Measure for height of fantasy
Irina Rempt
to share it. If anyone wants to contact him privately, he's Jon Noble
<jon_p...@yahoo.com>.
> I'm still inclined to think that people who try to
> define exactly what High Fantasy is are trying to
> include their own favourites in that definition, or
> perhaps if they favour Urban type fantasy, what they
> least like. There have been a few suggestions as to
> how to measure the "height" of a fantasy book here, so
> I will add my own proposal;
>
> Secondary Worldliness
> set in our world = 1 point
> set in a world nearly ours = 2 points
> set in a variant of ours (eg alternate history = 3 pts
> our world and a secondary world = 4 points
> set in a secondary world entirely = 5 points
> secondary world with maps = 6 points
> seconday world + maps + made up language = 7 points
> bonus points for extra maps and languages
>
> Scale of the story
> a family affair = 1 point
> set only in a local community = 2 points
> events affect a whole country = 3 points
> events affect the world = 5 points
> events affect the universe = 6 points
> and if time is also at threat = 7 points
>
> Good v. evil
> everyone is very nice = 1 point
> bad animals/beings follow own incination (eg
> dragons)=2
> a villian, but still human (eg criminal mastermind) =
> 3
> non human/undead villian = 4
> Hitler/Saddam Hussein type megalomaniac = 5
> true evil darklord = 6
> The very antithesis of evrything nice = 7
>
> Significance of magic to story
> Hardly noticed = 1 point
> incidental = 2 points
> down to
> Everyone has magic and its vital = 5 points
>
> Bonus points
> each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
> points for the same cliche repeated)
> Every 500 pages or part thereof = 1 point
>
> Add all points together, anything with more than 20
> points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
> Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
>
> :)
Irina (mine is 16 or 17 on this scale, allowing 7 points for the
pre-existing world with maps and a language; if I count only what's in
the book proper it's two points less)
--
Vesta veran, terna puran, farenin. http://www.valdyas.org/irina
Beghinnen can ick, volherden will' ick, volbringhen sal ick.
http://www.valdyas.org/~irina/foundobjects/ Latest: 02-Mar-2003
David Friedman
Irina Rempt <ir...@valdyas.org> wrote:
> > Add all points together, anything with more than 20
> > points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
> > Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
> >
> > :)
>
> Irina (mine is 16 or 17 on this scale, allowing 7 points for the
> pre-existing world with maps and a language; if I count only what's in
> the book proper it's two points less)
I think I'm about eight points, which looks safely in his range. But it
depends on how you distinguish between "a world nearly ours" and "a
secondary world."
Boudewijn Rempt
>> Secondary Worldliness
>> set in our world = 1 point
>> set in a world nearly ours = 2 points
>> set in a variant of ours (eg alternate history = 3 pts
>> our world and a secondary world = 4 points
>> set in a secondary world entirely = 5 points
>> secondary world with maps = 6 points
>> seconday world + maps + made up language = 7 points
>> bonus points for extra maps and languages
Oh, dear... 7 + 14 (maps that I still use), + 7 (extra languages).
That already brings me over 20. But there's a maximum of three
or four languages per book, apart from English. And I don't know
whether the maps should be in the book as published (though it
would be nice).
>> events affect a whole country = 3 points
>> non human/undead villian = 4
Technically, he just doesn't die... And he's not very nice,
but quite reasonable. Just defending himself against the
good guys, really.
>> Significance of magic to story
Let's say 4. We're fighting sorcerers here.
>> Bonus points
>> each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
>> points for the same cliche repeated)
None, really. That's a relief.
>> Every 500 pages or part thereof = 1 point
1 point. I don't think I'll go over 150.000 words with the WIP.
>>
>> Add all points together, anything with more than 20
>> points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
>> Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
>>
I'm definitely in the High Fantasy ballpark, then. Even though
there are no elves, and I think that my sorcerers are quite original,
being more like eccentric University professors than evil archimages.
Oh, well, back to the young apprentice sorcerer's remorse over her
having killed a henchman.
--
Boudewijn Rempt | http://www.valdyas.org
Aaron F. Bourque
>> Bonus points
>> each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
>> points for the same cliche repeated)
Hmm. I will be unable to calculate the validity of my fantasy
series without this "Tough Guide"!!!
Aaron "The Mad Whitaker" Bourque; my "least fantastic" is at
least 13 points before calculating these bonus points . . . (my
most fantastic is 37)
--
Women supposedly mature at a faster rate than men
If that is true, how come they live so much longer then . . ?
Nothing says maturity like transforming robot toys for ten-year-olds
http://members.aol.com/aaronbourque/cryotekwarning.jpg
Erol K. Bayburt
>pre-existing world with maps and a language; if I count only what's in
>the book proper it's two points less)
Mine is 17-18 on this scale. I could subtract a point for the very brief bit in
our world - but then I'd have to add a point (or more) for the cliche of "guy
from our world gets pulled into fantasy-land"
I also score the full 5 points for "everyone has magic and its vital."
--
Erol K. Bayburt
Ero...@aol.com
Jonathan L Cunningham
wrote:
>Someone posted this on the Diana Wynne Jones mailing list and allowed me
>to share it. If anyone wants to contact him privately, he's Jon Noble
><jon_p...@yahoo.com>.
>
>> secondary world with maps = 6 points
6
>> a family affair = 1 point
6 + 1 = 7
>> Good v. evil
>> everyone is very nice = 1 point
>> bad animals/beings follow own incination (eg
>> dragons)=2
Lots of (i.e. more than 2) non-human races, including
dragons, but they're not bad, (well, mostly not worse than
most of the humans) is that 1 or 2?
7 + [1 or 2] = [8 or 9]
>> Significance of magic to story
>> Hardly noticed = 1 point
>> Everyone has magic and its vital = 5 points
Magic is commonplace and it is hardly noticed. Hmmm. Call
it 3
[8 or 9] + 3 = [11 or 12]
>> Bonus points
>> each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
>> points for the same cliche repeated)
>> Every 500 pages or part thereof = 1 point
I think I need to add a cliche or two, to get smack into
the middle of the range, unless having the sequel worked
out (and yesterday I had an idea for a prequel) will get me
into the longer lengths.
>> Add all points together, anything with more than 20
>> points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
>> Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
Jonathan
--
(Replace netspam by jlc when appropriate)
Elizabeth Shack
wrote:
>I'm definitely in the High Fantasy ballpark, then. Even though
>there are no elves, and I think that my sorcerers are quite original,
>being more like eccentric University professors than evil archimages.
Doubt it's original if I managed to come up with that too. (Well,
some of the offscreen ones are evil archimages.)
--
Elizabeth Shack eas...@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~eashack/life.html
Busy. Got coffee?
Elizabeth Shack
wrote:
I was expecting "What's another word for a yard or a meter?"
>> seconday world + maps + made up language = 7 points
>> events affect the world = 5 points
but mostly focused on one country.
>> a villian, but still human (eg criminal mastermind) =
>> 3
>> Significance of magic to story
>> Hardly noticed = 1 point
>> incidental = 2 points
>> down to
>> Everyone has magic and its vital = 5 points
dunno. (what's magic's vital? <g>) probably 4 or 5 - not everyone has
magic, and for most of the book it doesn't particularly exist, but the
whole point of the book is getting it working again.
>> each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
>> points for the same cliche repeated)
I'd have to look it up. I'm sure there's several.
>> Add all points together, anything with more than 20
>> points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
>> Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
Well, I'm at least at 19, probably several points more, so I guess no
one has to bother reading it. :)
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
wrote:
>> I'm still inclined to think that people who try to
>> define exactly what High Fantasy is are trying to
>> include their own favourites in that definition, or
>> perhaps if they favour Urban type fantasy, what they
>> least like. There have been a few suggestions as to
>> how to measure the "height" of a fantasy book here, so
>> I will add my own proposal;
Cheater!
Cribbed from _Wheel of Time_!
vlatko
--
http://www.niribanimeso.org/eng/
http://www.michaelswanwick.com/
vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr
Charlie Allery
Irina Rempt wrote in message <4985068.n...@calcifer.valdyas.org>...
Someone posted this on the Diana Wynne Jones mailing list and allowed me
to share it. If anyone wants to contact him privately, he's Jon Noble
<jon_p...@yahoo.com>.
>
> Secondary Worldliness
> set in a secondary world entirely = 5 points
5 points for the completely other world
> Scale of the story
> events affect a whole country = 3 points
3 points for the country-level events
>
> Good v. evil
> a villian, but still human (eg criminal mastermind) =
> 3
3 points Yup, just human really.
>
> Significance of magic to story
> Hardly noticed = 1 point
> incidental = 2 points
> down to
> Everyone has magic and its vital = 5 points
>
Hmm, well everyone _else_ has magic except this one country, which is kind
of the point of the plot. So probably a 3.
> Bonus points
> each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
> points for the same cliche repeated)
No idea how many clichés I'm hitting
> Every 500 pages or part thereof = 1 point
>
I point for what I hope will be 120k-ish words.
> Add all points together, anything with more than 20
> points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
> Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
I make that 15 on what I can evaluate. Since there aren't any languages or
non-humans, it's pretty tame really. Just a tale of country folk ... ooops,
no, I mean ordinary folk doing extraordinary things for love of their
country.
Charlie (humming Jupiter, from Holst's Planets)
James Wallis
<ir...@valdyas.org> wrote:
>> Add all points together, anything with more than 20
>> points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
>> Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
"Mark of Damnation" (Games Workshop, released 1st March, my name
on the cover) weighs in at a respectable 12, despite being
Warhammer fiction.
The weird news: Amazon has decided to co-credit the book to
someone else, who happens to be a friend of mine but who had
nothing to do with its writing.
The better news: Games Workshop want three more with the same
character. However, they have already announced that the next one
(Mark of Heresy) will be out on 6th October. Which is nice, but
the first I've heard of it.
--
James Wallis
ja...@erstwhile.demon.co.uk
Irina Rempt
> On Sun, 02 Mar 2003 23:22:06 +0100, Irina Rempt <ir...@valdyas.org>
> wrote:
<something I quoted and someone else wrote>
> Cheater!
