Addiction in Fantasy

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elfrikichino

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Hello!

I'm doing a research project on various forms of addiction in fantasy and I'd appreciate any suggestions for stories, long, short, new, old. Specifically addiciton to "usual" substances like drug, alcohol, smoke and so on, but other kinds work too :)

Thanks,

efc
 
Hi,

I'm not quite sure what you're asking. All that I can think of is that in most Tolkien inspired fantasies, dwarves are portrayed as drunks, and slightly off the topic Sherlock Holmes was an opium addict. Also in LOTR Arragorn is a pipe smoker as is the wizard and Bilbo, not sure if they're addicted though.

Cheers.
 
In Melanie Rawn's series Dragon Prince the magic users (faradhi and diarmadhi both) can become addicted to an ability enhancing drug called Dranath. The Diarmadhi, or sorcerers, use it willingly. The Faradhi, or sun-runners, forbid its use.
interesting power play's made through out the series with this drug. it also ends up having medicinal uses which cause complications of their own. she covers, symptoms at several stages of addiction, and withdrawal. trafficking of it. and its social impact.

they are not shortish books (aprox 600pgs) but well worth the read.
 
Hi, I've moved your thread to SFF Lounge where it fits better than SFF News.

Melange or Spice is probably what you are searching for as Springs1971 has already said. I'd be interested in any other examples. I can think of many in science fiction, but not in fantasy.
 
Actually, my world has two very distinctive drugs, BASED off of real drugs, but different enough.

1: Hellroot - This root has the consistency of dried garlic. It is a deep blood-orange color, hence the name, and looks outwardly like a yam, but when dried for concentration of its chemicals and ground into a fine power it has uses similar to cocaine.


2 Dragon's Tear: This innocuous-looking flower, named for its large tear-drop shape and snow-white color, has certain juices in its petals that when pressed can be used intravenously as a drug similar to heroin. Because it can be dosed with far more care and control, and because it is water-soluble, this drug is used more pharmaceutically than Hellroot.


(Yeah, I know I need to come up with better names for things.)


These are just two examples.
 
As has been mentioned there are lots of examples in sci fi, harder to think of fantasy ones which itself is kind of interesting because drug use is very common in fantasy stories.

Gollum's precious could be talked about in terms of addiction and there's addiction to magic in the Wheel of Time (Robert Jordan) and Robin Hobb's Six Dutchies series (I think, it's been awhile since I read it).

But as for addictions to physical substances, apart from very minor, one scene type characters I can only think of Krager (alcohol) from Eddings' Elenium/Tamuli series.
 
Thank you all!

I know I'm kinda exploiting you, but I really don't know much about Fantasy.
Would sex addiction be easier to find in such genre? Probably not, but I thought I'd ask anyway.

efc
 
Actually, it's not that hard to incorporate erotic elements into fantasy, but unless you're going with something like the modern Urban fantasy setting or somewhat futuristic like cyberpunk, characters in fantasy might not actually know what sex addiction really is.
 
What an awful lot of fantasy heroes/heroines are addicted to is adrenaline. They're like bungee jumpers; can't resist the challenge of something a little more dangerous, more spectacular. Still, I suppose that's how you get to be a fantasy hero in the first place.

Does relying on some medication for survival count as an addiction? I'm thinking of Moorcock's Elric, who will die without a fairly frequent dose of somebody else's life force. A fairly typical vampire problem.

A few of the mortals who venture into faerie territory are held by sexual wiles; but prudishness in the copying has often left this as "hopelessly in love". And with faerie, you can never be sure there are no other enchantments involved.

Alcoholism in certain cultures is so universal as to make it practically impossible to be a hero without suffering from it (the morning after, at least). There again, the cultures from which the myths grew were very similar, and it wasn't considered as an addiction, any more than breathing, or eating.

Trouble is, the idea of addiction is fairly recent. Apart from lotus eaters, it's just assumed you've been enchanted in some way. Certainly, until you have broken the link between disease and magic, curses and misfortune, you are ill equipped to see that someone is 'wasting away' from substance abuse. If you are rich, and enjoy smoking opium, fine. If you are poor, you starve, and no loss. There are very few welfare states in fantasy.
 
