A 19 year old's perspective

[Lurue-Blackheart]

(The following post was inspired by the "The Future of S&S post)
(long but worth the read
rowing up in the 90's/2000's has been eventful and fun but i have many complaints about what is happening to entertainment/media/books

At the age of 11 I was introduced to Magic the Gathering the card game. it was very fun to me and got me deeply involved in Fantasy so i continued to follow the bunny trail which lead me to AD&D. i have the origional book deities and demigods which was the first time i saw Elric, Arioch, Yarkoon.....the whole shebang (which i believe was done without MR.M's concent but i could be wrong) stick with me i am getting to the point now.....As a teenager I was trapped in the past. I got a hold of every/any MM book i could find because it drew me in like no other and the Elric Saga fastly became my favorite book series. Heres where i realized the problem kicks in.....

What the hell is going on around me? I am reading these amazing books, watching old horror movies, jamming black sabbath and danzig, and realizing the 90's absolutly suck! dont get me wrong there are many things that i did like in the 90's but i liked the old things better. So as time goes on i start writing in high school. I dive into S&S and start writing some pretty good stuff if i must say so myself... my friends thought it was good, people liked it but as soon as i took it to school, or turned it into writing contests i was geting shafted every time because of the following reasons...
"too violant" "too dark" "not creative enough, to raw"
so i started to wonder... Maybe i am just not a good writer, so i was determined to get the answer. i brought in Elric of Melnibone to my creative writing class (11th grade high school) and read some excerpts. My teachers hated it because it was "too violant"and what not.
My question was answered. i am not a bad writer, its just most pieces of novalty these days dont have the raw feeling like they did have. i'm not a violant person but My teachers made me out to be because i had a person die in a damn book! whats wrong with that? Basiclly i wanted to state that the reason no one is making novals as raw, epic, or enthralling is because WE ARE BEING TOLD WERE WRITING CRAP! Publishers want to make money so they sign people who are writing Harry Potter or Eragon material. Its childish, happy, non realistic! (again dont get me wrong they are very good books and are well written) But i am ready to break out of the childish...and they lived happily ever after theme and write some raw, good old fashioned S&S but like i said, our generation is lead by the throat to make books that will SELL. its all about the money. Same thing with movies also. everything looks alike, they all follow the same template. Its like medias little supply and demand they hold over my generation and i am tired of it! we have to follow the flow and if you step out of line, you have no chance.

anyone know how i feel? :)
just had to get that off my chest.

[Lurue-Blackheart]

Please give me some feedback :D

[Whiskers]

Maybe you should decide for yourself and not worry so much about other people's interpretation of what you enjoy. It works for me. :D

[EverKing]

Sounds very similar to my experiences. The biggest difference is that in Junior High I had the support a two very open English Teachers who encouraged me to continue despite the opposition. Still though, through Highschool I saw many of the same things it sounds like you saw. In fact, I often pointed out to my Lit. teachers that the so called "great American liturature" we were being forced to read was little better than drivel. Oh, they often had good morals or wonderful basis, but the writting itself was what I would consider sub-par.

I see it as a "Disneyfication" of the American mindset. People want to see happy endings where the "good guys" always prevail with their superior morals and ethics. Mike put it best when he recently said that, like Rock and Roll, S&S lost its edge. As far as fantasy is concerned people want to see the Tolkien-esque "Epic Pooh" rather than any kind of gritty reality with real consequences.

I'd check out the "Enclave at the End of Time" forum here, if I were you. In it you will many great resources and information on writting as well as some excelent advice.

See you around!

E

[KanderGrimm]

I remember my Creative Writing teacher in High School. I wrote Blood and Thunder stuff as well (still do on occasion) and I remember him literally turning his nose up at it and practically picking up the sheets with a pair of tongs. My stuff was very dark, sombre and violent, but looking back at the stuff it wasn't badly written, just a little too derivative of my favourite authors of the time.

[Lurue-Blackheart]

Thanks! I appriciate that. I gets hard sometimes when you think somthing you've written is genius and you show it to a teacher or editor and they think its trash b/c it wont make money or its not set in a happy mood. I believe the best things come out when one is fighting aginst the grain, which I am doing now, so hopefully i will get a break. It really saddens me now that I (being in college) know that all the youngsters growing up have to be subjected to only reading what people want them to read... Its one of the main reasons teenagers now a days dont read at all, because they have never read anything that they can relate to or anything that grabs their attention. Books are becoming obsolete because no one has imagination any more because they dont need it, movies are being made more than ever and all they have to do is sit in front of a screen for 2 hours, take in some medocrity and forget it all in a couple of days. Why read the Bible when you can watch the passion of christ...its everyones perspective now and i think its crap. I do like movies, in fact i love them but i believe a mediation between reading and watching needs to be back like it used to be. no one works their minds anymore because theyd rather be living convieniently and take as less time as possible to live and learn.

