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World Building Limits

I think if we replace "setting" with "character" or "plot" or "editing" or "research" we cut right down to the fallacy. You're right that (most likely) no one reads fantasy solely on setting. Myself included. However, if any of your components suck --- setting included --- I'm gonna put your book down pretty quick.

No I'm not saying setting is unimportant. It takes a mixture of ingredients to make a novel. What I'm saying is: don't put more weight on setting thinking it'll see you through, because I don't think that's the case. I did actually say in my original post: "Having a rich and consistent setting is vital." so I'm not sure how you got me saying it was unimportant from that?
So very developed setting with little plot and bland characters. What I think it should be, is a rich and original setting with a good plot and three-dimensional characters. So don't expect setting to do all the work. Hope that cleared it up!
 
Bringing up Tolkien in this discussion is interesting. He was worse then the person mentioned in the original post. Going from memory, the first stories that started creating middle earth were started just after the first world war, and lord of the rings was published in 1954 (though it was started somewhere around 10 years earlier). So you could say that he spend at least 25 years world building. And yet, I don't think many people will argue that the work he put into world building was wasted time.

A big thing to consider here though is that much of his world building consisted of writing stories (or parts of stories). This is important because it not only gave middle earth a rich history and a feeling that something had actually happened in all those places marked on the maps, but also (maybe even more so) because it improved his craft at the same time as building his world. It's very instructional to read "the book of lost tales" which contains some of the earliest tales Tolkien wrote. And the writing and stories are pretty terrible. You only want to read them if you're a Tolkien aficionado and want to know as much about how middle earth came about as possible. But you notice as you read through the series of history of middle earth books that his craft improves.
 

Yora

Maester
The worst thing about the success of The Lord of the Rings is that so many people take Tolkien's path to writing it as the default reference point, when it really is a very strange and unusual special case. The success of the book was a lucky accident that wasn't planned or even the goal of its creation.
 

Aldarion

Archmage
The worst thing about the success of The Lord of the Rings is that so many people take Tolkien's path to writing it as the default reference point, when it really is a very strange and unusual special case. The success of the book was a lucky accident that wasn't planned or even the goal of its creation.

Yes and no. Worst thing is that people actually just steal from Tolkien. :D So you get a gazillion of copy-pasta worlds, with elves, orcs, trolls... even if these are sometimes given different names :)cough: Inheritance Cylce :cough:). As for those who take his approach, well... I brought him up because I have noticed that my approach to writing and worldbuilding is similar to his. But that has absolutely nothing to do with how much I enjoyed his work; rather, I likely enjoyed his work much more than average person would because I already was obsessed with history and mythology by the time I read Lord of the Rings for the first time. And as I pointed out before, it is precisely Tolkien's obsession with worldbuilding which gave Middle Earth the depth it required to "come alive". History within history, mythology within mythology... if you want your world to feel alive, you cannot not include internal history and mythology, because it is such an important part of our own world.

Also, many successful fantasy authors take history as inspiration and build a very rich and detailed world based on it. Tolkien is just the most obvious example, but there is also Martin, Turtledove... Reason for this lies in nature of the genre: fantasy is based on history and mythology - and mythology itself is a subset of history. So fantasy, high fantasy especially, is basically a setting based on history. And history as such could be considered a case of "spontaneous worldbuilding" by human civilization.
 

elemtilas

Inkling
No I'm not saying setting is unimportant. It takes a mixture of ingredients to make a novel. What I'm saying is: don't put more weight on setting thinking it'll see you through, because I don't think that's the case. I did actually say in my original post: "Having a rich and consistent setting is vital." so I'm not sure how you got me saying it was unimportant from that?
So very developed setting with little plot and bland characters. What I think it should be, is a rich and original setting with a good plot and three-dimensional characters. So don't expect setting to do all the work. Hope that cleared it up!

Indeed! Nor am I saying that worldbuilding (or character development or plot outlining) should be overdone. However, I'm apparently not alone in reading very many comments by writers that do not place enough weight on worldbuilding. The conventional wisdom is, sadly, that worldbuilding is unimportant and, of all the elements that go into crafting a story, is the one that can be most easily dispensed with.

