/lit/ - Literature

A concerted effort to defy tropes subordinating the construction of a strong narrative.

>write random sentences one after another
>"lel this is surrealism you need to be intelligent like myself to understand it"

Fantasy

>>4887226
oh come on, what exactly in fantasy bothers you?

>>4887237
All the retarded shit.

People who either think:

A) That only Hemingway's writing style is acceptable.

or (and worse)

B) People who confuse Hemingway's writing style for some sort of call for simplification. You have to be more economical, not any less nuanced.

Whisky drinking to show that the character is mature and depressed.

>>4887237
the lack of imagination.
any retard can entertain other retards with a world of ghouls and dragons. it takes a truly special retard to make a normal world interesting enough to make you want to read a few hundred pages.

>>4887248
who else drinks whiskey besides old war-torn men?

>Female characters who act like indecisive shit bags

>>4887214
yep, that's the one.

>>4887258
Do you even need to ask?

>>4887258
I drink whisky and I've been in exactly 0 wars.

Wish fulfillment YA lit.

writers being writerly or worse artistic.

>main character is a bored everyman with nothing to say and little personality
>and the story is told from their point of view

Just write in 3rd person, you fucking hacks. Then you cant hide your shittiness behind 1st person pov.

>>4887254
What kind of retard is interested in a world solely because it has ghouls and dragons?

I think you're correct in saying it's the lack of imagination, but only in the sense that there has been very little in the innovation since Tolkien. The fact that so many fantasy narratives regularly rip-off (or I guess, 'are inspired by') things like orcs and dwarves is testament to the sad state of fantasy.

Describing the wind, rain or clouds to create atmosphere.

>>4887301
Mfw every short story in Slow Learner starts like this.

>>4887209
Misuse of the word trope annoys me.
Not directly applicable within lit though.

>>4887274
>Then you cant hide your shittiness behind 1st person pov.
GEE, I WONDER WHY THEY WOULD DO THAT?

But no really, why don't you just read better books you pleb of plebs, mundaner of boards.

>>4887331
U mad

>>4887258
People with taste.

Actually that's BS, whiskey always taste like fucking bananas to me.

>>4887331
Condescension failed
Sarcasm failed
All around failure of a post

But I get what you were going for. Good luck next time. Please do put more thought into any subsequent submissions.

>>4887221

I do this, but I'm not particularly intelligent, though.
Feels good enough.

>>4887258

I used to hate whisky. Today I like to drink one or two shots a week. I find out a brand that is very tasty to me, yet is considered by whisky experts to be a pleb shit: J&B. I like it because it's not that strong: I generally drink it after a heavy meal – it comes down your throat and to your stomach burning everything down the way.

But I think that my favorite drink is gin and tonic with lemon: it’s perfect, fresh and light.

>>4887266

lol. That's actually pretty damn accurate.

>>4887262
I used to hate that trope as well until I realised that it's actually an accurate depiction of women.

>>4887434
I love gin. Have you tried Wild Turkey? Imo it's the smoothest whiskey/bourbon.

Using words to connote meaning. Can you be more imaginative please?

>>4887254
Actually the lack of imagination in fantasy really bothers me too. It's supposed to be the genre where the writer canr eally let his imagination run wild, put anything in there. But most fantasy is really dull and cliched.

>>4887464
>tips

Vowels. Fucking hate them

>>4887490
▲⃝ ▲⃝ ▲⃝▼ □✝□□■ ✝ ✝ ✝ ✝

>>4887506
✂❤❤❤❤

Dialogue that ends with anything besides
>," said Character.

>>4887468
>Have you tried Wild Turkey?

No, but will look up for it :)

>>4887528
Oh fuck, that's the most common amateur mistake.

>"What's up?" John inquired.
>"Not much," David exclamated.
>"Nothing interesting here either," John casually stated.

>To my (insert wife/mother/son/dog's name here)

>>4887209
Jane Pountney is 50 next year cloned into me with my help she is a whore, home wrecker slut.

>>4887561
Is this one of those funny memes?

symbolism

ooh a light shining through a window represents enlightenment wow so deep and meaningful!

All the silly "war genius" characters in Military-Scifi. Every other book has some near perfect super general or infantryman fighting battles several thousand years from now where the advanced tactics may as well have come out of a an old comic book.

>>4887258
Depressed alcoholics

>>4887618
Yeah. Screw my freakin' AP English teacher, he doesn't know CRAP-DIDDLY!

>>4887533
>"I will strike you down!" hissed the main character of this Fantasy story

>>4887618
yh nigga, prof tryin 2 say dat shit meen sumfin it aint be, u nahmsayin? da chair wuz red ain't no shit about vioence, dat nigga jus tryin to say dat chair b red

>>4887209
this stupid bullshit, esp. when drilled into students from elementary.

>>4887791
Read more literary fiction dum dum.

>>4887274
Is this really considered lazy?

I thought people write in first person to make the narrative more intimate.

Hemingway does it, Camus does it, what exactly is wrong with 1st person narratives?

>>4887283
Thats less the fault of the fantasy genre itself, and more the fault of poorly made fantasy. 99% of everything is shit, and 99% of fantasy is Tolkien rip-offs.

But unique fantasy that does it's own thing does exist ASoIaF deal with it and shouldn't be punished just because there's 458907645890 Forgotten Realms books.

>>4887803
People like Palahniuk or King do it too and they ruin it a bit.