Hold it, not me!
> Cribbed from _Wheel of Time_!
Never read it, so I couldn't have known.
Irina
Deirdre Saoirse Moen
<jon_p...@yahoo.com>:
> > set in a world nearly ours = 2 points
> > set only in a local community = 2 points
> > events affect a whole country = 3 points
There ought to be a setting in between those two, so I'm counting 2-1/2 points.
> > a villian, but still human (eg criminal mastermind) = 3
> > Significance of magic to story
> > Hardly noticed = 1 point
> > incidental = 2 points
> > down to
> > Everyone has magic and its vital = 5 points
I'd have to say three points.
So, 10-1/2 so far.
> > Bonus points
> > each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
> > points for the same cliche repeated)
> > Every 500 pages or part thereof = 1 point
Hmm, does that mean that 400 pages counts as 1 point? Doesn't seem fair,
does it?
> > Add all points together, anything with more than 20
> > points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
> > Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
Woohoo! I win!
--
_Deirdre http://deirdre.net
"I'm writing a book. I've got the page numbers done." - Steven Wright
Zeborah
height of people in fantasies before the invention of metric, or
whatever. :-)
Anyway, I'll try this for the Kangaroo Story.
I guess it must tehcnically be set in a secondary world entirely, even
though I have now to the kangaroos successfully added an obscure
reference to kimchi. No maps or languages except a witch speaking
Gibberish and my protag refering to a map someone draws as looking like
the outline of a cow's head until it's labelled. 5pts
Events do affect two countries, through no fault of their own except in
allowing idiots to live. 3pts
Hmm. There's no point system for a villain cursed with stupidity. Oh,
wait, there's that other villain. 3pts.
Magic is not by any means incidental but certainly not everyone has it.
3pts.
I'm not going through the Tough Guide right now, though I'll note that
they consume little stew in favour of pickles.
I'm likely to finish first draft long before page 200, so no real points
there either.
Something like 14pts, I guess.
Zeborah
--
http://www.geocities.com/zeborahnz2000
Kangaroo story wordcount: 35187 words
Stormie Parsons
> > Secondary Worldliness
> > set in our world = 1 point
> > set in a world nearly ours = 2 points
> > set in a variant of ours (eg alternate history = 3 pts
> > our world and a secondary world = 4 points
> > set in a secondary world entirely = 5 points
> > secondary world with maps = 6 points
> > seconday world + maps + made up language = 7 points
> > bonus points for extra maps and languages
5 for entirely secondary world. (Entirely secondary? How can you
have a secondary without a primary?) <becomes confused>
> > Scale of the story
> > a family affair = 1 point
> > set only in a local community = 2 points
> > events affect a whole country = 3 points
> > events affect the world = 5 points
> > events affect the universe = 6 points
> > and if time is also at threat = 7 points
5 for affects the world. That's the thing about messing with royal
successions and assassinating monarchs.
> > Good v. evil
> > everyone is very nice = 1 point
> > bad animals/beings follow own incination (eg
> > dragons)=2
> > a villian, but still human (eg criminal mastermind) =
> > 3
> > non human/undead villian = 4
> > Hitler/Saddam Hussein type megalomaniac = 5
> > true evil darklord = 6
> > The very antithesis of evrything nice = 7
3 for human villain.
> > Significance of magic to story
> > Hardly noticed = 1 point
> > incidental = 2 points
> > down to
> > Everyone has magic and its vital = 5 points
Umm. 4, I suppose. Not everybody *has* it, and if nobody had it,
they'd still figure out how to live, but the way things are set up, it
is vital. This all reminds me of the best (as in, pleasant and
positive, rather than useful) crit I got on my first twelve pages, in
which the kindly older gentleman professed himself "not a big fan of
story lines that depend on magic", making me wonder if he's OK with
gratuitous magic but just doesn't want to *depend* on it.
> > Bonus points
> > each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
> > points for the same cliche repeated)
I'd have to reread it to be sure, but if I'm permitted a guess,
somewhere around 4.
> > Every 500 pages or part thereof = 1 point
Beats me-- it ain't done yet. I'll give myself a point here, but it
may disappear later.
> > Add all points together, anything with more than 20
> > points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
> > Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
<counts on fingers> <runs out of fingers> Well, goody! I'm High,
even if I've overshot the wordcount.
Stormie
Nicky Browne
> On Sun, 02 Mar 2003 23:22:06 +0100, Irina Rempt
> <ir...@valdyas.org> wrote:
>
> >> Add all points together, anything with more than 20
> >> points is High Fantasy, Less than 5 points is Low
> >> Fantasy, Anything inbetween is probably worth reading
>
> "Mark of Damnation" (Games Workshop, released 1st March, my name
> on the cover) weighs in at a respectable 12, despite being
> Warhammer fiction.
>
> The weird news: Amazon has decided to co-credit the book to
> someone else, who happens to be a friend of mine but who had
> nothing to do with its writing.
>
> The better news: Games Workshop want three more with the same
> character. However, they have already announced that the next one
> (Mark of Heresy) will be out on 6th October. Which is nice, but
> the first I've heard of it.
That sounds like pretty good news to me - congrats!Do they take long to write?
Nicky
Helen
Bourque <aaronb...@aol.commandment> writes
>From: Irina Rempt ir...@valdyas.org
>
>>> Bonus points
>>> each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
>>> points for the same cliche repeated)
>
>Hmm. I will be unable to calculate the validity of my fantasy
>series without this "Tough Guide"!!!
>
ability to conjure spheres of light or *Magefire* (not that I call it
that). I think my *Colour Coding* is just skewed enough to escape
censure. Huw's eyes are grey (signifying power), which he does have,
but not much. And Mark's hair is blond and his eyes are blue, which
signifies goodness, and he is mainly the good guy, but he does later
stage a military coup and overthrows the rightful king. Which is *not*
what good guys are supposed to do. Anyway, I'm sure you're allowed 1
cliché per volume. :-) E.g. I have a *Missing Heir* in book three, but
he knows perfectly well who he is and has gone missing on purpose, so I
don't think that's quite the _Tough Guide_ cliché.
>Aaron "The Mad Whitaker" Bourque; my "least fantastic" is at
>least 13 points before calculating these bonus points . . . (my
>most fantastic is 37)
I'm not sure whether to count the map or not. There was one (done when
I was about 15), which is now all wrong. I haven't (as yet) produced
another, though I may need some sketch maps when the armies start moving
about. So the total comes out in the 16-17 range.
On the other hand a short that I'm halfway through comes out at 25-30,
but I've taken the clichés[*] from _Tough Guide_ and used them
deliberately for effect.
Helen
[*] Including things like attack by *Leathery-Winged Avians* and a
*Wizard* with a long white beard and robes and a *Quest Object*.
--
Helen, Gwynedd, Wales *** http://www.baradel.demon.co.uk
David Friedman
elie...@yahoo.com (Stormie Parsons) wrote:
> > > Bonus points
> > > each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra
> > > points for the same cliche repeated)
I only read the sample pages on Amazon, but judging by those I probably
don't get any points--perhaps because I'm not really writing fantasy.
The closest I came was the Anglo-Saxon Cossacks. My plains nomads, aka
Westkin, do live in the plains (close enough to steppes) and breed
horses. But they don't, so far as I know, have ponytails. There is one
reference that suggests riding horses acrobatically:
--
The silence was broken by Donal's arrival. He dismounted, walked over to
Kiron, looked at him carefully, spoke.
"Yes. Prince's eldest son. Won three silvers off him."
Kiron looked back at him.
"I didn't think the horse Š"
"Guesting with us, education, first rule: Don't bet with Westkin. Second
rule: Specially on horses."
---
Donal is a plains nomad (and Harald's foster son--Harald is the
protagonist). The final line is by Harald. Kiron at this point has just
volunteered himself as a hostage for the ransom of his father's defeated
army--in part because his father sent him along for his education, and
what could be more educational than spending a month or two as the guest
of the barbarian leader (from the Imperial point of view) who has been
defeating imperial armies for the past twenty years?
The Westkin are organized in clans but have no supreme chieftain, and
they clearly do fight among themselves. And they fight other people--as
mercenaries for the Empire and as allies of Harald. And everybody
doesn't know better than to mess with them--Artos, the top Imperial
general, has just seized some territory from a Westkin clan that had
been raiding his supply wagons. They don't live in stone fastnesses.
There is no evidence that their women wear long skirts or are wimps,
although it's pretty clear that they don't participate in warfare.
I suppose I might claim a quarter point or so. Nothing else in the
sample pages comes close.
Suzanne Palmer
[quoted point scoring system for High Fantasy snipped]
which, out of curiosity, makes me ask: has anyone else set out to
*deliberately* write an EFP, as a sort of a mental exercise? Or is it
just me, and my bad brain?
-Suzanne
Boudewijn Rempt
Not to novel-length -- EFP worlds bore me, and so did the story. But I
must have a few thousand words of a true EFP novel somewhere. I didn't
find it mentally stimulating.
David Friedman
Helen <ken...@baradel.demon.co.uk.please.delete.this> wrote:
> On the other hand a short that I'm halfway through comes out at 25-30,
> but I've taken the clichés[*] from _Tough Guide_ and used them
> deliberately for effect.
This suggests a new contest, or perhaps art form. Try to get the highest
possible score in the fewest words.
I once published an article in the Journal of Political Economy that was
less than a page long. I mentioned it to my colleague James Buchanan and
he said that he had been working for a long time on trying to produce
the smallest publishable article, and was hoping eventually to get it
down to a sentence.
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
wrote:
>On Monday 03 March 2003 01:05 Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>
>> On Sun, 02 Mar 2003 23:22:06 +0100, Irina Rempt <ir...@valdyas.org>
>> wrote:
>
><something I quoted and someone else wrote>
>
>> Cheater!
>
>Hold it, not me!
Oh, no, I know you didn't write it, but just didn't include the
author's address. Sorry.
>> Cribbed from _Wheel of Time_!
>
>Never read it, so I couldn't have known.
