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star wars - What motivated Lucas to convert a torch (flashlight) into a deadly weapon?


Has Lucas ever mentioned how he came up with the idea of the Lightsaber? I don't think it's a stolen concept as it's unique to Star Wars. Energy swords do exist in other sci-fi canons (like Halo), but those canons are newer than Star Wars.



Answer



There are prior examples of swords made of pure energy that can cut through anything.


From the wikipedia article on lightsabers:



  • Edmond Hamilton's story Kaldar: World of Antares (1933)

  • Fritz Leiber's Gather Darkness (1943): the priests' "rods of wrath" (energy projections) only end where they cut into solid matter, so that a single duel led to numerous casualties of bystanders and charred scores across all nearby walls


  • Isaac Asimov's Lucky Starr series (1952): The force-blade is "a short shaft of stainless steel" which can project a force field that can cut through anything, making it "the most vicious weapon in the galaxy." Asimov's force-blade expands on his earlier invention of "a penknife with a force-field blade," first used in his Foundation novel (1951)

  • Larry Niven's Ringworld (1970): Louis Wu uses his "flashlight laser" as a sword of indefinite length

  • M. John Harrison's The Pastel City (1971): the energy baan are used by the Methven, an order of knights sworn to protect their empire.


So Star Wars wasn't the first example of such a weapon.


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