Jerry
Minstrel
While this may fall under world-building, it's a bit more, so I hope placing here is fine.
When is it too much or too little? Obviously, this is the art and craft of the writer, but while studying the above topics, and certain 'sections' as examples from novels of how to describe scenes, scenarios, situations, and characters, I've become an overthinking writer and it has stifled my flow, including trying to get the words out of my head onto the page. I know what we write, as much or as little, is as pertinent as it is to the story - but I guess it is more about the artists' approach - how and what we choose and putting it on the page. Reading more of those excerpts and sections of selected novels of course helps... but I guess I'm bogged down by the approach. When and where and what to avoid.
In other words, if we have an MC who wanders into a bar. There are adjectives to use and avoid, world-building to be done (should it deem necessary), active setting, sensory details... well, the list goes on. It's an author's choice - but I've learned, in reality, it's the reader's mainly... what they get from the narrative, what we provide them that builds the world for them. In this, it seems I answer my own question, that its up to the author and define as deemed necessary. How does indeed the author, or by what rule, can we write what we need to write? I find that I struggle to get the words out of my head and onto the page perhaps because I'm over thinking it. I would like to read an example(s) of perhaps a full page(s) of a suggested novel, that sets up "Active-Setting/World-Building" with other narrative built before and around it, to see the ease into the set up that leads us there and after.
Dickens to me was a great example from "Hard Times" Chapter 5 that describes such a visually, tangible setting of Coketown and moves on from there. But it's an old example by today's standards and we all can't be Dickens - but how do we know when enough is enough and how can we get what is so trapped within onto the page.
I need therapy, I know...
When is it too much or too little? Obviously, this is the art and craft of the writer, but while studying the above topics, and certain 'sections' as examples from novels of how to describe scenes, scenarios, situations, and characters, I've become an overthinking writer and it has stifled my flow, including trying to get the words out of my head onto the page. I know what we write, as much or as little, is as pertinent as it is to the story - but I guess it is more about the artists' approach - how and what we choose and putting it on the page. Reading more of those excerpts and sections of selected novels of course helps... but I guess I'm bogged down by the approach. When and where and what to avoid.
In other words, if we have an MC who wanders into a bar. There are adjectives to use and avoid, world-building to be done (should it deem necessary), active setting, sensory details... well, the list goes on. It's an author's choice - but I've learned, in reality, it's the reader's mainly... what they get from the narrative, what we provide them that builds the world for them. In this, it seems I answer my own question, that its up to the author and define as deemed necessary. How does indeed the author, or by what rule, can we write what we need to write? I find that I struggle to get the words out of my head and onto the page perhaps because I'm over thinking it. I would like to read an example(s) of perhaps a full page(s) of a suggested novel, that sets up "Active-Setting/World-Building" with other narrative built before and around it, to see the ease into the set up that leads us there and after.
Dickens to me was a great example from "Hard Times" Chapter 5 that describes such a visually, tangible setting of Coketown and moves on from there. But it's an old example by today's standards and we all can't be Dickens - but how do we know when enough is enough and how can we get what is so trapped within onto the page.
I need therapy, I know...