Inside the Story Space

[scribblerworks]

(For my friends, there are a couple of reasons I haven't been posting much on LJ lately.  The sore foot acquired at Wondercon at the beginning of April turned out to be plantar faciitis -- distress of connective tissue in the foot, mostly on the underside.  Early on, if I did nothing but lounge on the sofa with the foot elevated, it seemed fine,

Comments

[kalimac]

The problem is that story spaces don't operate by the same standards. And I don't mean that they're mutually inconsistent. I mean that they're different the way that a great Picasso and a great Van Gogh and a great Rembrandt are great by different standards of greatness. Or the way you could say that an eight-year-old's drawing is fabulous for an eight-year-old, but some work by Van Gogh is not Van Gogh at his best.

When I have Middle-earth actively in my head, all other fantasy worlds seem cheap and shoddy until I can shake it off and immerse myself, with the sole exception of the Valley of the Na.

[scribblerworks]

Yes! I think you're right - jumping from story to story is rather like wandering a museum looking at pieces from various artists, right along with that eight-year-old's drawing stuck on the refrigerator.

And I agree that Middle-earth does indeed take supremacy. Tolkien's world-building is so thorough and yet engaging.

David Anthony Durham (the author of Acacia had previously written historical novels, and he was apparently very good working from established historical facts. He certainly brings that attention to detail to his fantasy writing. It's almost overload.

[sartorias]

My own wouldn't count (though I've slipped in and out for fifty years, now), so what does? The Vorkosiverse. I stepped into Herman Melville's paradigm of earth, and stayed long enough to decide I don't want to revisit it, so it will close behind me. I'm enjoying the America of West Wing because government actually works (what a fantasy!) and there are good people in it who can be effective. But then I drop over to NCIS.

I did try the world of 24, but I loathed it too much to stay there--your guts must be stronger than mine. Oh, how could I forget the LA of Chuck? *Love*

Just a few--this is already too blabbery.

[scribblerworks]

I think one's own created world should count! I was certainly thinking of mine as I wrote the post.

That vividness of my own creation was something that struck me as part of this "being inside the story space". I recently had the first two chapters of The Ring of Adonel critiqued by a writers' group, and many of the comments addressed the vivid sense of place I had managed to convey

[sartorias]

Kiefer is good, but the show was too humorless for me, and also the cost in innocents dying pointlessly way too high. But degustibus.

I enjoyed Castle, and I loved season two of Burn Notice . . . I will get three when Netflix releases it, and I hope it's not a repeat of two. The one I fell in love with was Chuck.

[sartorias]

Another thought, Melville is certainly at his best in Moby Dick, blending the real with the fictional world to give it added resonance.

However, I find that he has nothing to say to me in his subsequent stuff: I don't find Bartleby the least bit funny (this is where "absurdism as comedy" and I totally part ways), and Pierre is an abysmally, almost unforgiveably ugly view of writers, what they write, what happens to what they write, and the world they write in.

[jpantalleresco]

bookwise I am currently reading the Alchemist by Pablo Coehlo. It's not something I normally read but I'm enjoying it. I can kind of relate to seeking a treasure and journeying to unknown lands. I've done it many times.

Television Wise I'm watching episodes of Codegeass: Lelouche of the Rebellion. I've never watched a hero of a series be so diabolical. This series is epic and probably the best political show i've ever seen.

I'm rereading the Great Hunt by Robert Jordan as well. With him it's watching how his world just ties together so well. It's amazing to see how far in advance he planned things. A real master of his craft.

Your writing is brilliant Scribbler....

[anonymous]

...but the thinking behind the writing is even more so.

"I'm not really going anywhere with this rambling post. I'm just floating on a cloud overlooking the landscape of Storyland, and wondering how the various countries came about and why they so carefully maintain their borders -- and why we are free to be citizens of all the countries, if we so desire."

:) Wow to the 5th power!!!!!

Indeed, walking on a cloud... is very easy on a sore foot.

Jim from Michigan