Why are western stories called "Isekai"?

[halfeye]

There have been many such stories in the "west":

Gulliver's Travels, Robinson Crusoe, Peter Pan, The Water Babies, Three Hearts and Three Lions, The Dragon and The George, Spellsinger (+#2, #3 ... ), The Practice Effect etc..

I mean having a word for them is probably useful, but the genre isn't intrinsically Japanese.

[Wintermoot]

There have been many such stories in the "west":

Gulliver's Travels, Robinson Crusoe, Peter Pan, The Water Babies, Three Hearts and Three Lions, The Dragon and The George, Spellsinger (+#2, #3 ... ), The Practice Effect etc..

I mean having a word for them is probably useful, but the genre isn't intrinsically Japanese.

I don't think they are. Isekai refers to (many japanese anime and manga stories) where the main character is transferred to a magical world unlike his own (which is usually the real world)

So the stories you list meet that criteria, sure, but the same term is uses for 'eastern' stories that meet the criteria as well.

Or... wait. Did you mean to ask why western stories AREN'T called Isekai? instead of ARE?

If so, that's easy. Its a Japanese term that originated in relation to anime/manga specifically.

[hamishspence]

Robinson Crusoe isn't exactly a "magical world unlike the character's own" - I don't recall him getting to the island by magic, just a perfectly ordinary shipwreck. Nor is there anything overtly magical on the island so far as I am aware.

[GloatingSwine]

Or... wait. Did you mean to ask why western stories AREN'T called Isekai? instead of ARE?

If so, that's easy. Its a Japanese term that originated in relation to anime/manga specifically.

As far as I know the actual term Isekai is pretty recent, and mostly arose to describe the utter flood of web novels and their adaptations that sparked in the early 2010s and have been an ever growing part of the anime and light novel market since (I think there are six new isekai shows this season?).

There are older Japanese portal fantasy stories that, as far as I know, weren't described with that term because they weren't common enough to be their own subgenre yet.

[Wintermoot]

Robinson Crusoe isn't exactly a "magical world unlike the character's own" - I don't recall him getting to the island by magic, just a perfectly ordinary shipwreck. Nor is there anything overtly magical on the island so far as I am aware.

*sigh* I apologize for using the word "magical" differently than you use the word.

Please assume I said a word to indicate "substantially different than your normal environment/life, often requiring you learn new ways to interact and survive with the new environment" that meets your approval of precision. Perhaps "Wondrous" or "Unusual" or "Alien". Whatever your internal thesaurus accepts.

Personally, I wouldn't rate most of the example stories, including Robinson Crusoe, as "Isekai" anyway for my own personal pedantic reasons. However, I wasn't trying to give an example by example refutation, just trying to answer his intended question.

[GloatingSwine]

I think it's important to the subgenre that the world is explicitly separate from the primary world in time or space. A castaway adventure tale like Robinson Crusoe includes the concept that the protagonist is in a new and unknown part of the world he already knows, rather than a wholly separated one.

That's why I think isekai relies on some kind of unexpected transport to a new world, outside of the normal context of the protagonist's expectations.

So Robinson Crusoe is not an isekai because Crusoe was on a voyage on a ship and nothing out of the ordinary for a sea voyage happened, (sinking was not an unreasonable or unknowable outcome). But Buck Rogers in the 25th Century is an isekai because space shuttles do not in the normal course of their flight travel through time (at least not in the non-relativistic sense).

[Tvtyrant]

There have been many such stories in the "west":

Gulliver's Travels, Robinson Crusoe, Peter Pan, The Water Babies, Three Hearts and Three Lions, The Dragon and The George, Spellsinger (+#2, #3 ... ), The Practice Effect etc..

I mean having a word for them is probably useful, but the genre isn't intrinsically Japanese.

I have never heard that word used to refer to those stories.

[paddyfool]

I wouldn't apply that term to the stories from that list that I know. I might be tempted to apply it to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, however.

[hamishspence]

I might be tempted to apply it to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, however.It certainly fits the Trapped in Another World trope - but that's moderately broad:

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TrappedInAnotherWorld


A standard plot/Myth Arc for Speculative Fiction: The Ordinary High-School Student, frequently his friends, and sometimes his enemies are all transported (often summoned) to another world — distant planet, a Magical Land, Alternate Universe, the past, The Future — where they find they have an important role to play in Events of Significance that are occurring at the same time as (or sometimes because of) their arrival. Usually there is no hope of their finding a means to return home until after the great threat facing them has been defeated. Occasionally, they will then question if they even want to leave, especially when there is an ongoing Fantastic Romance. These stories often feature alternate methods of bringing the protagonist to the new world, such as Reincarnation, swapping bodies with an inhabitant of the new world, or becoming their own video game avatar, though simple bodily transport is still common.