>>4887803
Nothing is inherently wrong with 1st or 3rd person narratives, neither will help nor hurt if the writing is bad.

2nd person on the other hand is trickier to pull off.

>>4887807
>implying that 99% of something isn't representative of the genre

>>4887799
literary fiction follows it too dumbo

>>4887618

>>4887799
The fact that this is taught in school draws idiots towards genre fiction.

>>4887823
What alternative way to structure a story should we be teaching?

By the way, I just made the connection in my mind between the normal story arc and sexual intercourse. I wonder what Freud would have said about that?

>>4887815
2nd person is a gimmick

>>4887226
>>4887237
>>4887238
/thread

>>4887258
I crapped out on white rum after a couple bouts of alcohol poisoning so now I can't touch the stuff.
Decided to try some dark liquor and crapped out on Crown Royal.
So now I am drinking Jack.
Guess I'll be hitting up scotch here soon as my sixth bottle in three weeks of Jack is really starting to make me sick of it.

>>4887843
>2nd person is a gimmick
So is breaking the fourth wall. So is every metafictional device ever invented. Right?

>>4887836
Climax - Resolution- Turning point - Exposition - Rising action - Second climax - No Resolution

Show me a book that actually follows this structure, because I'd legitimately be interested in reading it

>>4887861
Breaking the 4th wall periodically is the only acceptable use of the second person

Attempting to write a narrative in it is sheer masturbation

Child protagonists.

>>4887533
Really?
Can't you have, say, shouted, whispered, barked, mocked? You're not going to make me use an adverb, are you? What's more, it's a little silly to demand that the writer uses ONLY said and expects you to infer from his writing what the tone is.
For instance
"You bastard, you left me to die!" is something that can take said, doesn't necessarily need anything else, but something like
"I'll have a beer," he said can be read in different ways.
"I'll have a beer," he shouted changes the meaning, if only a little.

A trope I hate?
The Noble White/Wise Foreigner. That, or shoehorned politicism.

>>4887863
Infinite Jest is hilariously close. Hal's breakdown is at the beginning, the resolution to the James Incandenza subplot occurs rather early, then exposition and rising action leading to the rollents' storming of Enfield and Gately's drug binge ending with no resolution.

>>4887807
>But unique fantasy that does it's own thing does exist

Maybe but its so rare that people have started to use the term "Fantasy" to describe a lack of imagination to be found in the story. That same old pseudo-european historical setting is so tired I can't take anything seriously that uses it now.

>>4887807
ASoIaF
>Doing it's own thing
Zombies and dragons and the War of the Roses oh my!

>>4887258

I am an upper middle class white recent college graduate and I drink Old Crow all day every day because I don't give a single fuck

>>4887821
Representative of the majority of content which exists inside of the genre, not the potential of the genre itself.

>>4887878
children

>protagonist is mentally ill
>story begins with the protagonist waking up
>story begins with the protagonist's dream
>protagonist looks in a mirror so the author can describe what s/he looks like
>describing what characters look like as if I'm going to imagine them that way at all
>describing the room by describing where everything in the room is
>dialogue where characters' voices and opinions are underdeveloped enough that I don't know or care who is speaking

>>4887964
Incredible!

>>4887964

Unbelievable!

Stream of consciousness.

I've hated it everywhere it's been used. Really fucks with my reading rythm, and there's no good reason it should be there. In my opinion, it says nothing that couldn't have been expressed without it.

>>4887836
I wonder what my 4th grade teacher would say if I told her that what she taught about narrative structure was just sex

>>4887807
If you think A Song of Ice and Fire does it own thing then you need to read more fantasy. Also, saying deal with it does not work as evidence of your argument.

When blushing is used to convey embarrassment, especially multiple times in the same book.

when a character's dream is very coherent and relates perfectly to their current life situation

>the protagonist is someone who gets perfect grades and whom everyone likes and is interested in them, yet they still think nobody likes them and there is nothing special about them

usually a girl too

>>4888227
>reading any books that may contain that

Why do you do that to yourself?

>>4888227
Worse is peter parker alleged anti hero where the character is attractive, intelligent, friends with beautiful women/ rich men, and moral, but still some how a loser for ungiven reasons

>dialogue is written in some dumb accent

I just find it so goddamn annoying. If you just say what their accent is like, I can imagine it on my own. You don't have to write "yes theese is what i vant, oy da 'ney do ya?"

i mean jesus fuck. that shit gets so tedious to read and it breaks immersion.

>>4888236
lol

>pure of heart
>the chosen one
>going to a new land via some portal and finding out you're a legendary hero
>important children who must save the world

Bitch, you know what kids do? Watch cartoons and whine for more juice boxes. Kids are boring and useless. They don't even have a developed personality at goddamned TEN years old or shit.

>the genius/prodigy

You know how someone becomes skillful at anything? They work their ass off. No, he gets tossed a sword, and in three weeks he's top dog in the world.

>author blathering about how pretty a woman is

We get it, you haven't gotten your dick wet in a while. Shut up. Why can't you say, the interesting woman? Or the smart woman? Or the brave woman? Always gotta be "beautiful." Christ, spare me, like the single highest attainment one can make is to be eyecandy for some creepy asshole in a cafe to stare at and write bad prose about.

>bitch faints

Just kill me. If you faint that easily, nigga, you need to get your ass to the doctor.

