The Dark One
Auror
It's a criminal offence not to smile in North Korea.
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Writing out of time
- Thread starter Finchbearer
- Start date
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- #22
Finchbearer
Istar
Pretty much
Miles Lacey
Archmage
When I go back to my home town of Porirua there are many parts that have not changed in over fifty years. The same old dreary box-like state housing. The same old narrow, winding streets. The same gangs with the same patches. The music is usually rap, hip-hop or reggae which were all around back in the 1980s. Heck, even the types of clothes the people wear haven't changed much. It's only when you see the cars, the lack of Afro hair styles and the street lights that you realise this is 2023 and not 1973. And the hills in the background now have million dollar homes rather than sheep on them.
It's not too hard to imagine a place where time seems to have stood still in some respects and advanced in others. Gotham City is an example of this in fiction.
I think that if you do create a fictional place in a real life setting where elements of different time periods exist it will require having to work out why this is the case. In some countries that could be explained by their remoteness so there is a great reluctance to get rid of anything unless it is well and truly munted. Thus, more things from the past are still around. This is particularly true in many of the Pacific Island countries like Tonga, Fiji and Samoa.
Alternate history can also be useful. Consider what life would be like if the products that made Microsoft and Apple huge high tech conglomerates had failed to sell and both companies went bust. No iPods or iPhone and no Microsoft Windows or Word. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs would be virtually unknown. Silicon Valley would not exist, at least in the form we know it. And Google...? Who knows?
A third option - which i went for in my work in progress - was to create a fictional world in which I borrowed elements from various time periods but mostly from the period between the two world wars.
It's not too hard to imagine a place where time seems to have stood still in some respects and advanced in others. Gotham City is an example of this in fiction.
I think that if you do create a fictional place in a real life setting where elements of different time periods exist it will require having to work out why this is the case. In some countries that could be explained by their remoteness so there is a great reluctance to get rid of anything unless it is well and truly munted. Thus, more things from the past are still around. This is particularly true in many of the Pacific Island countries like Tonga, Fiji and Samoa.
Alternate history can also be useful. Consider what life would be like if the products that made Microsoft and Apple huge high tech conglomerates had failed to sell and both companies went bust. No iPods or iPhone and no Microsoft Windows or Word. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs would be virtually unknown. Silicon Valley would not exist, at least in the form we know it. And Google...? Who knows?
A third option - which i went for in my work in progress - was to create a fictional world in which I borrowed elements from various time periods but mostly from the period between the two world wars.
pmmg
Myth Weaver
BearBear
Archmage
My main world is in an alternate timeline so even though it might be 1984 or 2020, they don't have personal computers and even telephone is a rare thing. They don't have TV, no movies, they have a sort of radio, lights, and for reasons no oil based technology so no plastic, no oil, no mined fuel at all. They have alcohol but it's not regularly drank by everyone, they have illicit drugs but not the ones we have here today.
Their technology was stunted ironically because they didn't have WWI or WWII, instead there was a kind of biological arms race and a disaster of sorts that caused extreme lack of male babies, so the world population never went exponential and it reversed. In the timeframe of 2020's the world population is still declining so war is kind of impractical. There isn't the necessity of high tech nor the power from oil. Coal is also for reasons rendered unusable for power.
They use oil lamps, this is vegetable oil mostly. They heat their water with oil only for baths and cooking, only the rich have this or in the main cities where they live in attached buildings mostly so each block would supply the oil, water etc. Otherwise it's a lot like turn of the 20th century, no cars, but they did have cars before the disaster so some still exist in certain government or other organizations. Busses are also running, trains, and they run on vegetable oil or alcohol but it's expensive.
So yeah, I did it with an alternate timeline with specific events that did or didn't happen starting in about the 1920's. So world history before then matches. Hundreds of years in the future they devolve from a one world government to feudal-like city-states or even smaller because of the continuing lack of population growth.
Their technology was stunted ironically because they didn't have WWI or WWII, instead there was a kind of biological arms race and a disaster of sorts that caused extreme lack of male babies, so the world population never went exponential and it reversed. In the timeframe of 2020's the world population is still declining so war is kind of impractical. There isn't the necessity of high tech nor the power from oil. Coal is also for reasons rendered unusable for power.
They use oil lamps, this is vegetable oil mostly. They heat their water with oil only for baths and cooking, only the rich have this or in the main cities where they live in attached buildings mostly so each block would supply the oil, water etc. Otherwise it's a lot like turn of the 20th century, no cars, but they did have cars before the disaster so some still exist in certain government or other organizations. Busses are also running, trains, and they run on vegetable oil or alcohol but it's expensive.
So yeah, I did it with an alternate timeline with specific events that did or didn't happen starting in about the 1920's. So world history before then matches. Hundreds of years in the future they devolve from a one world government to feudal-like city-states or even smaller because of the continuing lack of population growth.
- Thread starter
- #26
Finchbearer
Istar
The oil lamp makes me think of Watermelon Sugar where they use watermelontrout oil. 
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- #27
Finchbearer
Istar
This doesn’t sound like an article but more of a collection of written experiences from different contributors. Maybe the editor just picked a load of information from a Reddit thread or something.
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- #28
Finchbearer
Istar
On a tangent here, the best documentary out there about North Korea is A State of Mind, which follows two young girls as they train to take part in the mass games. Course, it’s not really about them, but about the North Korean regime and what daily life is like for people living there. They are exactly my age, so I wonder what they are doing now.
