It doesn't have to be the way it is. That is what fantasy says. It doesn't say, "Anything goes" - that's irresponsibility; when two and one make five, or forty-seven, or whuddevva, and the story doesn't "add up," as we say. Fantasy doesn't say, "Nothing is"- that's nihilism. And it doesn't say, "It ought to be this way"- that's utopianism, a different enterprise. Fantasy isn't meliorative. The happy ending, however enjoyable to the reader, applies to the characters only; this is fiction, not prediction and not prescription. - Ursula K. Le Guin, No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters