Overthinking Worldbuilding?

[Karlin]

Sometimes I wonder if "worldbuilding" is an independent hobby. A separate activity from "story telling".

 

[ludwig1beethoven]

Sometimes I wonder if "worldbuilding" is an independent hobby. A separate activity from "story telling".

I think it very much is, at least for me. Totally different things

 

[skip.knox]

It can be separate, but I would call it a hobby only if the person involved never actually wrote stories. Worldbuilding for a game, or simply as a pastime, is unrelated to the act of writing books (or short stories).

If it is part of the writing process, then no. Or, at least insofar as the writing itself isn't a hobby (for some it is).

Once we're in the land of writing, though, world building is part of the whole project. I mean, it would be impossible not to build some aspect of a fantasy world, even it's simply in the act of writing itself. Is it possible to overthink writing?

Sure, but that's not important. If people spend "too much time" on world building that can be defined only as "didn't finish the book." Otherwise, it's still a WIP, right? And if they didn't finish the book, as in ever, then either they deliberately abandoned the project, or they just sort of ground to a stop and never got started again. Either way, the issues at play run deeper and wider than world building.

This one gets up in the bucket along with a good many other writing questions. That bucket is labeled "Don't Worry About It and Get Back to Work".

 

[Karlin]

I'm reading a book by Agnon . "Only Yesterday". Considered his greatest book. It took him 21 years to write it. (twenty one years, not a typo). Of course in the meantime he wrote many other things. I am curious if he was a pantser. I have someone to ask.

 

[pmmg]

As Skip said. World Building is part of the whole...if in fact you are trying to write. Kind of why I keep saying Story trumps World Building. If you are trying to write stories, you need to spend energy on that too. World Building is just an exercise for RPG types otherswise.

 

[Lorn Ashby]

We have a great advantage over writers from decades and centuries ago: it's easy to change things.
It's possible that king v emperor will, in fact, matter, and you just don't know it yet.

I run into this all the time myself and have trained myself to pick one and run with it. If I change my mind later I can use my writing tools to make that change easily.

I used to sit around for hours trying to find the perfect name or word. Now, when I get stuck, I just insert a few characters that I don't otherwise use ("[ ]" or "|||"). When I'm having a hard writing day, I'll start searching for some of them in my manuscript and sometimes the solution pops.

 

[D. Gray Warrior]

Sometimes I wonder if "worldbuilding" is an independent hobby. A separate activity from "story telling".

I do both.

I write (and worldbuild as I need). Other times, I get a cool idea for a world, and make that, and sometimes story ideas pop up from it.