Is worldbuilding pointless?

[Marvolo]

"As you know, Bob, wearing red hats in blue hat land is punishable by death."

vs.

Jacob spotted a red dot in the blue horizon. Not far down the street, near the corner of 78th and Main, someone wore a red hat. At first Jacob simply stopped walking, stopping to stare at the inconsistency the red hat made against the fields of blue. Jacob wasn't the only casualty in the sidewalk caravan of blue hats. Others stopped to stare as well. It was madness. Jacob turned and looked around, wondering if perhaps the red hat wearer was lost. Blue hats meant residents of Westtown. Jacob did know what red hats meant.

That was when the whistled blew, the long whining sound that blared seemingly from all directions at once. Then the black van screeched down the street, turning around and through the stopped traffic towards the man in the red hat.

#

It is cheesy, but the best I can give this morning. You can world build through alien character reactions. None of us wear blue hats because it is punishable by death to do different. But a better author than myself could use abeyance and dramatic tension to lead us delicately into the world where that might be the case.

 

[iansales]

Jacob did know what red hats meant.

And the only way the reader can find out is if the writer narrates the red hat wearer's arrest, sentencing and execution - which might be completely irrelevent to the plot.

But I get your point. It's a technique that can be used. I just think it can relies overmuch on assumptions about the readers made by the writer - or rather, that can be a danger of the technique, if the writer is not careful...

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

The arrest could be treated in one sentence. And of course it should be relevant to the plot, but it could also be a good way of showing a character's reactions, her beliefs.
It must be relevant in some way.

Every technique has drawbacks and can go down slow or steep slopes.
This one is certainly better than the "As you know, Bob" dialogue, which must be avoided like the black death.

 

[HardScienceFan]

an exercise for everyone:
try describing our world to an alien

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

Hi, Ben. Why don't you start a thread in the Workshop?

 

[HardScienceFan]

Hi, Ben. Why don't you start a thread in the Workshop?

because it would be HUBRIS,that's why.

I don't fell qualified,having no ambition to write.
and it would quickly become political,as well




I think

 

[Sephiroth]

Good idea.


You are all aliens in my world.



Oh, go on....

Everything is political.

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

SF is very much about political statements. Take Dune, an ecological tale, and a tale of power, and...

Oh, the Dark Angel was even more peremptory.

Is affection political? I'm using the word in its first meaning.

 

[iansales]

This one is certainly better than the "As you know, Bob" dialogue, which must be avoided like the black death.

Cliches should also be avoided like the plague

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

Cliches should also be avoided like the plague

or transformed...

 

[Sephiroth]

Quite.



Affection is political...when it's the politics of emotion we're dealing with, at least.

But in the first sense? Not necessarily, I suppose.......

 

[HardScienceFan]

'Lopro':low productivity,or low protein,orign of the term uncertain
Ohno: after Tetsuo Ohno,perfector of the fusion reactor
POCK(probably derived from power cut): one of the strongest curses around,extremely rude,might get you in jail
FOG :failed organ graft
Am :Asteroid miner
Apper: artificial personality
Parker : party killer(to be taken literally:someone who tries to kill as many people as possible at a party
Morticulture: building the right surroundings for a cybernetically resurrected
Personality


i just made this up,incorporating some older ideas

does this already build up a mental picture of the kind of world these words would fit in?

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

lol, Ben

the morticulture...

 

[HardScienceFan]

describe the following to an energy being living in the solar corona:

Coca Cola commercials
love
civil war
gloves
Dick Cheney
daylight savings time
the stock market

 

[Ursa major]

Haughtified: has graduated from Swiss finishing school.

 

[Sephiroth]

Well, for Dick Cheney I'd just show them a sunspot........

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

If Swiss cows don't understand DST, why should the aliens do?

 

[HardScienceFan]

uh i should have said INTELLIGENT beings living in the solar corona

 

[Giovanna Clairval]

- We found evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence!

- Well, it has to be somewhere

-----Mars Attacks (I think)

Now will you please post threadful posts?

 

[Marvolo]

And the only way the reader can find out is if the writer narrates the red hat wearer's arrest, sentencing and execution - which might be completely irrelevent to the plot.

But I get your point. It's a technique that can be used. I just think it can relies overmuch on assumptions about the readers made by the writer - or rather, that can be a danger of the technique, if the writer is not careful...

Actually the line should read: Jacob didn't know what red hats meant.

It was very early and I should have caught my error.

But in such a case the arrest and execution (there is no sentencing in blue hat land!) would be paramount to the story because Jacob would begin to ask a question: Why would anyone wear a red hat in Westtown, knowing it would presumebly label them outsiders or insane?

Well, I didn't get flamed for my cheesy example, so I count this as a victory.