Writing for me is often like combing tangled hair. The strokes that I first take are short, ending abruptly, each such stroke usually being the major part of a sitting's work. The next stroke, at the beginning of the next sitting, usually has me comb through the same hair making sure the knots are gone, before attacking the tangle once more.
In combing the same material I find certain consistencies, for example I always seem to be providing a thought and then notting or norring it. But let us ignore that for now, did not bring about this ramble. Instead it deals with questioning the level of detail to go into during explanations
When I write, I often worry about leaving unanswered questions, something that makes sense based upon my job. But unlike my job, when writing fiction much that I write about is non-existent. At the minimum, my characters and the situations they find themselves in. Further, because I mostly write sci-fi or fantasy, the technology, magic, worlds, universe do not exist and it is in these details that I often get caught.
In my initial writings, I find myself trying to answer all questions; however, upon review it often makes the flow better to delete some explanation. Therefore, I now need to figure out what to dump. For me, that often tends to involve keeping things that are visual in nature, while removing a + b descriptions.
What I was wondering, is how writers determine the level of detail for their stories? And from readers, how much detail do you want?
Arcie, write for yourself
Arcie,
write for yourself FIRST. What makes sense to you. What kind of detail do you like in a story? write it that way.
For me, I picture the story in my head like a movie. I then write what i see and hear.
Find your own style and method. If it works people will come.
A.A.
Tough questions
How much detail to put in a story? It's a juggling act, and there is no definitive answer, but there are a few guidelines.
Much of it depends on your own personal storytelling style. There are some great authors out there, from the recently deceased Robert Jordan, who painted an incredibly detailed world and really got inside his main characters in his "Eye of the World" series, to Roger Zelazny, who is far more to the point and leaves many of the details to the reader's imagination. You might use a great deal of detail making a marvelous sci-fi or fantasy world, not only to give the reader a setting in which to place your characters, but to create what Erin calls a "sensawonda".
You might also use it to describe a scene to create a mood -- a cold, damp dungeon with musty straw on the floor, an eternal gloom with only flickering torchlight, a waste bucket in the corner, the barely heard laughter of the guards down the hall, and a rat the emaciated prisoner, who has been there so long he isn't sure what year it is, has named Fred.
The bottom line is to make the detail meaningful in some way, and it's important how you present the detail.
You don't want to over-describe. A walk-on character you'll only see once needs only a few words in most cases, a key detail -- a waiter wearing an apron, upon which he wipes his hands, with a twitch at the corner oh his mouth that betrays his impatience -- something like that. A common, well-know setting, such as an office or a standard house, normally barely needs to be described at all.
Try to use as few adjectives and adverbs as possible; too much distracts and weakens a sentence. A single expressive noun such as catamite, dictator, hypocrite and martinet is worth far more than a set of words describing the same thing. Brevity means power, which is good in a story.
If you can, describe characters by characteristics that define the person's character. Instead of saying he was simply tall or squat, had blond hair or with blue eyes, there should be something about the person the reader can relate to more intimately. I could list a few descriptions by the pros, but there are enough examples in books.
If you can avoid huge chunks of description that might bore the reader, the MEGO (My Eyes Glazeth Over) stuff, you definitely should. It's not a hard and fast rule, but most of the time, it's best to introduce necessary background details of a world a little at a time through the characters' eyes and thoughts, and there are exceptions. This is the start of a novel by Jack Vance:
"Toward the far edge of the Cornu Sector of Ophiuchus, Robert Palmer's Star shone blilliantly white, its corona flaring with films of blue, red and green color. A dozen planets danced attendance, like children careening around a maypole, but only the Camberwell knew that narrow range of conditions tolerant to human life. The region was remote; the early explorers were pirates, fugitives and fringers, followed by miscellaneous settlers, to the effect that Camberwell had been inhabited for many thousands of years.
Camberwell was a world of disparate landscapes. Four continents with intervening oceans defined the topography. The flora and fauna, as always, had evolved into forms of unique particularity, the fauna having attained such a bizarre variety, with habits so startling and destructive, that two continents had been set aside as preserves where the creatures, large and small, bipid or otherwise, could hop, pounce, lumber, run, rumble, pillage and grind others to bits, as met their needs. On the other two continents the fauna had been suppressed." He goes on like this for a couple more paragraphs before starting the story.
