The definition of insanity

[avevale_intelligencer]

I am a writer. I write fiction. I write fantasy. I've been doing it for five decades now, and it's not for me to judge whether I've got any good at it, but I think I deserve to be credited with knowing a little about my craft.

There are three ways in which a fictional world can diverge from the real one.

One, the writer makes whatever change is necessary to the story; imagines a world in which there are superheroes, or vampires, or aliens, or faeries. It's commonly acknowledged that it's best to keep these changes as few as possible; vampires and aliens together makes for a messy story, unless the vampires are also aliens and have a backstory that can be fitted into those terms. The more realistic the background is against which this change is set, the better. That's why good writers do research. This kind of change is necessary for any fiction, fantasy most of all.

Two, the writer makes whatever cosmetic changes are necessary to make the story acceptable to modern audiences. This is more important in visual media than in books; you can write about most people in ancient times having only three teeth and those black and rotting, but if you're putting the story on telly then that's only going to be a distraction and put your audience off. Likewise if it were possible to write people in Shakespeare's time speaking authentic Shakespearian English, half the audience wouldn't understand and the other half would think the story was set in America, so characters speak the language of the audience. The writer makes concessions, violates strict accuracy in small ways to get the story across. This kind of change shouldn't be necessary, but usually is.

And the third kind of change is the one the writer puts in just for the hell of it, because he can, because it's his story and who cares. And this is bad writing. If it violates the realism of the background it weakens the story. If the story is aimed at children and has a historical background, it runs the risk of setting up incorrect assumptions in their minds which will need to be corrected when they come to learn the truth about that period of history.

As I said, I am a writer. I know a little whereof I speak. Telling me I'm doing it wrong is one thing, and I'm open to that. Explaining to me that there's something called the willing suspension of disbelief kind of crosses a line.

Comments

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

In re the secondary part of point one: I like what I call kitchen sink fiction. I liked Illuminatus!. I liked David Drake's Birds of Prey, which starts with the one honest man (some sort of government inspector) in corrupt ancient Rome. It's noir, but there's a dinosaur in the Tiber. And an alien menace. And a time traveler.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

Illuminatus was a magnificent one-off. I don't know the Drake, but I'd be surprised if there wasn't a thread of internal logic binding the elements together. They are all from the sf end of the spectrum, too. The general rule is still valid, though as with all rules, once you've mastered it you know how and when to break it and still maintain internal consistency.

Don't take things personally ...

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

I'm a magician, the willing suspension of disbelief is precisely my craft.

People *know* that I can't really pull coins out of thin air, or restore someone after cutting them in half, and that I *probably* can't read their minds to determine their chosen card ...

... I believe (and you are free to disagree) that a writer can put whatever they want to in a story, and if it pleases the audience, then the writer has succeeded in producing a popular story.

However the writer could just be writing for themselves, or a small group of people, and can then do whatever the heck they want (like writing a Mary Sue, or writing in Klingon, or leaving all the letter "E"s out of the story).

There are three ways in which a fictional world can diverge from the real one.
I hadn't realised there was a writer's guide that explained that there were just three ways. And that a fictional world couldn't, say, be totally different from anything we've experienced ... like the Zelazny tarot world.


For TV "history/fantasy", it is widely known and accepted that they are going to play fast and loose with historical accuracy and realism.

For example, Merlin probably didn't exist, and if he did, then John Hurt was not the voice of the dragon, the armour wouldn't have looked like that in Arthurian times etc.

And Maid Marion's Merry Men are not an accurate depiction of whatever period of English history they are supposed to inhabit?

Children's fantasy TV, set in "historic" times, almost never depicts things with realism.

Re: Don't take things personally ...

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

It's not a question of a writer's guide. Those three types of change, the necessary, the cosmetic and the what-the-hell, cover all the available options.

Zelazny's tarot world (I assume you mean Amber) is far more like our world than it is unlike, as most fictional worlds are unless you're Hal Clement. Zelazny made the necessary change, imagining the multiplicity of Shadow worlds and Amber/Rebma, and left everything else severely alone. You'll notice that when Corwin is on Earth he is definitely on Earth--the ambulances aren't pulled by flying gerbils and his friend Bill Roth isn't married to a reptile. If changes like that show up it is intentional, to show that the world he's in is not Earth.

Maid Marian and her Merry Men is a televisual comic. If you're saying nuWho is on the same level, then I might agree with you, but many wouldn't, possibly including the writers who are trying to do serious drama (not very well, in my admittedly jaundiced view, but they are trying).