>>4888346
>author blathering about how pretty a woman is
Fucking this, holy shit.

>>4888260
>reading Faulkner
>dat niggatalk and hicktalk

I hate that too.

>>4888346

agree with the last one. i hate seeing characters faint when something shocking happens, or throw up. i mean im sure it happens sometimes but it always feels so unrealistic

>>4887266
For anything you dislike, there's always fedora images.

TEENAGERS WIF SUPERPOWERS

>>4888260

John le Carré is the best person for writing accents. He doesn't spell things differently but he gets the cadence and grammar down perfectly.

>>4887258
Grown men who need to overcompensate.
My friends piss away so much money on whiskey just to say they're drinking whiskey.

Alcohol is overrated in general. People will pay thousands of dollars for a hint of a taste.


>ugggghhhh soooo smoothe

has there ever been a good dream sequence? They all seem to be either excuses for purple prose or filled with not-that-cryptic clues for future events in the book.

>>4888530
Alcohol is man's oldest way of coping with conscious existence. Worship of the Alcohol Gods is optional. In short, don't knock a man who likes his scotch, he's probably wiser than you.

>>4888540
*tips hornpipe*

>>4888346
>boring and useless
Oh, that's just modern kids. Why, I wouldn't be surprised to see a brave child if only their parents would give them the freedom to develop bravery.

Orphans make the best child characters, so long as the author doesn't heap pity on them. In which case, they're stunting them as though they were a parent.

>>4888153
Key kid wanna /ss/?

>>4887863
Funny, I wrote a book with that structure, sorta. It ended up being kinda eh because I never write ever.

>>4888117
>Really fucks with my reading rythm

Then it isn't real stream of consciousness, or you are just terrible at reading english. The defining feature of stream of consciousness is how well it flows.

>>4888260
If it's done right it can be good, like the Redwall series.

>>4888415
FUCKING THIS

>>4888222
But muh crime and punishment!

>>4888533

I don't think so. Dream sequences are always horrible and forced. I can accept if an author points out a certain element has been in a dream, but beyond that it feels cliche.

>>4888566
I've never read any streams of consciousness that flow well sentences mash up together they aren't very clear and it makes it hard to see the point of what the writer is trying to tell you its really not a good device it even interjects with random things like "oh god oh god" every twenty or so words intending to tell you about the state of mind of the character but it really ends up being ass and interrupting your reading I fucking hate stream of consciousness it really fucking sucks ass not to mention those times when the text can be interpreted in different ways depending on the punctuation you make up for it in your mind why why why punctuation was invented for a reason

>>4888818

That's what makes the dream sequence in Best Served Cold pretty funny.

I hate the trope too, but this one was pretty good.

>>4887618
Well, what symbolism do you like. I mean, that's the main symbol in The Secret Window, but I enjoyed it because I didn't get it until later. It made me feel smart to figure something out.

>>4888856
Just leaving out punctuation is not stream of consciousness.

>>4887618
You haven't shown a real grasp at the concept of symbolism. You either mixed up the word with another one or you need to read more and better books.

>book is not dedicated to god

Disgusting

>>4887209
Special Snowflake narrators

>>4888370
I had to stop reading As I lay Dying 'cause reading the dialog by those illiterates was insufferable.

>>4887528
I also use "asked" and "replied" am I plebe?

>>4887490
0101010001101000011010010111001100101110

>Ctrl+f "allusions"
Really /lit/?

>>4887209
(insert name) noticed his/her sweat under neither their collar.

>>4889720
It depends on the allusion

>>4887209
When the author encourages Death of the Author.

>>4887933
0/10, try harder bitch faggot

>>4887209

I don't read shit-tier literature, so I usually don't stumble into tropes. I have read a lot of unpublished author workshopped stuff, so I'll list off a few the particularly bad ones

- The story begins with an alarm clock.

- The story centers around young people getting drunk/high.

- The crush is gaaaaay.

- Ouija boards.

- Lost/recovered memories.

>philosophers looking to Plato for truth
>God as the answer to life's questions
>Causa Prima answers to causality

Needless biblical allegories? Anyone?

>>4888187
If you think it doesn't then...I don't know what you can do; I'm not confident you'll be able to see something so obvious at this point. Writing quality aside, those books stand out like a sore thumb amongst a hive of blandness and similarity, and that's a very good thing.

>>4888215
What's wrong with that? I blush from embarrassment all the fucking time. It's annoying but certainly real.

"His manly love for his best friend was better than anything he could feel for frivolous whorish women."

>>4889820
Ice zombies, dragons, and medieval England with a sprinkling of middle eastern cultures? That's what stands out to you? I get it that simple folks like the cliffhanger based plots that GRRM uses and I know that people like you overlook the often unresolved plots he introduces because he writes vaguely interesting characters and foodporn, but come on. You seriously think this series stands out among the mountains of bland that populate the rest of the genre? You really haven't read enough to even be discussing things on this board.

>>4887258
young veterans who hate the marines, make music, and spent their deployments skateboarding on shabby halfpipes built in un-used tents.
>my brother

>>4889858
Where oh where do I start...

