Message Board Topic For 10/4

[Comicality]

 

There are many stories out there that take place in a certain place, time, and situation...that has to be fully explained to your readers. For example...if someone is reading "Lord Of The Rings", there is an entire WORLD that has to be given to the reader. Elves and Dwarfs and Mankind and Wizards and an entire HISTORY involving these rings and what they mean. That's not something that readers can just guess at. If a writer is creating a mythology, then it has to be delivered (in full) to the people trying to get into the story.

 

"Lord of the Rings" is a 'story', yes. But it is also a mythology. Meaning that there are certain fundamental rules that apply to what's going on. There's a history that has to be explained. "Harry Potter" is a mythology. "Star Wars" is a mythology. "Indiana Jones" is a mythology. "James Bond" and "Twilight" and "Nightmare On Elm Street"...those are all mythologies. No matter how many stories are told about those particular characters...there is a 'home base' of what you need to know to be put into their world. You need to know how the Skywalker bloodline and the empire works. You have to know that Hogwarts is a school for young wizards and who Voldermort is. You need a background of some sort to understand "Underworld", or "Tron", or "Sherlock Holmes". You have to put your readers in a whole other world that doesn't exist. A vampire fan can't just read "Dracula" and then jump into "Gone From Daylight" and expect the same rules to apply. They don't. The mythology is different. The RULES are different.

 

This isn't just for sci-fi/fantasy stuff either. Even the "Simpsons" is a mythology. You have to know the characters and the structure and the individual plot lines and the area that they live in to truly understand it all. "Rocky" is a mythology, "24" is a mythology, "Seinfeld" is a mythology.

 

This week's question is...how does one go about creating a mythology that will be both believable and entertaining enough to stick? How can you describe an entire WORLD of rules and characters and an atmosphere of its own without being 'boring'? How can you create characters that will inhabit this world and not have to re-expain it every few pages? How can a writer create an entirely original piece of folklore and a following that can reach the heights of "Blade Runner", "The Terminator", "1984", or "Interview With The Vampire"?

 

Let us know!

 

Mythology...the story that can stretch BEYOND the story! How do you do it? Talk to us!

 

 

 

 

 

[JamesSavik]

Don't expect to build your universe in one sitting. It takes a LOT of imagination and work.

 

You have to create a believable "history" and make your world consistent and logical for readers to buy into. Otherwise... well you've got network TV.

 

The Lord of the Rings didn't just fall from the sky complete and ready for Peter Jackson to exploit. It took Tolkien decades to build it all. He also borrowed quite a lot from Norse mythology. If building a massive history, mythology, folk lore and customs wasn't enough, Tolkien built several languages from scratch. Amazing and completely off the chain.

 

Other universes were collaborative. The Star Trek universe was created by Gene Roddenberry but it had numerous writers in its various incarnations all agreeing on basic precepts.

 

The Star Wars Universe is the private property of George Lucas but he has opened it for numerous authors and even game developers to expand it.

 

Speaking of games, Halo and World of Warcraft have their own shelf of formula derived fiction at Borders and Barnes&IgNoble.

 

I can't tell you HOW to build a Universe but I'll tell you how I'm building mine. I have notebooks full of material that I'm working on: history, culture, planet names, politics, points of conflict, flash points, names of ships, Technologies, etc. It's a huge undertaking but its a lot of fun.

 

If you do it right, kids will be buying your action figures.

[Agincourt]

One of the difficulties in a mythology situation is finding ways to convey the key information to readers without simply dumping it on them. It is a mark of skill to be able to carry the story along and reveal the necessary mythological info bit by bit, organically with what's going on. Otherwise the story begins to sound like a bad comic book.

 

One common technique is for characters to start talking about something the reader obviously won't be familiar with, causing the reader to become intrigued with whatever it is. Only later is it revealed what this mystery something is. Actually, this is a common storytelling technique in general -- the author controls the revelation of information. Think of all the things that happen at the very beginning of the first Harry Potter book, with a mysterious figure (later revealed to be Dumbledore) arriving on Privet Drive, putting out the streetlights, then McGonagle and Hagrid arrive (she initially as a cat, he on a flying motorcycle), etc. J.K.Rowling makes no attempt to explain these things; rather the significance is revealed bit by bit as the story unfolds.

 

Another technique is to have the main character confronted with the same mystery the readers are confronted with. In other words, as the story opens, the main character finds himself in a situation where he needs to explore and discover what's really going on in his world. This is clearly the case in Wizard's First Rule by Terry Goodkind (now seen on television as The Seeker), where Richard Cypher discovers, step by step, that he is a rather special person in rather special circumstances. With this approach, the readers find out what's going on right along with the main character. Thus, it's plausible for the revelations to come along when they do.

 

A

[hh5]

Have you notice in watching a Dan Brown \ Tom Hanks movie?

