![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Write Where it Hurts
Jan. 29th, 2004 10:10 amSome of you are writers. Some of you even make a living out of it. So maybe I can ask a question that's been bugging me all night.
How the hell much do you have to plan a book before you start writing it?
Let me explain. I had an idea for a story yesterday (damn you, Thren) and it looked to be ... well, fun. Interesting scope for characters, versatile plot ... the thing's mouldable like Play-Doh. But by the time I got home, exhaustion had sort of overwhelmed inspiration. I thought, as I generally do, that talking about it to someone might get the creative juices flowing again.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cholten99 was, of course, my first port of call.
Big mistake.
leopard_lady explained his reaction by saying "he's a pragmatist". She's right, too. Just, sometimes (particularly when trying to write a damn fantasy novel) the last thing on God's green earth you want is a pragmatist. I was thinking characters and action/reaction and interpersonal relationships and ... well, the sort of stuff that I think about when I'm writing things, when suddenly I got assailed with "who's your audience?" When I told him 'people like me' (because, hell, what's the point of writing something you don't know and can't enjoy?) he said it was unusual. What, people don't usually write for themselves? That strikes me as ... well, wrong. Anyway, after that it was questions like, "Why don't wizards just take over the world? That's the question that's never been answered to my satisfaction in, for example, the Potterverse..." and "If they're so powerful, magic-users, why don't they use their powers to make the world a better place by curing disease and that?" and "What's your literary arena? If it's something like Pratchett, that's one thing, but..."
GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
It's not mainstream literature. I'll probably never write mainstream literature! Shit, I am not F. Scott fucking Fitzgerald, alright? The stuff I write requires a certain amount of willing suspension of disbelief; it always has, it always will. And the thing that gets me is that he's trying to get me to plug unpluggable plot holes to make sure it's absolutely believable (magic users?!? That's willing suspension of disbelief right there!) when he watches complete dross that requires you to suspend your disbelief higher than Haman. His explanation when I pointed out that little hypocrisy was that he expects the person he's discussing this story with will want to make their story better than the dross on TV. What, the stuff he actually consumes? He doesn't buy mainstream literature. I've never seen him read mainstream literature. If I want things to sell (and I do), and if I'm taking him as my target audience (which I'm probably not, but I'm moving towards a point here), what would I rather do? Write mainstream literature and probably not have him even look at the thing, or write dross that'll make me some money? Jesus H Christ on a sidecar.
No, there's no satisfactory answer to "why don't wizards take over the world, if they exist?" -- not one that would satisfy him, anyway. I mean, fuck, I don't want to run the world. Too much responsibility, and I'd feel too bad if I fucked up. That's my reasoning; the personalities of characters may vary. As for stepping in with magic where modern medicine fails, I've finally come up with the one answer for why not that I might not need to explain too much -- Prime Directive. You don't burst into a culture with unfamiliar technique and alter their development. It could be detrimental. They want magic, let them work it out for themselves. The rest of it (particularly, "What kind of powers do these magic users have?" and "What's stopping this from being a Mage universe?") will be answered when I write the fucking book!
Or rather, if I write the fucking book. Ideas are like plants. In the seedling stage, they're way too easy to kill.
*sigh* All I want is to share things with someone. Is that so wrong? I mean, I admit that he did try, but books aren't always about the big picture. What about asking about the characters? What about the people who are going to make the story go; the ones who'll be answering as many of his questions as they can? Why does it have to be so clinical? I suppose that's his way, but it'll never be mine. It makes me too rabidly depressed to think of the whole thing as if it were ... well, I don't know what. Paint by numbers, perhaps. Cold and clinical, definitely. Completely ignorant of the human factor, even.
Is there an irony in the fact thatcholten99 has said he'd like to see me being creative more often but when I am, he looks at all the least creative aspects of the thing and bogs me down so far with logic that I can barely move? I suppose he's never read anything of mine and can't be expected to know ... well, what I can get away with, maybe. But are my storylines really that bad?