I guess all I can say is if you think those particular books were at any point mostly devoted to and concerned with ice zombies, dragons, and medieval England with a sprinkling of middle eastern cultures, or generating cliffhangers, then maybe you shouldn't be talking about something that didn't quite sink in? If you think plots are forgotten about and left unresolved, you were expecting a more conventionally structured story with clearly defined plots, the kind that always meet a meaningful conclusion like they're guided by some magic hand and follow some well laid out track. I suppose it is to avoid the messy anti-climactic way things tend to follow in real life. Nothing wrong with that, it's been integral to nearly all literature. It's just there does exist lit, both 'genre' and 'literary', that aims to reject such a conscious, 'artificial' way events occur, to mimic real life or history more.

>I get it that simple folks
>and I know that people like you
>You really haven't read enough to even be discussing things on this board.
This is the sort of thing I come here for - the delusional self importance and exclusivity. It's painful, take it from me.

>>4889912
>>4889858
I think this is one of those things like reggae subgenres where someone who likes it will know that roots reggae and rocksteady are completely different but the person who doesn't like it just sees it as all the same shit.

>>4889927
Nailed it.

The difference is when my friend tells me about this new genre of metal that's awesome, I'm not the autist that replies with
>HURRRRRRR DURRRR IT'S ALL THE SAME LOL ALL METALHEADS ARE TASTELESS PLEBS
I just smile, nod, listen to what he has to say and refrain from interjecting myself into a discussion I'm not qualified to partake

>>4889935
lol historical fiction/fantasy doesn't exactly require one to be qualified in order to appreciate it. Bad analogy.

>>4887209
The one where retards on the internet started using "trope" as a synonym of "cliche".

>>4888346
This sounds fun
>a fat lazy kid gets sucked into a portal to a fantasy land
>he is the chosen one
>either doesn't care and wilfully fucks up because lulz or actively helps the other side

Anyone have something like this?

>>4887266
Why do they always have something "off" about their skeletal structure?
Do they just tend to gravitate towards extremely unflattering clothes?

>>4889927
>Contemporary music
>good
Back to /mu/ you pleb.

>>4888260
In Morrison's comic "The Filth," the main gist behind the plot and an explanation of the setting is given about 3/4 of the way through in a nearly indecipherable Glaswegian accent. I liked that.

>>4889978
*tips fedora*

>>4889978
I know there's a difference between Romantic and Baroque.Fuck if I can hear it though.

>mentally ill main character (bonus points if he is schizophrenic but acts nothing like it)
>chosen ones
>people falling madly in love with the first woman/man they see during the story
>characters who act like assholes but are still loved by everyone

>all this dislike for mentally ill protagonists

b-but it's all i know how to write

>>4890033
No you don't. You're making an ass of yourself.

>>4887214
shots fired.

>>4890036
how do you know

>>4887618
9/10 would rage again

>>4888856
you obviously are not someone who should write in stream of conciousness

>>4890033
>all this dislike for shit
>"but it's the only thing that comes out my ass!"

Nobody wants your shit.

>>4887821
If you believe this, literature, film, and television are all shit.

>>4887869
Bright lights. Big City

>>4888117
If you really believe that, you ought to give Faulkner a go. He should change your mind

>>4889763
>young people getting drunk/high

what's so bad about this?

>>4889788
...pic unrelated, right?

Nietzsche blamed the Platonic search for truth for leading the entire western world into a defunct moral system that causes people to deny their own lives

>>4887528
What's wrong with something like asked?

Besides "You're such a faggot!", she said, doesn't make too much sense.

As long the writer doesn't painfully try to avoid "said" there is nothing wrong with other forms.

>>4887863
Given how the first climax is going to be rather weak, this is a pretty standard structure anyway, only turning away from the basic one at few points.

>>4887209
Writers who's main character is another writer.

>>4890121
And then the writer writes a book with the same name as the book you're reading

>>4890067
what if i mostly know mentally ill people for some unfathomable reason

>>4890158
Any examples beside P.K.Dick?

>>4890167

You sure they're really ill, not just hip wannabe mental kids?

>>4890121
So all of Stephen King

>>4890121
This happens way too much

>>4890214
quite a few of them are in my family and decades older than me, so yeah

>>4888346
>19th century lit
>characters die because the feel sad

>>4890453
>19th century lit
>Character gets sick
>Bedridden for 6 months

>>4890097
That's the joke...

>>4888227
The issue is that I feel like a number of girls actually perceive themselves that way. Not saying its smart on anyone's part. But accurate? Sure. And they hold this idea concurrently with the idea that they are amazing and should be above criticism.

Also, people want a main character they can either identify with or aspire to, and this represents the best of both worlds- when you picture the type of person who typically reads the book with this kind of character (Twilight, perhaps) what do you see? A fat, ugly, obnoxious chick who really doesn't have any friends. Reading books with a main character like that allows them to continue with this cognitive dissonance- they both actively identify with the loner aspect of the character, as well as the smart, funny, pretty part of the character in their mentally idealized image of themselves.

>>4888346

What if I'm writing about a woman from a chauvinistic male perspective (of a character) who finds her beauty as such a redemptive aspect that he learns to "treat her right" because she's worth it, if solely on that basis?

How, at all, does "beautiful" contradict "interesting"? Would she be more interesting if she were ugly?

>>4891469
An ugly woman would be more interesting in a "let me take you back to my lab and dissect you to find out what the fuck went wrong" sort of way

>>4891483

That's a really strange and rather unnatural sort of way.

>>4891469
I know I'm certainly more interested in beautiful women.

>>4887744
Read "The Colonel's Hash."

>>4890650
Made even worse when it introduces a sub-plot that tends to distract the reader from the issue at hand.