[halfeye]

I don't think they are. Isekai refers to (many japanese anime and manga stories) where the main character is transferred to a magical world unlike his own (which is usually the real world)

So the stories you list meet that criteria, sure, but the same term is uses for 'eastern' stories that meet the criteria as well.

I don't have any problem with the use of a Japanese word for Japanese stories. The Chinese may or may not have words to say about a Japanese word being used for Chinese stories, as may the speakers of any other non Japanese languages for the use of the word relative to their stories.


Or... wait. Did you mean to ask why western stories AREN'T called Isekai? instead of ARE?

If so, that's easy. Its a Japanese term that originated in relation to anime/manga specifically.

Nope, that was not what I was asking.

I come across the word a lot on Top Web Fiction when browsing for english language stories:

https://topwebfiction.com/


Robinson Crusoe isn't exactly a "magical world unlike the character's own" - I don't recall him getting to the island by magic, just a perfectly ordinary shipwreck. Nor is there anything overtly magical on the island so far as I am aware.

Crusoe may be the longest stretch in my list, but it's not his home area and it's all strange.

I agree the The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe probably fits, I almost mentioned the Wizard of Oz. There are many more in more recent times. I think Three Hearts and Three Lions may be the best fit for the genre if we accept there is a genre.

[Fyraltari]

Robinson Crusoe is, appropriately enough a robinsonade (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robinsonade). Unlike an isekai the focus is on the struggle with the environment.

[Precure]

Isekai, other similar words like shounen, shoujo, yuri, etc. is a word created for a certain genre within japanese media. It's not wrong to use it for works like Wonderland, Oz, Narnia, etc. but it's still not common.

[hamishspence]

Lost is characterised as a possible "Trapped in Another World" story, unlike Robinson Crusoe. Sometimes lines can be be blurred - is Lost a Robinsonade, an Isekai, or a little bit of both?

[Traab]

Isnt part of the wizard of oz the question on if it even actually happened? The books are a different matter, but the films make it kind of an open question as to dorothy actually being whisked away or being insane. Kind of like alice in wonderland which may have been a dream, may have been reality. The David Bowie film Labyrinth would count. She gets whisked away to another world, meets magical creatures, then returns to her real world, and gets proof that it actually did happen. As for why they might be called isekai instead of something else, its a matter of a previous term existing that is both well known and fits the description. There really wasnt a subgenre for western fiction specifically for people on earth being whisked away to another world. But when the isekai manga/anime subgenre gained traction, people noticed other works that also fit into the description and just said they count as such.

[Vahnavoi]

"Isekai" is the fashionable term for the concept because a lot of stories using it are coming from Japan. Just like, once upon a time, the French word "anime" became popular in Japan to describe animations. :smallamused:

The concept's older than whatever word's used for it, Narnia stories are very similar in concept, as are Brothers Lionheart (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brothers_Lionheart) and at least the beginning of Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chronicles_of_Thomas_Covenant) A person from our world ending up in a secondary fantasy world is old hat.

[hamishspence]

Any story with "Faerie" or "Elfland" could be thought of that way, too.

[GloatingSwine]

I don't have any problem with the use of a Japanese word for Japanese stories. The Chinese may or may not have words to say about a Japanese word being used for Chinese stories, as may the speakers of any other non Japanese languages for the use of the word relative to their stories.


Eh, loan words are common, and "Isekai" is shorter and snappier than "Portal Fantasy".

[Ibrinar]

Nope, that was not what I was asking.

I come across the word a lot on Top Web Fiction when browsing for english language stories:

In that case: Because it is a term for the genre some people know so they use it when talking about things in that genre. There is no real reason to not do that just because it is a japanese term. (Personally I don't but that is because I strongly associate Isekai with a specific kind of isekai.) Also if it was on top web fiction possibly because there is some scene overlap.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by halfeye
I think Three Hearts and Three Lions may be the best fit for the genre if we accept there is a genre.

Three Hearts and Three Lions definitely fits, and so do the first several Spellsinger novels, assuming we’re talking about the series by Alan Dean Foster.

[Vahnavoi]

Any story with "Faerie" or "Elfland" could be thought of that way, too.

The general term is Otherworld, which just so happens to literally mean the same thing as Isekai

[Lord Raziere]

There have been many such stories in the "west":

Gulliver's Travels, Robinson Crusoe, Peter Pan, The Water Babies, Three Hearts and Three Lions, The Dragon and The George, Spellsinger (+#2, #3 ... ), The Practice Effect etc..

