How to present ones conworld.

[Veris]

Basically, we conlangers - you, me, the type of people to post on conlang-oriented boards in general - present our conworlds in one form; the website. Maybe there's some pretty graphics, maybe there's even a bit of Java or something interactive, but ultimately, the majority of conworld presentations come down to an encyclopedia-like base of knowledge; descriptions of continents, of plants and animals, of peoples and their cultures and religions, all described in a fashion that ranges from off-the-cuff to scholarly, but always in non-fiction style.

While I praise highly developed conworlds, never once has it struck me to actually sit in front of my computer and spend hours upon hours reading through the minutae of one. Maybe that's just me, but even when a conworld is, in theory, very interesting to me, I don't take the time to read through the websites. It's essentially boring. Which is a shame because, as I said, the conworld itself might be enthralling; the presentation is just unpalatable.

Recently, I read the Old Kingdom trilogy. For the unfamiliar, it's a young adult high fantasy series about a lineage of anti-necromancers protecting a medieval-esque conworld from the Dead. Three books, the latter two of which were quite long, and to be honest, I really wasn't that impressed; it's not well-written, the characters are flat and unidimensional. True, it's only young adult fiction, but the Harry Potter series is aimed primarily at preteens and it's absolutely enthralling; you can only handwave so much lack of quality as "it's just for kids/teens/YAs" before relenting that it's just not that good a story.

Yet I read through three (subjectively) long books. Why? Well, the first was rather short and the conworld was mildly interesting. Knowing there were two more books, I sort of read them just to find out what happens next; once I start a story, it's hard to stop, even if it's not that good; I don't think I've ever actually just put down a book and walked away.

Do you see the point I'm trying to make? There's so many great conworlds out there which have tons of resources available to peruse at my leisure from any web-accessing anything (computer, videogame console, PDA, smartphone, etc.) in the world, and even though I find many of them fascinating, I don't read them. At the very same time, I read through a whole trilogy of books even though I knew by the third chapter of the first book that I didn't actually like it. On one hand; things I actually like, but don't read. On the other; something I disliked, but read.

Now, I may just be a ridiculous person with too much time on my hands (and that's a very real possibility), but I think there's a point to be made in this. Namely, mediocre stories beat fantastic encyclopedias -- you can have the most interesting conworld in the...er, world, but if your presentation is stale, nobody's gonna read it. At the very same time, you can have a crappy conworld or no conworld at all and a crappy story, and tons of people are gonna read it, just because; just look at the Twilight fanbase (bad example, I know, just roll with it).

And yet, paradoxically, even though an encyclopedia-like or (more and more commonly) a wiki-like presentation of a conworld is boring and won't likely develop much of a following, when even a mediocre story is unleashed into the world, a wiki springs up based on it, typically managed by a loyal fanbase, and people can and do get sucked into those things; you could spend all day on TVTropes, just reading about stories and worlds you never knew about and will probably forget in a few days time.

So, all that rambling is to say, what do you think of the idea of presenting a conworld not in non-fiction style, as if one were making a scholarly description of real-world peoples or places, but in the style of a story, perhaps even a book or a series of books? Just posted online, I mean -- getting a book published is a whole 'nother beast. Or can you think of any other way to present a conworld, besides a vanilla website listing facts and figures? Something feasible for anyone, I mean -- I wouldn't be opposed to the idea of presenting a conworld in a trilogy of movies, but I'll probably never find myself in a position to make that happen.

Oh, and do you actually like reading through huge conworld websites in the first place, or not?

[Tanni]

Basically, we conlangers - you, me, the type of people to post on conlang-oriented boards in general - present our conworlds in one form; the website. Maybe there's some pretty graphics, maybe there's even a bit of Java or something interactive, but ultimately, the majority of conworld presentations come down to an encyclopedia-like base of knowledge; descriptions of continents, of plants and animals, of peoples and their cultures and religions, all described in a fashion that ranges from off-the-cuff to scholarly, but always in non-fiction style.

