How is the writing quality in fantasy

[Wastrel]

But those words won't appear profane to the reader, so their significance will be lost. In any case, there's only a very loose connection between taboo words and cultural values. Why are the dutch obsessed with cancer and disease, and the english with excrement and fornication, and the french canadians with ecclesiastical items? It doesn't reflect any real differences in our cultures, I don't think.

[Stephanie]

I think we have to define what we're looking for in the style of fantasy writing. Prose should always be carefully written and well-worded and have resonance and layers of meaning if possible, but I'm a pretty down-to-earth person. "Literary" writing (lots of flowery description, words mostly found in the dictionary, authors wallowing in post-modern angst) often tends to strike me as pretentious and inaccessible, a little like abstract art. Give me the fantasy equivalent of Faulkner and you'll lose me. I still probably don't have some of the appreciation for some of Tolkien's description that many of you have, which is sort of funny considering I was an English major and enjoyed a lot of what I read for classes. What I want in a fantasy novel's style is well-done dialogue, effective but minimalist scene-setting, some subtlety, characters that feel like people you know and might run into (with allowances, given that characters might have magic, for instance), and language that quietly lends itself to the themes and plot and brings out the conflicts.

As for profanity, one of the reasons I like fantasy is that it tends to have minimal profanity and often works around profanity and coarse language.

[[deleted user]]

Wastrel wrote: "But those words won't appear profane to the reader, so their significance will be lost."

The reader will understand that to the characters and in their world those words are profanities, and therefore the significance of the words will not be lost.

[Kevan]

Rebecca wrote: "I don't mind a sprinkling of profanity in any book, but I have read some where it becomes redundant and loses impact...."

I would second that. An occasional swear word adds emphasis. But when it appears 3-4 times a page, I get distracted.

When a "respectable" character who has been using clean language for a 100 pages suddenly says "*@#!!", it underscores his anger and loss of control. Powerful. I think such instances add substantially to the book. But when the f-word crops up in every other sentence (as in some dialogues in Cuckoo's Calling), it interrupts the thought/message.

But then, it is only my personal taste, which was shaped when popular books had far less profanity.

[Bryan]

I'm with Wastrel. There are a lot of people in the world who use profanity in a lot of different scenarios and to differing extents, and the accurate portrayal of people is the focus of many authors. Now, if you prefer not to ever read any profanity in fantasy, that's your prerogative (although it seems a pretty strange hang-up to me). But to say that "excessive" profanity interrupts the message of a book is rather obfuscatory. What you really mean is that it bothers YOU enough that it interrupts YOUR train of thought and draws YOUR focus away from the message of the book.

That's not to say that there's no such thing as clumsy or excessive use of profanity, but it seems to me that it really depends on the character being portrayed and the way in which the author uses profanity. To take up Kevan's example of The Lies of Locke Lamora, there is a great deal of profanity in this book, but not an excessive amount in my opinion, as the majority of the characters are career criminals, and these sorts of people tend not to have clean tongues. If anything, I thought the use of profanity in the book was a little too creative. The few real-world criminals that I've met tended to swear excessively, but not creatively. I was willing to forgive that in this particular novel, however, as Locke and his crew were meant to represent an unusually clever segment of criminal culture, and thus their cursing was more clever than that of their peers.

[Baelor]

Swear words almost always bore me, especially if they are heaped up. Martin Silenus in Hyperion was perhaps the exception. The argument that "most people swear a lot" is risible. Most people have awkward pauses, anacolutha, and a general lack of elegance in their speech as well, but those are often not represented, with good reason.


At a general level, Sturgeon's Law certainly applies to fantasy. But even among my favorite fantasy books, the writing quality is worse than in many classic books. The poster who laid out three levels of prose was spot-on. Even the best fantasy prose is often invisible and serves only the plot. This makes me sad. Prose can do so much more. It seems to me that the authors are simply not deliberate in crafting the style of their books. Tolkien was, and I think many people do not realize that.

[Judy]

If a writer is being true to the time period in which their world is set, then certain modern swear words sound strange. When my grandmother went with me to see the movie "Titanic" one of the things she noticed was the foul language. She stated that in those days, people did not swear like that.

Just think what was common sixty years ago, and there was less use of today's popular swear words. The swear words you heard in the 50's to us sound quaint and cute. I think in a fantasy setting that sort of thing is appropriate. If you really want medieval foul language, read Chaucer.

[Kevan]

Bryan wrote: "What you really mean is that it bothers YOU enough that it interrupts YOUR train of thought and draws YOUR focus away from the message of the book...."

That's precisely what I meant, Bryan. I speak only of my perceptions and reactions. I am not sure I am qualified to make a wider literary examination.

[Rebecca]

Ross wrote: "Wastrel wrote: "But those words won't appear profane to the reader, so their significance will be lost."

The reader will understand that to the characters and in their world those words are profan..."

Precisely. If the dialouge is well-written, the reader will have no trouble understanding the intent of those words in the characters world, and yes, this a matter of opinion and taste.

