goblins in fantasy literature...

[Fred C. Dobbs]

Does anyone have any recommendations ? Also have they conformed to the traits set down in Tolkein ? I would be interested if here what's out there.

 

[j d worthington]

Oh, lord.... well, the one which immediately springs to mind is George Macdonal's The Princess and the Goblin.... And there's always Dickens' "Story of the Goblins Stole a Sexton" from the Pickwick Papers; and Christinia Rossetti's eerie poem, "Goblin Market"; not to mention their various uses in fairy tales and the like....

The following link may help somewhat, especially if you look down at the "Goblins in Literature" section... and then, of course, there are the various reference books dealing with fairy lore and the like, which often contain extensive bibliographies which may be useful...

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Goblin

As to the link with Tolkien... this also answers that, to some degree.

 

[Fried Egg]

I like the Goblins in "The Worm Ouroboros" by E.R. Eddison. Certainly not your Tolkienesque Goblins...

 

[iansales]

There's a good story in Jan's Beneath Ceaseless Skies - see here.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

I like the Goblins in "The Worm Ouroboros" by E.R. Eddison. Certainly not your Tolkienesque Goblins...

They aren't exactly goblinesque Goblins either!

 

[Connavar]

I dont care for Goblins unless in stories like The Hoard of the Gibbelins.

The Hoard of the Gibbelins - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

I will have to look into the works mentioned by J.D.

 

[Fried Egg]

I dont care for Goblins unless in stories like The Hoard of the Gibbelins.

Are Gibbelins the same as Goblins?

 

[dwndrgn]

Jim Hines has a series written from a goblin's point of view...Goblin Quest is the title of the first one I believe.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Are Gibbelins the same as Goblins?

Well, there's the question, isn't it? It never occurred to me before that they might be, but now that Conn mentions it ...

The word Goblin has been used so loosely over the centuries, it can be applied to a wide variety of creatures, most of them bearing no resemblance at all to Tolkien's goblins. In the past, it was most commonly used of fairies, especially the smaller ones: some of them helpful (though rather exacting in their requirements), like the Brownie; others mischievous, like Puck; some of them evil or downright malignant, like the ones that JD mentioned in Rosetti's "Goblin Market" and MacDonald's The Princess and the Goblin. None of the goblins mentioned above are particularly attractive and most tend to be grotesque, but in its widest application it could be any fairy, so that would include the beautiful ones as well. Or, in the case of the movie "Labyrinth", extremely seductive in appearance, in the person of Jareth the Goblin King, as played by David Bowie. I have also seen the term applied to ghosts or other phantoms, but in the stories where they appear as ghosts they are vengeful and terrifying.

Through the 20th century, the term became more and more associated with ugly, evil creatures, and especially in the last half of the century, in part due to the influence of Tolkien and in part because of role-playing games. Still, we have Jareth, to remind us that Goblins can also look like rock stars (although all the other Goblins in the film are exceedingly grotesque).


But this thread also provides me with an excellent opportunity to mention some of my own books. Shall I do it? Would it be mischievous? But am I not the Goblin Princess, and entitled to a little mischief?

So ...

I have taken advantage, over the years, of the very fluid nature of the word, to reinvent Goblins whenever I create a new setting for a series of books.

In The Grail and the Ring, they appear very briefly as faintly sinister fairies. (It's in the middle of a series, however, which is otherwise goblin-free.) In Goblin Moon, hobgoblins appear more briefly as small, grotesque, only semi-sentient creatures -- dangerous vermin -- but there are echoes of something far worse in the mythology attached to the full moon, where the Goblin appears as a huge, cannibalistic hag. The moon, in her Goblin phase, is a subtle, oppressive influence throughout the story. In the sequel. The Gnome's Engine, the hobgoblins play an important supporting role, and turn out to be much more than they seem. There is also one wicked fairy godmother.

And then we come to The Queen's Necklace where Goblins are vital to the plot, especially the dangerous, beautiful ones, although grotesque Goblins appear also as an oppressed minority, burdened with the sins of their more glamorous "relatives." Goblins are everywhere in TQN, but none of them bear the least resemblance to Tolkien's creations.

 

[j d worthington]

But this thread also provides me with an excellent opportunity to mention some of my own books. Shall I do it? Would it be mischievous? But am I not the Goblin Princess, and entitled to a little mischief?

Entitled to more than a little, I'd say.... In other words: why not?

I'm glad you mentioned them, as they seem an excellent example of what the poster is looking for... and because this serves as a useful reminder to me as well....

 

[Pyan]

Christinia Rossetti's eerie poem, "Goblin Market";

One of the more interesting Victorian poems, that one...


A good "non-fiction" book about goblins:

Goblins! : Ari Berk, Brian Froud

 

[Dave]

Through the 20th century, the term became more and more associated with ugly, evil creatures, and especially in the last half of the century, in part due to the influence of Tolkien and in part because of role-playing games.

Are you quite sure? I put it squarely down to Enid Blyton and Noddy. She must have turned generations of young children against Goblins, even before they could read themselves.

 

[Pyan]

Are you quite sure? I put it squarely down to Enid Blyton and Noddy. She must have turned generations of young children against Goblins, even before they could read themselves.

Up to the TV series in the 1980s, though, the villains were always the Golliwogs - they were changed to the Goblins at the behest of the production company, who were worried about the PC factors.

 

[Dave]

Sorry, you are correct. I was sure I remembered Goblins in the books (I'm a little old for the TV series) but there was only the Gollies in the original versions. Maybe the sanitisation began a little earlier, or maybe I am confusing it with other stories.

 

[The Judge]

I dont care for Goblins unless in stories like The Hoard of the Gibbelins.

Are Gibbelins the same as Goblins?

I've not read the story, but my first reaction on seeing the title was that it's a play on Ghibelline. Was Dunsany the type to make a kind of political point about the enormously wealthy and the way they 'eat' people? Or was he simply eschewing the obvious Gobblin' pun?

 

[j d worthington]

Dunsany was capable of such puns, though to my recollection he didn't use them all that often. At the same time, he was quite capable of picking up on a name or theme he had acquired in his education, but which he never really investigated, and spinning his own dreamweb around that, as he did with "The Queen's Enemies", based on his knowledge of the reference to Nitocris in Herodotos (which he refused to read before writing the play, as he didn't want it to influence how he developed the thing)....

 

[chrispenycate]

Slipping sideways; what about goblins outside fantasy literature? There are a few in Hollywood, of course, but you don't find many in the Herald Tribune, SF stories or true romances.

 

[Montero]

Hhm. My mind is boggling, trying to fit a goblin into a Barbara Cartland type novel. It would either
a) Be something for the heroine to scream about and the hero to kill
b) Have to wear pink with lace trim.

Thinking the ugly, bad sort of goblin of course.

On the other hand, the gorgeous goblin - handsome with a touch of danger in his make-up and past would BE the hero.

 

[shevdon]

So far no-one has mentioned Alan Garner's two books, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen and The Moon of Gomrath, both set in Cheshire around Alderley Edge and steeped in the local folk-lore.

Within the story there are the Xvart Alfar who are the goblin race and the Lyos Alfar who are the elves (with hints that these were once one race). The books are sort of YA, though they were written long before YA existed and are still very enjoyable, even as an adult.

Well worth a look.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

My mind being too often a one-track one, I was concentrating on races I remembered were specifically designated "goblin" -- but of course you are absolutely right that the Svart Alfar fit nicely into the goblin tradition. In fact, if my memory is not at fault, they are described in quite similar terms to George MacDonald's goblins.