While I praise highly developed conworlds, never once has it struck me to actually sit in front of my computer and spend hours upon hours reading through the minutae of one. Maybe that's just me, but even when a conworld is, in theory, very interesting to me, I don't take the time to read through the websites. It's essentially boring. Which is a shame because, as I said, the conworld itself might be enthralling; the presentation is just unpalatable.

Outside of boards like this, I never found that much of that sort. On boards like this, I skim over the description, if it interests me. If not, I'll ignore it. Sometimes, after a good start, there comes something in that fictional world that scares me away because I don't like that feature in the real world. Take into consideration that one single person can't manage all and everything, a fascinating conworld, a good story, a suitable presentation and lots of other things. See the end of films: there are lots and lots of people mentioned who contributed to that film.

Recently, I read the Old Kingdom trilogy. For the unfamiliar, it's a young adult high fantasy series about a lineage of anti-necromancers protecting a medieval-esque conworld from the Dead. Three books, the latter two of which were quite long, and to be honest, I really wasn't that impressed; it's not well-written, the characters are flat and unidimensional. True, it's only young adult fiction, but the Harry Potter series is aimed primarily at preteens and it's absolutely enthralling; you can only handwave so much lack of quality as "it's just for kids/teens/YAs" before relenting that it's just not that good a story.

You know how I think about the classification of all and everything. (I also gave some links to an interesting opinion concerning that topic in another thread.) Imagine, there are people out there, one of them Philip Pullman, who fight the age classification of literature! You should judge the story itself, not look through glasses of a classification scheme which distort your opinion right form the beginning. How can you know to whom J.K. Rowlins aimed her novels? If you write something, you primarily write it for yourself, I think, at least if you start out being an author. The classification comes later, made by whomever.

About the characters: What do you consider a flat and unidimensional character? Is it fair to classify them that way? Remember that writing a story takes much time, and people need to make money. A story is not the real world, and you can't make up everything in a form that suffices every taste. (I once gave the first part of my story to someone to read it for correction. He told me that it is a children's story and that I've gone too much into details. My story begins with two young children, and I wrote it in an approbriate way, I hope. But that doesn't mean that it is aimed at children. And I thought I gave to little details. See the problem?)

Yet I read through three (subjectively) long books. Why? Well, the first was rather short and the conworld was mildly interesting. Knowing there were two more books, I sort of read them just to find out what happens next; once I start a story, it's hard to stop, even if it's not that good; I don't think I've ever actually just put down a book and walked away.

A story that catches you that way is a good story!

Do you see the point I'm trying to make? There's so many great conworlds out there which have tons of resources available to peruse at my leisure from any web-accessing anything (computer, videogame console, PDA, smartphone, etc.) in the world, and even though I find many of them fascinating, I don't read them. At the very same time, I read through a whole trilogy of books even though I knew by the third chapter of the first book that I didn't actually like it. On one hand; things I actually like, but don't read. On the other; something I disliked, but read.

Have you ever considered that a story and a conworld are two different things? A story has or needs a plot, a conworld doesen't need it. A conworld is just a description of a fantasy world similar to a grammar is a description of a language. The optimum is that a fascinating story is set in a fascinating conworld and that these two components interact with each other very well. Being able to manage both is not that easy and takes a lot of time.

... and even though I find many of them fascinating, I don't read them.

How can you find them fascinating if you don't read them?

And yet, paradoxically, even though an encyclopedia-like or (more and more commonly) a wiki-like presentation of a conworld is boring and won't likely develop much of a following, when even a mediocre story is unleashed into the world, a wiki springs up based on it, typically managed by a loyal fanbase, and people can and do get sucked into those things; you could spend all day on TVTropes, just reading about stories and worlds you never knew about and will probably forget in a few days time.

Wikis are quite new, people my be fascinated by it, too, not just by the story. They like to be fans, and do something to support the story they like. They may like to list the ''inventory'' or the ''essentials'' of the story. And, most important, what is considered ''good'' depends on taste. What you consider mediocre may be considered good by others.