Profanity as described by Keven in message 54 is what is compelling. The liberal use is boring and if meant to shock, lost on me. Perhaps I don't enjoy being around this sort of person so why would I want to get into that character's head? But I also understand why some find this "real" and satisfying.

[S.J.]

As a rule I'm not fond of excessive profanity in stories either, but I can think of a few instances where it was used effectively. Rough and earthy characters ("Uno" from WoT comes to mind) who swear constantly in casual conversation and then struggle not to in polite company. In that case the struggle not to swear really endeared that character to me. :)

[Kevan]

I read Hyperion Cantos after my last post.

There, profanity was restricted to one character (the poet). That fit the character so well. The author used the ingredient expertly, and etched the character deeply. It's one situation where I didn't mind the profanity at all.

[Rebecca]

Sounds like expert character construction. No, I haven't read it, but this would be intentional use to show the character, rather than the author tossing in a heap of profantity because he-she don't know any other way to express emotion.

Yes, this is my opinion, and others will have differing ideas, but I will go for clever word play over constant swearing any day or the week. It's just more interesting.

[Steven]

To use a musical analogy, when I listen to truly great artists, I hear the song, not the notes. When I read a really great author's work, I see the story, not the words. I get lost in what I'm reading because their writing rises above the mechanics of how it's expressed.

Fantasy authors, or authors of any other specific genre, run the risk of focusing too much on the fantasy aspect of it and ignoring the craft of writing itself. "My story has a really awesome dragon, so I can skimp on editing and proper dialogue a little bit; my readers won't mind."

Nope.

Great dialogue, pace, plausible action, and overall plot matters more than if the story has a cool dragon but a cheesy hero that speaks as if his words came out of a 1980's skin flick.

[Rebecca]

Well said, Steven.

[Thomas]

Hello, Ma'am. I have come to slay your dragon.

Oh, come right in.

[Greg]

I think more fans are going to be expecting a grittier kind of fantasy in the coming years. I also think the whole genre will take on a darker tone, while YA fantasy will do the same but provide the counterweight.

[Baelor]

Kevan wrote: "I read Hyperion Cantos after my last post.

There, profanity was restricted to one character (the poet). That fit the character so well. The author used the ingredient expertly, and etched the char..."

The entire thing; all four books? That is impressive. Anyway, I agree with you, and find it interesting that Martin Silenus came to your mind as well -- cf. my message 56.

[Kevan]

Baelor wrote: "The entire thing; all four books? That is impressive. Anyway, I agree with you, and find it interesting that Martin Silenus came to your mind as well -- cf. my message 56...."

I've read the #1 & #2 so far. The characters change after that.

I took your suggestion from message 56 and got hold of Hyperion. Thanks for pointing me in that direction. It turned out to be a pretty good read. A fair bit of Asimov influence in the plot. One of the better SF tales. The second book is half fantasy.

[Toni]

To try to answer the question which stood at the beginning of this thread, there are some authors who write exceedingly well. But then, there are a bunch of authors who write just because the genre is on a high and they want their share (if anyone of you would go into a bookstore in a railway station in Germany, there is tons of fantasy, and i never touched half of it because it looks so horrible, and according to some amazon reviews, it is poorly written, though others like it immensely). Btw, talking about Germany: The style of a writer is very personal, and when I read some German fantasy books, i might like them very much. The same books in English will seem to me very poorly written, only because the translator was not used to fantasy or just was unable to translate the style. So, that's another problem we have to be conscious about when discussing styles and prosaic languages. On the other hand, reading the German translation of Tolkien when I was a kid was a great experience, while the English original to my adult self was pretty boring and too slow paced because of all the landscape descriptions. Yes, Tolkien has a great style and enormous writing skills, so don't ask me the reason why, but now I am stuck somewhere around shelobs lair and wonder when i will continue reading.

Other great fantasy writers are, of course, George Martin (Song of ice and fire, a great read), and also i admired Tad Williams' Otherland series a lot - he has shown a skill of mixing threads of the story that got me breathless at times. Though I have to confess that Otherland mostly is a sci-fi series, and his Fantasy prequel Misery, Sorrow, and Thorn has less of the apparent skill that i liked on the later series.
Then, the all-star, Terry Pratchett of course is unsurpassed, and with "Dodger", though it is not a fantasy setting, proves his stylistic skills to anyone who still needed that proof.

Comparing him to Umberto Eco or any grand master of old times still seems to be unfair, since in most cases, fantasy stories are plot-driven, while "serious" literature is supposed to be character-driven, so when Eco writes a whole book about an explosives specialist who tries to find his own self, he can do so masterly, even with a very reduced story, which only produces impulses for the development of the character -to come another step closer to himself. (This refers to "The Prague cemetery", for anybody who is wondering.) For Terry Pratchett, the twisted characters in their respective situations are presenting nice twists to the plot, and help to develop it in new directions. So, the comparison between the two styles cannot be fair. Yet, a good fantasy author will have nothing to envy to a good "classic literature" author, and with the bad ones, Sturgeons law applies.