I do disagree. I could put whatever I wanted to (in the sense you mean) into a story, but then it would be a mess. In the end, what a writer wants to put into a story is mostly what the story needs. There's a little wiggle room for tchotchkes, but they'd better be good, and they don't bear repeating. Think of Chekhov's rule about the gun; if it's on the wall in act one, it had better be fired in act three, and vice versa.

I have no idea how magicians perform their illusions, no particular wish to learn, and no opinion on how they should present them. I'm happy to enjoy them on their terms. On my own speciality, I'm rather more emotionally invested. Sorry about that.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

No disagreements with the general principles there.

Part of your point 2 explains to me yet another reason why I usually find TV/films annoying. No, I don't find Elizabethans with Elizabethan teeth distracting - I find Elzabethans with impossibly perfect teeth distracting, just as I would a flush toilet.

But your third point - yes. If you're going to change something from the "standard" (even if that "standard" is Generic Medievalia), then the result needs to be internally self-consistent. The more change you make, the more you need to think about the results. So for instance any fantasy world that routinely has flying attackers in every army, but keeps castle design as per the Normans or Crusaders, has got a huge, gaping hole in both plot and defences.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

Exactly. And a society in which heterosexual, intra-ethnic monogamy is seen as ordained by God (and which on the whole still actively professes to believe in God), while it will have non-standard relationships in it, would hardly (or so I thought) acknowledge such relationships as socially acceptable. I may or may not be in the process of learning differently. I think it's a quantum thing.

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

So how affecting would it be if Othello was a black man married to a white woman, for, say, Elizabethan society?

:-)

[the-alchemist.livejournal.com]

I think the answer is it's complicated.

For example, in Elizabethan society, there is quite a bit of evidence that while almost everyone thought 'sodomy' was a terrible thing, people didn't class the loving, sexual relationships they had as young men with other young men as anything of the sort.

Plus there's the fact that if homosexuality is completely unacceptable in a society, in some ways it's easier for same sex relationships to slip under the radar. See for example the way men regularly hold hands in Arabic societies - a gesture that would be read as 'gay' here, but nothing of the sort there.

Also the fact that it was perfectly acceptable for an unmarried woman to live with and share a bed with a 'companion' in Victorian England and no-one would dream that it was a sexual relationship unless they actually shagged in the street, or unless one or both of them did something ostentatiously transgressive, like trouser-wearing.

There are also (rare) examples of same sex couples living in publicly acknowledged relationships equivalent to marriage in places like 19th century Britain - for example the Ladies of Llangollen, who were criticised but by and large accepted.

[the-alchemist.livejournal.com]

Plus I think 'making people in the past a little bit more in tune with 21st century moral values' mostly comes into your second category rather than your third (unless you want to make it a category of its own).

For most of Christendom throughout most of its history, it was perfectly acceptable for husbands to beat their wives (as long as they didn't cause lasting damage) or to force them to have sex, and there's evidence that they commonly availed themselves of these rights. But if all fiction with historical settings were full of wife-beating and marital rape, then it would be quite difficult to get past that to pay attention to the actual storyline, so like with the teeth, writers tend to tone it down.

Similarly, they tone down racism and homophobia if they want the focus to be on something else.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

That looks as if it refers to some specific context that you didn't mention in the original post?

[the-alchemist.livejournal.com]

With me it's Elizabethans with perfect, meticulously-researched hair and clothes, and modern make-up. Drives me up the wall! At least good teeth existed, at least on young people, but modern make-up styles absolutely didn't.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Very true!

[dickgloucester.livejournal.com]

I'm curious to know what provoked this.

Context

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

I assume it came from a discussion elsewhere about the most recent season of Doctor Who ... so spoilers were avoided, but also the more general point was being made, that the writer/director changing bits of history to make some modern social point may confuse or misinform people (particularly children) about what the actual conditions were back then.

Re: Context

[dickgloucester.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

[jelas.livejournal.com]

I do agree with the point about changes to a historcal background in a book for children (or other people unfamiliar with that particular period), as it will lead to "false knowledge".
I do like to read books from the branch of "alternate history". But you do have to know your way around that time to know which part is history and which is alternate.
It would be helpful to make deviatons from what we call history to what we freely admit is fiction more visible, like pointing it out in the preface or dividing the story in two parts or something like that.
Else it is likely that fact and fiction nestle close to each other in the brain and you first have to unlearn the alternate part in order to get your history straight. This will be a problem for children when their classes get to that time and the kid thinks it knows all about it - only to find out that this is indeed not the case...
In this area I think that many writers do see themselves mostly as entertainers who can do as they please and disregard the educational influence that books have.