So, all that rambling is to say, what do you think of the idea of presenting a conworld not in non-fiction style, as if one were making a scholarly description of real-world peoples or places, but in the style of a story, perhaps even a book or a series of books? Just posted online, I mean -- getting a book published is a whole 'nother beast. Or can you think of any other way to present a conworld, besides a vanilla website listing facts and figures? Something feasible for anyone, I mean -- I wouldn't be opposed to the idea of presenting a conworld in a trilogy of movies, but I'll probably never find myself in a position to make that happen.

Why not presenting the grammar of a conlang in form of a story?

[Ashroot]

I am an odd ball and prefer a wiki over a story. I find it easier to read just the facts. I also wait for a movie to come out so that I can read the summery and understand what I'm watching. When talking about religion however I would like the actual text followed by a summery so that it isn't as starile.

[Yačay256]

I suppose I am similar to Ashroot, being very fact centered and not reading much fiction (though reading vast amounts of nonfiction). This is why I was able to read so much of the Almeopedia: It was in a nonficitionesque format.

I agree with Veris in the importance of conworld presentation, and thus as soon as I saw this page I rushed to write a short story about the day in the life of a working class person in contemporary Gaxtekpoje (Port Gentile; a major port city in Mbinhgany).

Thus, I Thank you, Veris, for [indirectly] reminding me to work on my narratives and vignettes.

[clockworkbanana]

I think, if possible, it's good to have a bit of each. Then again, I basically grew up on encyclopedias and fantasy/scifi novels, so I enjoy both kinds of writing. But, I just think that's better since you can introduce the ideas themselves fact by fact, and also be able to show how they work as a system.

[dwnielsen]

Maybe a tabloid or an explorer's log might be fun. Otherwise, the more tables, images, and audio/video clips in place of lengthy detailed descriptions, the better. Perhaps one thing that tends to set books apart is that we tend to expect some sort of larger point binding the work together, and they don't expect us to take on so much information without our choosing to along each step of the way - but then, I'm someone who does put books down frequently.

[Trailsend]

This is pretty common, actually--the majority of conworlders I know are authors who conworld for the express purpose of adding depth to their storytelling. Feayran and the conworld it comes from were created by a writers' guild, first and foremost to provide a setting for stories. I definitely prefer narrative presentation over expository.

[cybrxkhan]

This is pretty common, actually--the majority of conworlders I know are authors who conworld for the express purpose of adding depth to their storytelling. Feayran and the conworld it comes from were created by a writers' guild, first and foremost to provide a setting for stories. I definitely prefer narrative presentation over expository.

Very true. My conworlds all were - and still are - simply extensions of my creative writing, and also places for me to get more story ideas if needs be. It helps a lot with writing these kinds of stories, really, because instead of pulling out some random plot device or plot twist out of your ass, you can actually come up with something that (hopefully) makes more sense and is more believable by drawing on the elements you already have in your conworld.

[Veris]

How can you find them fascinating if you don't read them?

Skimming. When I come across one of those giant conworld websites, I casually skim through. Even when it's really interesting, though, I don't go to the trouble of reading through everything.

Why not presenting the grammar of a conlang in form of a story?

Why not, indeed. I imagine it'd be much more difficult, though. Creating a story to show off ones conworld, by comparison, would be a lot easier for most people, I think.

I should probably mention that I think writing a good story is pretty easy, something that virtually anyone can do. Not everyone can write a computer program; besides the fact that you have to learn a specific language, many people simply don't have the dedication and focus necessary to spend hours upon hours on one tiny piece of code at a time, even if they had the time and motivation. Storytelling is one of the most basic human activities, though; we all do it almost every day, but to each other, instead of in a written format. It's not at all difficult to make the jump, though. Writing, unfortunately, is one skill that we've been convinced is the privilege of the elite -- an inborn talent that, if you don't have, you can never hope to gain. Sure, not everybody (and in fact, only a very, very small number of people) who writes a book is going to find popularity, but that's not the point. The point is, anybody can write a good story.

