Fantasy and coming home

Astral and paranormal experiences, dreams and visions.
Mars
Posts: 186
Joined: Wed May 15, 2013 1:54 pm

Fantasy and coming home

Post by Mars »

There was an interesting newspaper story recently (in Finland) about young adults and their continuing obsession with the world of Harry Potter. In the article the term "coming home" was used to describe the feeling of returning to the world of the books and films. It's an interesting term which I've heard often in case of fantasy novels, games and films and a feeling I've felt myself on multiple occasions. Returning to a familiar imaginary world is comforting and cosy, like returning to the mother's womb. The mother's womb in this scenario can also be the womb of the Great Mother. For some reason this is most evident in the fantasy genre.

Any thoughts?
User avatar
Nahumatarah
Posts: 70
Joined: Wed Apr 03, 2019 7:08 pm
Location: Pohjola

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Nahumatarah »

I was never Christian in the real sense but it was the first form of religiosity that heavily influenced me when I was young, until later I tried to abandon it altogether. To me accepting Satanism revived my interest in Judeo-Christian thought so you could say it was sort of a "coming home" experience. Circle completed, opposites beginning to be resolved.

Interesting you should mention the Great Mother since this coming home of mine involved sudden heavy interest towards and visions of Mother Mary.
"The time has come to turn your heart into a temple of fire."

- Jalāl ad-Dīn Mohammad Rūmī
User avatar
Benemal
Posts: 562
Joined: Thu Feb 23, 2012 7:24 pm
Location: South-Fin

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Benemal »

Right now might be a good time to read something familiar and comfortable. I don't have a thing to return to again and again, like those Potter fans, but rereading Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy could be one, China Mieville's Bas-Lag trilogy I will certainly read a fourth time, Neal Stephenson's The Baroque Cycle, a sublime masterpiece, but a challenging read. The single book Anathem will probably feel like coming home, when I read it a third time, which I will. Imagine a Waltari historical epic, taking place on another planet. I started rereading Dan Simmons's colossal Hyperion/Endymion. Read it the first time in 2000, and it was maybe the first time I was reading 700 page books in two days, because it was so immersive that I didn't do anything else. It's not a safe and comfy read though, there's lots of things I didn't know twenty years ago, that open up the book in a darker light.
User avatar
Benemal
Posts: 562
Joined: Thu Feb 23, 2012 7:24 pm
Location: South-Fin

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Benemal »

Games were also mentioned in the first post. Playing Oblivion again and having that homecoming feeling, stronger than with most books.
Seferoth
Posts: 186
Joined: Sun Jun 27, 2021 12:18 am

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Seferoth »

Playing The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion for me is like coming home. I have played the game since it came out in 2006 and have played more than 5000 hours of it. Cyrodiil for me has been like a second home.
User avatar
Nahumatarah
Posts: 70
Joined: Wed Apr 03, 2019 7:08 pm
Location: Pohjola

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Nahumatarah »

Oblivion does it for me too. It's not often these days I play video games but when I do it's something from the 90's or early 2000's so I guess it's the nostalgia in it. Final Fantasy VI too. I still love the graphics, setting and gameplay to the death.
"The time has come to turn your heart into a temple of fire."

- Jalāl ad-Dīn Mohammad Rūmī
User avatar
Nefastos
Posts: 3029
Joined: Mon May 24, 2010 10:05 am
Location: Helsinki

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Nefastos »

Mars wrote: Wed Nov 10, 2021 6:51 pmThere was an interesting newspaper story recently (in Finland) about young adults and their continuing obsession with the world of Harry Potter. In the article the term "coming home" was used to describe the feeling of returning to the world of the books and films. It's an interesting term which I've heard often in case of fantasy novels, games and films and a feeling I've felt myself on multiple occasions. Returning to a familiar imaginary world is comforting and cosy, like returning to the mother's womb. The mother's womb in this scenario can also be the womb of the Great Mother. For some reason this is most evident in the fantasy genre.