Normally, a block of information like that might be a no-no, but Vance writes so well the description itself is interesting; it's very much like a storyteller telling a story, and therein lies an important point. Whatever the style of the story, a story should read like a story, smoothly, and, given the style it's written in, with no unnecessary padding.
Aardvark
"Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."
Mahatma Gandhi
"Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."
Mahatma Gandhi
Listen
Doug is good at descriptions, pay attention. :)
- Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
yes yes
the great terminte eater, aardvark, is one of the best here at description.
A key is to know when it is enough. Good luck figuring that one out.
John in Wauwatosa
John in Wauwatosa
I May Look for More...
...of that background than the average reader. (I'm the one, for instance, who asked A.A. about the logistics of releasing carrier pigeons from the underground kingdom in Healing a Princess. Turns out there are air ducts to the surface -- gnomes need to breathe too -- that weren't mentioned in the story.) If there's something that a reader needs to know about a world in order for the action to take place, it's just the responsible thing, IMO, for the author to point it out.
That said, I don't want to sit and try to read paragraphs of technical explanations interrupting the action in a story, the way some SF stories (George O. Smith comes to mind) used to. There needs to be a middle ground.
Not everything in a story's worldline has to be explained, of course. How-to books and writer interviews note that a writer often knows a whole lot more about his invented world than he needs to tell; the untold background puts the author and his story on more solid ground and makes the story more convincing, even though the reader won't know specifically why. But if something is needed to, say, explain the motivation of a character or the reason why something he does is particularly noble or depraved, I'd really like to see it.
Eric
What Works for You
In Honor of Harvey Korman:
Hedley Lamarr could have quit after saying, "I want you to round up every vicious criminal and gunslinger in the west."
But in a moment of brilliance he added.--
"Take this down. I want rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ass-kickers, shit-kickers and Methodists."
If the minutia fits -- share it.
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Good example
Description should serve a purpose. It should set the tone or mood, or set up the action, or provide details to understand character or situation, or make a distraction or diversion from some fact you don't want to stand out too big too soon. Or it can be a piece of poetry or humor that exists for it's own sake. Even then, it ought to make sense in a story-telling way, like Hedley Lamarr's laundry list of nogoodniks.
A description can spark a story. Often, I start writing a scene, describing the set, the characters and the action. Maybe one little scene is all I have when I start but by the time I've written it down, things began to come alive and a story starts happening.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Story details
I love seeing detailed information in a story, but the way it's presented can make the difference between an enjoyable read and something I'll just gloss over. One thing I've found that really helps is spreading out details rather than trying to put it all up front. That way it becomes a part of the story rather than something you need to read through before you get to the actual story. Here's an example of a story introduction told in two different ways.
This give a fair amount of information, but it feels a bit dry.
This gives the same information, but (I hope) draws you into the story and the feelings of the character rather than just relating the facts. I hope this example helps explain what I was trying to say. :)
Writer--Artist--Dreamer
PS: The second example was actually taken from my story Brianna's Big Brother.
Hmmm. I try to walk a line...
If the detail doesn't MOVE the story in some direction I'm interested in, or doesn't contribute to fleshing out the characters or meilu, I consider them open for chopping. If they do contribute to the story, then they're likely to remain. I next look to see if the "details" slow the pace of the story I'm trying to achieve.
I don't generally see/look at this on my first draft either. My first draft is generally from a rough outline and I'm filling in details as I write. When I go back for a second draft - some of the original details go away, and others get added.
Only one person has complained that I don't include sufficient detail (like what folks are wearing all the time, or what is eaten at a meal - both specific examples where a reader asked for details.)
There's my two cents, for what it's worth.
Annette
When I get tired of it, I move on.
So far, those who have bothered to read my stories have been really tolerant, seeming to let my sometimes muddled thinking pass. Perhaps I would work harder if someone spanked me sometimes. Any takers?
Khadija Gwen
Details
My mental picture has to be very detailed before I can write a story, even if all those details don't get put into words. Although in my longer works, I do tend to get very detailed and my reader reactions have been mixed.
In a short story, I aim to only put in the details that matter, roughly dedicating a fraction of the total number of words proportional to the significance of the thing being described.
The other key is the narrator. If I'm writing in first person, or in a specific character's point of view, I try to only include the details that matter to that character.