>>4887744
you confuse his point. He means symbolism annoys him -or at least it's what his post alludes- but you seem to think it means symbolism is not a real thing or is digging too deep

>>4890033
I think /lit/ in particular will tell you to knock it off because we have some bad memories from reading American Psycho, as well as from other poorly done representations of insanity running rampant in various mediums.

>>4889972
I'm pretty sure at least one episode of south park does this, if not several.

>>4889671
How does it feel to be an idiot?

>>4888260
I fucking loved Jones in A Confederacy of Dunces though

>>4887964
>I am an upper middle class white

And that's where I stopped reading.

>>4891469
Fuck off, tripfag.
http://youtu.be/-PfcimpK3Fo

>>4887309
Pynchon himself admitted the stories in Slow Learner aren't good, and all the book's critical attention is focused on the intro he wrote decades after he wrote the stories

>>4890078
AKA: the only decent 2nd person novel I have ever found. (Do you know any more?)

Mary Sues and Marty Stues

can't write enough about how I hate that

>>4893305
If On A Winter's Night a Traveller

>A more bohemian (but equally pathetic) version of the author seeks meaning in his oh so lonely and dreary life through the help of the love a manic pixie girl who helps him break out of his shell.jpg

>>4893305
>decent

You're joking, non, monsieur?

>>4893335
Only the first word is capitalized, homosaures wrecks.

>>4893367
Yeah but you're mom was yelling in all caps last night

>>4893335
my nigga

>>4893365
Well, I think it is decent. It's not great, interesting but not spectacularly so.

>>4887237
No "progressive"and forced 90s multi-culti?

>>4889645
>High school teaches symbolism wrong
>blame people for not getting it in spite of this

>>4892789
>>/v/

>>4892789

>>>/v/

>>4890082
It's Faulkner that mostly made me hate it m8

>>4892085
I'm curious, what could be a more accurate picture of mental illness than Patrick Bateman attempting to whistle while shoveling granola in his mouth and the running around in New York CIty while screaming his head off and pretending his $4000, bloodstained coat is a cape? I don't know how many crazy people you've met, but every single one of them in my life acts just like that.

>>4894759
Getting closer. Now take your advice and follow it. One icycalm is more than enough.

the chosen one is a concept that should die along with its supporters and retroactive psychic torture to its first proposers

>>4889763

>ouija boards

is that really a common trope?

When author's think I give a rat's ass about their opinion.

Worst offender is Tolstoy. War and Peace is great at characters. I'm amazed that to this day I see people from that book in real life. It legitimately helps me understand the world better.\

But holy shit please shut the fuck up Leo, I don't give a fuck if you think history cannot be changed you stupid turd. He's an idiot who is good at writing about life.

This also applies to hamfisted attempts to make social commentary. I forgot the name but I recently dropped a book when I figured out the whole point of the book within the first third

>>4888415
There was a time that teenagers having superpowers and being main characters was unheard of. Sadly it's been over used. I'd like to see read something where the main character is a teen or in early 20's and meets a small child with superpowers and this kid just goes around fucking people's shit because it hasn't learned what is morally acceptable yet.
I don't know, just a thought.

The main character as some complex and conflicted individual.

Like shit, is there a more overused trope?

>>4896065
I know the name of that book.

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair

>>4895813

I'm already there motherfucker.

And icy doesn't browse /lit/. I seriously doubt he even browses /v/ apart from when people namedrop / link to him.

It amuses me when people bring up Orgy of the Will here though.

>>4896264
Giving every character complex and understandable motives is almost as bad as making every character a barebones archetype. Some people really are petty and impossible to sympathize with.

>>4893330
the masculine form of mary sue annoys me. especially when people say gary stu but marty stu is also really awful.

Teenagers find totally-not-Narnia

It pisses me off so badly I'm writing a satire of it.

>his mouth worked soundlessly

>>4896277
I was referring to your desire to enter the world of published literature, which icycalm has already done. Is /v/ still the cultural cesspool of 4chan? I was thinking of dropping by when the Pathologic remake is released.

>>4887262
it's a relatable trope, if ya know, you've ever known or thought you've known) women before.

>>4887214
>see first comment

>>4896296
parody

>>4897588
Eh, honestly, it's closer to a deconstruction.

>>4897631
no it's not. deconstruction is showing the inherent contradictions in a text.

and please don't say "eh." it is my no. 1 pet peeve.

>>4890214
Y'all gonna kill me for this, but Be More Chill by Ned Vizzini
Its YA

>>4897654
Why do you have a peeve for a pet?

>>4887221
surrealism doesn't just mean "weird," you know...

>>4890007
Romantic is a solid procession of successive themes and parts. Baroque is one theme, for me anyway, and whereas romantic has this feeling of being "grand" or "whole", Baroque is much more of a "refined" or "regal" nature.

>>4887464
i keked

>>4888533
blah blah something about finnegan's wake blah blah. Not so much a sequence as a dream, but you get my point

>>4889972
Chronicles of Tomas Covenant, sort of

>>4893305
>(Do you know any more?)

La Chute.

>>4887468
Bourbon is my shit/

Nothing makes me happier than a bottle of barrel proof kentucky bourbon

>>4897930
makers mark is pretty good, or is it swill to you?

>>4897933
Makers mark is good, but it goes down like a ball of fire.