 

Symbolism - how he draws you into the mystery and how he rifles through some examples ... he draws you into his mysterious world.

 

Look at Jules Verne ... the adventure with a mystery.

 

Now Mystery island was a disappointment when the creatures were giant house hold pest.

 

Now for Lord of the rings ... It was really the hobbit that did the trick ... his sharing of runes and songs of ancient and the use of diction ... snatching you from your comfort zone ... to go on a long journey a quest ...

 

That's the trick ... the quest ... the sharing between Gandanulf and bilbo ... the others giving need to know intel ... drawing in bilbo to perform deeds that he had no idea he could do ... it seems to be a coming of age for him ... to grow up beyond his wildest dreams ...

 

That's some of the magic ... the same goes with ... Jason and the Argonauts etc etc

 

But if you have an audience ... oh I seen every thing there is to know about a Greek god or a hobbit ... it then you have to start inventing something they don't know

 

Avatar be an example ... but people would start to tie that with Pocahontas and colonies.

 

Your up against people that will try to tie in your story with similar experiences ... and its up to your to break that tie ... and get them to learn a new world.

 

It you go back 40 years ... no one had all this experience and knowledge ... or go back 80 years ... there was even less ... radio was the place for adventure and imagination ... the story of Camelot and Merlin

 

But for me I always try to watch a movie or read a book without all that Erbert and Siskal clutter or whatever ... I want to be drawn into the world of wonder and imagination ... that describes being young ... doesn't that seen to show you that your possible audience is the ten to fiftteen year olds.

 

But no you up against with read readers and authors and very intelligent people ... thats Why Avatar didn't quite draw me into their world

 

Its because I knew what was going to happen ... like Titanic ... in a real adventure ... I would not know whats going to happen ...

 

Thats what made Jules Vern and etc made it so exciting .... I guess you have to beyond writing a serial story ... it has to be fresh and style a constant mystery ... a learning curve

 

Oh stay away from the movie The Myth with Jackie Chan ... you don't want such a cheap myth thats so easy to tell ...

[Tipdin]

Perhaps OUR wold was created in seven days; however, I don't have that kind of magic - it takes a wee bit longer for some of us...

 

I began by telling stupid little time-filler stories to my kids so they would behave when in the car or waiting in lines. After more than 10 years of stories, often ad-libbed on the spot, there was a seed that I could plant. I expanded and told the stupid stories in more serious, grown up ways. Then I tried to weave the pieces together. Bit by bit, or perhaps I should say, word by word, I filled dozens of pages with notes.

 

Dozens of pages soon numbered hundreds. Weeks of transcribing written words to typed words. Then months of smearing the words about, rearranging them into something fractionally better. A mere thirty years later, and I can begin my story at the actual beginning; my mythological world was fairly new and its inhabitants were mostly everything but human. I introduced everything in somewhat logical, chronological order. People developed a crude form of communication, which led to more sophisticated forms. Everything had to be named, categorized, explained, and taught.

 

My epic saga starts with a human baby in a time when humans were little more than speechless animals. The equivalent of a thousand Earth years pass as the story unfolds, with over 500 characters playing various significant roles. It ends with an army of beings, from human to elf, to dragon to pixie, to talking trees and living rocks, all working in tandem against a common enemy. A volcano erupts as the nightmarish crescendo of the story takes places within range of the volcanic rain.

 

Like Tolkien, I created an alphabet and a language; an entire way of life, and ways of thinking unlike that of our own world. It takes time. A lot of time.

 

Everything I experienced, I tried to transform into inspiration, - everything. And I wrote. I wrote on everything, everywhere, and at the most inopportune times, anyplace and anytime an idea occurred to me. My friends confirmed what strangers would say - that I was a nut job. I walked out of movies and away from conversations to jot down something I just HAD to get down on paper before it was to late.

 

I started my nightmare, oops, I mean masterpiece in 1968. And I'm still refining. The story is there and told. But I've lived in that other world for so long that I cannot let my characters go, or maybe they're holding me hostage because without me, they would not exist. Either way, I now know them well and can create new friends for them to play with, new places they can explore. Side adventures I didn't know about 20 years ago and left out of the main story can now be told. And they often introduce me to new ideas, new kinds of beings and let me join them on their newest adventure.

 

Just keep writing.

[Agincourt]

This week's question is...how does one go about creating a mythology that will be both believable and entertaining enough to stick? How can you describe an entire WORLD of rules and characters and an atmosphere of its own without being 'boring'? How can you create characters that will inhabit this world and not have to re-expain it every few pages? How can a writer create an entirely original piece of folklore and a following that can reach the heights of "Blade Runner", "The Terminator", "1984", or "Interview With The Vampire"?

 

I realized that I hadn't really addressed the actual question, but rather only talked about techniques for conveying the world once invented.