I agree with Veris in the importance of conworld presentation, and thus as soon as I saw this page I rushed to write a short story about the day in the life of a working class person in contemporary Gaxtekpoje (Port Gentile; a major port city in Mbinhgany).

Thus, I Thank you, Veris, for [indirectly] reminding me to work on my narratives and vignettes.

Cool. And thanks. And can we see the story?

Maybe a tabloid or an explorer's log might be fun. Otherwise, the more tables, images, and audio/video clips in place of lengthy detailed descriptions, the better. Perhaps one thing that tends to set books apart is that we tend to expect some sort of larger point binding the work together, and they don't expect us to take on so much information without our choosing to along each step of the way - but then, I'm someone who does put books down frequently.

That's very important to keep in mind, I think, especially if one were to write a story specifically to show off their conworld. One thing that separates good stories from bad stories, I think, is detail -- good stories hint and suggest; as they say, the artist's hand is where the brush is not. Bad stories beat you over the head with too much detail.

For another bad example, take Christopher Paolini's Inheritance Cycle, constantly trashed by critics and the butt of a thousand internet jokes. I've read the first two books, and essentially, our innocent farmboy protagonist is just blindly lead from place to place by other people, and is constantly fed exposition by knowledgable strangers; fine details about the history of the world, how magic works, etc. It's essentially exactly what I'm talking about - a story to show off a conworld - but the story is infantile and the conworld is highly derivative and not very interesting. Going into too much detail is a major part of the problem. Contrast again with Harry Potter, which despite starring students in a school that teaches magic, stays very details-light and story- and character-heavy, much to the delight of millions of fans worldwide.

And yet! And yet, at the very same time, the world of Harry Potter is far, far more in-depth and far more detailed than the world of Inheritance. It's the Wiki phenomenon -- the raw Harry Potter books only contain suggestions and hints of the broad wizarding world; an off-hand reference to 17th century Goblin Rebellions, passing mention of foreign Ministers for Magic, etc. It just so happened to be a world that tons of people find fascinating, so in interviews, Jo Rowling has provided equally tons of supplementary information. If she'd included such information in the books, they'd be much longer and much more boring, and probably much less popular; imagine those alluded-to lessons on the Goblin Rebellions actually being written out in full detail!

It's a delicate balance, to be sure.

This is pretty common, actually--the majority of conworlders I know are authors who conworld for the express purpose of adding depth to their storytelling. Feayran and the conworld it comes from were created by a writers' guild, first and foremost to provide a setting for stories. I definitely prefer narrative presentation over expository.

Huh. I always thought it was solely your conworld.

How is the writers guild, by the way? I personally would probably hate such a thing; I'm very secritive and possessive about my writing, the notion of collaboration is off-putting (the prospect of dealing with future editors aside). Yet I always hear about famous groups of writers of the past. Then again, I can't name one great novel off the top of my head that was the result of a collaborative effort.

[Micamo]

I build my conworlds first and foremost to have a place in which to put my conlangs.

[Ainuke]

I like both, I suppose. If it seems interesting, I'll fuckin' read it, but if it has a story, I'll read that too. Just reading the facts is alot easier, but a story is fun because you have to pick it as if you're in the Conworld.

[Trailsend]

Why not presenting the grammar of a conlang in form of a story?

Why not, indeed. I imagine it'd be much more difficult, though. Creating a story to show off ones conworld, by comparison, would be a lot easier for most people, I think.

Not so difficult, perhaps. I got bored with my formal reference grammar a while back and instead started writing about a (human) youth who has a dream in which a god from his nation's pantheon tells him to sail to Feayra, which had been untouched by explorers for a long time. The church gets wind of it and assigns two Jesuit-style missionaries to accompany the boy into the North (by the will of the gods!). The story follows their interactions with each other, their struggles to figure out what exactly they're supposed to be doing (the gods are, unfortunately, less than specific), their misgivings about whether the dream was real at all...and of course, figuring out how to survive the Feayran climate and integrate into the local feayr pack.