I possibly read too much into "do think spending tons of time on setting is unnecessary." --- the question, again, is what constitutes tons, and why is it unnecessary?

I don't think anyone, least of all me, would disagree with the last two comments!
 
the question, again, is what constitutes tons, and why is it unnecessary?

To me the answer to that is, when you've spent years on world-building and done not actual writing. When you have thousands of pages on details miles away from anything your book will ever need. Of course, it could be handy for the writer to know their world in that much detail. But for me, knowledge isn't getting the book written. So world-build what you need, so thinks relevant to plot and character. Maps if your characters are going travelling. Then once the book is written and you take a break before getting, you can continue with mega world-building then go back and add in the little details. At least then you know what is needed. You don't need an essay on why and how your world has 2 moons if it never comes up. But you may need to know about herbs or plants and you didn't before. Plots have a habit of taking a curve balls sometimes. That's just my opinion anyway. I've seen more people put weight on setting (especially in fantasy and sci-fi) than not, but then that's my experience.
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
This corrals the question but doesn't really answer it. How many years? Thirty? Two? And what are we to make of those authors who wrote brilliant books and spent years doing so?

What constitutes actual writing? For example, what's the difference between a scene in an early draft that gets rewritten or discarded, and a scene written somewhere in one's worldbuilding notes?

Details that are miles away are easy to dismiss, but not so easy to recognize on the front end. And what if they're only feet away, or millimeters?

When we speak of worldbuilding in extravagant terms, done often for brevity's sake in an online discussion, we can easily give the wrong impression to the struggling writer because we present it as if it were all clarity. That it's easy to tell what's relevant and what isn't, what's "real" writing and what is a waste of time. I don't believe that's the case for most writers; only the very experienced or the very gifted can make such distinctions from the hip, as it were. Most, including the experienced and even the gifted, will say not only is the line blurry but there is no line at all. It's a vast, gray fog of possibilities and mistakes and explorations and blind alleys through which every writer must find their own way.
 
Those people who spent years planning got their writing finished. They completed a manuscript. I was referring more to those who only plan and never ever complete anything - I have been guilty of this I wasn't really planning, I was avoiding writing because I as afraid to mess it up.

The scene and the world-building notes is a good point but a scene if a first draft that is discarded is within a full manuscript. It's progression. Writing scenes in planning didn't completing anything if that's all it ever becomes. If those scenes are never added to. The scenes discarded in a first draft is from a completed work (I'm presuming you mean discard after it's written). I'm not saying world-building is a waste of time and the writer can spend as much time on it as they like and if they never get any further that's up to them. The point I was trying to make was if all you do is world-build and that's it it's not getting a novel completed. Am I making any sense? I feel I'm not making it clear. Still, it's nice to chat to people about this. I like hearing other people's opinions and it's all the better when they differ from mine. I don't often get to talk to anyone in life about writing which is why I joined this place.
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
I hear you, Darkfantasy. If people want to write, if they think of themselves as a writer, then they need to write. For a sterner (and rather meaner) take on that, read Hemingway's little essay "Letter to the Maestro". He's blunt, but he is not wrong.

It's also worth noting that worldbuilding can result in things other than novels, including poetry and short stories. Heck, I'd even include a D&D campaign. And if all a person does is putter around in made-up worlds, that's not really all that bad.

The crunch comes when a person earnestly wants to write that first novel, but hesitate to do so because their world is incomplete or insufficient in some way. That person needs to learn that worldbuilding and writing are not two separate activities, still less are they sequential. It's a dialectic between story and world. When the two go forward together, everyone prospers.
 

elemtilas

Inkling
To me the answer to that is, when you've spent years on world-building and done not actual writing. When you have thousands of pages on details miles away from anything your book will ever need. Of course, it could be handy for the writer to know their world in that much detail. But for me, knowledge isn't getting the book written. So world-build what you need, so thinks relevant to plot and character. Maps if your characters are going travelling. Then once the book is written and you take a break before getting, you can continue with mega world-building then go back and add in the little details. At least then you know what is needed. You don't need an essay on why and how your world has 2 moons if it never comes up. But you may need to know about herbs or plants and you didn't before. Plots have a habit of taking a curve balls sometimes. That's just my opinion anyway. I've seen more people put weight on setting (especially in fantasy and sci-fi) than not, but then that's my experience.