You have absolutely no idea what you fortunately missed. It's the
series that caused to coin the name of Extruded Fantasy Product. It's
now on the tenth book and nothing has resolved. I think that Jordan
has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
I read the first four or five and have no appetite to go there ever
again.
Anyway, it was intended as a humorous comment, not an accusation. I
still forget the limitations of the medium. :-(
Dorothy J Heydt
David Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> wrote:
>
>I once published an article in the Journal of Political Economy that was
>less than a page long. I mentioned it to my colleague James Buchanan and
>he said that he had been working for a long time on trying to produce
>the smallest publishable article, and was hoping eventually to get it
>down to a sentence.
Hmmm, sounds as if he was bitten at a susceptible age by a
Sanskrit grammarian. They went in for making grammatical
descriptions as short and concise as possible, leading to the
remark "The grammarian rejoices more over the saving of a
syllable half the length of a short vowel, than over the birth of
a son."
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt
Dorothy J Heydt
Suzanne Palmer
>
> Suzanne Palmer wrote:
>
> > which, out of curiosity, makes me ask: has anyone else set out to
> > *deliberately* write an EFP, as a sort of a mental exercise? Or is it
> > just me, and my bad brain?
> >
>
> Not to novel-length -- EFP worlds bore me, and so did the story. But I
> must have a few thousand words of a true EFP novel somewhere. I didn't
> find it mentally stimulating.
I just have notes at this point, it hasn't reached a boil yet so it
gets no attention until then. But it's very much standard EFP fare,
except told from the point of view of the local vegetation...
-Suzanne
Heather Jones
>
> In article <ddfr-B1C83E.1...@sea-read.news.verio.net>,
> David Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> wrote:
> >
> >I once published an article in the Journal of Political Economy that was
> >less than a page long. I mentioned it to my colleague James Buchanan and
> >he said that he had been working for a long time on trying to produce
> >the smallest publishable article, and was hoping eventually to get it
> >down to a sentence.
>
> Hmmm, sounds as if he was bitten at a susceptible age by a
> Sanskrit grammarian. They went in for making grammatical
> descriptions as short and concise as possible, leading to the
> remark "The grammarian rejoices more over the saving of a
> syllable half the length of a short vowel, than over the birth of
> a son."
Making it necessary for the _next_ generation of Sanskrit
grammarians to gloss the original to twice its length in order to
clarify those elegant ambiguities (or ambiguous elegances, more properly).
Heather
--
*****
Heather Rose Jones
hrj...@socrates.berkeley.edu
*****
Suzanne Palmer
> You have absolutely no idea what you fortunately missed. It's the
> series that caused to coin the name of Extruded Fantasy Product. It's
> now on the tenth book and nothing has resolved.
I had a friend who insisted that I read the first book, because it was
"the best ever". So I picked it up. I got to about 150 pages, and he
asked me what I thought so far, and I said that, so far, I couldn't
care less what happened to any of the main characters. He insisted
that it "picked up real soon" and I should keep going. So I did.
At 300 pages I gave up,= and abandoned the book on some table
somewhere. He asked me why, and I allowed as how what I'd said at 150
pages was no longer true, and that I actively wanted all the main
characters to die *horribly*. Given the number of books in the series
(and the size of each), it was obvious that even if I were to get my
wish, it wouldn't happen soon enough to be worth my time...
> I think that Jordan
> has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
Hmmmm. I think I need to have that explained to me.
-Suzanne
Jonathan L Cunningham
<spa...@umassp.edu> wrote:
>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote, re: _Wheel of Time_:
>> I think that Jordan
>> has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
>
>Hmmmm. I think I need to have that explained to me.
Last time I mentioned Xeno's paradoxes on this newsgroup, several
people pointed out his name was Zeno, and that they are Zeno's
paradoxes, so I'm sulking, and will leave it for someone else
to answer this.
(I gave up on _Wheel of Time_ nearer the beginning than you.)
Jonathan
(Who doesn't understand why Zeno didn't spell his name with an X
when there are several ancient Greek philosophers whose names
start Xeno... And, yes, I know we are really talking about Zeta
and probably Chi, not Z and X.)
Dorothy J Heydt
Suzanne Palmer <spa...@umassp.edu> wrote:
[_Wheel of Time_]
>
>I had a friend who insisted that I read the first book, because it was
>"the best ever". So I picked it up. I got to about 150 pages, and he
>asked me what I thought so far, and I said that, so far, I couldn't
>care less what happened to any of the main characters. He insisted
>that it "picked up real soon" and I should keep going. So I did.
>
>At 300 pages I gave up,= and abandoned the book on some table
>somewhere. He asked me why, and I allowed as how what I'd said at 150
>pages was no longer true, and that I actively wanted all the main
>characters to die *horribly*. Given the number of books in the series
>(and the size of each), it was obvious that even if I were to get my
>wish, it wouldn't happen soon enough to be worth my time...
Same here. I was going to an event where I knew I would have a
fair amount of sitting-in-one-spot-being-bored time, and I
figured the WoT was long enough to fill in all the blank spots.
Boy was I surprised. I slogged through the first book, though
about the time the wolfman (or whatever he was) showed up it
became really difficult; I got to the end. I started on the
second volume and here is the hero sitting around in some city,
knowing that any day now the {name of group} are going to show up
and then he'll be toast, but like Penzance's Finest, he doesn't
GO! So I pronounced the Eight Deadly Words, which I think I
invented on that very occasion, and gave the books to my niece
who had a long train ride ahead of her.
Later on people would keep saying "Oh, but it gets much better
around Volume 3!" (or "4!" or "5!") but I was not tempted. I am
sixty years old and in flakey health; I may not be around in
another ten years; life is too short to read pages and pages of
stuff because somebody else liked it.
Lucinda Welenc
Rather like the book that told the American Civil War from the POV of
Robert E. Lee's horse?
--
Alanna
**********
Saying of the day:
"Whoever said you can't buy happiness forgot about puppies." --- Gene
Hill
Boudewijn Rempt
> Later on people would keep saying "Oh, but it gets much better
> around Volume 3!" (or "4!" or "5!") but I was not tempted. I am
> sixty years old and in flakey health; I may not be around in
> another ten years; life is too short to read pages and pages of
> stuff because somebody else liked it.
>
Even if you're thirty-five (or was it thirty-four -- maybe thirty-three?),
and healthyish, then life's too short... I can read about eighteen books
a month, provided they're of a decent pagecount and not as turgid as
David Liss' Coffee Trader, and there's no way I'm going to start on
Robert Jordan. I just hope he's had as much fun writing them, as I'm
having not reading them.
James Wallis
Browne) wrote:
>James Wallis <ja...@erstwhile.blockspam.vcisp.net> wrote in message news:<nlk56v41r77mqjh9j...@4ax.com>...
>> "Mark of Damnation" (...)
>>
>> The weird news: Amazon has decided to co-credit the book to
>> someone else, who happens to be a friend of mine but who had
>> nothing to do with its writing.
>>
>Get them to change it - they or the publishers sem to get things wrong all the time.
This is in hand. Amazon.co.uk seems to be pulling all kinds of
interesting tricks right now: they're listing the UK edition as
"4-6 weeks to order" but the US edition (Pocket Books) is
apparently here and ready to go. They're also discounting it more
than the UK one, so unsurprisingly it's outselling it.
>> The better news: Games Workshop want three more with the same
>> character. However, they have already announced that the next one
>> (Mark of Heresy) will be out on 6th October. Which is nice, but
>> the first I've heard of it.
>
>That sounds like pretty good news to me - congrats!Do they take long to write?
The last one took about four months to first-draft. We have not
yet agreed the synopsis for #2. You see the problem.
--
James Wallis
ja...@erstwhile.demon.co.uk
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
<spa...@umassp.edu> wrote:
>> I think that Jordan
>> has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
>
>Hmmmm. I think I need to have that explained to me.
As Jonathan said, it's Zeno's paradox. Zeno explained that, if you
look at it logically, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. When you
release the arrow, the turtle is at a point. Arrow moves towards the
turtle, but the turtle moves to another point. And so on ad infinitum.
Ergo, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. At which point Zeno said,
"Q.E.D." or would have if was a Roman and not a Greek.
Anyway, the first book of _Wheel of Time_ is really the best of the
bad lot, if only because of the stuff he ripped from Tolkien and
Howard. The rest really looks like the turtle in the paradox - the
resolution costantly moves away. Why I read five of them, I have no
idea. Fortunately, I'm a fast reader.
ObNothingInParticular: The cat had been patting and nipping me on the
elbow to tussle with him, but since I'm typing, he went to chase the
brain around the room.
Deirdre Saoirse Moen
<hrj...@socrates.berkeley.edu> wrote:
> Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
> >
> > Hmmm, sounds as if he was bitten at a susceptible age by a
> > Sanskrit grammarian. They went in for making grammatical
> > descriptions as short and concise as possible, leading to the
> > remark "The grammarian rejoices more over the saving of a
> > syllable half the length of a short vowel, than over the birth of
> > a son."
>
> Making it necessary for the _next_ generation of Sanskrit
> grammarians to gloss the original to twice its length in order to
> clarify those elegant ambiguities (or ambiguous elegances, more properly).
I'm digressing here, but it had to go *somewhere*:
Other languages have wonderful words and phrases. I'm especially fond of
"jardinière des enfants." Instantly understandable, but quite different in
meaning and connotation than "kindergarten teacher."
Another word I came across last night:
vaiapuga:to be unsuccessful (when asking for a girl in marriage).
I guess it's common enough that they need a word for that. Rapanui, btw.
Pat Bowne
Pat
Marilee J. Layman
L Cunningham) wrote:
>On Mon, 03 Mar 2003 16:29:23 -0500, Suzanne Palmer
><spa...@umassp.edu> wrote:
>
>>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote, re: _Wheel of Time_:
>
>>> I think that Jordan
>>> has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
>>
>>Hmmmm. I think I need to have that explained to me.
>
>Last time I mentioned Xeno's paradoxes on this newsgroup, several
>people pointed out his name was Zeno, and that they are Zeno's
>paradoxes, so I'm sulking, and will leave it for someone else
>to answer this.
