The Lantern Hall
Painting: an ancient lexicon open on a carved lectern in a dark chapel of books, glowing runes and symbols lifting off its pages like fireflies.
TermLiterature term1939

Subcreation

Tolkien's term for the human act of making a Secondary world: the author as a sub-creator, working in the image of a greater Creator. It is the theological heart of his defense of fantasy.

Tolkien's term for the human act of making a Secondary world: the author as a sub-creator, working in the image of a greater Creator. It is the theological heart of his defense of fantasy.

Origin

J. R. R. Tolkien, On Fairy-Stories (lecture 1939) and the poem Mythopoeia.

Quick answers

What does "Subcreation" mean?
Tolkien's term for the human act of making a Secondary world: the author as a sub-creator, working in the image of a greater Creator. It is the theological heart of his defense of fantasy.
Where does the term "Subcreation" come from?
J. R. R. Tolkien, On Fairy-Stories (lecture 1939) and the poem Mythopoeia.

Nearby in the archive

Secondary world

Literature term1939

An invented world with its own consistent laws, which the reader enters imaginatively and believes in while inside. Tolkien contrasted it with the Primary World of real life and argued that making one well is a genuine art.

Mythopoeia

Literature term1931

The deliberate creation of a mythology within fiction: invented gods, cosmologies and legends that feel ancient. Tolkien's legendarium is the defining example, and the Mythopoeic Society took its name from the idea.

Eucatastrophe

Literature term1939

The sudden, joyous turn in a story when all seems lost, such as the eagles' arrival or the Ring's destruction. Tolkien considered it the highest function of fairy-story: a glimpse of joy beyond the walls of the world.

J. R. R. Tolkien

Author1892–1973

An Oxford philologist who invented languages, then a world for them to be spoken in — and, with The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, supplied the elves, dwarves, orcs and halflings of every roleplaying game since.

Worldbuilding

General term

The craft of inventing an imaginary world's geography, history, cultures, languages and ecology. Tolkien's languages and maps set the modern standard; roleplaying games made worldbuilding a hobby in itself, practiced by every Game Master with a campaign map.