Good versus bad... yeah, it's a tricky thing. I once offended a friend who made me read a book of SF short stories by her fave SF writer. I found the stories to be just another take on many motifs that have shown up in SF, and the prose itself something on the pedestrian side. But they were otherwise competent. So, when I returned the book to her, I said that I thought he was a fair journeyman writer, but that I had read better. I admit that her snit of "Well, that's just your opinion," bugged me -- because, after all, I did learn a few things about good writing in the pursuit of my English degrees.
But the thing was, the prose was "ordinary". The author didn't push himself to take an image further than the usual, there wasn't much that sparkled in the prose.
So, back to the good versus bad writing part ---
Anything that has too much of the passive voice ends up losing sparkle or life. And that's a hard one for any writer to watch out for -- heck, I fall into it myself, and have to excise it on rewrite.
Then, when the writer settles for the "usual" phrase, and never pushes beyond it. It really came home to me in my own writing a few years ago, and it has stuck with me ever since. In a script, I had two characters commenting about a third who was interrupting work because he was obsessed by something he'd missed, interrupting by phone, because he was actually sick at home. At the end of the call, character #1 says "He's having a hard time letting go, isn't he?" To which, originally, I'd had character #2 answer with the usual cliche "You have no idea." But a couple of things hit me with that -- generally, that phrase is a lie, because if it is a human experience, we all have the capacity to imagine ("have an idea") what someone else is going through. But secondly, for this story in particular, these characters are really, really smart people. They deserved something better than a cliche. So, I changed the line for #2 to "Think of nasty things that stick." Leeches, barnacles, ticks, etc.... It made for much better dialogue. Having done that myself, I'm not conscious of how good writing pushes beyond the easy cliches.
The other thing that puts me off are cardboard characters. Where, as you say, the emotions are predictable, and the victories are achieved without personal cost, where nothing surprises them, and the villains have no redeeming qualities to surprise you and regret their villainy.
Beyond those elements, I think you do start venturing more into matters of personal taste (although there do seem to be plenty of readers who are content with cardboard characters, alas).
But really... I don't think all judgement of good versus bad is subjective.
Very much worth pursuing. I guess I get obsessed about the objective/only subjective discourse because I do writing coaching as a sideline (very side at the moment, though). Because it's about communicating something, and if the writer I'm trying to help doesn't know what reaction he wants the reader to have, I can't help him craft the work to get the reader there. After that, how well he does it becomes his business.
But the thing was, the prose was "ordinary". The author didn't push himself to take an image further than the usual, there wasn't much that sparkled in the prose.
So, back to the good versus bad writing part ---
Anything that has too much of the passive voice ends up losing sparkle or life. And that's a hard one for any writer to watch out for -- heck, I fall into it myself, and have to excise it on rewrite.
Then, when the writer settles for the "usual" phrase, and never pushes beyond it. It really came home to me in my own writing a few years ago, and it has stuck with me ever since. In a script, I had two characters commenting about a third who was interrupting work because he was obsessed by something he'd missed, interrupting by phone, because he was actually sick at home. At the end of the call, character #1 says "He's having a hard time letting go, isn't he?" To which, originally, I'd had character #2 answer with the usual cliche "You have no idea." But a couple of things hit me with that -- generally, that phrase is a lie, because if it is a human experience, we all have the capacity to imagine ("have an idea") what someone else is going through. But secondly, for this story in particular, these characters are really, really smart people. They deserved something better than a cliche. So, I changed the line for #2 to "Think of nasty things that stick." Leeches, barnacles, ticks, etc.... It made for much better dialogue. Having done that myself, I'm not conscious of how good writing pushes beyond the easy cliches.
The other thing that puts me off are cardboard characters. Where, as you say, the emotions are predictable, and the victories are achieved without personal cost, where nothing surprises them, and the villains have no redeeming qualities to surprise you and regret their villainy.
Beyond those elements, I think you do start venturing more into matters of personal taste (although there do seem to be plenty of readers who are content with cardboard characters, alas).
But really... I don't think all judgement of good versus bad is subjective.
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