Are You Writing Serious Fantasy? II

[Estelyn Telcontar]

Since the Books forum is really reserved for discussions of Tolkien's books, I'm moving the writers' threads to the Novices and Newcomers forum. Please continue to share ideas there!

[Nurumaiel]

Keep it vague, don't name the religion as that will probably be a turn off. I don't know much about the Catholic religion, but keep their customs in the story and if a Catholic comes upon your story, he can mentally smile as he recognizes them. And if one isn't a Catholic, one can look at the story and appreciate how noble, etc, the characters are.

Imladris, thank you for that. There are still a few problems I have to work out, the main one being the Eucharist... This ties in with the problem I mentioned earlier. If this is an entirely different world than ours (which it very well may be) then there would be no Incarnation, and therefore could there be a Eucharist? I'll be even vaguer on this, because it isn't something I like to take artistic license with! As for Catholic readers, I fancy they'll have a few hints that won't be obvious to others... the characters' constant pleas to the Blessed Virgin Mary to intercede for them, though Mary in Trenian would be Mérali... thus far the characters have recited the Hail Mary once, but in their own language. Catholics might be able to guess, but non-Catholics would have a more difficult time.

Writing with the characters having certain religions, or none at all (atheism, unless I'm to throw in a character who as made that be a religion to him?), though not named inside the book, gives me a chance to do interesting things, such as how the characters will relate to each other. A Catholic and an atheist who are grand friends, or a Catholic and a Catholic who greatly dislike each other... the opportunity to put in really devout Catholics and those who are Catholics only by name but otherwise are not because they have abandoned all practice of their religion. Oh, this is grand, I am getting excited now. More and more characters spring into my head!

Thanks, Helen, for your advice. I suppose if I ever get the nerve to do it I'm going to do it the whole way... that means getting someone who won't balance praise and criticism evenly to spare my feelings. If there's more bad than good I want it all told to me. I can't say as much for my story, but as far as that goes my feelings could not be hurt. My story and the characters in it might be devastated, however.

I usually end up writing in my head because I forget to bring a notebook. Ah well... I'm going places today and tomorrow so I'll just use the posts I've read as a reminder to bring a little notebook. I have a darling pen that lasts nearly forever and doesn't show through on the opposite side of the page, and I have a little notebook about the size of a greeting card that is a binder... so I can add and remove paper at my pleasure! The main trouble is pockets. Most skirts are made with pockets. However I've discovered this temporary sling I've got on serves as an admirable pocket... though it hinders typing!

One thing I'd like todowould be carry a tap recorder around,since sometimesI have great dialogue or narrative that gets lost in the transition from thought to page.

I sympathize, Olorin. I had acted out a grand dialogue on the way to a baseball game. It was a bit of speech between two good friends who had grown up with each other and were now serving in the King's court. One was the son of the farmer, the other the son of the soldier. The son of the farmer seemed, as the dialogue went on, a bit insane, saying he was the rightful King of the land, and his friend expressed concern for him but also for his King, fearing the latter might come to harm. He was a bit harsh with the farmer's son, saying that if harm came to the King he would not spare his friend's life, much as it would grieve him. If I had written it down I might have been able to sort through everything weak and flabby and save everything grand and write out a wonderful scene, but it is completely lost to my mind now and even the general idea seems ridiculous. Ah well...

I'm going off to search for that little notebook.

[Sirithheruwen]

LIttle notebooks are a great idea. I don't carry one around with me everywhere, but I do have I notebook that I write all of my stories in, no matter how much the differ from each other. As a matter of fact, I have at least four to five stories that I started, but never finished. My characters become stale and the plot moldy (Well, I already said stale). WHich brings me to several questions:
How do you keep the original plot running smoothly?
I think my problem is, I rush things too much and get (or try to get) from Point A to Point B too fast. How do you avoid that?
Another one of my current problems is that I'm afraid to take the plunge on this story. (Remember, this is still the planning stage.) HOw do you just suck it up and start? WEll, that's all...have fun!

[Imladris]

I have never finished a long story -- just short stories -- but I've heard that you don't write a story. You let the story write itself. If you try to hard, it won't happen. That's essentially what Tolkien did as well. I remember in another letter that he had no idea who Aragorn was, etc. If you like, I will get the letter in it's entirety for you.

As for afraid to take the plunge, you can always re-write. How many times did Tolkien restart LotR? Heck, how many times did he add/change new characters?

As for characters and plots getting moldy, I have no idea.

Edit: If you want good info on writing (and if you don't crude references and bad language ), read Stephen King's book On Writing. It's very good and has lots of encouragement and tips.

[Saraphim]

I was as surprised as Frodo and Sam when Faramir rose from the grass in Ithilien

Something like that.

Anyway, this, to me, is a beautiful glimpse of the writing process. To read this, as a fan of Faramir and his exceedingly well-developed character, and to learn that Tolkien himself had no idea of his existence is phenomenal.

It shows that writing is indeed not a job, but an art form, and one I hope to be slightly as good as Tolkien at.

Not nearly to that point, nor will I be for quite a long time.

[mark12_30]

Saraphim-- Yes. I love that quote. This is the quote that inspired me to start writing:

"I met a lot of things on the way that astonished me. Tom Bombadil I knew already; but I had never before been to Bree. Strider sitting in the corner at the inn was a shock, and I had no more idea who he was than had Frodo. The Mines of Moria had been a mere name; and of Lothlorien no word had reached my mortal ears till I came there. Far away I knew there were the Horselords on the confines of an ancient Kingdom of Men, but "Fangorn Forest was an unforseen adventure. I had never heard of the House of Eorl nor of the Stewards of Gondor. Most disquieting of all, Saruman had never been revealed to me, and I was as mystified as Frodo at Gandalf's failure to appear on September 22."

I love this quote, especially the part about Strider sitting in the corner. If Tolkien could be baffled by who and what he wrote, thought I, then so can I. Easily.

I sat at the PC, and the first thing I wrote was a man running down a hill somewhere north of Bree. It went nowhere. The second thing I wrote was about a hobbit in a train station. Thank God. I'd call it a turning point in my life, I think... Two novels later, Bolco remains a huge favorite with me.