I read a mention of Zeno's Paradox this week and warmly remembered
that because of my irregular schooling, for a long time, I thought it
was only a stfnal thing, not a real thing.
--
Marilee J. Layman
Handmade Bali Sterling Beads at Wholesale
http://www.basicbali.com
Charlie Allery
Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote in message ...
>On Mon, 03 Mar 2003 16:29:23 -0500, Suzanne Palmer
><spa...@umassp.edu> wrote:
>
>>> I think that Jordan
>>> has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
>>
>>Hmmmm. I think I need to have that explained to me.
>
>As Jonathan said, it's Zeno's paradox. Zeno explained that, if you
>look at it logically, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. When you
>release the arrow, the turtle is at a point. Arrow moves towards the
>turtle, but the turtle moves to another point. And so on ad infinitum.
>Ergo, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. At which point Zeno said,
>"Q.E.D." or would have if was a Roman and not a Greek.
>
Just as well no one told Henry's archers they couldn't hit a moving target,
or does this just work with turtles, not with French cavalry?
Charlie
David Friedman
Marilee J. Layman <mjla...@erols.com> wrote:
> I read a mention of Zeno's Paradox this week and warmly remembered
> that because of my irregular schooling, for a long time, I thought it
> was only a stfnal thing, not a real thing.
It is only an sfnal thing, not a real thing. In the real world the arrow
hits the tortoise.
Just old sf.
Neil Barnes
news:3E63C933...@umassp.edu:
> Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote, re: _Wheel of Time_:
>> I think that Jordan
>> has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
>
> Hmmmm. I think I need to have that explained to me.
Tortoise Kebab. Yum! Onna stick. Gett'em while they're hot.
--
Neil
Brooks Moses
> As Jonathan said, it's Zeno's paradox. Zeno explained that, if you
> look at it logically, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. When you
> release the arrow, the turtle is at a point. Arrow moves towards the
> turtle, but the turtle moves to another point. And so on ad infinitum.
> Ergo, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. At which point Zeno said,
> "Q.E.D." or would have if was a Roman and not a Greek.
I have a marvelous proof of this with regards to computer programs and
the squashing of bugs therein, but the margin of this post is too small
to contain the rant....
- Brooks, poking at usenet in the middle of long program runs, and still
hasn't hit the blasted turtle after a month of trying.
Stuart Houghton
FA6EB8.112...@sea-read.news.verio.net:
> In article <8e89d445.03030...@posting.google.com>,
> elie...@yahoo.com (Stormie Parsons) wrote:
>
>> > > Bonus points
>> > > each cliche from Tough Guide = 1 point (but no extra points for
>> > > the same cliche repeated)
>
> The Westkin are organized in clans but have no supreme chieftain, and
> they clearly do fight among themselves. And they fight other people--as
> mercenaries for the Empire and as allies of Harald. And everybody
> doesn't know better than to mess with them--Artos, the top Imperial
> general, has just seized some territory from a Westkin clan that had
> been raiding his supply wagons. They don't live in stone fastnesses.
> There is no evidence that their women wear long skirts or are wimps,
> although it's pretty clear that they don't participate in warfare.
>
> I suppose I might claim a quarter point or so. Nothing else in the
> sample pages comes close.
>
But can they cook stew?
--
Stuart Houghton
Suzanne Palmer
>
> Suzanne Palmer wrote:
> >
> > I just have notes at this point, it hasn't reached a boil yet so it
> > gets no attention until then. But it's very much standard EFP fare,
> > except told from the point of view of the local vegetation...
>
> Rather like the book that told the American Civil War from the POV of
> Robert E. Lee's horse?
I haven't heard of that... but sounds like a good idea (-:
-Suzanne
Zeborah
> In article <20030302175626...@mb-da.aol.com>, Aaron F.
> Bourque <aaronb...@aol.commandment> writes
> >Hmm. I will be unable to calculate the validity of my fantasy
> >series without this "Tough Guide"!!!
> >
> Considering the WIP, the only cliché that springs to mind is Huw's
> ability to conjure spheres of light or *Magefire* (not that I call it
> that). I think my *Colour Coding* is just skewed enough to escape
I suspect I've avoided Colour Coding by the simple expedient of writing
too fast (Nanowrimo) to remember that I'm supposed to describe the
characters.
<snip>
> E.g. I have a *Missing Heir* in book three, but
> he knows perfectly well who he is and has gone missing on purpose, so I
> don't think that's quite the _Tough Guide_ cliché.
Does it count as a Missing Heir if you have two identical twin princes
who get swapped at birth?
The problem is in getting someone to suspect, let alone prove, that such
has been the case. ... Hey, what does the Tough Guide say about Oracles
and Prophecies?
<snip of different context>
> [*] Including things like attack by *Leathery-Winged Avians* and a
I have some dragons attacking. The soldier-horses kill them. Off-stage
and they can't talk, thank goodness, or I'd have to figure out how the
hell they did it.
> *Wizard* with a long white beard and robes and a *Quest Object*.
I don't have a Wizard. I do have a Picklejar of Convenient Omniscience,
but the blind prince, being unable to read the label, opens it for
breakfast the morning after they acquire it.
Zeborah
--
http://www.geocities.com/zeborahnz2000
Kangaroo story wordcount: 35640 words
Zeborah
> On Mon, 03 Mar 2003 16:29:23 -0500, Suzanne Palmer
> <spa...@umassp.edu> wrote:
>
> >> I think that Jordan
> >> has studied the paradox of turtle and arrow *very* carefully.
> >
> >Hmmmm. I think I need to have that explained to me.
>
> As Jonathan said, it's Zeno's paradox. Zeno explained that, if you
> look at it logically, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. When you
> release the arrow, the turtle is at a point. Arrow moves towards the
> turtle, but the turtle moves to another point. And so on ad infinitum.
> Ergo, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. At which point Zeno said,
> "Q.E.D." or would have if was a Roman and not a Greek.
And even if the turtle stands still you can't catch it, because the
arrow has to pass the halfway mark first. Then the 3/4 mark; then the
7/8 mark; and, to cut a long story short, since you can keep dividing
these points up ad infinitum, the arrows gonna keep on going for an
infinite time passing through them all, and will therefore never manage
to actually get to the turtle.
Zeno basically proved using logic that you can't go anywhere or do
anything, presumably to get out of an incomplete homework assignment.
Helen
>Irina Rempt wrote:
>[quoted point scoring system for High Fantasy snipped]
>
>*deliberately* write an EFP, as a sort of a mental exercise? Or is it
>just me, and my bad brain?
>
Only the short I mentioned in another post. All the fantasy world
characters and the majority of the plot are taken straight from _Tough
Guide_, and I have a bunch of people from our world who've been taken to
the other world to Fulfil A Quest. But I've given it a bit of a twist.
I hope. I don't think I'd want to do a whole novel. That goes beyond
what I'm prepared to do as a mental exercise or joke, call it what you
will.
Helen
--
Helen, Gwynedd, Wales *** http://www.baradel.demon.co.uk
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
wrote:
Yeah, there's good eating in one of them.
David Friedman
zeb...@netaccess.co.nz (Zeborah) wrote:
> I suspect I've avoided Colour Coding by the simple expedient of writing
> too fast (Nanowrimo) to remember that I'm supposed to describe the
> characters.
Are you supposed to describe the characters?
Off hand, I think I give some physical description for fewer than ten
characters, always or almost always for a reason. The same is true for
the physical setting. I wonder how much of that relates to my own mental
quirks--I have a good verbal and bad visual memory--and how much to
literary style--as few words as will do the job.
Boudewijn Rempt
> I have some dragons attacking. The soldier-horses kill them. Off-stage
> and they can't talk, thank goodness, or I'd have to figure out how the
> hell they did it.
I've got dragons too... The officers are horribly afraid they'll
break loose and start to graze on their own army, instead of the
much smaller enemy army.
--
Boudewijn | http://www.valdyas.org
David Friedman
Stuart Houghton <stu_ajh-utter...@hotmail.com> wrote:
I don't know; the question doesn't come up.
There is a stew of vegetables and lentils mentioned in the book, but
it's offered by a farmer on the other side of the mountains from the
Westkin. The reason it is lentils and not mutton is that it's early
spring--although of course I don't say so.
This connects with a post in the thread I just made, about physical
descriptions (of people and places, lack of in my novel). Medieval food
is something I happen to know quite a lot about. But hardly any of that
shows up in the novel--because there are only very occasionally places
where what people are eating is relevant to the story.
Do other people have views on the general subject? Does lots of not
obviously relevant detail (food, descriptions, landscapes) give a richer
and more persuasive world or distract from the story line? Or is this
one more example of different good ways of doing things, and are there
other related features of each?
David Friedman
Brooks Moses <bmo...@stanford.edu> wrote:
> Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
> > As Jonathan said, it's Zeno's paradox. Zeno explained that, if you
> > look at it logically, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. When you
> > release the arrow, the turtle is at a point. Arrow moves towards the
> > turtle, but the turtle moves to another point. And so on ad infinitum.
> > Ergo, you cannot hit a turtle with an arrow. At which point Zeno said,
> > "Q.E.D." or would have if was a Roman and not a Greek.
>
> I have a marvelous proof of this with regards to computer programs and
> the squashing of bugs therein, but the margin of this post is too small
> to contain the rant....
But until you squash them they are discrete, and Zerno's argument surely
depends on continuity.
Boudewijn Rempt
>
> But until you squash them they are discrete, and Zerno's argument surely
> depends on continuity.
>
Oh, no. Bugs aren't discrete. Perhaps the small ones, that are a continuum
in themselves. But bugs are as discrete as the jello covering the kitchen
where a five-year old has been having fun.
Boudewijn Rempt
>
> Do other people have views on the general subject? Does lots of not
> obviously relevant detail (food, descriptions, landscapes) give a richer
> and more persuasive world or distract from the story line? Or is this
> one more example of different good ways of doing things, and are there
> other related features of each?
