Is worldbuilding pointless?

[Giovanna Clairval]

John Harrison’s post on world building sparked off a heated discussion.

Very afraid, by M. John Harrison.

“Every moment of a science fiction story must represent the triumph of writing over worldbuilding.

Worldbuilding is dull. Worldbuilding literalises the urge to invent.

Worldbuilding gives an unneccessary permission for acts of writing (indeed, for acts of reading). Worldbuilding numbs the reader’s ability to fulfil their part of the bargain, because it believes that it has to do everything around here if anything is going to get done.

Above all, worldbuilding is not technically necessary.”

China Miéville’s opinion on the matter:

“Miéville: There are different ways of world-building. When we say “world-building,” we tend to think of that D&D-esque kind, which is not a diss incidentally. It’s just a description. It’s sort of a consolidation between the geography and the history and the culture and so on before writing the story. At that’s one way of doing it. But then there are others, which are less rigid, less to do with internal coherence, in the same way. So in terms of something like Un Lun Dun or some of the short stories or even King Rat, and the book I’m working on the moment as well, it’s less to do with having a coherent back-narrative and more to do with having a coherent moral and emotional feeling. I know the whole question of world-building is quite controversial at the moment, because M. John Harrison just wrote his blistering attack on the idea. Which I thought was, characteristically for his stuff, was a brilliant provocation and full of a certain kind of angry integrity. I don’t agree with him exactly, but I think it would be a fool who dismissed his criticisms out of hand.”
And, of course, the Big Question: “would Tolkien’s books have been nearly as enjoyable if he hadn’t described his world at length?”

The Bat Segundo Show » Blog Archive » BSS #105: China Miéville

And of course, there's the Big Question: "would The Lord of the Rings have been nearly as enjoyable if Tolkien hadn't passionately built his world?"

 

[Ursa major]

Even in cheap cartoons, the characters play against a background. Even in "cheap fiction" in other genres, the environment is at least sketched in.

I prefer reading SF to F; I'm not the kind of person who likes pages and pages of intricate description of places that are incidental to a story. (And given the derogatory phrase "Info Dump", I would guess that this is true of many readers of Fantasy.) But in SFF, the writer is either trying to take us away from this world, or creating an environment where the concerns of this world can be thrown into greater relief. In both cases, this requires the writer to provide a viable world.

By viable, I do not mean a minute description of all a world's parts, showing how they fit together perfectly; what I mean is an environment whose features do not jar with the reader; except, that is, where the writer wants them to do so.

Beyond that, it's all a matter of taste.

(Having not knowingly read any of Harrison's books*, I'll take him at his word that his world building is dull and technically unnecessary. I have read four of Miéville's books - King Rat, PSS, Scar and Iron Council - and I find myself wanting to know more about Bas Lag; but then again, I love maps, even of places that exist.)

* My recall is not what it was. (If it ever was; I can't remember. )

 

[Flavia]

You who see this message: don't log out.

See the section "Feedback". It would seem that an old backup of the DB is visible for those who just logged in.

I myself am stuck here with vestigial wings and starry eyes.


Well, on this topic.

There's a difference between setting and info-dump.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Harrison's own "world-building" in the Virconium books, which are the only things of his that I have read, can be very detailed and quite fascinating -- even masterful -- but it does not hang together in any logical way; it's all a sort of magnificent muddle. Going by these remarks, he would seem to consider any attempt at inner-consistency to be inartistic. This explains a lot.

I first read about these remarks and the discussion surrounding them at about the same time I was putting together the questions for the Tad Williams interview. So I asked Tad what he thought. His answer is here, near the bottom of the second message:

http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/40203-chronicles-interview-with-tad-williams.html

 

[Sephiroth]

Pah.

I prefer Tad Williams' opinion, I must say.

Unnecessary permission? Who needs permission?


If it doesn't fit his worldview, it lacks validity?

Surely it depends entirely upon what one is doing?

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Unnecessary permission? Who needs permission?

Oh, good point!

