Appendix N / Jeffro Johnson / Useful / Inspiring / Context

[Admin Pete]

What is essentially this thread has been started twice over at ODD74 and has generated a lot of discussion; unfortunately it has been locked twice for a variety of reasons. IMO none of those reasons should come into play on our board and I believe that we can have the discussion that Appendix N (from the DMG 1st Ed AD&D) and Jeffro Johnson's book deserves.  You may want to revisit these first two posts from time to time since I am going to be adding to them from time to time. The reason for that is that I think that sometimes context is everything and a lot of things about Appendix N gets taken out of context. Some of those things have been taken out of context with the book Appendix N: The Literary History of D&D by Jeffro Johnson. There is also a lot of misinterpretation going on and I hope in this thread that we can steer clear of that and have a great discussion.

In order to to facilitate the discussion we are going to avoid politics, social developments, and agendas. We are going to concentrate on what we can learn from the books of Appendix N, the pulp era magazines and books and Appendix N: The Literary History of D&D by Jeffro Johnson when we look at it in context.

The context is this, 

Gygax's original introduction to Appendix N:

Inspiration for all of the fantasy work I have done stems directly from the love my father showed when I was a tad, for he spent many hours telling me stories he made up as he went along, tales of cloaked old men -who could grant wishes, of magic rings and enchanted swords, or wicked sorcerors and dauntless swordsmen. Then too, countless hundreds of comic books went down, and the long-gone EC ones certainly had their effect. Science fiction, fantasy, and horror movies were a big influence. In fact, all of us tend to get ample helpings of fantasy when we are very young, from fairy tales such as those written by the Brothers Grimm and Andrew Long. This often leads to reading books of mythology, paging through bestiaries, and consultation of compilations of the myths of various lands and peoples. Upon such a base I built my interest in fantasy, being an avid reader of all science fiction and fantasy literature since 1950. The following authors were of particular inspiration to me. In some cases I cite specific works, in others, I simply recommend all their fantasy writing to you. From such sources, as well as iust about any other imaginative writing or screenplay you will be able to pluck kernels from which grow the fruits of exciting campaigns. Good reading!

More of the context is this comment that was posted by oakesspalding :

On this and the first thread, I stated multiple times that the Appendix N list was created by Gary Gygax as a list of books that influenced him. But, according to one original source, that's not precisely right.

Here is what Tim Kask had to say in a comment on an RPG Pundit blog post, almost exactly a year ago. The comment was subsequently referenced by Jeffro on his Jeffro's Spacegaming blog.

(XXX is a blogger and game designer at a now dormant blog.)

Here's Tim Kask:

While I agree with you that XXX is often a douchebag, and his reverence of Appendix N as though it were graven on tablets a bit absurd, many of you are missing the point, but some have hit the nail on the head.

I helped compile that list. They were not just Gary’s favorites. We both had nominations that did not make the list in the end.

We made that list for two reasons. The first was an encouragement to read; both Gary and I were sort of annoying in that regard.

The second was in response to a slew of questions that sort of boiled down to “Where are you (D&D) coming from?” We thought that if more people read Vance’s Dying Earth, for example, they would know where the memorizing your spells thing came from.

At that point in gaming history (sort of pretentious-sounding, I know) we were encouraging players to lift and modify things from books and movies; Appendix N was meant to serve as a starting point for good sources.

It is so d**ned easy to sit and pontificate about something we did 40 years ago, and quite frankly I am tired of people second-guessing and speculating on what we did without once asking anyone who was there.

So I would like for us to look at Appendix N and Jeffro's book not as a holy grail but as an influence, an inspiration and also to speculate on what other books they Gygax and Arneson may have read, if you want to include movies they may have seen that is good to. 

If you want to be contentious please don't, play nice and if this thread rubs you the wrong way, then please ignore it and don't read it. That is not to say that other viewpoints and dissent are not welcome, they are; however, if it upsets you a lot, then you may want to refrain from posting. Many of us love these books bitd and love them now.

And here is more context, this is what Dave Arneson thought regarding influence (source):

“As far as books go, fantasy books, science fiction/fantasy books that inspired me, we’re talking about Poul Anderson, Robert Heinlein, and a lot of the other authors, like the author of the Horse Clans series. (Robert Adams) Gary Seems to have listed every book he’s ever read in his bibliography, and I’ll be blunt, I don’t think I’ve read a lot of those books. Although, after having read a few thousand books, I really can’t remember which ones I’ve read anymore… So a lot of it is, Yes, I was inspired by…; but where does the inspiration stop and the game design begin? I mean, you’ve got to make changes. You’ve got to do variations. You can be influenced by something you read and don’t even remember reading, because you want to include “oh here is something neat I can incorporate into my world.”