[Lurue-Blackheart]

I remember my Creative Writing teacher in High School. I wrote Blood and Thunder stuff as well (still do on occasion) and I remember him literally turning his nose up at it and practically picking up the sheets with a pair of tongs. My stuff was very dark, sombre and violent, but looking back at the stuff it wasn't badly written, just a little too derivative of my favourite authors of the time.

to tell you the truth its not even that violent... but its not wishy washy sugar coated sour everyones used to

[Doc]

I think you learn from things that are constructive and technical. You can learn from constructive criticism like "this is clumsy phrasing" or "this is entirely to pedantic." Matters of taste are different things altogether. "Too violent" is a matter of taste, rather than mechanics, substance, or creativity. In matters of taste, people won't agree.

I also think you have to believe some of the good and some of the bad responses you get, but all of neither.

[HawkLord]

I kind of know what you mean here. Luckily for us, a good book is timeless, so we can delve in and out of periods at will. However, I think that there are and were some really good authors writing both just now and in the 90s. Observe cyberpunk stuff by authors like Jeff Noon and Neal Stephenson. Both writing near future science-fiction, but with such an original take on it. The fantasy of the moment does often seen a little childish but I think authors like Robert Jordan are still writing decent stuff.

Personally, I don't find that my teachers dislike my pieces as a matter of opinion, except once when I 'used too many metaphors'. Re-reading that piece, I don't agree with the comment but I agree that some of it was a little clumsy and rushed (it was a short story of a little over one thousand words). Basically, I think you should choose your own path in terms of writing, but listen to criticism. If someone says it is not creative enough it may be you are using too many cliches. I myself struggle to be creative sometimes, but I think my work has improved a lot just by writing more and taking on board comments that people has. Now I get much better marks for my writing, get told I am creative and whatnot but in the end I write to describe a feeling, emotion, or social comment. So be yourself!

[David Mosley]

Re: A 19 year old's perspective

i have the origional book deities and demigods which was the first time i saw Elric, Arioch, Yarkoon.....the whole shebang (which i believe was done without MR.M's concent but i could be wrong)

Actually, the story goes that Mike did give TSR a verbal permission to use the Melnibonean deities and characters in Demigods. Unfortunately, he'd also previously agreed that Chaosium could make an Elric RPG and while he had/has no problems with there being two role-play systems out there, Chaosium got very snooty about having exclusive rights to the characters and kicked up a fuss.

If you want to find out what Mike's opinion of Chaosium is today (hint: it's not great ;)) you can do a 'Search' on "Chaosium" in the Q&A and Terminal Cafe fora.

[Lurue-Blackheart]

Thanks for the imput guys it helps a lot. i didnt quite make myself clear on the whole 90's novalty. i think past authors did keep on making good books in the 90's but the up and coming fantasy authors made childish flim flam......which happened to be well written :P
i do listen to constructive criticism because it makes me better at what i do. Again i appriciate your imput.. thanks guys/gals

Thanks for clearing the whole Chaosium deal up also..... dosnt seem like MM cares too much for them anymore :P

[Poetgrrl]

I remember my Creative Writing teacher in High School.

He told me my writing was therapeutic. Okay. Maybe it was. but it felt like a negative comment and i took it to heart.

The bottom line for a writer who wants to break in is ... publishers want stuff that sells. And if your stuff is therapeutic and it sells... fine. And if it's not going to grab the mainstream, your works will be turned down.

The wonderful thing that's shifting, though, is small press, Indies, self-publication. You may wince because Eragon stuff was self-published, too, but y'know? He got it out there. Stephen King is a proponent of independent book publishing and I'm so grateful he is.

I liked your post, Lurue-Blackheart, and the best thing I can say is this: Keep writing. Keep reading. Keep submitting your stuff. Don't let the mainstream be your guide. Because after 999 times of "no", there's a "yes" out there for your work!! :up:

[S_Ombre]

If you haven't looked in Enclave yet, I suggest that you do. Prototype X might just be interested in your work. A lot of the stuff that was in the first issue was not mainstream and most of it was definately not cute, cudly or disneyfied. Your comments would be wolcomed on many of the threads in Enclave, and if you want, you could post some of your work for constructive criticism.
I hope that you'll keep working on the type of stories that you want to write, and that you search out opinons that are helpful :D .

S. Ombre