Makers 46 is a lot more palatable. I like to mix my 46 and make old fashions or whisky sour.

>>4890121
Character always ends up being a no personality narrator. It kind of hints about what wet towels authors are that use such blatant self inserts

>>4896065
East of Eden is the worst at this, relentlessly hit you over the head with his crappy message of a baseless godfag spin on free will

>>4887434

Lakefront Brewery out of Wisconsin has a whiskey called Kinnickinnic. Got voted Best American Blended Whiskey at some big brouhaha last year. Pretty tasty, gets ya drunk.

I'd make fun of you for the WASPy-ass gin and tonic, if my go-to drink wasn't Grey Goose over ice.

>>4898067
You live in Milwaukee bro?

Haven't been to the Lakefront but that sounds fantastic.

Is Horny Goat worth a visit?

I don't get out much.

I drink alone.

So alone.

>>4888533
Here is a snippet from my self-published humour novella "A Dark Hand".

I think it's a good dream sequence because it's meant to be a dumb dream sequence.

(free copies of my book available on request, paid-for copies also available)

>>4889972
whatshisface from the chronicles of narnia who sides with the white witch because candy

>>4897654
I apologize for the "eh."

I'm not really pointing out contradictions, but inconsistencies of the genre. The general lapses in logic that come with most stories.

I am not quite sure what to label that.

>>4888346
I'm writing something specifically to counter the first list.

The kids who find the mystic portal all are really young adults, and they quickly go back to Earth and get armed to the teeth with modern weaponry. They then proceed to technically fulfill most of the prophecy (defeating the cliched non-human antagonist race), but the amount of violence they inflict pretty much ruins the society they were trying to save.

The protagonists proceed to grab their gold and fuck off, not really caring to help the people rebuild.

>>4887496

The problem is its hard to cover new ground in the genre.

Try to invent a new sentient fantasy creature that someone doesn't immediately say "X did it first and better" about, it's really hard. Don't you dare mention beards, pointy ears, large noses, or any other easily distinguishable traits you could put on a face, Tolkien has claimed those sections of anatomy with gusto. Want to have a backstory wank about whatever sentient amorphous blob you come up with to evade Tolkien's control over humanoid creatures? Tolkien already owns the backstory wank of all time. Any form of man insect or tree thing? Done to death. Don't try to invent a new language, you'll be trying to pull a Tolkien without Tolkien's experience. Don't put magic in, or if you do, bottle it up and make it so constrained by rules that it may as well be science; Tolkien already claimed wizards of truly epic power.

Seriously: Tolkien basically /threaded high fantasy adventure stories before the genre could even get off the ground. Find me a high fantasy novel with absolutely zero influence by Tolkien after his books were released and I'll call you a liar.

>>4898737
Eh, just don't write medieval fantasy?

>>4898737
>Find me a high fantasy novel with absolutely zero influence by Tolkien after his books were released and I'll call you a liar.
How would one prove that exactly? Wouldnt you have to prove that the author had never ever read Tolkien's works?

>>4898262
i'm sorry for you.

>>4898737
>Don't you dare mention beards, pointy ears, large noses, or any other easily distinguishable traits you could put on a face, Tolkien has claimed those sections of anatomy with gusto.
only humans are humanoid

>Want to have a backstory wank about whatever sentient amorphous blob you come up with to evade Tolkien's control over humanoid creatures? Tolkien already owns the backstory wank of all time.
base it on brahmanism's mythology instead of gnosticism

>Any form of man insect or tree thing? Done to death.
shapeless spirits that can only manifest through dreams and nature
the fumes of animal carcasses often mix with those and create flashy ghosts with mass

>Don't try to invent a new language, you'll be trying to pull a Tolkien without Tolkien's experience.
only humans use words. everything else gestures or quacks

>Don't put magic in, or if you do, bottle it up and make it so constrained by rules that it may as well be science; Tolkien already claimed wizards of truly epic power.
magic can only be learned by getting wasted regularly on peyote
magic is executed by spitting liquor into the air while thinking of things to materialize in a mathematical formula
girls cant magic

There, cunt.

>>4898737
The thing is Fantasy should not mean: "How can I operate within the milieu Tolkien set up for himself and tell my own story." It just comes off as hackwork. I'm not saying that you can't use a historical setting but it has to be its own thing like Howard's Conan stories were.

>>4889709
you're still using words you dick

>>4887535
>dog's name here
Implying that's different from "mother/wife"

>>4899332
#rekt

>goody two-shoes main character

Seriously, who the fuck acts like that all the time?

>>4899332
I cannot believe just how funny you are. Amazing! Hihihihihihi

Flawless geniuses who draw conclusions from supernatural deductions in what are otherwise considered simple mystery novels with no supernatural attached to them.

Snarky/Sarcastic main character who is better and smarter than everyone else but is also an underachiever

>>4887209
>tropes
>unnecessary swearing
And back to >>>/tv/ you go.

>>4890453
>>4890650
>muh realism

>Did you know that there are actually hidden fairies/wizards/gods who live in our day to day world and hide in plain sight? In this unique adventure 1 young boy/girl will go from zero to hero when they're thrust into a magical adventure!

I swear to god every single popular book from my childhood seemed to be this.

>Story has an obligatory section were the main character talks about how great books are

>>4898737
Odysseus

>>4887301
>The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead
channel.
>not one of the best incipits ever

Racism.

Racism against elves.

