver birch and something that has gold leaves. I think putting a silver or a gold
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  tree in the front garden, they may not last very long. They would be melted down and turned into,
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  well, maybe rings. Who knows. So Professor MCC, who I think is Mike. Mike says, I cannot wait to
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  stay. And it would it be possible to do a short residency to say work on a novel and research.
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  We don't quite know what the pattern is of people renting. We are hoping to make it available for
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  people coming to study for, say, like, doing a masters in Oxford or coming for a study for a term.
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  There are six bedrooms. So I think different bedrooms will be doing different things. It won't be
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  like an Airbnb with people passing through every two or three days. It will be a family,
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  a made family living there and sharing spaces together and all drawn together by the fact that
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  they love Tolkien and the inkling. So the idea is that you share with each other and that is part
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  of the experience. So yes, Mike, if you've got a sabbatical, that's exactly the kind of thing
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  that it could be useful to come and stay for a term. So that was all the questions we had sent
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  in so far and we always try and answer everybody's question. So do carry on talking to us on social
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  media or directly by email and we will get back to you with a reply. But thank you very much for listening.
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  Thanks for listening to MythMakers podcast.
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