>
_I_ like details a lot. If well-woven into the story, or even if as obvious
as a stupid noble clamouring for lamb broth and getting mutton soup because
it's late winter. I like to read about them. I also like to show what a
character is feeling through their small actions, the daily interactions
with their environment. For instance, I like things like a short sequence
where someone cooks and thinks. The adding of ingredients and the
development of thought can be interleaved in an interesting way.
But then, I'm not reading for the excitement of the story. I read because I
like the people in the book, and possibly because their world interests me.
Any excitement tends to distract me from the true meat of a book :-).
Mary K. Kuhner
Dorothy J Heydt <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote:
>[_Wheel of Time_]
>Later on people would keep saying "Oh, but it gets much better
>around Volume 3!" (or "4!" or "5!") but I was not tempted. I am
>sixty years old and in flakey health; I may not be around in
>another ten years; life is too short to read pages and pages of
>stuff because somebody else liked it.
I short-circuited the "it gets better in volume 2" argument by
only reading volume 2, about which all I can say is:
If all the men were One Man,
and all the women were One Woman,
how very tedious their dialog would become.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
David Friedman
Boudewijn Rempt <bo...@valdyas.org> wrote:
I'm writing because I like the characters as well as the story. But
there are lots of opportunities to show little details and small action
without what seem to me digressions from the story line. Examples:
---
(Protagonist has a broken arm; friendly lady shows up--no romantic
involvement)
The lady Elen came through the door, eyes wide.
"I heard you were hurt, Excellency."
"Most folk call me Harald."
"My lady ... "
"Lady Anne calls me 'Excellency' because His Majesty does. His Majesty
uses the title in hopes I'll forget who I am and where I come from,
decide the North Vales are really a province of his kingdom and I'm
their lord. His father got most things right, that included, not all."
"Can I get you anything?"
"You can get me a pitcher of beer and two mugs then sit here and let me
tell you the rest of Saemund's tale, help me forget what my arm feels
like. If you would, leave word for the King I won't be at council
tonight and why."
When she returned, with pitcher, mugs, and a servant carrying a stool,
he was asleep.
---
(After he gets out of the castle despite the wishes of his host, rides
through the night to get somewhere he won't be easily found)
The next step was pine branches cut a safe way off to thatch the
shelter, or snares, or ... . He found himself lying in the piled pine
needles by his shelter, the sun a considerable way down the sky,
considering that perhaps, at his age, a broken arm deserved more respect
than he was giving it.
---
Both of those are indirectly signalling things about the personality of
the protagonist--but integral to the plot.
----
The question I'm asking is whether richness of detail that doesn't serve
any direct purpose--such as revealing character--is a feature or a bug.
Boudewijn Rempt
> I'm writing because I like the characters as well as the story. But
> there are lots of opportunities to show little details and small action
> without what seem to me digressions from the story line. Examples:
> ---
>
> (Protagonist has a broken arm; friendly lady shows up--no romantic
> involvement)
>
> The lady Elen came through the door, eyes wide.
>
> "I heard you were hurt, Excellency."
>
> "Most folk call me Harald."
>
> "My lady ... "
Here I get a bit confused; who's speaking now? Harald's turn has just
been, so this should be Elen, but she wouldn't say 'My Lady', would
she? Oh, it's _another_ lady -- I'd say something like "But my Lady
always says--".
>
> "Lady Anne calls me 'Excellency' because His Majesty does. His Majesty
> uses the title in hopes I'll forget who I am and where I come from,
> decide the North Vales are really a province of his kingdom and I'm
> their lord. His father got most things right, that included, not all."
>
And perhaps here an 'Harald interrupted' after 'does' -- the rest of the
paragraph feels stiffish, but I guess Harald is angry about this?
> "Can I get you anything?"
>
> "You can get me a pitcher of beer and two mugs then sit here and let me
> tell you the rest of Saemund's tale, help me forget what my arm feels
> like. If you would, leave word for the King I won't be at council
> tonight and why."
Now, those are details that just fit, and work, to my mind. I like a few
interruptions in so long a sentence. A glance, some plucking at the bandages
or something. But if that how he speaks, that's how he speaks.
<...>
> The next step was pine branches cut a safe way off to thatch the
> shelter, or snares, or ... . He found himself lying in the piled pine
> needles by his shelter, the sun a considerable way down the sky,
> considering that perhaps, at his age, a broken arm deserved more respect
> than he was giving it.
> ---
> Both of those are indirectly signalling things about the personality of
> the protagonist--but integral to the plot.
> ----
Well, I like these details.
>
> The question I'm asking is whether richness of detail that doesn't serve
> any direct purpose--such as revealing character--is a feature or a bug.
>
Nah, _this_ compiler doesn't complain. And if you can find a compiler that
compiles your code, you're basically done, I always say. One way of
scratching the detail itch is to reserve it for those places where you
_need_ a hickup, a pause in the pacing, to heighten the tension.
Charlie Stross
as <ja...@erstwhile.blockspam.vcisp.net> declared:
>>> The better news: Games Workshop want three more with the same
>>> character. However, they have already announced that the next one
>>> (Mark of Heresy) will be out on 6th October. Which is nice, but
>>> the first I've heard of it.
>>
>>That sounds like pretty good news to me - congrats!Do they take long to write?
>
> The last one took about four months to first-draft. We have not
> yet agreed the synopsis for #2. You see the problem.
That sounds familiar.
(Once I get through the mad panic-dash to nail down the final draft
of "The Iron Sunrise" in time for the deadline in April, I have all year
left to, er, write the final two novellas in "Accelerando", then build
a mere 200-250,000 word fantasy sequel for Tor. Mmmph. And they're trying
to move the deadline on that one forward ...)
-- Charlie
Charlie Stross
> Someone posted this on the Diana Wynne Jones mailing list and allowed me
> to share it. If anyone wants to contact him privately, he's Jon Noble
....
> Irina (mine is 16 or 17 on this scale, allowing 7 points for the
> pre-existing world with maps and a language; if I count only what's in
> the book proper it's two points less)
The thing I just emailed my agent scored *at least* fifteen -- although
it's a bit hard to be sure. (There are no maps, but then there's no point
including any because it's explicitly set in geographical cognates of
a very well-mapped part of the real world.)
Do we need to work out a high fantasy purity test?
-- Charlie
Irina Rempt
> Do we need to work out a high fantasy purity test?
Ooh, yes, yes!
Irina
--
Vesta veran, terna puran, farenin. http://www.valdyas.org/irina/
Beghinnen can ick, volherden will' ick, volbringhen sal ick.
http://www.valdyas.org/~irina/foundobjects/ Latest: 02-Mar-2003
David Friedman
Boudewijn Rempt <bo...@valdyas.org> wrote:
> David Friedman wrote:
>
> > I'm writing because I like the characters as well as the story. But
> > there are lots of opportunities to show little details and small action
> > without what seem to me digressions from the story line. Examples:
> > ---
> >
> > (Protagonist has a broken arm; friendly lady shows up--no romantic
> > involvement)
> >
> > The lady Elen came through the door, eyes wide.
> >
> > "I heard you were hurt, Excellency."
> >
> > "Most folk call me Harald."
> >
> > "My lady ... "
>
> Here I get a bit confused; who's speaking now? Harald's turn has just
> been, so this should be Elen, but she wouldn't say 'My Lady', would
> she? Oh, it's _another_ lady -- I'd say something like "But my Lady
> always says--".
It didn't occur to me that the reader would see "My lady" as a form of
address rather than as the beginning of "My lady always calls you 'Your
Excellency.'" One more word should fix it. It may help that Elen has
been using "My lady" in referring to Anne earlier.
> > "Lady Anne calls me 'Excellency' because His Majesty does. His Majesty
> > uses the title in hopes I'll forget who I am and where I come from,
> > decide the North Vales are really a province of his kingdom and I'm
> > their lord. His father got most things right, that included, not all."
> And perhaps here an 'Harald interrupted' after 'does' -- the rest of the
> paragraph feels stiffish, but I guess Harald is angry about this?
Not exactly angry--and certainly not angry at Elen. "Feels strongly"
would be closer.
> > "Can I get you anything?"
> > "You can get me a pitcher of beer and two mugs then sit here and let me
> > tell you the rest of Saemund's tale, help me forget what my arm feels
> > like. If you would, leave word for the King I won't be at council
> > tonight and why."
> Now, those are details that just fit, and work, to my mind. I like a few
> interruptions in so long a sentence. A glance, some plucking at the bandages
> or something. But if that how he speaks, that's how he speaks.
>
> <...>
>
> > The next step was pine branches cut a safe way off to thatch the
> > shelter, or snares, or ... . He found himself lying in the piled pine
> > needles by his shelter, the sun a considerable way down the sky,
> > considering that perhaps, at his age, a broken arm deserved more respect
> > than he was giving it.
> > ---
> > Both of those are indirectly signalling things about the personality of
> > the protagonist--but integral to the plot.
> > ----
>
> Well, I like these details.
Good.
Part of what both the end of the first passage and the second are
supposed to signal is that Harald routinely pushes himself--wants to do
a lot and takes it for granted that he can. He is in his early fifties
and has just been injured--and only notices when he finds himself
falling asleep of exhaustion instead of doing the next thing on his
mental list.
...
> One way of
> scratching the detail itch is to reserve it for those places where you
> _need_ a hickup, a pause in the pacing, to heighten the tension.
Or where I need to make it clear who is speaking without using "he
said/she said," which feels clumsy to me. If you describe a character
doing something then have a line of dialog, the reader usually takes it
for granted that that character is the speaker.
Charlie Stross
> Irina Rempt wrote:
> [quoted point scoring system for High Fantasy snipped]
>
> which, out of curiosity, makes me ask: has anyone else set out to
> *deliberately* write an EFP, as a sort of a mental exercise? Or is it
> just me, and my bad brain?
My agent tried to prod me into doing so. I counter-attacked with a
proposal for an alternate history novel about the Evil British Empire
(set in the early 1960's, with OSS agents "Wild" Bill Burroughs and
Phil "don't say it" K infiltrating the sleazy Adolf Schickelgruber's
counterculture nightclub in Hamburg in an attempt to find out where the
kidnapped and brainwashed rocket scientists are going -- evidently to
the evil Professor Clarke's nuclear interplanetary conquest project,
which is being run from his mountain-top base in Ceylon).
