Relaxed Reflection: Day 15

[B] Worldbuilding. (15,319 / 1,000,000)

I was thinking about potentially classifying the different posts that I publish here, so that you guys know what you’re getting into before you start reading. I basically only have blogs and short stories, so it would be pretty easy. Yeah, I think I’m just going to do it. I’ll but a [B] in the subtitle thing for blog posts, and an [S] for short stories.

So, the theme of the week has been worldbuilding, and two days ago we talked about the big bad bullies of the world - a.k.a. non-human entities which hold power. We talked about their impact on our world, and the kinds of conflict that they create. From a writing perspective, they create so much material from which a storyteller can draw. Yesterday, I tried putting those concepts into practice in my little short story. Here are the things that I learned.

First, a very small amount of information can hint at the shape of the world at large. A single person in a cramped workshop can create a teleportation device on their own? That single idea kind of sets the stage for the level of technology of the world overall. At least, it should for the story to be consistent (in this case). It would make sense that if one person can do that in their personal workshop, then a team of experts could make something at least equivalent, if not much better. And if that’s the case, then there is almost certainly a team doing just that (or they did it already). Not to say that the small figure from yesterday isn’t a badass genius, because they are. Oh no… I’m already starting to grow attached to my characters, I’m doomed. How am I ever going to kill any of them off? Just kidding, your favorite characters are safe. Or are they…?

Second, once you write something into your story, you can’t really write other things that contradict said thing. Unless of course you’re pulling a fast one on your readers, in which case go right ahead you magnificent, evil writer. What made me think of this concept when I was writing yesterday, was actually the ending. When I was first writing the ending, the pod thingy didn’t end up chasing the figure a second time. But I thought to myself, “If it found them the first time, quickly and easily, why would it be unable to find them a second time?”. It wouldn’t make sense for it to have found them so easily the first time, but then be totally lost upon a second jump. Unless there was a reason ‘off-screen’, of course. Like maybe I could have written in “their energy signature was now lost in the crowd of many other energy signatures”, or something like that. But that didn’t feel right.

Third, I wanted to work with the concepts that I had talked about the day prior. That is, the world-shaping powers that non-human entities have. So in my story yesterday, I introduced whatever entity is responsible for the teleporting jail-bot thing. Some entity somewhere can teleport shit around, and they don’t want other people teleporting shit around all willy-nilly, so they made it ‘illegal’. You can assume or infer from the text that the entity responsible for the police drone thing is the local government, or at least a governing entity with a monopoly of power. Not only that, but the device that came to apprehend our protagonist was the judge, jury, and executioner, which gives more insight into the type of entity that sent the drone thingy (technical term).

Fourth, I absolutely do not mean to suggest that what I wrote yesterday was a perfect exemplification of how to build worlds. Not at all. I’m mostly writing this as a means of deliberate reflection, in an attempt to gain some personal insight into why I wrote what I did; and hopefully, so that I can look back on these posts a few months or years from now and think, “Wow, what a bunch of crap. I’m glad I’ve improved so much”. Fingers crossed. I actually wonder how funny posts like this one may seem to you guys, when it’s essentially me trying to make my brain make sense of itself. Sometimes I feel that I have decent ideas in my head, but each idea is a single noodle of cooked spaghetti in a bowl, and they’re all covered in olive oil. Trying to pluck them out, analyze them, and arrange them in an intelligible way is… difficult. But I guess if writing was easy, everyone would be Frank Herbert.

I really enjoy worldbuilding, but I have an affliction which makes it so that if I read, hear, speak, or write an idea too much, I get sick of it. You know how it goes, if you listen to your favorite song enough, you eventually can’t stand it. So, while I enjoy worldbuilding immensely, and it’s probably one of the things that attracted me to Sci-Fi and Fantasy, I think it’s time to move on. Writing is a dense, vibrant jungle of fun, and I want to explore every leaf and mossy stone that’s in it. So, let’s think of what’s on the horizon. We could zoom in on characters, and analyze what makes a character interesting. Are they an analog for the reader - relatable and charming? Or are they gloriously evil - the cliff face upon which waves of hope break? I love evil characters. Maybe I’ll write a story consisting of entirely evil characters. Scratch that, maybe I’ll do a deep dive on point-of-view, that could be interesting.

I like to say that I live on the timeframe of minutes and hours, not days and weeks. By that I mean, I don’t stretch my consciousness too far into the future, questing for lines of possibility like Paul in Dune. All that to say, I usually have no idea what I’m actually going to write until I sit down, and click “New Post”. So, we’ll see where tomorrow takes us. Thank you for reading, and as always…

Totally nailed it,

Michael