Well, that would be me! Quite literally!

Begs the question: why do I have to write my novel, begging your pardon, on your schedule? Why can't I write the world, in all its thousands of pages of intricacy and depth, in all its wonderful and minor details that will never be seen in the novel first?

I think this largely gets quite at the heart of the matter. Perhaps not every writer wishes to write the novel before they understand what it is they're writing about? I only finished my first story of any great length (a novelette) this year after thirty-five years and nearly 2 million words of coherent world-building. I don't consider that work unnecessary or excessive as it consists, not so much in notes but in articles and stories and poetry and myths and grammars and liturgical books and physical artifacts and in-world cyclopedias. When I think on it, that book wasn't really written any differently. I didn't sit down and say "oh, I'm writing a real book now" or "golly, I have to switch gears to actual writing now"; rather, it was more the same kind of experience. The excessive work and needless detail simply gives me the sense of ubication, of whereness. I just close my eyes and see. And then write it down. It was no different than writing the grammar of a language or a description of an ancient history.

I guess to each his own!
 

Futhark

Inkling
Not-writing is complicated. When a person goes a long time without writing (or without ever writing the first one), it's rarely because of a single factor. Life gets in the way. Lack of discipline (or at least a routine). Maybe the person isn't really a writer after all. Maybe the person got seriously ill, suffers from depression. There's a list of factors as long as a human.
I agree. I guess you could say I have spent 20 years world building. Working on a factory line, or driving between deliveries, or whatever mind numbing crappy job I had at the time; I worked on world building. I only knew what I didn’t want, until I did. Then I needed that world to be rich enough to breathe life into my characters. Now, I don’t have encyclopaedias of details, because I’m a big picture kind of person, and I can do the details as required. Others need the details beforehand.

Now that I’m ready to write, I’m finding out that world building and storytelling, while intertwined in regards to plot, character, and theme, are very different (for me at least). Storytelling can’t really be broken down into components like the elements of a world, or even a character profile. It is daunting, and it makes me wonder if I am really a writer. Why do people tell stories? Do I really want to tell stories? Do I even have stories to tell? I guess some can’t, or won’t, make the transition. Some need a helping hand, or a push, or a swift kick. So, are there limits to world building? No, it’s all fuel. Can it become too comfortable, and impact the writing process? I believe, yes.
 
Maybe there's another way to consider this.

Can world building help you write a great story? Yes, it definitely can. Rich source material shows through, even if you don't use most of it.

Does world building make you a better writer? No, not necessarilly. Writing and world building are two different beasts. And doing one doesn't teach you how to do the other. The reason it's not a complete no is that if world building for you means writing stories that happen in your world then it can help you become a better writer.
 

Yora

Maester
The important question is do you want to have fun or do you want to make an income?

Most people who write don't do it as their day job.
 

Aldarion

Archmage
The important question is do you want to have fun or do you want to make an income?

Most people who write don't do it as their day job.

What if it is both?

Maybe there's another way to consider this.

Can world building help you write a great story? Yes, it definitely can. Rich source material shows through, even if you don't use most of it.

Does world building make you a better writer? No, not necessarilly. Writing and world building are two different beasts. And doing one doesn't teach you how to do the other. The reason it's not a complete no is that if world building for you means writing stories that happen in your world then it can help you become a better writer.

Agreed. Mythology after all consists of stories, so if you include mythological stories into your world, that is a good exercise in writing.
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
I agree that writing and worldbuilding are two distinct activities. It makes me wonder, since we have editors for writing, what about editors for worldbuilding? Wouldn't that be fun?

Then again, having an editor for worldbuilding would be something like having an editor for sculpting. Or an editor for paint mixing.
 

Devor

Fiery Keeper of the Hat
Moderator
I agree that writing and worldbuilding are two distinct activities. It makes me wonder, since we have editors for writing, what about editors for worldbuilding? Wouldn't that be fun?

Oooh, oohhh! Pick me, I'll do it!
 
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