 

No doubt journals or text files on the computer containing notes about the world would be helpful. I think everyone is different in this. James Frey (How to Write A Damn Good Novel) recommends writing out a lot of preparatory stuff in advance of the actual writing. I'm not good enough to do this properly. I have to start writing something first. I use the journals to keep track of all the details I've laid out, in as much detail as possible, so I can refer to these details without having to hunt through the entire manuscript every time I need to confirm something. It also reminds me of little items I've dropped into the narrative that I may have forgotten about later.

 

I do find it useful to lay down some biographical/backstory information about the characters early on. This allows me to make sure that the characters are actually different from one another. If I don't do this, a lot of my characters will seem like clones of each other (basically versions of me).

 

As for mythological worlds (finally getting to the subject of the question): I think that no matter how distant in time or space the mythological world may be from our present world, and how different the environment and beings, readers need some kind of anchor to the familiar. Unless there is a story reason to change certain things -- and any such changes should be made sparingly -- then most of the characteristics of the mythical world should be what readers expect from their experience with the actual world. For instance, when an object is released from the hand, it should fall to the ground (i.e., gravity). When it hits the ground, it should make a noise. If it is fragile, it should shatter. If a device mounted on the wall emits a signaling tone and a character goes over to interact with it, it should behave like a telephone or an intercom. If a character works hard on some physical activity, he or she should tire. And so on.

 

Gene Roddenberry (whom I met when he came and gave a talk to the writing students at my college) said that Star Trek, for all of its space-age sophistication, was at heart nothing more than Wagon Train set in the future. In other words, underneath the photon torpedoes, the Tricorders, the warp drive, and the transporter, human stories of ambition, greed, jealousy, corruption, triumph, and heartbreak were being told.

 

And it's interesting how some of the most sophisticated technology on that show was instantly obvious and understandable to viewers. When a patient was lying on one of those electronic beds in Sick Bay, for example, the audience immediately understood the significance of that monitor panel on the wall, coupled with the periodic "doonk" sound of a heartbeat. When Dr. McCoy held that little round shiny thingy (actually a salt shaker, I later learned) over a patient, with the funny sound effect that went with it, we instantly realized that it was some kind of scanner to determine the status of things under the skin. We didn't need to be told -- the logic filled itself in. Yet it was quite advanced, and not something we had when the show was on the air (nor today, for that matter). The Transporter was also self-explanatory. (It was actually introduced as a way to save the money that would have to be spent on filming actual landings on planets in a spacecraft.)

 

My thought, then, is that mythological worlds may have a lot of cosmetic differences with our own world, but that a lot of the underlying characteristics of the mythological worlds should remain anchored in the familiar. Specific changes should be made, first, for express story purposes, and second, for atmospheric purposes (but only within reason). Otherwise, if nothing on the mythological world behaves the way we would expect, the story will not be interesting any more, because it will be too frustrating for the reader. Moreover, such a story would be far more challenging to write, because the author would have to constantly guard against doing anything "conventional." That seems like too much work, and it's unnecessary.

 

Indeed, I think that keeping the mythical world grounded in the familiar adds to the story value. In the Harry Potter books, for example, for all the witchcraft and wizardry that could do such remarkable things, there were major limits. No wizardry could bring someone back to life from the dead. And Voldemort's attempt at immortality carried with it a terrible, ghastly price. Thus, I would say that in creating the mythical world, a writer should not make the world so ideal that there is no opportunity left for conflict or loss. There should still be room for all the human frailties and emotions that drive a good story.

 

A

[StoriesByCirrus]

There are two elements really: creating the mythology itself, then how you introduce that mythology to the readers.

 

When it comes to the second element, there are good ways to do it, and bad. I think the most effective way is when the mythology (or "back story" if you like) is introduced gradually, and always in context of the story. George RR Martin's "Song of Ice and Fire" series is one of my favourite series of novels (of any genre). Like a lot of multi-book fantasy stories, its got a *lot* of back story (more than most actually). But the information gets doled in little bits at a time, and Martin never lets explaining the mythology distract from the story that's being told in the present.

 

Neal Stephenson's "Anathem" adopts the complete opposite approach. Before you've even read the first chapter, there is a long timeline detailing 10,000 odd years of history of the world that Stephenson has imagined. You read the whole thing because hey, its probably important. Only after finishing the book do you realise that absolutely nothing in the timeline was essential to understanding the story, and you could have skipped over it completely.

 

Everyone seems to be going gaga over a novel called "The Passage" this year, and I just found it annoying. It felt like there would be two pages of plot, then three pages of flashback, as the complete life histories of characters were detailed - characters who were ultimately only supporting members of the cast, and dead by the time the lengthy prologue ended.

 

So my advice when introducing the mythology of your world to your readers: start small and build from there. Focus on the world as it affects your characters first, then widen the scope. And never let the world building distract you from telling a compelling story.