Some people dislike the idea of “worldbuilding”. While the distinction made in this piece is more of a spectrum than a binary, it does have a point.
Reviewers seldom mention the worldbuilding in my Gryphon Clerks series, which was mostly worked out in advance, in detail. Several reviewers have mentioned enjoying the depiction of the world of the Hand of the Trickster books, which I made up as I went along. I think there’s something to be said for both approaches.
Originally shared by Adafruit Industries
Worldbuilding or Worldconjuring? The Science Fiction and Fantasy Debate
via Electric Literature
In contrast to “worldbuilding,” I’ll offer the term “worldconjuring.” Worldconjuring does not attempt to construct a scale model in the reader’s bedroom. Worldconjuring uses hints and literary magic to create the illusion of a world, with the reader working to fill in the gaps. Worldbuilding imposes, worldconjuring collaborates.
Let me make a necessarily incomplete analogy to another platform. In painting, worldbuilding is like Renaissance art that attempts to create realistic figures even when they are cherubs, demons, or god. Worldconjuring is a spectrum of other techniques: Matisse implying dancing figures with a few swoops of the brush, Picasso creating a chaos of objects to summon the horrors of Guernica, Magritte shattering our vision with impossible scenes. We should enjoy realistic paintings, but we shouldn’t impose their standards on every school of art.
Worldbuilding is The Silmarillion, worldconjuring is ancient myths and fairy tales. (In fairy tales, we don’t learn the construction techniques of the witch’s gingerbread house or the import/export routes of evil dwarves.) Worldbuilding is a thirty page explanation of the dining customs of beetle-shaped aliens, worldconjuring is Gregor Samsa turning into a beetle in the first sentence without any other fuss.
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But giving it another term, bringing the number of terms from one to two, implies a binary when it is in fact a spectrum.
But giving it another term, bringing the number of terms from one to two, implies a binary when it is in fact a spectrum.
But giving it another term, bringing the number of terms from one to two, implies a binary when it is in fact a spectrum.
But giving it another term, bringing the number of terms from one to two, implies a binary when it is in fact a spectrum.
But giving it another term, bringing the number of terms from one to two, implies a binary when it is in fact a spectrum.
In response to the original post, I’d say that the worldbuilding described is, in today’s literary climate, a case of bad writing. Still, both ends of the spectrum are valid. They simply have different pitfalls. Different strengths, too. =)
In response to the original post, I’d say that the worldbuilding described is, in today’s literary climate, a case of bad writing. Still, both ends of the spectrum are valid. They simply have different pitfalls. Different strengths, too. =)
In response to the original post, I’d say that the worldbuilding described is, in today’s literary climate, a case of bad writing. Still, both ends of the spectrum are valid. They simply have different pitfalls. Different strengths, too. =)
In response to the original post, I’d say that the worldbuilding described is, in today’s literary climate, a case of bad writing. Still, both ends of the spectrum are valid. They simply have different pitfalls. Different strengths, too. =)
In response to the original post, I’d say that the worldbuilding described is, in today’s literary climate, a case of bad writing. Still, both ends of the spectrum are valid. They simply have different pitfalls. Different strengths, too. =)
Perhaps it’s a difference in usage, but I distinguish between world-building and world-showing: for example, before co-authoring my last fantasy series, we worked out all the types of magic and what they were good/bad at (world-building) but nowhere in the book does anyone list that information (world-showing); knowing how the magic worked meant that the magic we showed was consistent, so there aren’t any gaps a reader can’t logically fill in but there are still gaps to fill in.
To expand the art analogy: Matisse could only imply figures with those few strokes because he’d considered the range and significance of human motion.
Perhaps it’s a difference in usage, but I distinguish between world-building and world-showing: for example, before co-authoring my last fantasy series, we worked out all the types of magic and what they were good/bad at (world-building) but nowhere in the book does anyone list that information (world-showing); knowing how the magic worked meant that the magic we showed was consistent, so there aren’t any gaps a reader can’t logically fill in but there are still gaps to fill in.
To expand the art analogy: Matisse could only imply figures with those few strokes because he’d considered the range and significance of human motion.
