Professor Muhammad Abd-al-Rahman Barker (born Phillip Barker, 1929-2012) was a noted linguist, novelist, and game designer. He was one of the first people to catch the bug of the now widespread "do it yourself" aesthetic with regard to fantasy role-playing games. When Dungeons & Dragons first came out in 1974, it was just a threadbare set of suggestions for people to take on the roles of heroic characters and set forth into fantasy worlds. In 1975, Barker followed in the footsteps of J.R.R. Tolkien in designing one such fully realized world for his friends to explore, with a detailed history, culture, and language(s) all its own.Although a lot of this creative work was included in his own separate game, Empire of the Petal Throne, it also spun off five fantasy novels, dozens of articles published in several periodicals, and reams of unpublished research that Tekumel enthusiasts are still exploring and cataloging.
Tekumel itself is a planet, inhabited by humans and many other beings, roughly 100,000 years in our future. Its baroque cultures and empires are kind of based on India, ancient Mesoamerica, and the Middle East, but they're refracted through a thoroughly alien lens that has resulted in something quite unique. The languages are probably the most impressive part, though Barker himself admitted that
"Many have muttered about the relative unpronounceability of Tekumel's many languages... and not without reason. In defense, the author can only say that he ENJOYS societies which are not simply reruns of the usual Graeco-Roman or Mediaeval fantasy mythos, but which present something really different: something akin to stepping off an airplane in Bhutan or Medina, rather than in familiar old London or Paris.
After all, if there is any universally applicable conclusion to be drawn from a study of history it is this: the future is going to be quite different from the present. Man will organise himself into different types of societies, hold different values, worship different gods, utilise different technologies, and speak different tongues than he does today. Tekumel tries to be true to this to some extent."
 |
| Click if thou art friendly with the Omnipotent Azure Legion |
The magical objects that Barker suggested can be discovered in the dungeons of Tekumel were things of imaginative beauty. The most famous of them is probably the "Eye of Joyful Sitting Amongst Friends" (a gem that transforms enemies into allies); there's even a blog named after it. :-) In addition to the requisite magical swords and amulets, there were androids (The Alluring Maiden of Nga), tinfoil hats (The Skullcap of Girigamish), portable homes (The Little House of Tranquil Dwelling), and cursed books that make you lose all interest in life (The Pessimistic Treatise of Total Inaction).
Fans of Barker and Tekumel are definitely glad that the good Professor never stumbled upon that last one, and are probably convinced he was gifted with an Eye of Incomparable Understanding, in order to conceive and bring forth such a world.
0 Yorumlar