Were it an actual book, I wouldn't do nearly as much with the language, but really, it's a reference grammar with a plotline. The missionaries wrack their brains trying to figure the language out, and the audience is privy to their hypotheses, their experiments, their conclusions and triumphs. This also helps me see the language moving in real life--I found that, for me, describing it in the reference-grammar style left it feeling pinned and preserved, like a moth in a shadowbox. I've seen grammars that don't have this problem, but I have yet to manage avoiding it myself :(

I should probably mention that I think writing a good story is pretty easy, something that virtually anyone can do. Not everyone can write a computer program; besides the fact that you have to learn a specific language, many people simply don't have the dedication and focus necessary to spend hours upon hours on one tiny piece of code at a time, even if they had the time and motivation. Storytelling is one of the most basic human activities, though; we all do it almost every day, but to each other, instead of in a written format. It's not at all difficult to make the jump, though. Writing, unfortunately, is one skill that we've been convinced is the privilege of the elite -- an inborn talent that, if you don't have, you can never hope to gain. Sure, not everybody (and in fact, only a very, very small number of people) who writes a book is going to find popularity, but that's not the point. The point is, anybody can write a good story.

Ehhh...this is a little off topic, but I kinda disagree with you here. Partially. Sort of.

Most anybody can write a good story, as most anybody can draw a good picture. But learning to really do it well takes a lot of time and practice, which for some people, is better invested elsewhere. In my experience, I code far, far faster than I write, despite (or perhaps, due to?) having much more practice in the latter, and it's the same for the other writers I know as well--it may well take hours to get one paragraph, even one line, just right. And even so, the vast majority of writing is crap. In fact, the vast majority of writing by the best writers is crap. They lock that stuff away though (or only show it to their guilds/critique groups) and only publish the 400th rewrite. It's a little sobering when you realize that the author probably spent well over an hour working on the sentence you just finished in four seconds.

But! As you say, storytelling is deeply embedded in all of us. We do it all the time in various shapes and forms, and everyone has the capacity to be a fantastic storyteller. Way too many people buy into the privilege-of-the-elite, inborn-talent myth you describe--even those who don't at first, once they set pen to paper, compare their first draft to [insert favorite author here] and then conclude that they just can't write, without realizing that the vast majority of writing by the best authors is crap. Anybody who wants to do it well can learn to do it well, but you do have to learn to do it well. (You don't need no fancy-shmancy edjumacation neither, just a lot of practice, reading, and good feedback.)

[/soapbox]

How is the writers guild, by the way? I personally would probably hate such a thing; I'm very secritive and possessive about my writing, the notion of collaboration is off-putting (the prospect of dealing with future editors aside). Yet I always hear about famous groups of writers of the past. Then again, I can't name one great novel off the top of my head that was the result of a collaborative effort.

It's a blast. We aren't really writing for publication, we're writing because it's fun, and we want to get better. By its nature, the community attracts folks that are very involved with school, though, so we usually aren't very active except during vacation seasons.

[Tanni]

How can you find them fascinating if you don't read them?

Skimming. When I come across one of those giant conworld websites, I casually skim through. Even when it's really interesting, though, I don't go to the trouble of reading through everything.

I consider skimming as some form of reading.

Why not presenting the grammar of a conlang in form of a story?

Why not, indeed. I imagine it'd be much more difficult, though. Creating a story to show off ones conworld, by comparison, would be a lot easier for most people, I think.

The question was rhetorical.

For a somewhat related idea, see the Collaborative Conlanging Introduction project.

I should probably mention that I think writing a good story is pretty easy, something that virtually anyone can do. ...

Storytelling is one of the most basic human activities, though; we all do it almost every day, but to each other, instead of in a written format. It's not at all difficult to make the jump, though. Writing, unfortunately, is one skill that we've been convinced is the privilege of the elite -- an inborn talent that, if you don't have, you can never hope to gain. Sure, not everybody (and in fact, only a very, very small number of people) who writes a book is going to find popularity, but that's not the point. The point is, anybody can write a good story.

There's a difference between writing and storytelling. You can't compare them that way. Never heard that writing were a privilege of the elite, at least not in the past hunderd years or so. There are writer's seminaries, so you can learn to write stories. You need to be interested, but that holds for everything humans can learn. What is considered ''good'' heavily depends on the taste of the audience.

In other/former cultures, there is/was the institution of a storyteller, i.e. someone who professionally does storytelling. Everybody can tell a story, but not everybody can do so professionally. (Most things can be done by everyone without much learning, but most of this attempts won't be good at all. But that doesn't mean that those are ''innate'' abilities.) It's one thing to tell a story to a small group of your peers, but another to tell stories to a wide range of audience in a professional way. The peer telling you a story (a lie probably) put into the position of a professional stroyteller will fail, most likely, because he isn't used to speak in front of a probably huge audience. That's something you must learn.

Compare it with the difference between what a translator and what an interpreter does.

A storyteller does his job in real-time, has direct contact to his audience and interacts with it. He may modify his stories according to the needs of his audience. A storyteller may not be able to write. Most important: A storyteller may not need to invent his own stories -- but of course can do so --, just tells stories he already has heard form others. A writer or author does not do his job in real-time, usually doesn't have contact with his audience and hence can only interact indirectly with it, if at all. (But, as things once written down can be read as long as the text is available, he can influence the thoughts of others centuries or even millenias after his death.) He usually provides just one version of the story. A writer may not necesseaily be also a good storyteller. A writer may take inspirations from other stories but invents his own more or less unique story, which may also be based on his own real-life experiences.

Not everyone can write a computer program; besides the fact that you have to learn a specific language, many people simply don't have the dedication and focus necessary to spend hours upon hours on one tiny piece of code at a time, even if they had the time and motivation.

For storytelling, you have to learn at least one specific language: your native one.

For writing a computer program, you have to learn at least one programming language, which then is something comparable to your mother language in the field of programming. (Most programming languages are based on English keywords, and if you are cunning, you will name the things to be named in a way that keywords and names together form a more or less correct English sentence.)

Not everyone can write a computer program because not everyone has the need to do so. If you wouldn't have the need to speak, you wouldn't learn a natural language as well. (There were experiments in the past to find out about the ''original'' language of humankind by giving children everything but don't speak with them. The result was, that they didn't come up with a language by themselves.) In a ''normal'' situation, there are always other people, so you need to speak. Humans have the ''innate'' ability to produce a considerable amount of sounds. If they use that to develop/learn a language, and the way they use that language, depends on other factors. Acutally, the basics of a programming language are not hard to learn, it's just a few keywords and some syntactic rules. Everybody can learn that in a few hours or days. And you get a errormessage instantly, if something is wrong, so learning is quite effective. Then you are able to write some basic programs. But being able to write a good program which is really useful or solves a nontrivial problem, you need lots of experience and background knowledge, especially in the field of application of the program.

For me, writing and programming, i.e. writing a story and writing a program, are related activities, I enjoy both of them. It surely isn't by chance that the title ''author'' applies for people performing one or both of that activities.

You also need time, motivation and dedication to write a story or tell a story to others in the sense of aformentioned storytellers. You always need time, motivation and dedication to be good in whatever you're doing.

[Curlyjimsam]

I think in general bad novels do not get read. Most people, if they know they dislike a book by the third chapter, will not carry on reading; they will almost certainly not read the sequels. The people who read Twilight do so because they think it is good.

The big divide, I suspect, is not of genre (conworld vs. novel), but of presentation (online vs. print). It would take an exceptionally good story for me to read it all on the computer - reading off a screen, I struggle even with short stories of a few thousand words that I would have no problem with in print. If you want to get people to read about your conworld, give them that information in book form. The appendices of The Lord of the Rings are not much different in kind, and may not even be all that different in quality, from the sort of stuff you find in many online conworlds, but I find them much easier to read just because they're printed on paper. If, somehow (and I have no idea how), you can somehow persuade people to buy a book about your world, I suspect most of them would read it.