Caitlin made me drop it and write something sensible instead. Humph.
-- Charlie
Mark Atwood
>
> My agent tried to prod me into doing so. I counter-attacked with a
> proposal for an alternate history novel about the Evil British Empire
> (set in the early 1960's, with OSS agents "Wild" Bill Burroughs and
> Phil "don't say it" K infiltrating the sleazy Adolf Schickelgruber's
> counterculture nightclub in Hamburg in an attempt to find out where the
> kidnapped and brainwashed rocket scientists are going -- evidently to
> the evil Professor Clarke's nuclear interplanetary conquest project,
> which is being run from his mountain-top base in Ceylon).
>
> Caitlin made me drop it and write something sensible instead. Humph.
That's too bad. I'd buy it.
--
Mark Atwood | Well done is better than well said.
m...@pobox.com |
http://www.pobox.com/~mra
Helen
Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> writes
>
>Do other people have views on the general subject? Does lots of not
>obviously relevant detail (food, descriptions, landscapes) give a richer
>and more persuasive world or distract from the story line? Or is this
>one more example of different good ways of doing things, and are there
>other related features of each?
>
characters look like and also likes vivid description of place. To me
it enriches the story, if by story you mean what happens. I don't just
want to know what happens, I want detail. And not just visual either, I
want sounds and smells and textures. (Up to an appropriate level, of
course. I don't want yards and yards of *irrelevant* description.)
Jonathan L Cunningham
wrote:
>And even if the turtle stands still you can't catch it, because the
>arrow has to pass the halfway mark first. Then the 3/4 mark; then the
>7/8 mark; and, to cut a long story short, since you can keep dividing
>these points up ad infinitum, the arrows gonna keep on going for an
>infinite time passing through them all, and will therefore never manage
>to actually get to the turtle.
>
>Zeno basically proved using logic that you can't go anywhere or do
>anything, presumably to get out of an incomplete homework assignment.
If you drop a mathematical ball onto a flat surface, it will bounce
an infinite number of times.
While doing so, it will travel finite distance in finite time.
Zeno obviously never studied modern algebra or mechanics, and
didn't know how to sum an infinite series.
Frex, if the ball is exactly 50% elastic, and you drop it from
a height of 1 metre, on the first bounce it will rise to half
a metre,the second bounce a quarter of a metre (Zeno, are you
listening?) then an eight of a metre, and so on.
In all, it will travel exactly 3 metres, and it will do this
in exactly. Uh, it depends what the exact value of gravity
is, where we do the experiment. So it could be exactly 1 second
if you pick the right (mathematical) planet.
There the ball will bounce an infinite number of times in one second.
Jonathan
--
(Replace netspam by jlc when appropriate)
Helen
Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> writes
[Examples snipped]
To be honest, I find your style too sparse for my taste. There's only
the dialogue and a very sketchy description of what they're doing.
>
>The question I'm asking is whether richness of detail that doesn't serve
>any direct purpose--such as revealing character--is a feature or a bug.
>
But detail *does* reveal character. Clothes reveal class and occupation
as well as status. Whether the character bites her nails, or has very
soft white hands give us further insights. Description of the landscape
or buildings in a city put the characters into a physical context and
tell us more about the world.
Jonathan L Cunningham
wrote:
>David Friedman wrote:
>
>>
>> Do other people have views on the general subject? Does lots of not
>> obviously relevant detail (food, descriptions, landscapes) give a richer
>> and more persuasive world or distract from the story line? Or is this
>> one more example of different good ways of doing things, and are there
>> other related features of each?
>>
>
>_I_ like details a lot. If well-woven into the story, or even if as obvious
>as a stupid noble clamouring for lamb broth and getting mutton soup because
>it's late winter. I like to read about them. I also like to show what a
>character is feeling through their small actions, the daily interactions
>with their environment. For instance, I like things like a short sequence
>where someone cooks and thinks. The adding of ingredients and the
>development of thought can be interleaved in an interesting way.
J K Rowling put in descriptions of what people were eating into her
books because (she said) when she was a child, she wanted to know what
the characters in books she read were eating. (I'm not remembering
this well, maybe someone else who saw the interview can remember
more.)
It doesn't seem to have hurt her sales too much, but I don't know
to what extent this applies to fiction targeted at adults.
(The thing that impressed me from the documentary was just how
incredibly detailed her worldbuilding was -- she even has notes on
what marks each student got in exams, although that kind of
stuff *doesn't* get into the books (fortunately).)
Charlie Stross
>> Caitlin made me drop it and write something sensible instead. Humph.
>
> That's too bad. I'd buy it.
The "sensible" alternative isn't all that sensible -- ook one starts
slowly and boringly and looks like vaguely sub-Zelazny fantasy, but by
the middle of ook two[*] I should have introduced the CIA psyops unicorn,
the princess will be filing patents for the turbojet and nylon, and
the Evil British Empire will be putting in an appearance (complete with
atomic-powered dreadnoughts and depraved gangsters from Hamburg). It's
just a matter of suckering the readers into a false sense of security ...
-- Charlie
[*] If one is going to gibber and extrude at series length, I
figure calling the installments "ooks" makes more sense than
claiming they're novels in their own right.
Nicky Browne
> On 3 Mar 2003 10:50:56 -0800, nicky.m...@btinternet.com (Nicky
> Browne) wrote:
>
> >James Wallis <ja...@erstwhile.blockspam.vcisp.net> wrote in message news:<nlk56v41r77mqjh9j...@4ax.com>...
>
> >> "Mark of Damnation" (...)
> >>
> >> The weird news: Amazon has decided to co-credit the book to
> >> someone else, who happens to be a friend of mine but who had
> >> nothing to do with its writing.
> >>
> >Get them to change it - they or the publishers sem to get things wrong all the time.
>
> This is in hand. Amazon.co.uk seems to be pulling all kinds of
> interesting tricks right now: they're listing the UK edition as
> "4-6 weeks to order" but the US edition (Pocket Books) is
> apparently here and ready to go. They're also discounting it more
> than the UK one, so unsurprisingly it's outselling it.
I don't think my details are completely right either- but I haven't
got round to querying them.
>
> >> The better news: Games Workshop want three more with the same
> >> character. However, they have already announced that the next one
> >> (Mark of Heresy) will be out on 6th October. Which is nice, but
> >> the first I've heard of it.
> >
> >That sounds like pretty good news to me - congrats!Do they take long to write?
>
> The last one took about four months to first-draft. We have not
> yet agreed the synopsis for #2. You see the problem.
Yep! Have you get a synopsis that they can't decide on or are you
still planning?
N
Dorothy J Heydt
Jonathan L Cunningham <net...@softluck.plus.com> wrote:
>
>Zeno obviously never studied modern algebra or mechanics, and
>didn't know how to sum an infinite series.
Nor did he know that the universe is quantized.
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt
Mary K. Kuhner
David Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> wrote:
>Do other people have views on the general subject? Does lots of not
>obviously relevant detail (food, descriptions, landscapes) give a richer
>and more persuasive world or distract from the story line? Or is this
>one more example of different good ways of doing things, and are there
>other related features of each?
It really depends on the story. I own and enjoy a lot of books (mostly
DAW, from the seventies) which are very spare and short, not much
description, but a finely crafted main line. I also own and enjoy a lot
of lush, sprawling, lavishly described books, mostly more recent but not
all.
I think there are ways of making even 'irrelevant' detail relevant.
--The setting can become a character in its own right, and then the
physical detail fleshes out that character. Patricia McKillip's later
books work like this--the physicality of _The Book of Atrix Wolfe_ or
_Song for the Basilisk_ are really necessary. (Interestingly, these
are *short* lavishly described books.)
--The choice of details, or the characters' reactions to the details,
can support characterization. This is especially fun if you have multiple
POV characters. Whenever I write Analee the furry quadruped as a POV
character, I try to wallow in smells and sounds and the way things look
from down near the ground.
--The details can be so interesting that the digression is welcome.
Neil Stephenson is good at this. It's tricky because you can end up with
a book where every part is satisfying but the whole is less satisfying--
I just finished _Psychohistorical Crisis_ and that's my immediate
reaction to it, though I reserve the right to change my mind after I
digest it.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Warrick M. Locke
The other place where details are needed is when the style calls for it,
and yours doesn't. The snips you've posted are from a fairly headlong,
mostly action story, with some interesting characters. I can enjoy that.
I can also enjoy the Jack Vance sort of thing, where the details [*] are
what is really important. Either way works for me, if the author is
telling a story that fits the style.
Regards,
Ric
(*) and the footnotes.
Patricia J. Hawkins
BR> David Friedman wrote:
>>
>> But until you squash them they are discrete, and Zerno's argument surely
>> depends on continuity.
>>
BR> Oh, no. Bugs aren't discrete. Perhaps the small ones, that are a continuum
BR> in themselves. But bugs are as discrete as the jello covering the kitchen
BR> where a five-year old has been having fun.
What is a "small bug"? One that has minor effects, or one that is
easy to find, or one that is only a few characters mistyped?
If the last ...there was that "small bug" that paralyzed all phone
assignment changes to a Deutche Telecom phone switch for something
like a month -- I got to work with a very nice programmer from IBM
Köln over that one -- they shipped him over here with the entire
application in his luggage because they couldn't narrow the problem
down any more than that.
--
Patricia J. Hawkins
Hawkins Internet Applications, LLC
James Wallis
Browne) wrote:
>Yep! Have you get a synopsis that they can't decide on or are you
>still planning?
I've got a synopsis -- it's not 100% complete, but then the
synopsis of the last one wasn't much like the finished book, and I
like to leave myself plenty of room to breathe. The question is
how happy they are with it.
I'm off to Nottingham tomorrow to thrash out the details with my
editor and publisher over a long lunch, tickle my publisher's new
daughter under the chin, and hand the accounts person the invoice
for the short story they've I've just accepted (contracted at 8000
words, delivered at 11,500, negotiated down to 10,000. I really
ought to stop doing that.)
