steepholm: (Default)
steepholm ([personal profile] steepholm) wrote2014-04-20 02:09 pm
Entry tags:

High and Low Fantasy

I put this query out on Facebook but may as well repeat it here, since the answer hasn't come zinging back in unambiguous terms as yet...

Who coined the terms "high fantasy" and "low fantasy" - both the concepts and the actual phrases? I feel this is something I ought to know just like that, since they have historically had quite wide currency, even though (for several reasons) I dislike and avoid them myself.
larryhammer: floral print origami penguin, facing left (Default)

[personal profile] larryhammer 2014-04-20 03:09 pm (UTC)(link)
The Encyclopedia of Fantasy credits low fantasy to Boyer and Zahorski, but in the introduction to The Fantastic Imagination from 1977.

---L.