How the hell much do you have to plan a book before you start writing it?
Let me explain. I had an idea for a story yesterday (damn you, Thren) and it looked to be ... well, fun. Interesting scope for characters, versatile plot ... the thing's mouldable like Play-Doh. But by the time I got home, exhaustion had sort of overwhelmed inspiration. I thought, as I generally do, that talking about it to someone might get the creative juices flowing again.
cholten99 was, of course, my first port of call.Big mistake.
leopard_lady explained his reaction by saying "he's a pragmatist". She's right, too. Just, sometimes (particularly when trying to write a damn fantasy novel) the last thing on God's green earth you want is a pragmatist. I was thinking characters and action/reaction and interpersonal relationships and ... well, the sort of stuff that I think about when I'm writing things, when suddenly I got assailed with "who's your audience?" When I told him 'people like me' (because, hell, what's the point of writing something you don't know and can't enjoy?) he said it was unusual. What, people don't usually write for themselves? That strikes me as ... well, wrong. Anyway, after that it was questions like, "Why don't wizards just take over the world? That's the question that's never been answered to my satisfaction in, for example, the Potterverse..." and "If they're so powerful, magic-users, why don't they use their powers to make the world a better place by curing disease and that?" and "What's your literary arena? If it's something like Pratchett, that's one thing, but..."GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
It's not mainstream literature. I'll probably never write mainstream literature! Shit, I am not F. Scott fucking Fitzgerald, alright? The stuff I write requires a certain amount of willing suspension of disbelief; it always has, it always will. And the thing that gets me is that he's trying to get me to plug unpluggable plot holes to make sure it's absolutely believable (magic users?!? That's willing suspension of disbelief right there!) when he watches complete dross that requires you to suspend your disbelief higher than Haman. His explanation when I pointed out that little hypocrisy was that he expects the person he's discussing this story with will want to make their story better than the dross on TV. What, the stuff he actually consumes? He doesn't buy mainstream literature. I've never seen him read mainstream literature. If I want things to sell (and I do), and if I'm taking him as my target audience (which I'm probably not, but I'm moving towards a point here), what would I rather do? Write mainstream literature and probably not have him even look at the thing, or write dross that'll make me some money? Jesus H Christ on a sidecar.
No, there's no satisfactory answer to "why don't wizards take over the world, if they exist?" -- not one that would satisfy him, anyway. I mean, fuck, I don't want to run the world. Too much responsibility, and I'd feel too bad if I fucked up. That's my reasoning; the personalities of characters may vary. As for stepping in with magic where modern medicine fails, I've finally come up with the one answer for why not that I might not need to explain too much -- Prime Directive. You don't burst into a culture with unfamiliar technique and alter their development. It could be detrimental. They want magic, let them work it out for themselves. The rest of it (particularly, "What kind of powers do these magic users have?" and "What's stopping this from being a Mage universe?") will be answered when I write the fucking book!
Or rather, if I write the fucking book. Ideas are like plants. In the seedling stage, they're way too easy to kill.
*sigh* All I want is to share things with someone. Is that so wrong? I mean, I admit that he did try, but books aren't always about the big picture. What about asking about the characters? What about the people who are going to make the story go; the ones who'll be answering as many of his questions as they can? Why does it have to be so clinical? I suppose that's his way, but it'll never be mine. It makes me too rabidly depressed to think of the whole thing as if it were ... well, I don't know what. Paint by numbers, perhaps. Cold and clinical, definitely. Completely ignorant of the human factor, even.
Is there an irony in the fact that
cholten99 has said he'd like to see me being creative more often but when I am, he looks at all the least creative aspects of the thing and bogs me down so far with logic that I can barely move? I suppose he's never read anything of mine and can't be expected to know ... well, what I can get away with, maybe. But are my storylines really that bad?