--
James Wallis
ja...@erstwhile.demon.co.uk
David Friedman
Helen <ken...@baradel.demon.co.uk.please.delete.this> wrote:
> I do like relevant description. I'm one of those who like to know what
> characters look like and also likes vivid description of place. To me
> it enriches the story, if by story you mean what happens. I don't just
> want to know what happens, I want detail. And not just visual either, I
> want sounds and smells and textures. (Up to an appropriate level, of
> course. I don't want yards and yards of *irrelevant* description.)
Is "relevant description" description that is relevant to the plot? Or
is what is going on that you want the equivalent of a full sense
movie--or more precisely, the material from which you can synthesize a
full sense movie? If the color of a character's hair or vest has no
relevance to anything that happens, do you still want to know it so that
you can visualize the character?
Marilee J. Layman
<vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr> wrote:
>ObNothingInParticular: The cat had been patting and nipping me on the
>elbow to tussle with him, but since I'm typing, he went to chase the
>brain around the room.
You have an extra brain?
--
Marilee J. Layman
Handmade Bali Sterling Beads at Wholesale
http://www.basicbali.com
Boudewijn Rempt
>>>>>> "BR" == Boudewijn Rempt <bo...@valdyas.org> writes:
>
> BR> David Friedman wrote:
>>>
>>> But until you squash them they are discrete, and Zerno's argument surely
>>> depends on continuity.
>>>
>
> BR> Oh, no. Bugs aren't discrete. Perhaps the small ones, that are a
> continuum BR> in themselves. But bugs are as discrete as the jello
> covering the kitchen BR> where a five-year old has been having fun.
>
> What is a "small bug"? One that has minor effects, or one that is
> easy to find, or one that is only a few characters mistyped?
>
One that takes only three days to find, makes you go slap your face
because it's _so_ obvious, only put a wrong object in .equals, nothing
more, only the compiler wouldn't find it, damn strongly typed languages
anyway, and, more importantly, doesn't mean you have to change code all
over the place after fixing the bug.
Mary Messall
> If the color of a character's hair or vest has no
> relevance to anything that happens, do you still want to know it so that
> you can visualize the character?
On consideration, I think I at least do want to know. Because I know
that otherwise I'm going to fill in young white people who look like
movie stars (or fantasy stereotypes, all blond and violet-eyed or
bearded and musclely.) And I don't care about stereotypes and movie
stars as much as I care about real people. A few details of appearance
to make these into specific people rather than generic male and female
lead will go a long way, I think. (But descriptions which perfectly fit
the generic type will activate me "give me a break" reflex, causing me
to drop or throw the book...)
-Mary (realizes she said "describe them only if they're ugly" before,
and yet surprisingly had to think about this question for several
minutes.)
David Friedman
wrote:
> David Friedman wrote:
> > If the color of a character's hair or vest has no
> > relevance to anything that happens, do you still want to know it so that
> > you can visualize the character?
>
> On consideration, I think I at least do want to know. Because I know
> that otherwise I'm going to fill in young white people who look like
> movie stars (or fantasy stereotypes, all blond and violet-eyed or
> bearded and musclely.) And I don't care about stereotypes and movie
> stars as much as I care about real people.
Thanks. That was what I was curious about.
I don't have a particularly visual memory or imagination. When reading a
book, I don't think I have any mental picture of, say, the color of a
character's clothes. I'm interested in the personality, and the plot,
and the structure of human interactions, and words--including style of
speech. But not pictures. I like poetry but not painting.
I don't know if that means that my writing will be less appealing to
those who do have visual imaginations, or if I can simply rely on their
filling in all the blanks themselves.
David Friedman
Marilee J. Layman <mjla...@erols.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 04 Mar 2003 01:31:56 +0100, Vlatko Juric-Kokic
> <vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr> wrote:
>
> >ObNothingInParticular: The cat had been patting and nipping me on the
> >elbow to tussle with him, but since I'm typing, he went to chase the
> >brain around the room.
>
> You have an extra brain?
Or alternatively, typing doesn't require one. Or the brain has a
wireless link with the body. Or ... .
David Goldfarb
>an infinite number of times.
>
>While doing so, it will travel finite distance in finite time.
>
>Zeno obviously never studied modern algebra or mechanics, and
>didn't know how to sum an infinite series.
I've read (I think it was in Rudy Rucker's _Infinity and the Mind_)
that the Greeks considered infinity to be an undefined concept. If
you could show that an infinity crept in somewhere, that was an
automatic _reductio ad absurdum_.
The *worst* explanation of Zeno's paradoxes I've ever seen was a
caption in a comic book from the '60s, along the lines of,
"Zeno failed to take into account the *rate* at which Achilles
and the Tortoise travel." To quote somebody: "That isn't right.
That isn't even wrong."
--
David Goldfarb <*>|"Steppe nomads are a lot less frightening since
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | tanks were invented."
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | -- Graydon
Thomas Lindgren
gold...@OCF.Berkeley.EDU (David Goldfarb) writes:
> To quote somebody: "That isn't right. That isn't even wrong."
Wolfgang Pauli, I think. "That's not right. That's not even wrong."
(at least that what I found somewhere :-)
Best,
Thomas
--
Thomas Lindgren
"It's becoming popular? It must be in decline." -- Isaiah Berlin
Stuart Houghton
news:ddfr-133913.1...@sea-read.news.verio.net:
>
> Do other people have views on the general subject? Does lots of not
> obviously relevant detail (food, descriptions, landscapes) give a
> richer and more persuasive world or distract from the story line? Or is
> this one more example of different good ways of doing things, and are
> there other related features of each?
>
It all depends on context and novelty. If every single scene is laden down
with an exhaustive list of every object, sound and smell it will make
reading your book a bit like playing _Zork_ in verbose mode.
On t'other hand, detailed descriptions can flesh out characters by giving
the reader a feel of what it is like to live in their world, and can be used
to great effect symbolically. You just have to treat them like seasoning
and add exactly the right amount for the dish.
--
Stuart Houghton
Boudewijn Rempt
> David Friedman wrote:
>> If the color of a character's hair or vest has no
>> relevance to anything that happens, do you still want to know it so that
>> you can visualize the character?
>
> On consideration, I think I at least do want to know. Because I know
> that otherwise I'm going to fill in young white people who look like
> movie stars (or fantasy stereotypes, all blond and violet-eyed or
> bearded and musclely.)
Well, that's an important point. I do visualize quite vividly when reading,
and I appreciate any pointers that make me visualize someone. I'm not much
cursed with move stock characters -- not seeing many of them, but I tend
to visualize underdescribed characters as looking a lot like me in my
dreams.
<...>
> -Mary (realizes she said "describe them only if they're ugly" before,
> and yet surprisingly had to think about this question for several
> minutes.)
Not quite, I think. I mean, there are quite a few striking details that
are not stereotyped, nor ugly. Imagine a scholar at the Quainterbury
College of Applied Sorceries with an enormous amount of frizzy black curls,
who always goes barefeet and wears a golden dragon in her left nostril.
Perhaps not a good idea to introduce her this way, but these little facts
can be given over time. At one time, a gust of typical Qainterbury eddying
wind tangles leaves in her hair. Another time she exchanges her usual gold
dragon for a more subdued rose. And when a student visits her to deliver
his term paper, he looks at his feet and notices hers. And the silver ring
on her second toe, which shows up in sharp contrast.
--
Boudewijn | http://www.valdyas.org
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
> In article <3e6527dc...@usenet.plus.net>, Jonathan L Cunningham
> <net...@softluck.plus.com> wrote:
>>
>>Zeno obviously never studied modern algebra or mechanics, and didn't
>>know how to sum an infinite series.
>
> Nor did he know that the universe is quantized.
Um. Actually space is still generally considered to be
/continuous/.
Stephen Wolfram has argued a view that it might be
/discrete/ instead. So far he does not have a
consensus behind him. His book _A New Kind of Science_,
has mostly met with derision. Although that has as
much to do with his personality as with his ideas.
Compared to Stephen Wolfram, David Brin is self-effacing
and shy.
--
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen (AIM name "sir iso root")
To reply by Email, please remove "this".
Boudewijn Rempt
> J K Rowling put in descriptions of what people were eating into her
> books because (she said) when she was a child, she wanted to know what
> the characters in books she read were eating. (I'm not remembering
> this well, maybe someone else who saw the interview can remember
> more.)
Gorging in food is a time-honoured standby in children's books. There's
in Dutch 'Brieven van de Generaal' by Paul Biegel where children are fed
platefuls of sugar by their aunt, for instance. And brussels sprouts with
whipped cream.
> (The thing that impressed me from the documentary was just how
> incredibly detailed her worldbuilding was -- she even has notes on
> what marks each student got in exams, although that kind of
> stuff *doesn't* get into the books (fortunately).)
It's the only way to get a consistent depiction of a large society.
--
Boudewijn | http://www.valdyas.org
Erol K. Bayburt
>> If the color of a character's hair or vest has no
>> relevance to anything that happens, do you still want to know it so that
>> you can visualize the character?
>
>On consideration, I think I at least do want to know. Because I know
>that otherwise I'm going to fill in young white people who look like
>movie stars (or fantasy stereotypes, all blond and violet-eyed or
>bearded and musclely.) And I don't care about stereotypes and movie
>stars as much as I care about real people. A few details of appearance
>to make these into specific people rather than generic male and female
>lead will go a long way, I think. (But descriptions which perfectly fit
>the generic type will activate me "give me a break" reflex, causing me
>to drop or throw the book...)
Is this a violent allergic reaction to any speck of Perfect Beauty in the book?
Or is it a matter of "the dose makes the poison" or "a very little goes a very
long way"? Does it help if there's an in-book reason for the Beautiful
Person(s) to be beautiful? (E.g. Bujold's Haut-ladies)
In my own WIS and sequel WIP, I have a female character that the
protagonist-guy-from-our-world has mentally tagged as looking like a "storybook
princess" - slim, petite, long blond hair & blue eyes. There's also a comment
about a generally high level of female beauty due to the inexpensiveness and
ready availability of alchemical health-and-beauty potions.