So above are three points of context and I urge you to keep them in mind as your read and as you post.

I am going with my wife to look at hot air balloons, I will expect things to be in order when I return, have fun, we intend to. (The balloons were delayed and then only a few went up because of the wind, but we did get a few pictures and she was happy to see them - she loves hot air balloons). (I will probably move this paragraph to its own thread at some point and post a few pictures)

[Admin Pete]

Appendix N: The Literary History of Dungeons & Dragons Kindle Edition by Jeffro Johnson

Jeffro Johnson's Appendix N: Preview to a Review

Appendix N Survey Complete

[Admin Pete]

So what was Appendix N, as noted above Gygax and Kask wanted to put together a list of books they would recommend to people who bought AD&D, part of this was encouraging people to read, part of it was sharing things that inspired them and hoping it would inspire others. Further is was to have people read books that would resonate with them and playing D&D/AD&D and maybe, just maybe, they would get a glimmer of how you can read a book and then take the idea or concept that you liked and tweak it and use it in your own game. One of the reasons that this is of interest is that even at a point in time where Gygax had "sold out" to the corporate way and "standardized" D&D instead of the original open game, part of him still wanted people to get it and do their own thing, even though his public pronouncements were otherwise.

As noted above this Gygax and Kask compiled a list and then edited it down to a final list. Favorites of both were excluded from the list so it is not a complete list of all the books that inspired Gygax with reference to D&D. Granted many ideas came to Gygax from Arneson, that is not disputed and Appendix N does not contradict that. Also as noted above, Arneson read some of these books and is not sure that he ever read others, but he has read many books and did not remember all of them. Per the above quote by Arneson we can also gather that many ideas may have come from a source of which there was no conscious memory at the time the idea arose in the design phase (which for Arneson never ended).

As just one example, the use of dungeons and the dungeon crawl clearly came from Arneson and that is both well documented and attested to.  

No one is disputing any of this; however, the Sign of the Labrys was published in 1963 and at some point Gygax says he read it and used it for inspiration for his dungeon. That does not contradict evidence that it was purely Arneson's idea to use dungeon's in the campaign that started with Blackmoor and that he introduced Gygax to the idea. Yes, Dave introduced Gary to his concepts and Gygax used things that he read to flesh it out when Dave went home. Those does not in any way discount anything that Dave did, it only informs what Gygax did after Dave showed him Blackmoor. That is it in a nutshell, nothing more and nothing less. Jeffro's book is not discounting anything Dave Arneson did. That I think is part of the misunderstanding that is going on. At least that is how I read the book from cover to cover. I would love to see a similar book about Dave Arneson and it would be about him and not about Gygax. Both informative and useful.

[Admin Pete]

To be clear I do not worship at the altar of Appendix N, some do and that is their business, and some hate those that do and that is their business. As in any hobby you have people at the extremes with the bulk of people in the middle. IMO those of us in the middle appreciate Appendix N for what it is, an inspirational reading list. Maybe some of Arneson's ideas, if traced back to the source might have come from some of these books and some came from other sources that even Arneson was unsure of and those could have been things that are really obscure even. Many ideas went from Arneson to Gygax and then Arneson went home. Although they corresponded and did collaborate on writing D&D, Gygax altered the mechanics to suit himself for the most part. Sometimes it was just changing from d100 to d20 (a 65 in the table became a 15 for instance), other times Gygax thought about things he had read or etc and came up with a different mechanic altered in some way based on those sources and different from how Arneson did it.

Some people get/got really upset by the title of the book Appendix N: The Literary History of D&D and I think it is largely due to ignoring the context and part of the context for the book is choosing a title that will help it sell. Ask yourself which title is more marketable "Appendix N: The Literary History of D&D" or "Appendix N: Inspirational Reading List for D&D," which title is likely to sell more copies and generate more buzz?

So as we discuss this, please keep in mind the context and part of that context is that an author and publisher or author/publisher has to do their best to get people to read their book and talk about their book.

[finarvyn]

What I like best about Appendix N is that it gives a solid listing of "classic" literature that a person might read if they want to get the vibe of the old school campaigns. Stuff like Lankhmar and Conan and Elric. In the old days everyone in my group read those books but now I find that most of the new players that I encounter haven't read that stuff and I think they are really missing out on some good flavor for how a game might feel. I've never thought that the list was intended to be the end-all or anything like that; it's just a list of what inspired Gary and Co.

I suppose one could counter the whole thing with a "Appendix N 2010" of new books that the old timers might not have read. I suppose if I want to get in the head of my players it would make sense to read some of what they are reading.

[Admin Pete]

I previously started a thread (Oct 2016) titled Ye Olde School Appendix N - What is your personal list? that you might want to check out and add to.