Holidays in Fantasyland
We're closing in on what I call the "legitimate" holiday season. (I summarily reject the notion that "the holidays" start with Halloween.) The impending arrival of Thanksgiving and Christmas has me thinking a little bit about the calendar in the other world I occupy--the one I write in.
I will admit, the calendar of my world is an area I have neglected pretty fully. I have a general sense that there is a Yule Feast in the winter, a day of celebration that is especially enjoyed by the forest gnome population, that Midsummer's Day is significant in celebrating blessings and abundance, and there was once this dwarvish holiday/event invented in my world charmingly dubbed the "Boulderkegger." That one is a long story, and I didn't actually make it up, but the genius of it seemed too good to pass up. Well, good if you can overlook the way it doesn't exactly exemplify the virtue of temperance.
But besides that, I have to admit I haven't put a lot of thought into feast days and celebrations, and I need to get to it, because every layer I add to my world makes it more believable and more captivating. But it's not as though I can just make a a handful of holidays and call it good. After all, if we have things like Boxing Day and Thanksgiving and Rosh Hashana and Valentines Day in this world, my imagined places and cultures will need to have observances that are particular to their cultures and spiritual inclinations, which then means I have a minimum of 12 different cultures to deal with--handling only one continent. And as always, I buy into my habit of letting the projection of the overwhelming size of the job prevent me from just starting the dang thing, one element at a time!
So that leaves me to pose a question to you, dear readers: which holidays in this world do you enjoy the most, and what about them resonates with you? By mixing, grafting, tweaking, and tranforming what already exists, hopefully I can come up with a holidays and observances element to my world that is both fresh and nostalgic at the same time.
I will admit, the calendar of my world is an area I have neglected pretty fully. I have a general sense that there is a Yule Feast in the winter, a day of celebration that is especially enjoyed by the forest gnome population, that Midsummer's Day is significant in celebrating blessings and abundance, and there was once this dwarvish holiday/event invented in my world charmingly dubbed the "Boulderkegger." That one is a long story, and I didn't actually make it up, but the genius of it seemed too good to pass up. Well, good if you can overlook the way it doesn't exactly exemplify the virtue of temperance.
But besides that, I have to admit I haven't put a lot of thought into feast days and celebrations, and I need to get to it, because every layer I add to my world makes it more believable and more captivating. But it's not as though I can just make a a handful of holidays and call it good. After all, if we have things like Boxing Day and Thanksgiving and Rosh Hashana and Valentines Day in this world, my imagined places and cultures will need to have observances that are particular to their cultures and spiritual inclinations, which then means I have a minimum of 12 different cultures to deal with--handling only one continent. And as always, I buy into my habit of letting the projection of the overwhelming size of the job prevent me from just starting the dang thing, one element at a time!
So that leaves me to pose a question to you, dear readers: which holidays in this world do you enjoy the most, and what about them resonates with you? By mixing, grafting, tweaking, and tranforming what already exists, hopefully I can come up with a holidays and observances element to my world that is both fresh and nostalgic at the same time.
a lot of holidays, feast days come from celebrating something, remembering something. the old testament might be a good place to start to look for ideas. In your world, what kind of battles won, historical events that people would want to remember and keep celebrating? Many of the OT feasts/holidays were a reminder of what God did. Also, if you look into other cultures and other time periods like medieval it might give you some ideas like blood month. To answer your question lightly, I like Christmas cause I like to give gifts, but I think here in the United States we have lost many cultural celebrations due to the fact that we have so many different cultures residing here. If you've ever traveled to other countries you'll see a rich assortment of celebrations. Anyways, my quick little two cents. :) I hope it helps.
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