>>4898703
> I apologize for the "eh."
found the hoser

>>4893357
I can't believe no one has commented on this. This is YA lit.


Also: "his life was about to change, forever."

>>4887618

>>4896233
Stephen King's "The Firestarter" actually did this

I remember it being pretty cool, but I was also in 7th grade so there's that.

>>4902756
>Fahrenheit 451

>>4904246
>annie in rose red

>>4904228
>meaning
keks for the kek god, are you stuck in the 19th century or what?

none of these tvtropes generation sacks of excrement have any idea of what a trope actually is

>>4904327
>le born in el wrong generation
*tips top hat

>>4887843
you best not be talking smack about choose-your-own-adventures, son

>>4887863
You pretty much described a novel that uses in-medias-res. Which is starting you off in action already started, so as to add to the initial excitement and reveal preceding plot later, rather than let it slowly build up as usual.

>>4887248
Hemingway actually subverts this in In Our Time by having two young men get drunk off one's dad's whiskey and talk about ignorant ass pleb books, it's pretty fantastic.

>>4902756
I feel the same way. Unless it's a kunstlerroman, where a love of literature can be an important character trait, then it's usually just a soulless way to get the reader to relate to a protagonist.

>Biblical references in contexts which have nothing to do with religion
It just comes off as pretentious. I've honestly never seen anyone lifting stuff from the good book do it properly.

>>4891449
So..escapism?

>>4904531
No, escapism takes you away.

This is more like masturbation, keeps them happy in the box they made.

>>4904500
Moby dick.

>non-human characters trying to understanding human emotion

>other worldly beings being able to understand and speak fluent English

>the human element always wins, be it alien invasion or machine uprising ect.

>one soldier or Joe Average being to stop a threat and becoming the main hero even though all he has is incredible luck

>>4896296
I hate stupid parodies. I bet yours will be one.

when MC's confession to senpai is interrupted by some stupid shit like a baseball through the window or something.

Oh also when you find out two siblings who were raised together arent blood related

>>4904563
Is the kid on the right Mario?

>>4904586
No, it's Tomoki you fucking retard.

>>4887964
>old crow
>any year ever

ishygddt

>>4904563
tomoko was a cutie

>>4902731
There's a comic, The Invisibles by Grant Morrison, that does a really cool take on that type of story.

>>4890097
Oh? So how are humans supposed to live their lives if their search for truth is destructive?

>>4892143
Jones was great.
Contrast with: Wardine

>>4898262
>Frederica

Fuck you, man.

>>4899017

>only humans are humanoid
>shapeless spirits that can only manifest through dreams and nature

Nice "sentient amorphous blobs you came up with to evade Tolkien's control over humanoid creatures" you got there, kiddo.

>Base it on brahmanism's mythology instead of gnosticism

Good job with getting creative with "new" material.

Now all you have to do is either completely gloss over backstory and hope your reader won't notice or figure out how to justify whatever that implies without making a backstory wank that's remotely comparable to Tolkien's, which will most likely end with a simple "Tolkien did it better and first" signing your book off for the bin.

>only humans use words. everything else gestures or quacks

Nice job. You've basically proven that the only way to compete is not to play: Tolkien stole all ground available to compete on here.

Besides the strange ass magic system you came up with, you've basically proved my point: you can't fight Tolkien's monolith, everything about your high fantasy has been defined by what you can't do in his wake.

>>4890097
Where does he say this. I absolutely agree.

>>4904593
>>4904563
Fuck, I'm crying.

Ideology heavy, story thin novels like Atlus Shrugged. "Outsider" narrators also piss me off, an example would actually be muersault from the stranger.

>>4887247


Man, glad Feminist's like don't know what you're talking about. Stick to Slyvia Plath

>>4898940

You can't prove a negative, but you can certainly find counterexamples.

Tolkien left a lot of genre trappings in his wake as noticeable proof of influence. If there are any fantasy races referenced in a way that does not introduce them organically (e.g, the author literally uses the name "dwarf", with perhaps a short description of one's appearance, glossing over backstory knowing society post Tolkien should know what the fuck a dwarf is), they are cribbing from Tolkien's mythology.

If the idea was originally Tolkien's and they use it in a way that assumes pop culture understanding of Tolkien's creations due to reuse, you've proven Tolkien's influence is at play.

1.Symbolism: This is what keeps feeding hungry liberal art majors.
2.Ideology: No one wants to hear your worldview of how ethics should be or how the world should work, the fact that you pretend to have the answer means you can't comprehend the complexity and subjectiveness of the world.

3.Conflict: If you need a sheep jumping a fence for anything to happen then you're in the wrong profession.
4.Narrative: Your purpose-oriented lecture keeps the mind grounded, the opposite of what a book should be.
5.POV: It's equivelant to imitating voices and labeling it as high level comedy.
6.Dialogues: Don't.
7.Metaphors/Similes: Obviously you lack any ability to describe the simplest things and you resort to cheap tricks.
8.Flashbacks: Even weebos know this is bad.
9.Description of setting, characters, objects: If I wanted to know how every paper roll is folded I'd watch a fucking movie.