I guess I like to see big scoops of wish-fulfilment and escapism in my fiction,
and I'm not put off by sugar-coating. What gives me a drop-in-disgust reaction
are stories with painstaking descriptions of dirt, disease, and poverty,
applied as a sort of anti-sugar-coating or fiber-supplement to make the work
seem more "serious" or "realistic."
--
Erol K. Bayburt
Ero...@aol.com
Alter S. Reiss
"David Friedman" <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> wrote in message
news:ddfr-88D5BC.2...@sea-read.news.verio.net...
Or, in addition to a cat, Vlatko has a pair of white mice.
Narf.
Mary Messall
> >Mary Messall wrote:
> >(But descriptions which perfectly fit
> >to drop or throw the book...)
> Is this a violent allergic reaction to any speck of Perfect Beauty in the book?
> Or is it a matter of "the dose makes the poison" or "a very little goes a very
> long way"? Does it help if there's an in-book reason for the Beautiful
> Person(s) to be beautiful? (E.g. Bujold's Haut-ladies)
Oh, it's really an exaggeration for the fun of it. I don't mind the
Haut-ladies (especially if they stay in their bubbles). Better to say
that I like Miles, who violates every stereotype, as a hero much better
than I do any blond twenty-year-old who comes to mind. I like T.H.
White's Ill-Made Knight far better than any of dozens of male-model
Lancelots I've met. I like Robert Graves' Claudius and Charlotte
Bronte's plain Jane and formiddable Rochester.
I strongly associate descriptions of fiery hair or willowly blondness
or broad shouldered strength with things I read (and regrettably,
wrote) in fifth grade or so. I won't actually put a book down for that
alone. It's just that the books I put down for any reason, often have
too much flawlessness among their flaws.
> I guess I like to see big scoops of wish-fulfilment and escapism in my fiction,
> and I'm not put off by sugar-coating. What gives me a drop-in-disgust reaction
> are stories with painstaking descriptions of dirt, disease, and poverty,
> applied as a sort of anti-sugar-coating or fiber-supplement to make the work
> seem more "serious" or "realistic."
Like what? I'm not sure I've read much of that... But attempts to be
"serious" and "realistic" (especially "serious") can, I agree, be
deadly. Nothing sinks a story faster than a desperate attempt to be
weighty and deep. <g>
-Mary
Mary Messall
> Mary Messall wrote:
> > -Mary (realizes she said "describe them only if they're ugly" before,
> > and yet surprisingly had to think about this question for several
> > minutes.)
> Not quite, I think. I mean, there are quite a few striking details that
> are not stereotyped, nor ugly.
Yes, of course. How, about, "Describe them only if you are not
describing Elle McPherson or Gary Cooper"?
> Imagine a scholar at the Quainterbury
> College of Applied Sorceries with an enormous amount of frizzy black curls,
> who always goes barefeet and wears a golden dragon in her left nostril.
> Perhaps not a good idea to introduce her this way, but these little facts
> can be given over time. At one time, a gust of typical Qainterbury eddying
> wind tangles leaves in her hair. Another time she exchanges her usual gold
> dragon for a more subdued rose. And when a student visits her to deliver
> his term paper, he looks at his feet and notices hers. And the silver ring
> on her second toe, which shows up in sharp contrast.
I like her already.
-Mary
Zeborah
> On Tuesday 04 March 2003 22:06 Charlie Stross wrote:
>
> > Do we need to work out a high fantasy purity test?
>
> Ooh, yes, yes!
It's got to have something about the language level. I was a bit
disappointed that the height measurement didn't have anything about the
use of "thou".
Zeborah
--
http://www.geocities.com/zeborahnz2000
Kangaroo story wordcount: 35640 words
Dan Goodman
Do you remember only in abstractions? Or do you remember in some other
sensory mode -- sound, for example?
David Friedman
zeb...@netaccess.co.nz (Zeborah) wrote:
> Irina Rempt <ir...@valdyas.org> wrote:
>
> > On Tuesday 04 March 2003 22:06 Charlie Stross wrote:
> >
> > > Do we need to work out a high fantasy purity test?
> >
> > Ooh, yes, yes!
>
> It's got to have something about the language level. I was a bit
> disappointed that the height measurement didn't have anything about the
> use of "thou".
Extra points if the pattern of usage is historically wrong and/or
internally inconsistent.
David Friedman
wrote:
> I strongly associate descriptions of fiery hair or willowly blondness
> or broad shouldered strength with things I read (and regrettably,
> wrote) in fifth grade or so.
I confess to one case of fiery hair. But it serves a plot purpose. At
two different points it lets the lady be recognized under circumstances
where she otherwise would not be and where her being recognized is
important.
And one case of blond hair, where the purpose is to let me mention
someone in several different places without my characters knowing his
name and have the readers realize it is the same person (he's also tall,
and context helps).
Manny Olds
> Do you remember only in abstractions? Or do you remember in some other
> sensory mode -- sound, for example?
I seem to store things as moving dynamic shapes, textures, and feelings,
but I am a primarily visual learner.
--
Manny Olds (old...@pobox.com) of Riverdale Park, Maryland, USA
"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not
become a monster. For when you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks
into you." -- Nietzsche
Brian M. Scott
news:1frde39.1lu30kg1xjg5r3N%zeb...@netaccess.co.nz in
rec.arts.sf.composition:
> Irina Rempt <ir...@valdyas.org> wrote:
>> On Tuesday 04 March 2003 22:06 Charlie Stross wrote:
>> > Do we need to work out a high fantasy purity test?
>> Ooh, yes, yes!
> It's got to have something about the language level. I was
> a bit disappointed that the height measurement didn't have
> anything about the use of "thou".
So how high is 'hight'?
Brian
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
Tonight, Alter, we are going to do...
Actually, it's a squeeze-ball, you know, the thing you use to exercise
your hand while sitting. I picked one in Cannes and it's in the shape
of brain. The picture is great: a black cat kicking a white brain
around the room. :-)
vlatko
--
http://www.niribanimeso.org/eng/
http://www.michaelswanwick.com/
vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr
Boudewijn Rempt
> I like her already.
So do I, upon reflection. But I'm afraid I don't have book
planned for her, at the moment.
--
Boudewijn | http://www.valdyas.org
David Friedman
Dan Goodman <dsg...@visi.com> wrote:
> David Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> wrote in
> news:ddfr-B1B306.2...@sea-read.news.verio.net:
> > I don't have a particularly visual memory or imagination. When reading
> > a book, I don't think I have any mental picture of, say, the color of
> > a character's clothes. I'm interested in the personality, and the
> > plot, and the structure of human interactions, and words--including
> > style of speech. But not pictures. I like poetry but not painting.
> >
> > I don't know if that means that my writing will be less appealing to
> > those who do have visual imaginations, or if I can simply rely on
> > their filling in all the blanks themselves.
> >
>
> Do you remember only in abstractions? Or do you remember in some other
> sensory mode -- sound, for example?
I have a very good verbal memory--I can recite poetry literally for
hours. And I am good at dealing with abstract ideas--it's part of how I
make my living--in part because they seem real to me. I don't think I
remember in terms of sound or sight. So perhaps "abstractions" is the
right way of putting it.
For what it's worth, I'm also pretty nearly tone-mute. I can recognize a
tune but not reproduct it.
I have no idea what color the eyes of my characters are. Do most
authors? Most readers?
Boudewijn Rempt
>
> I have no idea what color the eyes of my characters are. Do most
> authors? Most readers?
>
I'm pretty good at visualizing my characters. But I wouldn't know
the colour of their eyes, unless almost demanded by their ethnic
descent. But then, I cannot remember the colour of my own eyes,
or my daughters. Interesting, lively eyes, Naomi's -- but what colour?
--
Boudewijn | http://www.valdyas.org
Mary K. Kuhner
David Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> wrote:
>I have no idea what color the eyes of my characters are. Do most
>authors? Most readers?
For _Harry's Landing_ I know because it's a moderately important
differentiating detail for the cultures involved. Chernoi notices
that Linda and Honor have blue eyes because it's not a color she's
used to seeing. She notices, occasionally, that her husband (like
her) has black eyes because it's a societally important marker for
their Family. ("Black as the Void.") Everyone else's eyes are of
course brown, their racial default, and she doesn't notice--I doubt
I ever say that Valentine's eyes are brown, and comment on Christine's
only when she is considering whether she'll pass as a native.
Harry-Who-Makes has white eyes with little black U shapes for pupils,
and there I think it is useful to describe them--the reader can't
really be expected to have a default image of an alien. (Or if
you assume that she does, you get Star Trek aliens or Star Wars
aliens for sure.)
As a reader I seldom notice unless the color is really odd, like
silver or red, or the point is important to the plot. I like detail,
but visual detail is not the only kind, not even my favorite. The
bit I recall best from Boudwijn's description is the bare feet with
toe ring, which is as much a feeling--how it feels to be barefoot
everywhere--as a look.
Visual detail that I don't remember for more than a few seconds can
still add to my enjoyment by getting across mood. Creating a visual
image is not its only possible use.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Dorothy J Heydt
David Friedman <dd...@daviddfriedman.com> wrote:
>
>authors? Most readers?
Probably, but there's always Isaac Asimov, who used very little
physical description (with the exception of the Mule, whose
appearance was taken from life). Someone told him once "Why
don't you put in more description? The color of the character's
eyes, the shape of his nose." And Asimov said, dead-pan, "Nose?
My character has a nose?"
Another time an editor suggested the readers might like to know
what a character looks like, and he said, "Oh, they know." He
proceeded to quiz half-a-dozen female editors and assistants as
to what his current female character looked like. Each woman
described herself.
There's a phenomenon in comics called by Scott McCloud and others
"the masking effect," whereby the scenery in a comic will be
beautifully and elaborately drawn, letting the reader feel "the
world is real," and the characters will be simple and cartoony,
letting the reader identify with the viewpoint character, "the
character is just like me." It works for comics, it worked for
Asimov, it could work for you.
Personally, I like to do just a smidgen of description when the
character first appears, and leave it at that.
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt