What's your favorite aspect of world building?
- Buffy_Ginger
- deele
- Buffy_Ginger
- deele
- plox
- deele
- plox
- deele
- plox
- deele
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» Buffy_Ginger - Re: What do you like most?
Language is my most favorite part. I love constructing languages. Language is fun! Next would be coming up with the history.-- posted by Buffy_Ginger
» deele - Re: Re: What do you like most?
In response to message posted by Buffy_Ginger:Do you try to build your languages from scratch, or start with an existing language and use it as a starting point?
History can be a great mover and shaker! Just look around the Earth...how many groups have been fighting each other so long that they don't remember why. I play with that one in the novel I'm working on...I think in a way I just want to see all the fighting stop so it will be a common theme for me. I can offer up lots of solutions and hope that I'll be a megastar one day, and so many people read my ideas that they use them.
Hey, I can dream, can't I? 
-- posted by deele
» Buffy_Ginger - language
I usually work from scratch when forming a language. Sometimes I will modify an existing English word--for example, in the language I'm writing for my book, "ti" is the equivalent of "the". It sounds like "the" except instead of the th-sound, it has a t-sound (tee). I hadn't thought of modifying an existing language for a whole new language. That may be a fun project to try in the future!History is fascinating. A lot of my favorite fantasy books are those that explore some element of history in the world in which they're set. These are some of the most interesting books to me.
World peace would be great. The bad news is that the nature of humankind makes it impossible. The good news is that at least we can still write about it!
-- posted by Buffy_Ginger
» deele - Re: language
In response to message posted by Buffy_Ginger:I've actually avoided the issue of creating new language because that isn't my cup of tea. I was just at a writers' conference this weekend and attended a historical fiction workshop. Jack Whyte was speaking there. I haven't read any of his books, but he's got the most wonderful Scottish accent. He was saying that he tends to write in current English but avoids anachronisms as much as possible (and that some occasionally slip by). That is probably the direction I'll go.
However, for those writers who have a talent for languages, using them well can definitely add richness to a world. I add mine in other areas, where my talents lie. I fear that any attempt at building a language would be too forced.
That said, I do choose names and town names and terms from existing languages, whether today's version of them or old versions when I can find information on them. I also got a language atlas that is very cool, showing the spread of language through time in various areas so I can be more aware of how such things ebb and flow.
-- posted by deele
» plox - Hi, Dee, just droppin by, and awed to be in the company of write
Hi, Dee, just droppin by, and awed to be in the company of writers. I'm a reader, so that makes me a co-dependent I guess. lolSince you are talking about languages, I'll add that it always, always bothers me when a character in a past-time setting uses current slanguage, or when a primitive uses modern insight. It can just kick me right out of the story. Later...
-- posted by plox
» deele - Re: Hi, Dee, just droppin by, and awed to be in the company of w
In response to message posted by plox:Thanks plox. Don't be too awed...writers would cry without readers. For one thing, no one would pay us! Second...let's face it, we're not writing just for ourselves usually. It's painful to write someone and have no one want to read it.
I'm actually interested in your feelings on what kinds of modern language get to you. Anachronisms are of course a no-no. So are slang terms that didn't exist in the time period. But what about contractions, for example? There's a wide range of opinions out there on the issue so I like to take polls on that.
As far as insights...it depends. Sometimes we modern folks have incorrect assumptions about how people in another time thought, and the writer discovers that during their research and goes with it. However, I don't believe in rewriting history. Certain places in certain eras were particularly racist, sexist, etc. As the saying goes, if we forget history, we are doomed to repeat it.
-- posted by deele
» plox - Re: Re: Hi, Dee, just droppin by, and awed to be in the company
In response to message posted by deele:Dee, I have to confess that I have a problem with memory so can't give specific examples of things I've read.
By contractions I quess you mean our ordinary flow of speech, like can't instead of can not. If they are not used the dialog will sound stilted.
As for modern insights, it bothers me when a primitive character thinks in concepts he could not have been familiar with. Not the words, but the world-view of knowing the earth is a planet in space, modern psychology, disease germs, etc. Just basic background assumptions that we have but the character wouldn't.
Think what I'm trying to explain would also be a factor in writing children's books. You could not have a child acting, reacting or musing from the stance of adult knowledge and experience.
I am very glad you contribute to the discussions in Fun Stuff.
-- posted by plox
» deele - Re: Re: Re: Hi, Dee, just droppin by, and awed to be in the comp
In response to message posted by plox:Yes, it's a huge problem to have characters know things they patently would NOT know. Throws the reader right out of the story. And, it's harder than you might think to keep that stuff out of there. I actually kind of enjoy trying to work around those kinds of things. Trying to get into the mindset of "If I didn't know X, Y, and Z, what would I think of this thing I just saw/learned/experienced?"
Thanks, by the way. I was actually thinking of pulling away from that area for personal reasons, but I just decided that I'd stop spending so much time there and just respond when I really felt a need to make a point. Problem is, I always have the need to make a point. *grins*
-- posted by deele
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