Anyone else likes Robert Jordan better than Tolkien?

[Planesdragon]

Jordan's major technical flaw as a writer is as other's have mentioned - a good story has a begining, middle, and an end. The lack of conclusion and resolutions in Jordan's work mars the story as a whole. Jordan knows how to earn money. But, if he doesn't know how to end a story, he's not a particularly good writer. Sorry.

The Wheel of Time, as a work, suffers from having its subplots be the main component of "storytelling", like how an episodic TV show works.

Dismissing Jordan just because "his story doesn't have a begining, middle, or end" is akin to dismissing a Jazz musician for not following meter. Novel-writing is art, and in art the rules can be broken for reason. A better critique on Jordan isn't "He doesn't follow grade-school writing rules", but rather "he meanders on too long, and fails to compensate for his deviations from the standard form."

(on a side note, I must admire the attempt to express a world-spanning tale by having it actually feel like there's more than just a camping trip through three towns.)

 

[Hand of Evil]

A friend and myself have a theory that each book is a smaller increment in time. The first and second book took place over a years time, the third & fourth months, the fifth & sixth weeks, the seventh & eighth days, the ninth & tenth hours. Books 11 and 12 will be minutes of time passing!

 

[Taelorn76]

I enjoyed The New Spring. It made the world seem a more alive, that not everything revolved around Rand, even though it does. :\ That makes no sense , what I am trying to say is that I enjoyed a pre-Rand world. I would recomend it even if you have not read any of the others.

...whats this about New Spring:the series is long enough as it is...now he's doing a prequel?

He has mentioned that he is doing a total of 3 prequels, and hopes to finish with a total of 12 main books, but is not ruling out 13. He also mentioned that he originaly thought he could do the whole story in 6 books.

That would have been nice.

 

[ASH]

That would have been super nice.. 6 books!

I am actually looking forward to the next prequel.. I also enjoyed a pre-Rand world.

It gave me a few idea's about running a WOT campaign.

 

[Taelorn76]

Here is a link to Tors website on Robert Jordan WoT

This is a link to a video interview where he discusses future books and some other questions. Bookwrap
Just click the bookwrap icon to start playback.

 

[Ranger REG]

That said, while I adore the story of LotR, I detest Tolkein's writing. I finally managed to make it through The Hobbit and it was like driving a rusty nail into my knee-cap.

Well, Tolkien wasn't your conventional, traditional fiction writers. A professor of language and literature does not make him a story writer. Perhaps it was luck and opportunity that allow him to go down in history as being the creator of modern fantasy genre, and the father of fantasy literature.

* ducks for cover from Fundamental Tolkien Purists *

 

[Dragonblade]

Since you have a vested emotional interest in those books, I'm sure you need to tell yourself that. Often.

Someday you'll realize it's ok to admit you like some things even though they're bad for you.

Isn't it great, though? It's all relative, so I'm not actually being obnoxious and condescending, I'm just being honest. Hell, I'm writing, so I'm actually being an artist as well.

I like lots of things that are bad for me. Pizza comes to mind!

 

[drothgery]

I love Jordan, but I've been getting more and more frustrated with each passing book. Something really needs to happen in the next book to get the series back on track. That said, I've never read or saw a battle scene on a television that can compare to Dumai's Wells.

Actually, that the Dumai's Well's scene happened at all is symptomatic of Jordan's problems. He clearly rushed the development of the Asha'man (creating them and making them a major force in the world in one book -- and in less than two months of "book time"), had only a handwaving retconned-explanation of how they showed up for the party at all, and missed a perfect chance to settle a few other plot threads by have Egwene & co. play the rescue party instead.

That said, while I adore the story of LotR, I detest Tolkein's writing. I finally managed to make it through The Hobbit and it was like driving a rusty nail into my knee-cap.

Which is to say that I'd much rather read 9 of the 11 WoT-universe novels than any book of LotR, and even the painfully-bad writing in The Path of Daggers is far more readable than the beginning of Fellowship or JRRT's poetry.

 

[ConnorSB]

Here is how I view the issue:

I hate that LotR wasn't as easy a read as The Hobbit.

I hate that Jordan has written so many books

I hate that Martin has written so few.

 

[Andrew D. Gable]

I agree with all these people who've posted. Yeah, I admit, Jordan's not the best writer in the world. But that said, I like the series. True, it drags for me... but I can usually find at least a few positive things about nearly anything (House of 1000 Corpses comes to mind). I wouldn't say I like him better than Tolkien (well, see later), but I certainly don't mind him. WOT and Dark Sun were two of the major influences on my homebrew, after all.

Tolkien... well, we're all of course indebted to the man, after all he did create the whole genre we're all so into, but admit it. He reads like the instruction manual for your VCR. I can appreciate how he was influenced greatly by Medieval works, and I love everything about Middle-Earth, but I could never be one of those folks who reads and rereads LOTR 20 times over.