Between you and me, I must confess that I hate Harry Potter, although not as vehemently that I hate Terry Pratchett's books. I do not confess this to Harry Potter fans though, for I definitely understand the need for escapism, and I too have read (and still read) very bad novels, like Dragonlance. So awfully written that it often makes you grind your teeth – but the sense of otherworldliness is so much needed in our bleak culture.

Tolkien is the most classic example of this "yearning back to home and mother" fantasy. The Lord of the Rings trilogy even ends with this particular line. It came very apparent when we were doing our reading through the LOtR with sister Astraya (published in 2018), and was evidently the red thread through the story's hopes and fears both. That's why we chose to name the commentary after the important (and factually the first real and not prologuing) chapter "The Shadow of the Past," Menneisyyden varjo. Tolkien is under the constant thrall of something that has already moved into the past, and this creates both his heroes and the threat they face. And as I claim in that commentary book's end chapter, the same goes for Tolkien's "left hand path" equivalent, Lovecraft.

This makes one think... are we actually living in one of those "fallen ages" of humankind, which actually failed to grasp their possibility to go onwards in spiritual development, and went astray in a demonic loop? Is this reality we live in already a fallen state, and what we yearn for is the actual healthier timeline which has not went mad with new technology and its violent influences to all the surrounding nature, as we have?

Eternal return is perhaps the most important topos having to do with the Great Mother. It is this Ouroboric loop (potentially spiralling and only in its regressive way repeating the same endlessly, traumatically) which is the serpent that the Lady of the Mountain holds in her hands, and which creates life from death and death from life, the world-serpent renewing itself. It has been much in my thoughts lately. People tend to confuse this life-giving Great Mother to Lilith, who is her vampiric counterpart, the suffocating mother, who under the pretext of safety actually suppresses.

Everyone wrote:Oblivion
I am totally a Morrowind fanboy myself. There is extensive dialogue system, the story is better, there is no immersion-breaking scaling of the encounters, and you can levitate...

Only when the games were started to be done in a "realistic" way, did the immersion broke for me: because AI can never be actually believable, but it instead leads to very humorous attempts. Especially including voice acting into every game was the worst thing that has happened: not only because it limits so terribly the possibilities of dialogues, but also because those voice actors are almost always either terribly bad or the same in every game, or both.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
User avatar
Benemal
Posts: 562
Joined: Thu Feb 23, 2012 7:24 pm
Location: South-Fin

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Benemal »

Nefastos wrote: Thu Nov 11, 2021 11:06 am Especially including voice acting into every game was the worst thing that has happened: not only because it limits so terribly the possibilities of dialogues, but also because those voice actors are almost always either terribly bad or the same in every game, or both.
New Vegas is one also, that has that level of familiarity. As with New Vegas, the most recent game by it's creators, Outer Worlds, also did these things better than Bethesda. Most immersive new game experience maybe in the last five years. There's always a trade-off and I don't think any new game is going to be as atmospheric, as Oblivion. Still, I'm sure I'll love Bethesda's space rpg, Starfield. That's been in the works since before Fallout 4.
Nefastos wrote: Thu Nov 11, 2021 11:06 am but the sense of otherworldliness is so much needed in our bleak culture.
For otherwordly reading I highly recommend Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea trilogy (it's not really a trilogy, she just wrote three books, and then more after a long break); Wizard Of Earthsea, The Tombs Of Atuan and The Farthest Shore. There's magic in that writing, that's gone now from the world. Big influence on Elder Scrolls
User avatar
Smaragd
Posts: 1120
Joined: Thu Jan 09, 2014 4:27 am

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Smaragd »

Nahumatarah wrote: Wed Nov 10, 2021 8:28 pm To me accepting Satanism revived my interest in Judeo-Christian thought so you could say it was sort of a "coming home" experience. Circle completed, opposites beginning to be resolved.