I mean having a word for them is probably useful, but the genre isn't intrinsically Japanese.

Because isekai is a short word, the internet takes any term that vaguely applies to something and hammers it in without caring how little it fits and is propagated by memes and people so young they never heard of any of those. I've certainly only heard of some of those things and never seen any of them except maybe parts of peter pan, whatever those are.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Vahnavoi
The general term is Otherworld....

And now I'm reminded of an 80s TV series called Otherworld. Gloriously cheesy at times, but great fun. And fits the definition well enough.

[tyckspoon]

I wouldn't apply that term to the stories from that list that I know. I might be tempted to apply it to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, however.

The Narnia stories fit, and Dragon and the George definitely qualifies. It even has most of the memes/tropes of the genre - dude from Modern Earth gets swapped into Magic Fantasy Land, finds he has unique capabilities that allow him to solve problems the actual inhabits of the land can't, gains power and status within the Magic Fantasy Land because he's Special. You could rewrite it as 'I Got Reincarnated as a Dragon?!' and not blink.

[Prime32]

The concept's older than whatever word's used for it, Narnia stories are very similar in concept, as are Brothers Lionheart (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brothers_Lionheart) and at least the beginning of Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chronicles_of_Thomas_Covenant) A person from our world ending up in a secondary fantasy world is old hat.See A True Story (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_True_Story), second century AD.


Three Hearts and Three Lions definitely fits, and so do the first several Spellsinger novels, assuming we’re talking about the series by Alan Dean Foster.
Regarding the formula people tend to think of when they hear "isekai"... IIRC, Three Hearts and Three Lions features a guy being summoned to another world to be a hero, quickly bestowed with boons and love interests, and told that his home country on Earth is morally superior to all others.
And the D&D paladin class was explicitly modelled on this guy, while a bunch of other elements from the story were dropped in directly (e.g. regenerating trolls that you kill with fire)

[Ramza00]

As others have already pointed out, before "western" used the term Isekai which is a loan word, these type of stories are often called Portal Fantasies, Portal Quest Fantasy, or Accidental Travel

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasy#By_the_function_of_the_fantastic_in_the_na rrative
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accidental_travel

Note there are dozen of other names for this "western" story for many of these stories are not English originally and the genre is called different things in different languages.

-----

Isekai is 異世界 which means "different world."


異 1) different, other, hetero- 2) uncommon, special 3) curious, odd
世 has like 8 different definitions depending on context but talking about a period of time like a life span, a season, this world / this life, world or society are the main ones
界 1) world / border. Note this symbol has more meaning in theology / philosophy / religion asking what is the essence of things and its properties, and the limits of language to articulate an essence (when things change) for example what is the dividing line between two different species in a taxonomy.

[Rynjin]

Eh, loan words are common, and "Isekai" is shorter and snappier than "Portal Fantasy".

This exactly.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Prime32
Regarding the formula people tend to think of when they hear "isekai"....

Which formula is that? I have no preconceptions regarding a formula for isekai.

[Vahnavoi]

The formula is roughly "this nerdy loser who wastes their life away playing games dies in a freak accident and ends up in a fantasy-fullfillment world where their gaming skills are now the hot stuff!"

[Rynjin]

That's a little too narrow. It doesn't necessarily involve gaming, but a lot of the trash ones involve that same kind of power fantasy. Transported to a fantasy world, your Average Guy (TM) now has some kind of cheat power and dominates everything. Even some fo teh good ones operate on a variant of this.

Some do this trope well, by having competent writing, like Jobless Reincarnation (where the main character no-lifes magic from the time he's a toddler because he has nothing better to do, and then is roughly on par with your average adult professional wizard by the time he's 10 or so).

Some good ones just subvert it, like RE: Zero (where the main character is a surprisingly buff neet who thinks he can game his way through life because he's physically fit and has played a lot of visual novels, therefore he knows how people think somehow, and gets disabused of this notion that he's special through a long, long, loooooooong series of gruesome deaths until he EARNS the right to be kind of confident in his abilities).

[Imbalance]

And now I'm reminded of an 80s TV series called Otherworld. Gloriously cheesy at times, but great fun. And fits the definition well enough.

That's the term I usually think of because I dislike how often western reviewers apply the "fish-out-of-water" trope term to the overall genre. That show, though...every time I think of it I get a serious Mandela effect vibe because it aired weirdly and was so brief, but it was real, I did watch it, I was interested...then it disappeared.
Nobody else even remembers it.

