whygodwhyyyyy

So because I feel bad 'cause I don't really share fandoms in any real sense with anyone on my flist anymore, and I'm like '....but SGA and POT don't caaaaall to me, I'm soorrryyy', and seeing this colorbar at this particular moment: Slytherin is I really wanna get in your pants so I'll tell you I love you and then only call you again if I'm really horny.

...I just had this rabid urge to write post-HP-but-in-Hogwarts fic with like, OC boys, one in Slytherin & one in Gryffindor. Just, start all over. Oh, and I could get away with writing the bitchy!snarky-fanon!Draco-type without any guilt -.-;;

......THAT'S HOW SAD I REALLY AM. -.-;;;;;;;

I actually want to write H/D but the thought of just random snarky!porn makes me feel guilty 'cause I 'should' be writing my 'serious' longfic and/or I 'should' be writing original!fic, but I just want Harry & Draco to snark and to make stupid bad jokes about Gryffindors in hats. (Like, 'what do you call a Gryffindor in a hat?' 'Why, a hat-stand'. *facepalm* Also: 'What's a Gryffingeek like you doing in a place like this?'-- 'Admiring the fumes.')

HEEEELP! I NEED HEEELP :((

[write what you -have to- know, and/or: world-building (is not) for dummies]

I think being so well-versed in fanfic and coming back suddenly to tons of (well-done) epic fantasy books, it's really been brought home to me just how bloody hard world-building really is, at least for me, because I loathe thinking on group scale rather than about inviduals. It's funny, on some level, because that's what I used to do back when I wrote lots of high fantasy stuff from ages 16-20 or thereabouts-- largely ignore characterization (or just do it sloppily & off-the-cuff) and make stuff up about the world. See, but 'making stuff up' and creating society outlines and weird theologies and odd customs-- I can do that, but I don't think that's what (good) world-building is really about. World-building really rests on group characterization-- because the people largely determine the world. You can't have one without the other. Gah.

I've been turning a halfway-studious eye on Flewelling's 'Luck in the Shadows', and I think-- I think the difficult part is not to make up weirdass environments for the pretty characters to 'play' in, but to always think of the human reasons and the human consequences for every societal or magical thingamabob you come up with-- now that's really hard. It's like... a society, all its ills and benefits, comes from a historical basis, so in order to understand your 'central' society (made-up or just any that's not currently 'yours', time-wise), you have to understand its allies, bordering nations, and of course its enemies. Further, you have to have some idea of what social forces drive it (for subtly different 'issues' drive every society, much as they naturally have in common, depending on the people's ethnic background and the natural resources, etc). Lastly, you have to remember there is always internal as well as external conflict, and all societies have to be non-homogenous-- ie, either naturally diverse or unnaturally stifled.

This seems a task less for unbridled imagination and more just-- for very step-by-step, rigorously logical thinking, and imagining myself doing that sort of makes me a bit green around the gills. Basically, even if I don't have a cast of at least 50 in a high fantasy (or any other-world) novel, I'd have to keep many, many more characters (and groups!) than that in mind, all in the background motivating the say, modestly interconnected group of dozen people I actually write about. And if you're thinking 'just a dozen??' then realize I'm thinking 'OMG A DOZEN WOULD BE 6 TIMES THE AMOUNT OF PEOPLE I GENERALLY HOLD IN MY HEAD AT ANY ONE TIME'.
    In other words... I'm generally proud when I remember to put in something about Draco's dad in a fic. ^^;;; Although... to give myself -some- credit, I'd say that the more I write in a story-- in my latest H/D novella, anyway-- the more the characters naturally multiply without much volition; they just sort of seem to 'fit in' where there appears an 'empty spot' that suits that sort of person. So perhaps it's not all conscious logical step-by-step analysis. One can hope that sometimes it's a bit like a puzzle-- gets easier to 'see' the pieces the closer to done it is. And perhaps... perhaps societies are also built by something like a 'fractal' method, the way individuals are-- you start out with something small and simple & complexify outward according to certain basic directional 'arrows' you can follow. Or something. Though it's still really intimidating to look at the 'finished product', looking outward-in, rather than working outward from the inside. Le sigh.

( ....nguh. 'write what you know', they say. bastids. )

~~

It's no news to anyone that knows me, but...I really suck with people, man. Ack. I 'forget' to give the pizza-guy his tip and he says in this soft voice, 'next time, don't say you'll give a cash tip on the phone if you won't' and I'm like 'oh, gimme sec' and by the time I come back with the change (having left the door open!) he's gone! I even went outside after him in my thin shirt & pajama bottoms, but he was gone! GAH! So now I'm painfully, painfully guilty and I feel awful (it's the soft voice!!) and mourning my pizza, since now I won't have the guts to call them ever again -.-;; *facepalm* I'M SUCH A MOOOOROONNNNnnnn... ><;;; graaargh. Being softly chastised by a nice person is MUCH WORSE than being told off by an asshole. WAH.