- Thread starter
- #29
Finchbearer
Istar
Miles Lacey
In some countries that could be explained by their remoteness so there is a great reluctance to get rid of anything unless it is well and truly munted.
Remoteness is an important aspect of the plot, and so this is what I’m trying to achieve. It’s almost an eerie feeling, but I don’t want it to feel creepy, I just want it to add to the atmosphere of the storytelling. Remote parts of Scotland, the little islands and Highlands are a little like your home town, not much has changed in the past fifty years or so.
In some countries that could be explained by their remoteness so there is a great reluctance to get rid of anything unless it is well and truly munted.
Remoteness is an important aspect of the plot, and so this is what I’m trying to achieve. It’s almost an eerie feeling, but I don’t want it to feel creepy, I just want it to add to the atmosphere of the storytelling. Remote parts of Scotland, the little islands and Highlands are a little like your home town, not much has changed in the past fifty years or so.
The Dark One
Auror
Have you read The Orphan Master's Son? Amazing book. Out-Orwells Orwell.
Rexenm
Inkling
There are five rules to backward thinking.
1. The terms must be black and white.
2. Not so primitive that it is erotic.
3. Males and female must be kept a foot apart.
4. No telling jokes.
I can’t remember the fifth one.
I guess what I’m saying, is that it’s your world, your rules..
1. The terms must be black and white.
2. Not so primitive that it is erotic.
3. Males and female must be kept a foot apart.
4. No telling jokes.
I can’t remember the fifth one.
I guess what I’m saying, is that it’s your world, your rules..
- Thread starter
- #32
Finchbearer
Istar
No but will have a look.
pmmg
Myth Weaver
Perhaps, but the was search on is smiling mandatory. I see nothing that says it is, and some stuff that suggests the opposite. Which come back to who knows what happen in NK. I suspect there are happy moments there too.
Renè Williams
Minstrel
I'm not sure it's exactly the same, but this has been something I kept in mind during my world building. In my WIP, the society of the world is both technologically advanced and capable of magic to varying degrees, some people not being able to use it at all. It isn't clear at all from the start how 'old' this society/civilization is and some parts of the world itself seem to live in different ages of the past, having formed their small subsets of culture around the ways of the time and/or technology of the time. Magic itself fuels technology, so there exists weird gaps in technology we have set expectations of within our own society (EX; Cell Phones that really only work within certain cities' limits and other waypoints due limitations of signal power and the gaps of wilderness between, free power being unavailable at the edges of major cities and so causing small sects of capitalism to creep in on the Utopia-like parts of society, nomadic groups that have little if any modern technology + whole settlements/towns that have only older tech for one reason or another), making the time period of the novel pretty ambiguous. It's also fun to build expectations just to dash them (Electricity is at first thought by the MC to just be created by magic, but the truth is much more nuanced) and for me, it has given me the opportunity to make it so i can make my cast or character in question feel isolated or have intimate scenes without worrying about the things a modern society and it's tech brings, while also letting me use it when it's fit to or needed or would make the most sense.
I just work on a backwards concept where you get introduced to the modern world and learn how unmodern so many parts still are as time goes on.
I'm fond of your idea of having the characters only interact with certain aspects of technology at a given time, although I don't think I'll be using it the way it feels like you might be suggesting where you would keep a pretty good veil over the existence of modernity. The way I use it is having a character with only knowledge of some of the 'modern' world and no real sense of modern life/technology/magic discovering them as the story goes along, well, more the one characters. I would definitely read stories where I, as the reader, am uncertain of the age/time of the story taking place, especially in real world settings, where part of the fun/mystery of the whole thing is building towards guessing then getting the reveal of when/where the story actually takes place.
I'm not sure if this is what you were looking for at all but your post made me think about the way i've gone about building my world as it stands.
- Thread starter
- #36
Finchbearer
Istar
Your worldbuilding sounds very intriguing Renè. Always good when a thread can make you think more about your own project. I think you nailed that idea of a lack of technology adding to intimacy. We all live such fast, instant gratifying lives now with tech advancements, and omitting technology into the writing I think is a good way of creating a feel that harks back to a time where we would have to be more analogue, making us feel more connected with one another, probably.
You’ve described what I want to achieve more eloquently than I ever could;
I'm fond of your idea of having the characters only interact with certain aspects of technology at a given time, although I don't think I'll be using it the way it feels like you might be suggesting where you would keep a pretty good veil over the existence of modernity.
It is a veil.
You’ve described what I want to achieve more eloquently than I ever could;
I'm fond of your idea of having the characters only interact with certain aspects of technology at a given time, although I don't think I'll be using it the way it feels like you might be suggesting where you would keep a pretty good veil over the existence of modernity.
It is a veil.
Rexenm
Inkling
My world building is based on backyard thinking, around a BBQ, or a watching a dog take a leak. Everything is flippant, and arrogant, maybe family friendly.
The Dark One
Auror
Just to be clear... I was joking.
Renè Williams
Minstrel
It is certainly a veil, even in the real world, we all hide behind technology to some extent (My way is reading articles because I can't stand the news and the feeling of being lectured on curated content, not that written journalism is always much better, I can at least choose science journals and philosophy and nature over war, crime and plagues). I think one thing our story telling might have in common, from reading your OP, is having technology/power sources that exist that benefit society but not always individuals, in particular the individuals our stories revolve around and so they go about sort of just not using most of the available tech or being frustrated when they want to or need to but just cannot, even given the existence of magic. Hope i got you thinking about yours as much as you made me think about mine.
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