10.Exposition: HEY I'M EXPLAINING TO YOU EVERYTHING BECAUSE I CAN'T CONVEY ANYTHING THROUGH OTHER MEANS SO I'LL PASTE FROM SIMPLE WIKIPEDIA SO WE'RE ON THE SAME PAGE, OK?
11.Plot: Buddy, buddy, if I wanted objectives and achievements and levels i'd play an MMO.
12.Characters: People?You seriously can't think outside of your everyday tiny casual mental box?
13.Obscurantism: Another pedantic turd that keeps lowest tier academics surfing on bullshit.
14.Quirkiness: This is by far the most cringeworthy technique, if your quirk isn't unconscious it will show as the most pathetic attempt to sound cute.

>>4904831
What book is the closest to this?

>>4904763
Shut your whore mouth

>>4889972
>>4898669
>Narnia
Yes! I wonder what can be done with that if adults was taken to that fantasy world.

>>4904831
So, in conclusion, there is no book you could possibly read that wouldn't piss you of.

Authors that infuse their work with teenage wank politics.

>>4905290
Teenage what now?

>>4904843
The manual for the calculator you had in highschool.

>>4905307
That had exposition, I'm afraid.

>>4888346

Hey guys, I've found the unattractive feminist girl!

>>4887878
Blood Meridian.

>>4904720
>Besides the strange ass magic system you came up with
Drugs are the go-to guys of most historical shamanic religions.

>>4890214
Hesse in Steppenwolf, kind of.

>>4894159
I feel like this can be said for a lot of other things not just symbolism.

>>4889645
>victim blaming
>ever

>>4904311
I wish

>>4904720
You asked for something different, I put out something different.
All you're doing with your bitching is throwing a fit over how it's impossible to do different fantasy than what Tolkien did.

Shit, you only have to switch the source mythology and you have something else.
Change the hero's journey structure to any other rite of passage from somewhere else and you have a completely different thing.

Besides, you're acting as if the european mythology which is the source of Tolkien's work is the only possible mythology.

>Now all you have to do is either completely gloss over backstory and hope your reader won't notice or figure out how to justify whatever that implies without making a backstory wank
>what is the silmarillion

>You've basically proven that the only way to compete is not to play: Tolkien stole all ground available to compete on here.
Why would I need to play if I don't even need the different languages, which were just the cute autistic part of Tolkien that ended up infecting fantasy with stupid sounding names?

>>4906613

Throwing a fit? Please.

>Original Problem: Most fantasy is dull and cliched. Why?
>My answer:
>Tolkien snagged up so much ground so successfully that if you want to tell a story which involves dragons, sentient humanlike races in conflict, ConLangs, or a minimally rule constrained magic system, you're basically just forking off of Tolkien, which makes you cliched.
>Ideas specifically trying to avoid forking off Tolkien just end up being a fork off Tolkien in the opposite direction, defined by evading him rather than creating something organic or new.
>You can't even approach the europeon mythological elements Tolkien touched inside the adventure story genre while still creating something new and organic. All that's left is alternative mythologies and nonsentient eastbeasts.

>Your post literally reaffirms all of the aboves points

To claim you still have something new rather than just the same unoriginal anticliche based backlash is silly.

stronk independant womyn

>>4887744
I hate this fucking image
>I'm a fucking teenage who knows shit about literature and is just now reading a book on author X
>I don't know what poetry is besides those cute separated random phrases I see on tumblr (pic related) and I have never heard of the concept of finding meaning within written text besides what's actually written
>I KNOW SO MUCH I'M SO SMART I'M 100% SURE ALL THERE IS TO THE TEXT IS EXACTLY WHAT IS WRITTEN AND NOTHING ELSE
>such smart
>wow

>>4906895

i don't know
why you're so upset

anon
can't you under
stand the brilliance of ran
domly broken lines and

s
ta
nza

s?

>>4904556
Fuck, just reading your post already made me angry.

>>4906833
So Tolkien made the magnum opus of European fantasy, what's your point?
You said fantasy, man, not European fantasy only.

>>4906833
>>Ideas specifically trying to avoid forking off Tolkien just end up being a fork off Tolkien in the opposite direction, defined by evading him rather than creating something organic or new.

Not every fantasy story is a response to Lord of the Rings in some way any more than every action adventure comic is a response to Superman. People do have fantastical stories they want to tell that they don't feel the need to run by the spinning corpse of Tolkien.

>>4891469
>How, at all, does "beautiful" contradict "interesting"? Would she be more interesting if she were ugly?
Nah. Problem is, women are rarely depicted as anything more than eyecandy. They can be both eyecandy and interesting, but they rarely are.

>>4894863
I hope you're not being serious. Insane person doing random things for no reason is the most inaccurate portray of insanity one can make. There are like a thousand mental illnesses and not all of them cause the sufferer to do that kind of shit. Read Nerval's Aurélia.

>>4906833
It sounds like you're focusing on Tolkien-styled fantasy and then complaining about how every european Tolkien-like medieval fantasy is compared to Tolkien. You're creating your own problem.

>>4907064
>There are like a thousand mental illnesses and not all of them cause the sufferer to do that kind of shit.
>not all of them
So some of them do. And thus it's not inaccurate. there.

>>4907163
You are a nitpicky faggot you know that

>>4907213
you're the one criticizing an appropriate trope

>>4897757
I'm fairly sure that's the point he's making.

>>4898019
That novel is one of the worst classics I have ever read.

>>4899404
It seems someone was assigned a Dickens novel in English.

>>4900859
Caulfield is one of the only examples I've ever seen pulled off successfully.

>>4904276
Also known as "/pol/ writes a science fiction novel."