9 Dark Fantasy Stories Before A Game of Thrones

Skimming through forums with thread about Game of Thrones, Song of Ice and Fire, modern fantasy in general etc... I often see people bragging about how no and I mean no fantasy story before Game of Thrones ever discussed all the dark themes that GoT faces. But is this really true?

They claim that heroes never died, that morality was always black and white in those stories, that good always triumphed over evil etc... they say that GoT is better than older fantasy books because its darker, because it actually shows people dying and having sex and gore and blood, all that good stuff.

Oh they'll acknowledge that other fantasy books that are as dark or even darker than SoI&F exist but they'll usually be more modern books or books dating at around the same time, circa the 90s. Or at least acknowledge that childrens fairy tales (particularly by the brothers Grimm) were much darker than the Disneyfied versions of today, probably out of contempt for the medieval people of the past. In reality, its not so simple as there have been many, many dark fantasy novels in the past for adults, fantasy stories that make a GoTs look like Care Bears even.

Now this list wasn't made to say that these books are better than GoT because I think its a great story despite its gaping flaws; its been made to destroy this myth that fantasy was never groundbreaking, that it was always light fare and that it never explored dark themes. To wit, in order of age before Game of Thrones was released in the year 1996:

9. Vivia, by Tanith Lee.

Released one year before Game of Thrones, Vivia is the DARK story of a girl who after living through an orgy of death brought about by the plague running rampant in her fathers castle, becomes an immortal vampire by practically sleeping with a god of death. After that, she is captured by an evil Warlord called Zulgaris who uses her for his own gain and pleasure and lets just say it does NOT go well for Vivia from there.

Vivia is a truly beautiful work of fiction; Vivias character isn't really that likable but she is still compelling and sympathetic and Lees prose is great and poetic. But even for fans of dark fantasy, Vivia may prove too much for them; it features a ton of rape which is detailed rather explicitly, is very gory and goes into great detail about internal bodily pain and feelings and it is also very, very scary. And sad; you'll feel older as you're reading this novel and it will leave you with a great feeling of emptiness and I should know; its been a month since I've read it and I still haven't gotten over Vivia. It's that powerful.

8. Berserk, by Kentaro Miura.

One reason I think berserk is better than GoT is because Berserk is a more simple yet deeper story; no political bullshit here, its all about character. Sure, we have politics in the story with Griffiths quest for power etc... but Berserk focused mostly on Miuras beautifully written characters and as I've said before, Berserk has some of the best character development in any medium ever.

Part of what makes Berserk so great is the fact that its protagonist, Guts, is such a killing machine but at the same time you see that he is still human; he fights and almost always wins but he doesn't get out of it lightly. He gets heavily scarred and there is always a danger of him losing his humanity. Because of this, you feel for the character more; Guts doesn't come off as an archetype but as a person. He wasn't made to deconstruct any stock character; his brutality, his personality, his tender moments and the fact that he was raped as a child are all there because Guts just is. Coupled with one of the saddest and at the same time scariest scenes in anime and manga history, Berserk is a must read.

7. The Black Company, by Glenn Cook.

No discussion of dark fantasy is complete without Glenn Cooks Black Company series, except Black Company goes into a more interesting direction; instead of the more grey vs black morality that Song of Ice and Fire espouses (i.e. Starks vs Lannisters), Black company goes into grey vs gray morality. it is the story of the titular Black company, a mercenary group reluctantly hired by a tyrant 'Lady' who is worried about a prophecy that is about to be fulfilled, proclaiming her downfall. The people of her realm (rebels) rise up in anticipation.

Now, in the words of TV Tropes, the company itself is very frankly portrayed, the Lady herself has her own valid reasons why she would fight against the rebels and the rebels themselves can be a ruthless bunch. If that isn't morally ambiguous I don't know what is.

6. The Chronicles of Amber, by Roger Zelazny.

Ok, so Amber really isn't a dark fantasy and it won't have you grabbing your tissues over the death of a character. It does not mean that it is not a flipping great story or one of the most influential fantasy books ever because really, since when did 'dark' and 'rape' automatically equal 'high quality'?

Adult themes can be explored in books that feature little blood and Amber certainly has them. After a certain man named Corwin wakes up in a hospital where he was being forcefully kept in a coma, he escapes, confronts his own sister and realizes that he is the  crown prince of a far away fantasy land called Amber.

