Different Opinions

Before I begin this post, I would like to say that this is all the opinion of someone who doesn’t read. All experience I’ve gained is from writing my own stories and attempting to understand the complex minds of readers. Take everything you read with a grain of salt, as it may sound super obvious to you, or rather ridiculous that you can’t help but laugh. Also, as always with me, it could make zero sense. Either way, thanks for the view.

I speak a lot when it comes to writing that everyone has a different opinion on what is good and what is bad. This is true. Everyone does like different things, and these tastes change over time. You may like something the first time you watch/read/listen to it but then hate it the second time. 

But, there is this thing that goes around, particularly in writing, and that is ‘outstanding writing’.

Now, if I told you to think of an ‘outstanding’ song or piece of art, you’d all come up with something different.

By why is it that writing is different?

Is writing different? I’d say it is.

Why do we say books like Harry Potter and Lord of The Rings are great? I can’t say, because everyone is different, but strangely, there isn’t much difference.

Perhaps it’s because writing isn’t something injected into everyone’s daily lives that you rarely hear about it. You hear about people’s varied opinions of art and music, but why is it that books like Harry Potter always get a ‘positive’ response? Perhaps they are just good?

But what is good in writing?

Well, personally for me, I do enjoy scene description. But, despite this, I am a person who can imagine things with just the bare minimum, and I think most people are. If a book takes place in a school, everyone thinks of their school they went to (or maybe in). If a book says it takes place in a warehouse, we all have a different yet similar idea in mind. But, why is it that people need extra information? Why would you need to know the smell of the toxic waste barrels or the mouldy wet floor? Is it that readers are greedy? Perhaps, but ultimately it’s for immersion.

As I said, I’m pretty good at imagining things so I don’t need these extra descriptions that don’t affect my immersion, if anything, they may ruin it for me. 

I think what I just said can be seen in my earlier writing. I feel like at points I described scenes ‘wrong’. I like to leave things empty, meaning that I want the reader to fill them in with their own imaginations. I can’t speak for anyone other than myself, but a description only serves the purpose of adding detail at the moment I’m reading it. After I’ve finished reading your paragraph, I’ve forgotten all you told me about the place we are in, and I’m imagining it my way.

Now, these details are important, they could further the stories. The toxic barrels I mentioned could be used later to help the good guy escape or something. It’s about foreshadowing.

In school, you are always analysing the hidden meanings. How do we know the writer meant this hidden meaning? An English teacher I had compared it to a footballer. How does a footballer know where to stand and where to be when the ball is passed to him. It’s all just instinct. Back then, I thought she was talking rubbish. But, now I agree. I like this hidden meaning way of writing. I like the idea that every word has some type of secret meaning.

I’ve said many times that I don’t read as I can’t. I’m incapable of staying focused on a paragraph unless I really care about it, which is almost never. 

An interesting discussion on this topic could be Shakespeare. To me, I see writing as I would art. Sure it’s cool and all with what it did at the time, but it’s not that good. I’m not that big of a Shakespeare fan. I’d compare him to the Mona Lisa, meaning that they are overrated. A lot of work from history is overrated. The historical aspect of it is interesting, but the work itself is rather boring. You can make your own opinion on that. Forget about what they did to develop writing and think of the work as a piece of literature/art. You might see it the same as before or you might realise that it is rather meh. But, that could be modern tastes taking over.

This can bring us onto the topic of uniqueness and creativity. Creativity is a must. I do agree that is true. Having cool ideas is good. But it’s not bad to go back to old ideas. The reason things like Slice of Life is so popular is because it’s relatable and makes us think of something that could have been. but the reason fantasy is so popular is because of these amazing worlds with a history of their own. So perhaps, there is a difference to what makes things good. Perhaps the genre gives it a set of criteria. Maybe fantasy is after more uniqueness, whereas romance is about reality and relatability.

I’d say adaptations help a lot. People that read books after watching the film will imagine the film, so it’s easier for them. Maybe reading the book will ruin the film? Or watching the film will ruin the book? Are the two the same or different? If you’ve read a book before a film came out, did the film ‘feel’ like the book? Were things as you imagined or completely different? Too many questions and too many opinions, which is why we cannot say.

So this is all my experiences with what I’ve learnt in my own understandings. I’ve formed these opinions and these ideas on my own with no care for the writing world or how professionals/consumers feel about writing. All that I’ve said could be 100% true about the writing world, or it could be wrong. I’d like to understand why people think certain books are good or bad. I’d like to understand why a large group collectively agrees on what books are good or bad. I’d like to understand why every book I see is the #1 bestseller. Not for my own writing but because it’s interesting. But, I guess this is why book clubs exist, so they can slate every book and discuss their opinions, but from what I’ve seen of book clubs on TV, they seem to mostly agree with each other and never debate if it’s good or bad.

I understand that books are long so ‘giving a book ago’ isn’t the easiest thing. It’s like with a TV show, people read/watch the first few parts and then decide to carry it on or not. It’s all about first impressions (I guess), but perhaps that’s why I like web novel style of shorter weekly chapters. As a consumer, it’s easier to catch up and keep reading if you like something. Because it comes out slowly over time, it’s easy to keep up with it and not care about it interesting you in the first few chapters.

I believe that my writing style will change over time, but if it does change it’d not be for the readers. It may sound like an asshole thing to say, but I don’t care too much about the readers. I write stories I want to write. I’ve always written for me. Sure if people liked it that’s a plus, but I like it.

I suppose what I’m trying to say is that you never really see debates about if a book is good or not. Or maybe you do and I just don’t stumble across them. Why do people argue about if a film is good or bad but not books? (Before people type to me that they do happen, just know that I’ve probably never encountered these types of debates as I’m not in those circles).

I’ve probably contradicted myself or gotten lost in my words again, but perhaps someone understood. This is probably something a case study could be done on. But, I’m too impatient to do research into this type of thing and just care about my own opinion.

Anyway, that’s all from me on this edition of ‘repeating the same rubbish I’ve mentioned a million times in the past’. One day soon I’ll come up with something original for this blog and think of what to do with it. 

But, thanks for reading, as always, my links are below.

My links: https://linktr.ee/FabledByte

Arbitrary Echo: https://linktr.ee/ArbitraryEcho