Perhaps it’s a difference in usage, but I distinguish between world-building and world-showing: for example, before co-authoring my last fantasy series, we worked out all the types of magic and what they were good/bad at (world-building) but nowhere in the book does anyone list that information (world-showing); knowing how the magic worked meant that the magic we showed was consistent, so there aren’t any gaps a reader can’t logically fill in but there are still gaps to fill in.
To expand the art analogy: Matisse could only imply figures with those few strokes because he’d considered the range and significance of human motion.
Perhaps it’s a difference in usage, but I distinguish between world-building and world-showing: for example, before co-authoring my last fantasy series, we worked out all the types of magic and what they were good/bad at (world-building) but nowhere in the book does anyone list that information (world-showing); knowing how the magic worked meant that the magic we showed was consistent, so there aren’t any gaps a reader can’t logically fill in but there are still gaps to fill in.
To expand the art analogy: Matisse could only imply figures with those few strokes because he’d considered the range and significance of human motion.
Perhaps it’s a difference in usage, but I distinguish between world-building and world-showing: for example, before co-authoring my last fantasy series, we worked out all the types of magic and what they were good/bad at (world-building) but nowhere in the book does anyone list that information (world-showing); knowing how the magic worked meant that the magic we showed was consistent, so there aren’t any gaps a reader can’t logically fill in but there are still gaps to fill in.
To expand the art analogy: Matisse could only imply figures with those few strokes because he’d considered the range and significance of human motion.
Dave Higgins That’s pretty much what I thought reading this. Writing a world with three genders, for a book, I considered every detail of how they’d function, down to chromosomes – even though the people in that world would have no concept of such things and they’d never discuss it – because I wanted the world to be realistic to the reader.
As mentioned there’s a difference between creating a world with every detail planned before you start and coming up with a vague idea that you flesh out as you go, but in either case the way you pass on that information regarding how the world functions will create a different experience for the reader. Importantly, you can use both at different times, for example explaining exactly how a race’s magic works while giving little information on how their advanced technology achieves what you require.
Dave Higgins That’s pretty much what I thought reading this. Writing a world with three genders, for a book, I considered every detail of how they’d function, down to chromosomes – even though the people in that world would have no concept of such things and they’d never discuss it – because I wanted the world to be realistic to the reader.
As mentioned there’s a difference between creating a world with every detail planned before you start and coming up with a vague idea that you flesh out as you go, but in either case the way you pass on that information regarding how the world functions will create a different experience for the reader. Importantly, you can use both at different times, for example explaining exactly how a race’s magic works while giving little information on how their advanced technology achieves what you require.
Dave Higgins That’s pretty much what I thought reading this. Writing a world with three genders, for a book, I considered every detail of how they’d function, down to chromosomes – even though the people in that world would have no concept of such things and they’d never discuss it – because I wanted the world to be realistic to the reader.
As mentioned there’s a difference between creating a world with every detail planned before you start and coming up with a vague idea that you flesh out as you go, but in either case the way you pass on that information regarding how the world functions will create a different experience for the reader. Importantly, you can use both at different times, for example explaining exactly how a race’s magic works while giving little information on how their advanced technology achieves what you require.
Dave Higgins That’s pretty much what I thought reading this. Writing a world with three genders, for a book, I considered every detail of how they’d function, down to chromosomes – even though the people in that world would have no concept of such things and they’d never discuss it – because I wanted the world to be realistic to the reader.
As mentioned there’s a difference between creating a world with every detail planned before you start and coming up with a vague idea that you flesh out as you go, but in either case the way you pass on that information regarding how the world functions will create a different experience for the reader. Importantly, you can use both at different times, for example explaining exactly how a race’s magic works while giving little information on how their advanced technology achieves what you require.
Dave Higgins That’s pretty much what I thought reading this. Writing a world with three genders, for a book, I considered every detail of how they’d function, down to chromosomes – even though the people in that world would have no concept of such things and they’d never discuss it – because I wanted the world to be realistic to the reader.
As mentioned there’s a difference between creating a world with every detail planned before you start and coming up with a vague idea that you flesh out as you go, but in either case the way you pass on that information regarding how the world functions will create a different experience for the reader. Importantly, you can use both at different times, for example explaining exactly how a race’s magic works while giving little information on how their advanced technology achieves what you require.