fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2532 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2532 ⌋

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Notes:

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Obviously my opinion isn't the popular one here judging from the comments, but I usually don't give a rat's ass about the setting in most fics. Yeah, a little description here or there is fine, but I don't need to have purple prose discussing the desert at night or paragraphs upon paragraphs of setting. That just doesn't interest me, and I don't include it when I write fic, either.

The one exception being, of course, AUs, where there's a completely different world (not high school or coffee shop or whatever, but something where things are COMPLETELY different).

Yours might not be the popular opinion in this thread, but it probably is the popular opinion in fandom. That's why there are so many people complaining about the lack of fic. :)

Personally, as a fic writer, that's the reason why I do fic instead of original. If I wanted to devote all that time to worldbuilding, I'd write my own stuff. Sometimes I just want to play in an already-built world with already-developed characters.

I think there's a difference between worldbuilding and atmosphere. To take an example that a lot of people in the thread have used, if you're writing a Sherlock Holmes fic, you can play in an already-built world and still spend time on, you know, hansom coaches splashing through rain-sodden streets, and smoky train stations packed with endless crowds embarking and disembarking, and that kind of thing.

Not that you need to, or even necessarily should - if you're not interested in atmosphere there's no reason to write it. It's just weird to me that people are associating worldbuilding and atmosphere so closely.

See, but that's kind of a complaints about lack of good writing. Good fics almost always have a handle on atmosphere.

Hm. I wouldn't see it that way. I think you can have a good fic that doesn't care about atmosphere (although I personally would prefer one that does).

Agree to disagree, I guess!

It doesn't have to be done in a "now let us pause for five paragraphs of description" way though. It can be a buildup of little visual details scattered throughout the plot and action in a way that paints a vivid picture over time.

It doesn't need to be purple prose about the setting. I get where OP is coming from because writing a love letter to the setting means integrating the characters into a place that feels lived-in and real. It's about describing the way the ash of Mount Doom feels on a character's skin; about how the snow storm makes the forests of Skyrim look to a new adventurer; how the aurora borealis lit up the night sky just in time for a character to see an enemy coming at them. Characters don't live in a void-- writing about the world they live in is tied to the way they see it and how it affects them.

purple prose discussing the desert at night or paragraphs upon paragraphs of setting

But that has nothing to do with atmosphere/worldbuilding, or lack thereof - it's just poor writing to have "paragraphs upon paragraphs" of *anything*. Just as if you had acres of text describing a character's backstory or past relationships without incorporating it properly into your own story or the current relationship(s) you're writing about.

If that is genuinely how you see setting, I think you've probably read some really poor fics - or poor use of setting at any rate.

Not to say you can't like or dislike whatever story elements you want to, just that setting =/= purple prose or paragraphs upon paragraphs.

Exactly. It's a bit like saying you don't like music because this one band you heard was terrible.

When an author does description really well, it's probably not even something a reader would notice because it'll be incorporated into the story rather than just clumsy chunks of text plopped down in the middle of the page.

So you don't like descriptive prose when it's done badly? That's not really that unpopular of an opinion.

I agree.

See the thing is writing good description is hard. I'd rather have none at all then have it done really badly all over the place. I think this is a matter of being trained out of it. You have a lot about the setting and you have no readers, but you have a great story and you get a lot of them.

Even in original fiction it has me skimming pages more than it has me stopping to read it. It has to be good...and I can't even think of an author off the top of my head as an example.

You are misunderstanding entirely. "A lot" about the setting doesn't mean longwinded descriptions with high wordcount, it means well-chosen, vivid details that create verisimilitude.

What you're describing is an entirely different type of setting-description that actually lessens the impact and vividness of the setting, because that kind of description isn't integrated into the actions and movements of the characters.

good writing and atmosphere =/= purple prose

Some people see an adjective and they're all "OMG the URPLE it's killing me!"

Damn that Hemingway.

And you too, Carver.

[ SECRET POST #2532 ]

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