 

[Ursa major]

Harrison's own "world-building" in the Virconium books, which are the only things of his that I have read, can be very detailed and quite fascinating -- even masterful -- but it does not hang together in any logical way; it's all a sort of magnificent muddle. Going by these remarks, he would seem to consider any attempt at inner-consistency to be inartistic. This explains a lot.

I stand by my earlier comment about not liking page upon page of peripheral description. I would like to add, though, that I can, if I have to, skip info dumps; I am only annoyed if I miss some key part of the plot by doing so.

Crass illogicality, however, simply kills my suspension of disbelief. I start to think that the writer couldn't be bothered to do their groundwork. I begin to doubt that they're up to the job in other areas of the text. It smacks of rank amateurism, an aspect of an expensively bought book that can irritate me to the extent that I feel conned. To sum up, illogicality can ruin a book for me.

Perhaps I won't bother to read Mr. Harrison's apparently shoddy work; he seems to be in no hurry to correct any errors he has made in this aspect of his work.

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

John Harrison is a poet and a master of the Anglish language.
He is not after logic. But I perfectly understand that a logical mind can be thrown off by the author's disinterest for the internal consistency of a setting.

I always go for consistency because my beta-readers pester me too much about that. And they scare me, and follow me on my cell phone, and inside my head, asking questions about this and that. Most of my worldbuilding comes from their bullying of me. I am a coward.

Now I've been bitten, though. I find worldbuilding exhilarating, as a writer.

If I put myself in the shoes of a reader… I hate info-dump, and I dislike too many descriptions. I mean, a novel that is mostly based on the setting? This led me to read the first 200 pages of Perdido Street Station in two months! The novel is a beautiful tour de force, although the story could have worked as well if the author had cut a lot of digressions.
I think that this was Miéville’s outrageous way of being “different”. And it worked.

As for Tolkien, the first time I read the LotR, I skipped most of the descriptions, as I did with Zelazny’s transformation of the Shadows in the Amber cycle. These two are my favourite authors ever, but I hate to stumble on digressions when I am walking down a story.

Of course, I go back and re-read. Once, twice, ten times.

Digressions are good for the re-readers.


EDIT: sorry, the last sentence in Miéville’s interview is not his. It was an editing gone awry:

'And, of course, the Big Question: “would Tolkien’s books have been nearly as enjoyable if he hadn’t described his world at length?”'

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

No, no, I didn't mean to say that Harrison's work is shoddy, Ursa. Quite the reverse. But his aesthetic is not for everyone, and he seems to think that it should be.

 

[Ursa major]

I must bow down to your superior knowledge, Teresa.

(But I still don't like the sound of "muddle", however magnificent.)

 

[Anthony G Williams]

The importance of world-building does of course depend very much on the type of story, and the plot. You might be able to get away with a (very) short story with no context, but anything longer needs some sort of canvas on which to paint the story. It is a matter of judgement to decide how much world-building is necessary for your story, and of authorial skill to introduce it unobtrusively rather in an "info-dump".

One thing I do agree on, very strongly, is the need for internal consistency. I can swallow all sorts of absurd notions in enjoying a tale, but internal contradictions turn me off instantly. I suppose the message is that the author must think through the world being created in some detail in order to avoid inconsistencies, even if much of this information may not be needed and can be omitted from the book.

 

[Wiglaf]

Pointless, I think not. Put only what is necessary in the stories. But, you still need to do world building beyond eliminating inconsistancies, which if the story is good may be missed by the reader. The reason being, how better to get some extra cash than to produce a guide to the world you created for your best-selling six volume series. Cash is King. At least if you enjoy living indoors and eating semi-regularly.

 

[Anthony G Williams]

I would define "internal consistency" as more than just avoiding obvious mistakes (I can think of one fantasy I - partly - read recently which featured small elves which were described as being as heavy as humans, but one of which managed to hide in a man's bag without him noticing any extra weight...). I also mean devising a coherent, realistic world which hangs together logically.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Put only what is necessary in the stories.

If we only put in those things that everyone could agree were necessary to the story, we would all be writing ten page synopses instead of novels.

Different readers look for different things in SFF. Some want something approximating a catalogue of actions, events, and conversations (the more exciting and filled with conflict the better); others want to be able to be immersed in the story, to come as close as possible to experiencing it along with the characters, which necessarily involves quite a bit of description, sensory detail, and internal dialogue; while others are eager to become acquainted with a new world, a new society, and new modes of thinking and/or perceiving, which necessarily includes more exposition of background information.

Worldbuilding gives logic and coherence to the kind of book that provides that third experience. Nevertheless, books exist that have that level of detail and exposition without any worldbuilding at all. These books may be supremely artistic (but largely inaccessible to readers who don't have the same reference points, or who are not equipped to make the same intuitive leaps as the author), or they can merely be lazy and self-indulgent. Or they can be both artistic and self-indulgent, without being lazy.

It's possible to enjoy more than one kind of book -- or to not enjoy a book at all and still be able to appreciate it's virtues. Or to enjoy a book immensely and still be aware of its shortcomings.

Or you can be close-minded and categorize everything that doesn't please you, personally, as rubbish, and everything you like as high art.

 

[dustinzgirl]

I think world building is important, we are all partially products of our environment, and when that environment changes so do we. However, sometimes it can be really long and boring explanations of the world which is not necessary.

 

[Anne Lyle]

I get the impression Harrison is describing a particular type of world-building-related writing, one that can afflict historical fiction writers as well as SF&F writers. You know the sort of writing I mean - "I've invented/researched this fact, so I'm d***ed well going to stick it in the book". This technique is not to be confused with books that describe their invented worlds in vivid sensory detail, or even wander off into diversions. The latter are a feature of the writer's style, not his or her degree of world-building.

The best world-building gives the impression that there's a lot more the writer isn't mentioning - even if sometimes that impression is false

 

[Wiglaf]

What is necessary is obviously a matter of opinion. What you missed, Teresa, was my alluding to the fact that world building often seems to be done after the fact in order to sell a crappy guide to the world of whatever for some quick cash. Maybe I'm just cranky.

 

[Ursa major]

The best world-building gives the impression that there's a lot more the writer isn't mentioning - even if sometimes that impression is false

That's one of the things I like in an SFF book; there is more to it than is put on the page; just like a book (a well-written book, that is) about the real world.

As an aside, the North-South mainline through the middle of Hampshire travels through a lot of cuttings; even where these are shallow, you often don't get to see more than a couple of fields' distance away from the tracks. I somethimes get the feeling that, as far as I'm concerned, there might be a void beyond the horizon. On the other hand, I know that this is false.

Reading a book with the right amount of description of the environment (right for me, that is) is like that: I feel that, were I to venture beyond the current horizon, the imagined world would not suddenly end. Something in the writer's description cons me (in a good way) that I am travelling but one path through a maze of others. Apart from anything else I, as a reader, can safely imagine what is happening around the story being told. I can do this because the writer's skill permits me (to borrow a verb!) to do so.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

What you missed, Teresa, was my alluding to the fact that world building often seems to be done after the fact in order to sell a crappy guide to the world of whatever for some quick cash. Maybe I'm just cranky.

I didn't miss it. I had a reply all ready, but it was very much aside from the point I was really trying to make, so I decided not to include it. I will now:

According to my observations most of these crappy guides are written by fans instead of by the authors themselves, or by people who make it their business to make money by exploiting other people's creativity.

There are, for instance, dozens of guides of different sorts devoted to Middle Earth (many of these by David Day, and most of his cover the same territory over and over), and I think I am safe in saying that not one penny of the money made by selling these guides is going into J. R. R. Tolkien's pocket.

 

[chopper]

Short answer: no.

Slightly longer answer: every story needs a rationale. The "world" is a part of that rationale - I take it as read that in SF/F certain things will happen that cannot happen in everyday life, so the writer must tell us why those things can happen.

Frodo's journey down the River Don to Rotherham would have been dull and frankly uninspiring (and frequently interrupted by gangs of unruly pre-teen glusniffers). Thus, Middle-Earth.