Against Worldbuilding by Alexis Kennedy

[The Big Peat]

So I found this essay the other day on Worldbuilding and fell in love with it, particularly the end. The title is deliberately provocative, but I find the text itself measured and very sane as to why we should worldbuild vs what a lot of people do

Against Worldbuilding

"Worldbuilding!" You read it all the time in reviews. "A triumph of worldbuilding." "A masterpiece of worldbuilding." "…

www.gamesindustry.biz

 

[Christine Wheelwright]

Worldbuiding is something that should happen while you tell your story. Rather than vice versa. And there is also a tendency to treat them as sequential activities; build the world so that the story can then be set within it. But it is a joy for the reader to chance upon new information as the story develops, constantly learning and even modifying the image that was previously being formed in their minds.

 

[Venusian Broon]

Worldbuiding is something that should happen while you tell your story. Rather than vice versa.

Unless, of course, it is 'vice versa' and it just works. It's rare but it can definitely work in a piece of literature.

As for the article,. @The Big Peat I am somewhat puzzled. Perhaps as I've never formerly been taught 'worldbuilding' I've never felt the need to enquire about timelines or maps! Nor am I interested in really finding out such things in other author's works. Is this a big thing - that high fantasy authors are told?

I suppose I do occasionally like building bits and pieces but try to hide it all, and I like to think I'm more on the M. John Harrison side of things when it comes to worldbuilding. Well, at least pointing towards his side!

 

[The Big Peat]

Unless, of course, it is 'vice versa' and it just works. It's rare but it can definitely work in a piece of literature.

As for the article,. @The Big Peat I am somewhat puzzled. Perhaps as I've never formerly been taught 'worldbuilding' I've never felt the need to enquire about timelines or maps! Nor am I interested in really finding out such things in other author's works. Is this a big thing - that high fantasy authors are told?

I suppose I do occasionally like building bits and pieces but try to hide it all, and I like to think I'm more on the M. John Harrison side of things when it comes to worldbuilding. Well, at least pointing towards his side!

There's a very strong vein of thought in that direction, yes (and maybe in game design too?), both in formal books and in general advice. Maybe less timelines, but maps are very popular, and both represent a general "make sure your nuts and bolts are very secure approach". I think we can see it in some of the questions we get here too.

 

[Biskit]

Very good article, @The Big Peat. I know it's partly because it's confirming my personal bias, but I can't help being delighted with someone quoting Tolkien to say lay off the worldbuilding.

I was recently having an online conversation about worldbuilding, and the fact that my current WIP has reached a level of intricacy that I've had to start making notes on my world. I even drew a map (which I've now lost) because I mixed up who was coming from the east and who from the west. And pretty much all of my (after the fact) worldbuilding is about the plumbing.

Worldbuiding is something that should happen while you tell your story.

And for me, something that happens whilst I write my story.

 

[Wayne Mack]

I suggest one of the more pre-eminent world builders is J. K. Rowling. Harry Potter's world is so engaging that there is a theme park dedicated to it. I would argue that the world is more memorable than the characters or plot. Few authors, though, are capable of that level of engaging world building.

Probably the key to the article is the paragraph about infodumps. These are sections where the story stops dead to recount some detail that the writer finds interesting or necessary to explain to the reader. On the other hand, when done well, these expositions can make the world feel broad and deep. They also help set expectations for what is permitted and what isn't within the world. These constraints are necessary to preclude a magical or scientific solution to plot conflicts.

World building is a necessary part of the story and every story needs world building to some degree. The challenge is to do it well.

 

[The Big Peat]

Probably the key to the article is the paragraph about infodumps. These are sections where the story stops dead to recount some detail that the writer finds interesting or necessary to explain to the reader. On the other hand, when done well, these expositions can make the world feel broad and deep. They also help set expectations for what is permitted and what isn't within the world. These constraints are necessary to preclude a magical or scientific solution to plot conflicts.

Re this - I am coming to the opinion that this is a case of Russell's Conjugation.

I present intriguing morsels of worldbuilding; you exposit clumsily; they info-dump most boringly.

It's all the same, just a matter of finding the presentation where people love it.

 

[Venusian Broon]

There's a very strong vein of thought in that direction, yes (and maybe in game design too?), both in formal books and in general advice. Maybe less timelines, but maps are very popular, and both represent a general "make sure your nuts and bolts are very secure approach". I think we can see it in some of the questions we get here too.

The problem I have with maps is that they can (if you let them) break up your reading concentration, so you read that character X is at the city of rhombaloid in the Merry Duck Tavern etc... and you stop and pull up the map to see where it is (and if even worse they have a city plan so that you see where tavern they are in is.)

But that is just me, and of course a book can have a nice map for those cartophiles and those that like tracking where the characters are on the world, I can just ignore it.

I've got nothing against Authors making maps - done it myself to plan particular chapters - just not keen on them for the reading experience!

 

[sknox]

I found the article touched so many bases, I'm not sure if we made it home or are somewhere in left field. Do build, don't build, make a timeline or not, real places but maybe not or else yes. By the time I got to the end I came away with a profund lesson: be sure to do what works.

The article also rather confuses the worldbuilding that happens outside the book with what happens inside. Those are two quite different things. IMO, both happen with most authors and most books. I'm sticking with fantasy here; let the SF authors speak their own piece. Peace.

