Why Fantasy Understands Armies Better Than Navies
Fantasy has no trouble marching to war. Its maps almost invite it. Mountain passes divide kingdoms, old roads connect fortified cities, rivers create vulnerable crossings and castles stand precisely where an army will eventually need to take them. Even when no map is printed, epic fantasy trains the reader to think territorially. Power occupies a capital, claims a border and fears whatever may descend through the northern pass. That is the sharp contrast with the sea. Fantasy has ships, pirates, islands, voyages, monsters and storms , but it has developed armies far more often than navies as complete fictional institutions. On land, the genre readily imagines campaigns, mercenary companies, sieges, occupation, supply lines and civilian devastation. At sea, ships more often remain vehicles for escape, discovery or outlaw adventure. The difference is not simply that land battles are easier to picture. Land war moves through the political and geographical structures fantasy already ...