Tolkien was probably the first fantasy author to be concerned with world-building. He created a world that was vibrant and life-like. He thought through every detail. In an effort to try and imitate Tolkien, many fantasy and science fiction authors think that they must consider every single detail. They spend an inordinate amount of time on world-building instead of actually writing. There’s something to be said for letting the story develop on its own without worrying about every little detail. Just let the story breathe, and worry about the little details another time.
The old pulp writers like Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard built their worlds as they went along, for the most part, adding details when it suited them. Tolkien’s contemporary and friend, C.S. Lewis, for example, was part of this school of writing. He simply threw mythology and theology in a sack, shook it up, and dumped out the contents. He had fun with it, and I had fun reading it. Too many people forgot the simple joy of reading and writing. This is my style of writing. Yes, I did some world-building at the outset, but mostly I world-build on the go. I’m still world building and I’m loving every minute of it.
3 Comments
David Glenn
1/25/2021 06:11:48 pm
I get what you're saying. It's just the last time I made things up as I went along, my story was a disaster.
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Will
1/25/2021 08:14:43 pm
That's certainly true about C.S. Lewis, I think. He certainly did not start from the beginning with a fully developed Tolkien-like world in "out of the Silent Planet", but it emerged as the story went along.
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1/26/2021 04:20:17 am
That's why you write a second and a third draft to firm things up.
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AuthorI'm Ian Wilson; an eccentric comic artist, just telling a story.
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