Here's a postscritive comment: proscribe prescriptions, especially when they address "fantasy" as if it all suffered from the same malady. A timeline in a comedy short story (fantasy) would be rather silly. And I much doubt it's been done more than a few times. But a timeline for a fantasy epic series makes good sense. So does a timeline for most any mystery. And timelines just to get the events of a day or a few days straight when there are multiple locations also makes sense. Same goes for maps, histories and all the rest of the worldbuilding apparatus.

 

[The Big Peat]

The point of the article as I saw it is that what works are images and descriptions that resonate with the other person, and those things don't come from timelines. Sometimes they are supported by them, but they're never them. And that the term worldbuilding and much of the advice about it seems to suggest focusing on those support elements, rather than the images and descriptions and sense of wonder, and that doing so is a mistake. Building more support structure than you need is a waste of time.

 

[sknox]

>Building more support structure than you need is a waste of time.
Knowing what is needed is more than half the battle, though, isn't it? Knowing what resonates? For myself, I don't see any way to know precisely what support structure a story needs before the story exists. Even after I've written the dang thing, I'm hard pressed to say this datum was needed but that wasn't. It's a process, and every step along the way, however wandering, got me to the end. There's more to art than necessary and unnecessary. There's also the unavoidable.

I would have liked the article to provide examples of advice that suggests focusing on support elements rather than on sense of wonder etc. I'm suspicious of criticisms of targets that are off-stage. It's too much like setting up straw men. If there were such advice (I'm sure at least one example could be found somewhere), then it would surely be wrong. All world building with no images, descriptions, or sense of wonder? Foolishness!

But I don't think that's what's going on. I think it's more likely there are articles than go into great detail on worldbuilding and that a novice writer might become so fascinated by such things that their storytelling becomes a bit mechanical. That's fine. If they truly are writers, they'll grow out of it. If they aren't, no amount of wonder sensing is going to lead them to a solid story. It's all of a piece, and different artists come at their art from different angles. There are formulae for chemistry, not for art.

But, just to argue with myself for a moment, articles on writing have this virtue, at least: they turn out to be useful to someone, somewhere, some time. So, let a thousand flowers bloom.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

I think we could distinguish between worldbuilding in general and maps in particular. Generally I do the minimum amount of worldbuilding required for a novel so that my imagination has maximum flexibility and scope. However, maps are very useful, for the author and the reader. For Monique Orphan, I did a detailed map of the four storey orphanage she lived in so everything was right for the action - all coherent and feasible. Personally, I'd take maps out of the worldbuilding discussion.

 

[G.T.]

I made a comprehensive map of the entire continent for the fantasy trilogy I've written (now editing). My biggest problem now is second guessing my own travel times between places. I often wonder if I should just remove all mention of distances in miles in the text and the scale on the map. The actual action takes place over less than a quarter of the continent.

As for Worldbuilding within the text, I'd agree that it should be sprinkled rather than dumped and the test of a well written world is when the reader feels immersed without noticing it happen. Unless you are getting feedback while writing, you have to just hope your own judgement is balanced enough for it to work without requiring major editing later.

 

[Toby Frost]

I find it slightly depressing that even now, the first question raised is "What would Tolkien do?" The answer to me is "Whatever he'd do, he'd do it many years ago, in a completely different publishing environment, with a lot more knowledge and skill than most authors trying to do anything similar."

That aside, I agree with this essay. It seems that a lot of people confuse size with depth when talking about fictional settings, especially in fantasy and stories with an epic feel. Star Wars, for instance, no longer feels epic to me because fan-service demands that the same few characters keep meeting in the same few places and doing much the same things.

I find this sort of writing especially irritating: "Then came Zeb, son of the kings of Gob, who longtime had ruled the land of Zarg from the halls of Throng, where the horn of fair Mog hung above the silver throne of Gong, and..." This is an exaggeration, but it's very easy to create this kind of shallow, ultimately meaningless stuff. The real depth comes from characters. The Long Goodbye feels like epic to me, likewise The Name of the Rose, despite their small casts and settings, because they involve characters going deeply into their own strange societies and making discoveries and taking actions that affect them profoundly.

Last year I wrote an SF novel on another planet, for which I'm looking for a publisher. The planet has two important events in its history: (1) settlers arrived on the planet and (2) the government tried to put all the genetically-modified people into a reservation. Those are the only two events that seriously impinge on the plot. A list of monarchs and cities would just be a load of made-up words. I realise that for a lot of people inventing settings (me included) is fun, but this doesn't write good novels without a lot more.

 

[Toby Frost]

Last year I wrote an SF novel on another planet

Or rather, last year I wrote an SF novel set on another planet.

 

[nixie]

@Toby Frost, finally your secret is out. You're either an alien living on earth or you have the means to travel to another planet, you can't fool us by pretending your first post was an error.

 

[Toby Frost]

@Toby Frost, finally your secret is out. You're either an alien living on earth or you have the means to travel to another planet, you can't fool us by pretending your first post was an error.

On my homeworld, I'm a best-seller. They're just a bit slow in posting the cheques.

 

[Biskit]

On my homeworld, I'm a best-seller. They're just a bit slow in posting the cheques.

You must have an amazing internet service package to keep in touch with Chrons.

 

[The Big Peat]

You must have an amazing internet service package to keep in touch with Chrons.

I dunno, maybe it's the forum software.

After all, I've always got the feeling a lot of people here might be coming from a different planet to me...

 

[Swank]

Isn't the article primarily about video game design? Certainly there are similarities, but the ability to control the gaze of the "narrator" in a game is very different than the way text or film controls what is on the page or screen.