CoA features the all the usual good stuff like political intrigue, betrayal etc... but what makes it so unique is that Corwin (the books written in first person from his viewpoint) is such a likable unreliable narrator. You can often see that our hero does horrible things, sometimes truly horrible things like sacrificing half a million innocent soldiers just so he could use them in a war to regain his homeland. Yet despite all this, he never becomes unsympathetic. Corwin will convince you to be on his side and as the books go on, Corwin changes and receives a ton of character development even though he always stays morally gray.

5. Children of Hurin, by J.R.R Tolkien.

Didn't expect a a dark fantasy by JRR Tolkien did you? Well children of Hurin can be described as one of the first examples of a modern dark fantasy. Whilst it wasn'tpublished during his lifetime, it was obviously written by Tolkien so it still counts. After his family is cursed for refusing to reveal the location of the Elvish city of Gondolin, the children of Hurin, the greatest of all mortal warriors, have to struggle living with this curse as it leads them into a terrible (terrible as in sad) ending.

Turin himself is deeply flawed character, from being someone who is hot blooded and arrogant only to slide down into becoming a murderer. His companions aren't that better either and a lot of his anatagonists are themselves morally ambiguous. That said, CoH is not lighthearted fantasy fare despite being made by Tolkien whose work is so dismissed nowadays by people who probably never read his work.

4. Faust.

Here, I'll be mostly talking about the 1926 movie as I am more familiar to it but essentially, Faust is the story of an aging alchemist who makes a deal with the devil to keep him alive so that he may not be touched by the oncoming plague. Another deal later, giving him back his youth and the ability to enjoy sexual pleasures, Faust meets and sleeps with a beautiful woman only for his bargain with the devil to end, forcing him to acknowledge the fact that his soul belongs to a demon.

Faust does end on a much happier note than the description above would imply, a happy note that is very well written but it still counts. Faust deals with a variety of topics like the loss of ones faith over superficial objects and finding true love. Not only that but for 1926 and even today, Faust is still a visual marvel.

3. The Great God Pan, by Arthur Machen.

The Great God Pan has been described by Stephen King as one of the scariest novels of all time and despite its clumsy and very verbose prose, it is still very scary and horrifying. I don't want to go into too much detail as it would ruin the punch that the story has but lets just say that for 1890, nobody took all the sexual horror well at all...

2. Don Quixote, by Miguel Cervantes.

OK so I'm cheating here as Don Quixote is not a fantasy novel per se but it does deconstruct the ideas of chivalric romances and adventure a couple of healthy centuries before George R.R. Martins series was even written. But unlike Martin, Cervantes didn't write Don Quixote with the idea of making the world a more brutal place but to show how superficial peoples perceptions of heroism were; in essence, Cervantes wanted people to realize what makes a true hero.

Don Quixote is the story of a poor man who disillusioned himself so much by reading fantasy literature that he literally started believing he was a Knight in shining armour. By the end, after all the ridicule and jokes he suffered from his peers, Don Quixote stops believing in his fantasy world and dies a death of despair because of it.At the same time, his companion Sancho Panza gets highly influenced from Quixote and starts believing in the same ideals that Quixote held. People back then and today sadly don't get the themes of despair and deconstruction of romanticism that Don Quixote explored but when it was published, Don Quixote was a huge cultural phenomena; everyone in Spain knew of Don Quixote in a matter of months and people started reading the same chivalric romances the book set out to deconstruct so in a way Cervantes fulfilled the most essential thing a novel should do: to change reality.

1. King Arthur. Just King Arthur...

Finally, we end this list with King Arthur, just King Arthur and his mythology. I watched the movie Excalibur and reads novels involving King Arthur long before I even heard of SoI&F and it changed me, Arthurian mythology really changed me. I think because of it I started appreciating 'deep' stories as I was truly astounded by how sad the stories of the good King ended, how Arthur himself was a very flawed human being, the territories that fantasy could explore.

This is a story where an idealistic King witnesses the downfall of his kingdom as his Knights die by one and gets betrayed by not only his own enemies but those most beloved to him; this is the story of a King who is forced into putting his wife on trial over accusations waged against her only for her to leave him after her trust for him vanishes; this is the story of a King who sometimes commits truly terrible actions in order to avoid trouble; and finally, this si the story of a King who dies with nothing left, declaring as he rides to his final fight: What have I left in this world to live for?

Of course, there are more stories of King Arthur in existence then there are people living in this world so what can I recommend? Sadly that is a list for another time so until I actually do read more and more retellings of King Arthur, I'll say that the Once and Future King and the movie Excalibur are the best place for you to start, with OaFK being hailed as one of the all time greatest fantasy novels ever written by nermous people. Oh, and don't forget Monty Python and the Holy Grail of course...