Interesting you should mention the Great Mother since this coming home of mine involved sudden heavy interest towards and visions of Mother Mary.
A deeply relatable experience. If we look at the phenomena from the perspective of the topic at hand, it could be seen as a (re-)ignition of a religious mythos in one's soul. Stepping more consciously and deeply in to the path of occultism already might have some sense of coming home, as in to the right place in one's life, but acceptance of a certain mythological structure or current seems to make it further so. The Great Mothers of different mythologies, with their metaphysical connotations to the matrix, could be seen as figures who embrace the aspirant who has accepted the mythos to their hearts. The matrix as a metaphysical necessity in the background, and the mythology as an emphasis in the soul through which to relate to the nuances the matrix holds within, similarly as the Great Mother holds all the different stories and ideas, gods and demons within its womb.

Fantasy, especially as a literary genre, seems like an escape place or some sort of threshold area for the souls of our time, where religion is in a major crisis and our souls are trying to find something to fill this hole, the banishing of religion has created. Fantasy may also fill those gaps the accepted mythology lacks in canonized expression.
"Would to God that all the Lord's people were Prophets”, Numbers 11:29 as echoed by William Blake
User avatar
Nahumatarah
Posts: 70
Joined: Wed Apr 03, 2019 7:08 pm
Location: Pohjola

Re: Fantasy and coming home

Post by Nahumatarah »

Smaragd wrote: Thu Nov 11, 2021 3:53 pm
(re-)ignition of a religious mythos in one's soul. Stepping more consciously and deeply in to the path of occultism already might have some sense of coming home, as in to the right place in one's life, but acceptance of a certain mythological structure or current seems to make it further so.
Well said. This describes it almost perfectly. Even the word (re-)ignition has many layers of fitting meaning. There were physical sensations of warmth included. I remember walking in freezing weather not feeling cold at all feeling warming love was being poured into my soul. It felt like i was being purified in fire and in a lot of pain too but it was ok (hence my signature). At first I tried to somewhat resist this return to form of sorts. I was afraid it was only psychological "familiarity principle" (or "response", I'm not sure what's the right term). I was afraid i was regressing instead of going forward, but as time has passed so have things grown and taken new shapes so i know now it's not that.

After having a child I started to revisit childhood places, books, and films. I had some of this stuff, old toys mainly packed away in boxes. When i started to go through them it brought back many forgotten memories often not directly related to the objects themselves. These moments of recall taught me many things about myself. It helped me see my progress as a human being more clearly and how seemingly unimportant events might have more importance than seems.

I remember hearing of someone who did the opposite. They unpacked all of their stuff and burned them as effigies to help disconnect from traumatic childhood. Since I had a pretty happy childhood it's hard to relate to this but I can somewhat understand it. I recently discussed with a person who told me they liked to watch their favorite childhood films when feeling depressed (or hungover). It gave them solace. To me it's the other way around. It seems to feed the bad feelings rather than the opposite although it somewhat does both.
Smaragd wrote: Thu Nov 11, 2021 3:53 pmFantasy, especially as a literary genre, seems like an escape place or some sort of threshold area for the souls of our time, where religion is in a major crisis and our souls are trying to find something to fill this hole, the banishing of religion has created. Fantasy may also fill those gaps the accepted mythology lacks in canonized expression.
This really seems to be the case. Conventions revolving around fantasy and science-fiction often remind me of some sort of religious gatherings. Theres the same sense of strong togetherness that these events seem to trigger in participants. I hear these cons also trigger some odd (fanatic maybe?) reactions in participants that cause them to faint and even hallucinate. I don't know much about these events and can't remember where I heard this though so I can't provide examples.
Nefastos wrote: Thu Nov 11, 2021 11:06 am Especially including voice acting into every game was the worst thing that has happened: not only because it limits so terribly the possibilities of dialogues, but also because those voice actors are almost always either terribly bad or the same in every game, or both.
When I play I often turn all sounds off (except FX, combat sounds, etc cetera if possible) and choose my own music to enhance the experience, unless the game has a great soundtrack. Minimalism works best for me. Ambience, drones, metamusic. If it sounds too orchestrated it also takes away from the immersion. I dislike voice acting in games almost categorically for the same reasons. When it's the same couple of actors doing all the characters that's a total immersion killer.
"The time has come to turn your heart into a temple of fire."

- Jalāl ad-Dīn Mohammad Rūmī
Locked