Author telling the story?

[Alex]

Ok, so, Tolkien had done it with great success. He wrote the Hobbit and the LotR trilogy as if he himself were the narrator. I feel that this pulls the reader in more. It has also proven to be successful (when written by a skilled writer) but what does everyone else think? What are your thoughts, opinions and advice for writing in such a manner?

 

[sashamerideth]

I actually don't want to emulate Tolkien, I think his style is old fashioned and his narrative slow. He was a trend setter, but we need new trends.

 

[Shasjas]

I actually don't want to emulate Tolkien, I think his style is old fashioned and his narrative slow. He was a trend setter, but we need new trends.

Whats wrong with a slow narrative? As long as its written well of course.

 

[Aidan of the tavern]

I actually don't want to emulate Tolkien, I think his style is old fashioned and his narrative slow. He was a trend setter, but we need new trends.

Well, its not for everyone, though personal I think the story benefits from being old-fashioned and slower.

Anyway, to get back to your point Alex, I agree that it is an effective style, you feel like you're actually there with this anonymous narrator. However, and its a big however for me, I think that as a writing style it could be very tricky to get right. Don't be put off if you want to try it, just approach it with some caution and handle it with care

 

[sashamerideth]

It's slow. That's what is wrong with it. The arc finished way before the book did. He spent too much time in the folklore. He took too long to get out the door. His created languages took center stage.

I can't find it now, but aparrently Tolkien couldn't understand why his LOTR books were so popular, but his scholarly works didn't do as relatively well.

It has been a few years since I read, so all this is from memory. I probably should go back and read them again.

 

[Xanados]

I can't say that I'm a fan of Tolkien's writing style, but it was a necessary part of The Hobbit. As for LOTR? I haven't read it yet :S

 

[Steerpike]

You can certainly create a successful story with an intrusive narrator. It appears more often in older works than in modern ones, but you still see it now and again even in new books. I like it if it is done well. I guess that goes for anything, so you hear that a lot, but it is true. The potential problem with an intrusive narrator is that you interrupt the story rather than strengthening it. If the statements coming directly from the author/narrator to the reader are handled in a clumsy fashion, you'll be better off without them.

 

[myrddin173]

The arc finished way before the book did.

I would disagree there as I would say the arc ended when Frodo and Bilbo left on the boat, in the last chapter. The Scouring of the Shire is an important part of the story and its absence is why the movies don't have quite the effect of the book.

 

[Shasjas]

I must disagree. If the story is interesting enough to keep you reading, it doesn't matter the pace of the narrative. To which you will probably reply that a story wont be interesting if its narrative is slow. Stalemate I guess.

 

[Benjamin Clayborne]

I must disagree. If the story is interesting enough to keep you reading, it doesn't matter the pace of the narrative. To which you will probably reply that a story wont be interesting if its narrative is slow. Stalemate I guess.

A reader's interest is a product of many factors, one of which is the pace. There are books that I love everything about, and if the only change was that the pace was much slower, I'd probably still read them... but there are other books that I enjoy just enough to read, but if the pace was much slower I'd probably not bother.

 

[Graham Irwin]

The Scouring of the Shire is an important part of the story and its absence is why the movies don't have quite the effect of the book.

I totally agree! The gauzy cgi never-ending nonsense at the end of the 3rd film was really disappointing for me. Not that I wanted to see the hobbits get revenge, as the story is about casting down power and violence and that would have been hypocritical, but Tolkien crafted the book very carefully, and the shire at the beginning was meant to be book-ended by the shire at the end. Not including that made the end feel rushed. I know the movie was over-long, but they could have made the third book into two films. Lesser works (ahem) have commanded similar screen treatment.

Or so I think. But as my girlfriend will tell you, my thinking isn't always the best.

 

[Ice Spider]

I actually don't want to emulate Tolkien, I think his style is old fashioned and his narrative slow. He was a trend setter, but we need new trends.

I'm a huge Tolkien fan, but I have to +1 this. And it's not just the bad pacing, tendency to ramble, or overly detailed descriptions like many people say. I actually don't mind rich, delicious descriptions in fantasy, as long as they're not overdone. I actually think this genre demands them. It's the whole detached, dry style his stories are written in.

I'm mostly talking about The Lord of the Rings, mind you. The Hobbit was charming, down-to-earth (despite being a fantasy!), fast paced, and fun. It's old fashioned, but not because Tolkien was trying to emulate Anglo-Saxon sentence structure - it's because it was published in 1937! The asides, narrator, and whimsical way in which the story unfolded all hearken back to the old Victorian adventure stories, but never in a way that feels dated. Tolkien handled this style deftly, and in the end it only adds to the charm.

But with The Lord of the Rings he stopped writing to entertain his kids, and things took a turn for the worse. Gone was the playful prose of the Hobbit. He started writing like he did at the university, which unfortunately means that many of his his characters sound like Oxford dons giving dissertations. He admitted himself being in academia conditioned him to want to write things like "discoursed" instead of "talked", and the effect it had on his work was mostly negative, IMO. Don't get me wrong, I love that story, but not the style in which it was told.

But hey, at least he knew how to make it sound convincing. I can't stand the fake Elizabethan English I see in so many fantasy books. Some fantasy fans write "oft" when they mean often, "speak of" when they mean "speak about", and use obsolete syntax (inconsistently of course, and usually incorrectly). It's like they have to "formal up" everything they say. I don't really understand. Writing words like "at length" doesn't create atmosphere for me; it just comes off as stilted and dry. Sometimes this habit even crosses over into their everyday, non-fantasy writing, especially if their day job doesn't involve written communication.

Don't get me wrong, many of these people are probably much more talented writers than I am, and can still tell riveting stories. And there is a lot about Tolkien that we would do well to take inspiration from. I just don't feel his style is one of those things, and people's insistence on writing in his mold is not doing the genre any favours. The opposite extreme is bad too, though. Farmboys should sound like farmboys, and kings like kings. They don't need to use the words thou and thee, but they also don't need to sound like suburban, middle class teenagers!

 

[Shasjas]

I'm a huge Tolkien fan, but I have to +1 this. And it's not just the bad pacing, tendency to ramble, or overly detailed descriptions like many people say. I actually don't mind rich, delicious descriptions in fantasy, as long as they're not overdone. I actually think this genre demands them. It's the whole detached, dry style his stories are written in.
...

This is fair enough, i would probably agree that his writing style is very dry. I'm just trying to say that i have no problem with a story that takes its time, providing it keeps me interested in other ways.