Coined by Phil and Kaja Foglio to describe their webcomic Girl Genius, gaslamp fantasy is a subgenre of speculative fiction that brings enchantment to the real world's past. Simply put, an historical time period provides the basis for a story of sorcery and the supernatural—celebrating the aesthetics and complexity of a bygone era, with strange and sometimes terrible additions from the imagination. Gaslamp fantasy can overlap as a genre with steampunk (when engines of brass and steel power advanced Victorian technology, don’t be surprised if you find a few gremlins), gothic horror (all those monsters, wicked magicians, and ancestral curses find a lovely home on the cobblestones beneath the gaslamps), and alternative history (surely the presence of the paranormal would create great changes throughout world history). If you want to explore this beguiling world, then read on. You'll find books, roleplaying games and board games that bring it to life.
One of the most acclaimed books of the last several decades was Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke, which brought fairy folk into a story of war and drawing room etiquette. Big, flashy magic has officially been brought back to London by the magicians Strange and Norrell, but while it’s helping beat back Napoleon's forces and entertaining the masses, it has also opened a door through which very dangerous creatures may enter and exploit the mortal realm. Magic might give you a wonderful new life, or might spirit you away and replace you with a changeling. You never know!
Theodora Goss’s novel The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter starts off with the adventures of the Athena Club—a group of daughters of mad scientists from Victorian literature. Whether you call their births matters of witchcraft or innovation, they are not much inclined to be used as pawns or research subjects, and they band together to protect their own. Cat-women, creatures made from dead flesh, sisters who respectively embody good and evil—all are welcome to help each other in the Athena Club.
Stardust by Neil Gaiman makes the merging of the past and imagination physical—a young man named Tristran crosses over a great stone wall in search of a present to impress the girl he fancies. The Wall’s purpose, it soon turns out, is to separate the bucolic English countryside from a world of fairies, witches and fallen stars, and the simple matter of retrieving a gift becomes an adventure across the entire land. Tristran's journey does more than just expand his mind—it changes everything about the quiet life he once had planned.
Roleplayers may already know a very popular work of gaslamp fantasy—Blades in the Dark! This game puts the players in a grimy city similar to a Venice of the past, but powered by magic. Our protagonists are not noble adventurers—they are thieves and killers, looking to make money and carry out their schemes, both fighting and using the supernatural to achieve their ends. In a world without sunlight, crime and sin can be hidden well—but what else may be hiding in those shadows?
The Yellow King is an intense rpg inspired by a classic work of Victorian horror, The King in Yellow by Robert Chambers. In depicting a world gone mad through the influence of beings and works of art beyond our comprehension, The Yellow King offers multiple settings across history in which to place our heroes, one of which is Paris in 1895—the same time and place in which Chambers wrote. Bohemians create paintings, wear the latest fashions and sip absinthe while the world around them slowly unravels. The Paris that they know is changing through the influence of a cursed play, and it won’t be long before reality itself becomes entirely rewritten.
For those who prefer board games, Mysterium is always a good choice. On Halloween in 1920, a group of psychics gather to commune with the ghost of a murder victim. They may have supernatural powers of communion with the dead, but that doesn’t mean things will be easy—the ghost can only communicate through surreal dreams and visions, and it’s up to the players to dig up the occult clues it’s trying to convey. Work together to solve the mystery, or the ghost will remain in torment... at least until the next time you play.
For a very different time, place, and method of dealing with ghosts, look no further than Ghost Stories! As Taoist monks, players must defend their town from the lord of hell, Wu-Feng, and his armies of the unquiet dead. The ghosts have to be exorcised, but beware—they all represent unique challenges with their different abilities and powers. You might even have to bring your own friends back from the dead if the ghosts get them! Use your magic against that of hell itself before it’s too late.
From Girl Genius to Ghost Stories, gaslamp fantasy has helped us totally rethink how we view potential worlds for fantasy, not to mention history itself. Have some fun playing around with the genre. Always be ready to find yourself in a forgotten corner of the past!
By: Mira G.
Edited By: Jasper R.