Are You Writing Serious Fantasy? II

[TheBladeThatWasBroken]

Originally Posted by Morquesse

How did you decide that you wanted to write fantasy? What kind do you write?

Has Tolkien influenced your writing? If so, how?

1. I used to write fanfictions for anime and stuff... it was fun when I first began writing, but as I wrote, the feeling of satisfactory lessened everytime I recall that I didn't create the world that my fanfictions took place in. And after reading Professor Tolkien's works, I've decided that I'm going to write in my own world as well... and that's how I began

2. I think Professor Tolkien has influenced, however little, every fantasy writers' writings... after all, you could call him the Father of Fantasy Fiction.

My problems are that I'm extremely lazy, and I just wish that my stories will come out on paper on their own exactly the way that I had pictured them in my mind, so that I don't have to go through all the grammar and stuff. And my other problem is that, being a non-native speaker, my writing skill isn't at its best... you could probably already caught several grammatical errors in this post itself =_=

Argh, I wish I could write better.

And while we're on the subject of names, I find myself disliking real names. So when coming up with names, I use the widely popular word-manipulating method. Only that I manipulate word roots of different languages, and that the meaning behind those roots will have some relationship to the place/object/person with that name.

For ex. the world in which my story takes place is named "Jahanneth" and it came from the Persian word Jahan which means "the World."

Just in case anyone's interested, here's the site that I use: Behind the Name - Etymology and History of First Names

And that's about the longest post I've posted in the Downs so far =_=...

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

Some good, intelligent and helpful discussion here. On the subject of names; It is not names of characters that trouble me, rather names of places.

It is really troubling me. Does anyone else have difficulty with this, as opposed to character names?

[Eowyn Skywalker]

Oh yes, the evil art of place naming. I actually have became more adept at places to people, actually... being as I can follow some basic ideas for them. Now, for planets... that is easy, just come up with a name that's two or three syllables (sp?) long, such as Lanathaá... most are like that... Coruscant... Tatooine... Corriellia... many of the Star Wars planets are like that. Cities, on a fantasy world can contain 'fort' or 'tower' or something else of the like, if it is large... such as Fort Aleaon (made up on the spot). Towns tend to contain desriptive words, that are like the town, village, whatever. Such as Willow Creek, or Two Hills, or Rock Hollows... yeah. Things like that. Forests and mountains are easy to name. Here's my tip for creating a world, and that's to draw a map right off the bat, and come up with names, places, etc. That's what I did... drew a few maps... and now I have *counts on fingers* Akk... I can't even remember all my worlds... heh.

-Eowyn Skywalker

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

Oh yes, I love drawing maps! I keep putting off the actual task of writing because I want to refine the maps.

[Lathriel]

What makes naming places for me easier is to look where they are situated on your map. If the place is far north I tend to give it a simple northern name like for example ice town or I look for celtic like names.

If the place is south than I try to find a somewhat southern name.

[Elennar Starfire]

For names, I usually think of someone I know that's like the character I'm trying to name, and scramble up the letters in their name until I get something I like.

Place names are a nightmare...