Friday 29 July 2011

Epic Fantasy

  I'm just thinking everyday about the world of Geniania. I just want to create a world that's so rich and full of reality that it could be real. To achieve this, and also to stretch my creative wings I know I'm going to have to create a massive history and culture to for the world and the countries that make it up. I've got all these ideas to do this, like epic poetry, mythology and religions. For the religion I've got a couple of different ones already started, they just need to be built on.
  The problem with all of this though is that I want to work on them all at once and there's just not enough time in the day to juggle working on all those things as well as my Witchan webcomic. I've almost finished the page for this week, I've just got to do the last half of block shading on the page and then can start on the next one. Annoyingly I have no drive to do it today but I really should so I'll probably work on it later tonight.
  I can't help but think about Tolkien and how he created Middle Earth. He spent decades working on these stories and the world that goes with them. Half the people that read the books or watch the films don't seem to realise how much work he put into it or how much of the mythology makes Middle Earth seem real. Few people probably consider that without this background story the Middle Earth would probably be flat and unreal. I really should work on the world some more though.

Sunday 17 July 2011

Juggling Creative Things

I'm working hard on creating the world of the novel that I'm working on. The thing is I'm trying to juggle creating it from three different directions. You're probably wondering what these three directions are and I'll tell you. They are; creating a language or two, creating the countries themselves and coming up with characters. The three directions are all very complex as well as all three need some form of history and general information. I'm enjoying all three things though which is always good. The thing is that I just keep getting idea after idea relating to each of them and I'm trying to get them all written down. That's the problem with writing, you're forever plagued with ideas and have to find ways to bring them together. I'm just weird in that for any idea I have while I'm working on a project, I'll try to find a way to bring it into the current project. If not I'll just write it down and put it with the other WIPs to use at a later date.
Once again people will probably be wondering, 'why are you putting so much effort into creating a world in such detail?' Readers probably won't see all of what I create, they'll more than likely only see a tiny portion of it but the fact that it is there for me to draw on allows me to write stories at a later date that might draw on other parts of the history of the world. It all also makes the setting seem much more real... well at least as real as a world where trolls and dragons run amuck can be. All this history and interest into how a country has developed; why the towns are the way they are, why there's a specific form of heirachy, how the creatures have evolved over the centuries. All the thought that goes into those things just helps round out the setting and although they're not mentioned right away goes towards making everything a little more real and 3D. That's what I want from my writing. I want people to read my stories and think or know that they could live in that world, that it wouldn't be awfully different to our lives now. It just makes the world that much richer to know that these people have a history, they're all connected through this development over the centuries.
I'm gushing again, I can feel it. I'm probably going to take another of my walks again soon too, bringing a fair few pictures back again that inspire me and I'll also pop them on here. In the meantime I plan on working on my world some more and also on reading lots more fantasy to see if it can give me yet more ideas.

Monday 4 July 2011

Research and language creation

Looking at the title I've just realised that I'm absolutely rubbish at coming up with titles, for blogs and for stories. I need to work on that.
Anyway, back to the task at hand. Last night, while watching Lord of the Rings, extended edition, I was inspired. It was great. I was just sat on my bed, surrounded by paper and writing stuff about the world that I'm planning to set most of my stories in. I ended up doing lots of organising, which let's face it, I love. I've finally found a way to bring in the elves and dwarves and other crazy creatures that make fantasy more fantastic. I blame Terry Brooks for this of course. Him and Tolkien. First I had to figure out what kinds of creatures I wanted to include within Geniania (that's the world, yes.. the name needs a little work) and then I had to figure out why they didn't appear in the history of the countries I'd already written about. I've got the first few figured out but may well include others later as I write stories in other countries.
I'm also, dare I say it, looking at creating languages for these other races which is both exciting and nerve-wrecking. I probably won't use much of any languages I do create, just a few words. Either way though I'm hoping that it's going to be a fun and interesting thing to do, even if it has little baring on the stories themselves.
People are probably reading this and wondering why am I putting so much research and work into backstory that won't be relevant to the stories themselves or that the readers may well never hear about. People could think "it's fantasy, why do you need to research anything? You can just make it up and say it's that way because the world says so" There's a simple answer to both of those questions. It makes the world and its people seem much more real. I could simply start writing without doing any of this research but I'd probably get stuck halfway through and get my facts all mixed up.
There's other stuff I need to research too but it's not really world specific, more story specific and it would give things away. All this research could very well see me in the library at some point though so I need to track down Nottingham Library as well as Cotgrave and West Bridgeford so that I can have a wander around.