Line #30 Creator/GeorgeMacDonald


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/george_macdonald.jpg]]
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3	[=George MacDonald=] (10 December 1824 – 18 September 1905) was a Victorian Era [[UsefulNotes/{{Scotland}} Scottish]] writer who's chiefly known for his fantasy works, which were read by such authors as Creator/GKChesterton, Creator/JRRTolkien, and Creator/CSLewis. Beyond what we've listed below, he also wrote a fair number of non-fantasy works, primarily concerned with romance, suffering and adventure in [[UsefulNotes/{{Scotland}} the Highlands]], which are generally passed over for some reason. [=MacDonald=] was also a Christian minister who wrote several books on theology and sermon collections.
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5	Other writers who [[SincerestFormOfFlattery cited [=MacDonald=] as an influence]] include Creator/WHAuden, Roger Lancelyn Green, Creator/MadeleineLEngle, Creator/ENesbit, and Elizabeth Yates. Essentially, he is the grandfather of nearly the entire modern genre of {{fantasy}}. Appropriately enough, he sported a pretty impressive WizardBeard.
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7	He is not Creator/GeorgeMacDonaldFraser.
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9	!!Works by [=George MacDonald=] with their own trope pages include:
10	[[index]]
11	* ''Literature/AtTheBackOfTheNorthWind''
12	* ''Literature/TheLightPrincess''
13	* ''Literature/Lilith1895''
14	* ''Literature/TheLostPrincess''
15	* ''Literature/{{Phantastes}}''
16	* ''Literature/ThePrincessAndTheGoblin''
17	* ''Literature/ThePrincessAndCurdie''
18	[[/index]]
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20	!!Short stories by [=George MacDonald=] with their own trope pages include:
21	[[index]]
22	* "Literature/UncleCorneliusHisStory"
23	[[/index]]
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26	!!His other works provide examples of:
27	* BittersweetEnding: [[strike:Frequently]] ''Always''.
28	* CoolOldLady: Fairy grandmothers often appear, and are always awesome.
29	* {{Determinator}}: Many of his child characters, especially the virtuous ones. Occasionally crosses over into BadassAdorable.
30	* DeathOfTheAuthor: [[invoked]] Applied this idea to his own works in his essay "[[http://www.george-macdonald.com/etexts/fantastic_imagination.html The Fantastic Imagination]]". When readers asked him what meanings he put in his fairy tales, he assured them it was much more valuable for them to think for themselves and find their own meanings, rather than him having to explain.
31	-->"A genuine work of art must mean many things; the truer its art, the more things it will mean. If my drawing, on the other hand, is so far from being a work of art that it needs THIS IS A HORSE written under it, what can it matter that neither you nor your child should know what it means? It is there not so much to convey a meaning as to wake a meaning."
32	* DiedHappilyEverAfter
33	* DiedInYourArmsTonight:
34	** In one of the stories in ''Phantastes'', Cosmo von Wehrstahl dies in the arms of the Princess von Honenweiess he has released from the mirror she has been enchanted in, but she finds him too late and cradles him as he dies in her arms.
35	* DreamingTheTruth: In "Literature/PortInAStorm", it's how he finds the port.
36	* EverythingsBetterWithRainbows: In ''Literature/TheGoldenKey''
37	* FairytaleMotifs
38	* FirstNameBasis: In "Port in a Storm", the father stops his story to comment that he and their mother were on first name basis already at this point in the story.
39	* FunetikAksent: Just in case you ever forgot you were in Scotland.
40	* GreatBigLibraryOfEverything: Mentioned in ''Phantastes,'' ''Lilith,'' ''Literature/AlecForbes''... This is a recurring image throughout [=MacDonald's=] fiction, probably inspired by a year [=MacDonald=] spent as a youth cataloging books in a large house in Scotland.
41	** Such places tend to be more of a MagicalLibrary at heart.
42	* HeldGaze: The supernatural variant of the trope, in which case it fills the two gazers with such longing that they are so consumed with love that they depart from each other and die, being reborn as children.
43	* TheHeroDies
44	* LittlestCancerPatient: They appear with some regularity in his non-fantasy works, dying of VictorianNovelDisease rather than cancer. (Three of [=MacDonald's=] thirteen children died of tuberculosis.)
45	* LivingShadow: In "Literature/TheShadows", living shadows cast themselves on walls to comfort the bereaved, amuse children, inspire musicians, and confront guilty parties with their misdeeds.
46	* LoveRedeems: Central to arguably all of [=MacDonald's=] work.
47	* {{Mythopoeia}}: C. S. Lewis cited him as a TropeMaker.
48	* OrphansOrdeal: ''Literature/ARoughShaking''.
49	* ThePowerOfLove
50	* ThePromise: In "Port in a Storm", the narrator got his uncle to not interfere with his wooing the uncle's wealthy niece, despite the appearance of trying to get at her money, by bringing him port to drink during a storm and collecting this as his reward.
51	* PublicDomainCharacter: All of his characters, as he has been dead for over 100 years.
52	* TheSpeechless: Wee Sir Gibbie in... ''Literature/SirGibbie''.
53	* StoryWithinAStory: Has one in several of his works.
54	* TropeCodifier: Being one of the major creators of modern fantasy literature, [=MacDonald=] had a huge hand in establishing the tropes now prominent throughout that genre.
55	* WriterOnBoard: An example that even this [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools trope is not bad]]. Creator/CSLewis observed of [=MacDonald's=] non-fantasy novels, "Sometimes they diverge into direct and prolonged preachments which would be intolerable if a man were reading for the story, but which are in fact welcome because the author... is a supreme preacher."
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57	!! George [=MacDonald=] in fiction:
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59	* Creator/CSLewis was particularly moved after reading ''Phantastes'', and much of Lewis' writing reflect the themes that [=MacDonald=] used. Accordingly, in ''Literature/TheGreatDivorce'', Lewis used [=MacDonald=] as a [[TheMentor guiding character]] in the same way that Dante had used Creator/{{Virgil}} in ''Literature/TheDivineComedy''.

Context Creator / GeorgeMacDonald