Hussar
Legend
Just a thought about Conan and world building.
One of the stock descriptions of Conan is the last son of Atlantis. (or something to that effect.) It's a great line, properly mythic that turns Conan from just a big barbarian to something of a superhero. Yet, throughout the Conan stories, Atlantis is never explored. No information is given about Atlantis. It is left entirely to the reader to gain meaning from the line. In other words, the work hasn't been done for the reader.
If Howard was a world builder, we would have at least a few paragraphs detailing the history of the rise and eventual fall of Atlantis. We'd have a few bits about Conan's ancestors and how they relate to Atlantis. But we don't. The whole bit is reduced to a line or two and left to the reader.
I believe that Celebrim would call this world building since it is creating setting elements that don't directly relate to the plot. I would not. I call it creating setting elements. How can it be world building if you are never actually building the world? ((Appologies to C if I'm still getting his point wrong - I honestly did think this was what you meant))
I cannot possibly be the only reader of Tolkien who skips large numbers of paragraphs to avoid going to sleep. I couldn't possibly care less about the culinary habits of hobbits. I love LOTR and The Hobbit because they are really damn good stories. Or, to put it another way, I love them despite the world building elements in them. And I don't think I'm alone in this.
Fantasy lit is littered with ubiquitous trilogies that could be chopped down to a single book if authors would stop filling them with superflous setting elements in an attempt to show the world how incredibly clever they are. I adore Tad Williams, I really do. But, as I've gotten older, I realize how incredibly boring the Dragonbone Chair series is. It's filled with filler. Read Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard and tell me that world building is a good thing.
Contrast Tad Williams with Steven Erikson. Both write very long winded series of books. But, where Tad Williams devotes paragraph after paragraph detailing setting elements, Erikson's books read like Robert Howard - full of action with sparse, but meaningful detail.
I used to adore those world building books. Dragonlance, Williams, Anne MacCaffery, Anne Rice just to name a few. Now, my tastes run to much more focused writing and usually much shorter fiction. Give me short stories over 10000 page multivolume novels pretty much any time.
The little screed on the first page of this thread pretty much nails on the head why, for me. I have so little interest in seeing how smart some writer thinks he is anymore. Exploring yet another setting with unpronounceable names and half arsed history does not appeal to me anymore.
One of the stock descriptions of Conan is the last son of Atlantis. (or something to that effect.) It's a great line, properly mythic that turns Conan from just a big barbarian to something of a superhero. Yet, throughout the Conan stories, Atlantis is never explored. No information is given about Atlantis. It is left entirely to the reader to gain meaning from the line. In other words, the work hasn't been done for the reader.
If Howard was a world builder, we would have at least a few paragraphs detailing the history of the rise and eventual fall of Atlantis. We'd have a few bits about Conan's ancestors and how they relate to Atlantis. But we don't. The whole bit is reduced to a line or two and left to the reader.
I believe that Celebrim would call this world building since it is creating setting elements that don't directly relate to the plot. I would not. I call it creating setting elements. How can it be world building if you are never actually building the world? ((Appologies to C if I'm still getting his point wrong - I honestly did think this was what you meant))
I cannot possibly be the only reader of Tolkien who skips large numbers of paragraphs to avoid going to sleep. I couldn't possibly care less about the culinary habits of hobbits. I love LOTR and The Hobbit because they are really damn good stories. Or, to put it another way, I love them despite the world building elements in them. And I don't think I'm alone in this.
Fantasy lit is littered with ubiquitous trilogies that could be chopped down to a single book if authors would stop filling them with superflous setting elements in an attempt to show the world how incredibly clever they are. I adore Tad Williams, I really do. But, as I've gotten older, I realize how incredibly boring the Dragonbone Chair series is. It's filled with filler. Read Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard and tell me that world building is a good thing.
Contrast Tad Williams with Steven Erikson. Both write very long winded series of books. But, where Tad Williams devotes paragraph after paragraph detailing setting elements, Erikson's books read like Robert Howard - full of action with sparse, but meaningful detail.
I used to adore those world building books. Dragonlance, Williams, Anne MacCaffery, Anne Rice just to name a few. Now, my tastes run to much more focused writing and usually much shorter fiction. Give me short stories over 10000 page multivolume novels pretty much any time.
The little screed on the first page of this thread pretty much nails on the head why, for me. I have so little interest in seeing how smart some writer thinks he is anymore. Exploring yet another setting with unpronounceable names and half arsed history does not appeal to me anymore.