Oh, one that comes on the basis of Chrispy's post, the Mistborn series by Sanderson, can their ingestion of metallic elements to use their powers be considered; some of them "burn" these for longer than they should and become at least semi-reliant.
 
The thing with fairy tales and myths (in my opinion the parents of fantasy) is that they deal with social things in a round about way.
on the surface Cinderella can look like a warning against trying to be a social climber. the step mother and sisters try for the prince and come to a bad end, while Cinderella works hard and is rewarded for it. under that there is the element of Personal Freedom, a prince who is whored out by his parents at a ball and cant be tempted except by the enchanted beauty, a scullery maid who for one night gets to be a princess.

i've wandered off my point and before i fall over the edge and dont make it i'll jump back to it.
you might check over some well known fairy tales or myths for "addiction problems" Bacchus certainly had his. And I think its safe to say that Zeus was a sex-addict (which by the way is not someone who is addicted to sex but someone who is so inhibited from it they force it on themselves. sadly its more like self rape then an over active libido)
 
Not just a self-rape either, HW. Zeus raped his sister Hera in order to blackmail her into marrying him, and during their union he cheated on her numerous times, mostly with mortal women.


That point aside, there are actually quite a few little aspects to fantasy one today could consider addiction that historical settings would have no idea about. Sex aside, there's blood lust, adrenaline, numerous little "herbs" that might be seen rising from a pipe in one's mouth, control over others, shopping, a lot of things. We can't forget to mention gambling here now, either.


(And as you've risen the point, HW, I have to ask-what socially moral outcome do you think that The Princess and the Frog was trying to show us? That bestiality is okay? You can't kiss a frog to turn him into a romantic prince, you know.)
 
Finding the good in the people you are stuck with.
Its hard to tell a girl that she is going to be married off for money/power and that she has to be happy with it. She might want to run off and not keep her word, she might pout through dinner and in the eyes of everyone around her make a fool of herself.
but in the end, if she looks past the slimy warty exterior of her unchosen husband she will find someone she can love after all.

of course this lesson is less applicable today when marriages are arranged by the participants not their parents. so we would have to look deeper to find something that would still apply.

I like that the frog-prince had faith in the spoiled princess, that he saw the good in her and with his steadfastness helped her to find it in herself. I like that he saves her from an awful fate (being a spoiled princess is after all a fate worse then death) by awakening her to herself. He sacrifices himself utterly to her and when she cries over his broken body she is transformed more then he is. What I would think modern readers could take from it is to believe in the good within others, and act with that in mind.
 
Actually most fairy tales go that way. Shrek was actually a really good example of such a thing.


I just can't get over the frog-kissing bit. That would just be disgusting. (And many FROGS are actually slimy, insofar as the toxic ones are. Toads tend not to feel that way unless wet.)
 
Tim Lebbon's first two Noreela novels ("Dusk" and "Dawn") feature a narcotic substance called Fletch; a sort of dry crumbly rock that's mined in the same way as gold. In its powdered form, Fletch is highly addictive and, if I remember correctly, can also induce some mystical/visionary experiences, but utterly fatal. It's like heroin mixed with LSD.

More interesting than the drug itself is the sub-culture that Lebbon builds up around it. The Fletch miners are a society set apart - they live in the mines and, because they've been passively inhaling the Fletch dust all their lives, are automatically addicted. They're outcasts from the wider society, but absolutely vital to it because Noreela's demand for Fletch is so high.
 
I haven't got round to reading it yet, but Steph Swainston's "The Year of Our War" is sat on my bookshelf and from the little bit I read I got the impression that substance addiction (of some sort) is a big part of the story. I remember looking at her website at the time I got the book and it seems addiction is a big interest of hers in general so anything by her might be worth checking out.

I don't know that much about it though as the book was a present and I hadn't heard of it or her before then, and I still haven't read it :/ it's definitely a fantasy book though, it even has a map at the beginning to prove it :)
 
Wow, thanks. So many replies! I'm gonna check all these things out.
And I was thinking about the Greek mythology just yesterday for another class when I recalled a cartoon I used to watch as a kid, where Hera wears stockings, a corset and has a leash to punish Zeus when he fools around with mortals. Childhood, good times! :D
 
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