[Traab]

The Narnia stories fit, and Dragon and the George definitely qualifies. It even has most of the memes/tropes of the genre - dude from Modern Earth gets swapped into Magic Fantasy Land, finds he has unique capabilities that allow him to solve problems the actual inhabits of the land can't, gains power and status within the Magic Fantasy Land because he's Special. You could rewrite it as 'I Got Reincarnated as a Dragon?!' and not blink.

Also we cant forget Magic Kingdom For Sale: Sold! Terry Brooks wrote that series and its a pretty good example. There is some back and forth like, the guy didnt die and get reborn in a new world, but he did get transported there and now he has to rule this magical kingdom that has all sorts of problems. And Im pretty sure at one point he comes back to earth and has an adventure there too. But like 95% of the series is in this other world.

[GloatingSwine]

The Narnia stories fit, and Dragon and the George definitely qualifies. It even has most of the memes/tropes of the genre - dude from Modern Earth gets swapped into Magic Fantasy Land, finds he has unique capabilities that allow him to solve problems the actual inhabits of the land can't, gains power and status within the Magic Fantasy Land because he's Special. You could rewrite it as 'I Got Reincarnated as a Dragon?!' and not blink.

I think if we were going to get technical, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and The Last Battle are isekai, but The Magician's Nephew, The Horse and his Boy, Prince Caspian, and The Silver Chair are not.

The latter three are just secondary world fantasy which happen to be in a world someone else got isekaid to once before, and The Magician's Nephew features intentional interdimensional travel, and I think the unexpected nature of the travel is important to the experience of a genuine isekai.


As for the isekai formula, in modern isekai there are actually three. Straight power fantasy (esp. involving sex), management isekai (where the protagonist may or may not be exceptionally personally powerful but they win by replicating societal expectations the audience is familiar with, also usually a power fantasy where the hero encounters no significant obstacles and everything they try is always correct and works), and survival isekai (where the protagonist is dropped into a hellworld that tries to kill them at every opportunity).

Although there is generally a common feature in that the protagonist is suitably generic and unaccomplished in the primary world for the audience to project themselves onto.

[Precure]

It's funny to think that the train in the last Narnia book is basically an isekai truck.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Imbalance
I get a serious Mandela effect vibe because it aired weirdly and was so brief, but it was real, I did watch it, I was interested...then it disappeared.
Nobody else even remembers it.

If it’s any consolation, I remember it fondly and well.

[Ramza00]

The formula is roughly "this nerdy loser who wastes their life away playing games dies in a freak accident and ends up in a fantasy-fullfillment world where their gaming skills are now the hot stuff!"
It is more fun when it is a story about a girl with depression in high school yet she tries her best.

[Tyndmyr]

The general term is Otherworld, which just so happens to literally mean the same thing as Isekai

Yeah, that's the English term for it. The two words are essentially the same thing, just in different languages. Use whichever you prefer or is convenient for the language you're speaking in.

Stories tend to have some pretty strong similarities regardless of culture, some of the same beats and conventions arise regardless. This is one of those, and I think perhaps there's something universal to humanity in imagining the what-if of being in another world.

[halfeye]

Also we cant forget Magic Kingdom For Sale: Sold! Terry Brooks wrote that series and its a pretty good example. There is some back and forth like, the guy didnt die and get reborn in a new world, but he did get transported there and now he has to rule this magical kingdom that has all sorts of problems. And Im pretty sure at one point he comes back to earth and has an adventure there too. But like 95% of the series is in this other world.

That's another I didn't remember to include (I did think Questor Thews i.e. Adventurer Thighs was a strange name for a wizard since wizards are usually skinny), there must be hundreds, another is Tetrarch by Alex Comfort (yes, that Alex Comfort).

[Yora]

People use a foreign word when their native word has the same meaning because they consider it fashionable all the time.

[Ramza00]

People use a foreign word when their native word has the same meaning because they consider it fashionable all the time.

*nods* in agreement. We do not just take loan words because a language lacks word.

Sometimes we take loan words for we have a word that 75% fits, or it has 2 or more meanings, and we want a more precise meaning. This is especially true if the field is technical in some way and we want more precise language.

But also like Yora said, sometimes it is just for "fashion" and the fashion communicates some form of symbolic meaning we want to signify. Why did the word anime come about in English (which in turn came from Japan and before that French / France with one etymology, but in another etymology it could have came from English.)

Well in the United States anime signified a different style of anime that what existed earlier. Thus just like fashion we signify A and not A, just like we may have a word for dress and then we create a new word for a variant of a dress that has a slightly difference in fashion.

But the word anime comes from アニメ (literally anime when pronunced phonetically) which is an abbreviation of アニメーション (animēshon) , well アニメ was pointing to something slightly different in Japan when it etymologically arroused. Thus you can have a word that is literally the same but points to different things when language moves through cultures. Language is like a river and not like an ice cube with specific fixed timeless meanings.

-----

Why did we use to call things Portal Fantasies and now call them Isekais in a culture, well cultures change and the metaphor of erosion but also building something anew is always underway. Now can someone explain to me these TikTok teens for my 35 year old brain understands some things kids these day do but not others :smalltongue:

[Forum Explorer]

As for the isekai formula, in modern isekai there are actually three. Straight power fantasy (esp. involving sex), management isekai (where the protagonist may or may not be exceptionally personally powerful but they win by replicating societal expectations the audience is familiar with, also usually a power fantasy where the hero encounters no significant obstacles and everything they try is always correct and works), and survival isekai (where the protagonist is dropped into a hellworld that tries to kill them at every opportunity).

Although there is generally a common feature in that the protagonist is suitably generic and unaccomplished in the primary world for the audience to project themselves onto.

I'm not sure I'd agree with that. I'd break it up differently:

1. Classic. A Hero is summoned from this world and granted a special power with which to fight evil. Though this special power is an advantage, it more or less puts them on the level of the opposition they face. Or not even.

2. Power Fantasy: The summoned individual's power or knowledge gives them a massive advantage over everyone in the world. Enjoy them curb stomping everything and collecting a harem.

3. Subversion: Deathworlds fall into these, but also parodies or stuff like slice of life.

And of course these aren't hard categories. There's no reason something can't be a Subversion and a Power Fantasy for example.

[hamishspence]

1. Classic. A Hero is summoned from this world and granted a special power with which to fight evil. Though this special power is an advantage, it more or less puts them on the level of the opposition they face. Or not even.

Through The Dragon's Eye, from the old BBC programme Look And Read, fits the classic mold fairly well.

The heroes are children, and their special power (which they already have, but the residents don't) is literacy, and they never actually fight the evil directly themselves,

but they do have a task that only they can accomplish. And there is an evil that gets fought in the story - called "Charn" - just not fought by them personally.

[Vinyadan]

The formula is roughly "this nerdy loser who wastes their life away playing games dies in a freak accident and ends up in a fantasy-fullfillment world where their gaming skills are now the hot stuff!"

Sounds a bit like Erfworld.

[Traab]

Honestly, the only hard and fast rule is "Main character is from our world and winds up in another one." Everything else is a laundry list of tropes that can be combined in any number of ways to create an interesting take on things. Thats as generic a description as "Sci fi has advanced science in it in some form" but it also includes everything that could fall under that genre unlike specifics such as hard sci fi which excludes a lot of stuff that is still science fiction. Isekai can have any combination of genres added on, the only thing that makes it an isekai instead of something else is the mc winding up in another world somehow.

[Yora]

But also like Yora said, sometimes it is just for "fashion" and the fashion communicates some form of symbolic meaning we want to signify. Why did the word anime come about in English (which in turn came from Japan and before that French / France with one etymology, but in another etymology it could have came from English.)
And before that it was Latin, coming from "animus" and meaning "giving life/soul". :smalltongue:

[Vahnavoi]

Sounds a bit like Erfworld.

Yes, Erfworld hits key aspects of the formula. What about it?

[LibraryOgre]

Any story with "Faerie" or "Elfland" could be thought of that way, too.

Not necessarily. The Broken Sword, by Anderson, has an Elfland, but it is a relatively normal part of the world in which the characters exist, and they, themselves, are normal parts of the world, too (not brought in from another time or place).

[Manga Shoggoth]

Not necessarily. The Broken Sword, by Anderson, has an Elfland, but it is a relatively normal part of the world in which the characters exist, and they, themselves, are normal parts of the world, too (not brought in from another time or place).

As is Tam Lin by Patricia Rede - Fey, but takes place entirely in this world.


That's another I didn't remember to include (I did think Questor Thews i.e. Adventurer Thighs was a strange name for a wizard since wizards are usually skinny), there must be hundreds, another is Tetrarch by Alex Comfort (yes, that Alex Comfort).

One of my favourite books in my library is a first edition of Tetrarch brought for me by my inlaws - I was intrigued, given that it is Sci-Fi based on - loosely - psychology (and a bit of mysticism) rather than the hard sciences.