Or, “On Worldbuilding Discourse.”
- TTLY…: Old posts.
Your Worldbuilding Bores Me When They Tell You to Do This
“The…” Fantasy, As Yet Untitled – Workshop #6: How Do We Keep Fantasy Weird and Eerie?
The sixth and final installment of “The…” Fantasy, As Yet Untitled:
- 1. A Cry for the Eerie – Mark Fisher: a palate cleanser for all those Freudian texts you’ve been forced to read;
- 2. Welcome to the New Weird – But not before brief detours to Lovecraft and Lucian;
- 2.1 Fantasy’s Weird Emulsifiers – Oil and water can, in fact, mix;
- 3. ☜︎♏︎❒︎♓︎♏︎📪︎ ☜︎♏︎❒︎♓︎●︎⍓︎ ✋︎■︎⧫︎♏︎❒︎♏︎⬧︎⧫︎♓︎■︎♑︎ 📫︎ ✋︎ ♐︎□︎❒︎♍︎♏︎♎︎ ⍓︎□︎◆︎ ⧫︎□︎ ●︎□︎□︎🙵 ◆︎◻︎ ♋︎ 🕈︎♓︎■︎♑︎♎︎♓︎■︎♑︎⬧︎ ⧫︎❒︎♋︎■︎⬧︎●︎♋︎⧫︎□︎❒︎🖴︎
- 3.1 ♋︎☠︎⧫︎✋︎❍︎☜︎❍︎☜︎⬧︎📫︎ 🗏︎🖲︎♊︎🗏︎🖲︎🕯︎📄︎📄︎📬︎🖮︎✂︎☠︎ 🖰︎📄︎♊︎🗏︎🖮︎🕯︎📂︎📄︎📬︎📁︎✂︎☜︎🖴︎
- 3.2 ✌︎︎■︎︎☠︎︎♓︎︎☟︎︎♓︎︎☹︎︎♋︎︎❄︎︎♓︎︎⚐︎︎■︎︎ 📫︎ 📂︎📁︎♊︎📁︎🗏︎′🗐︎🗏︎″💧︎ 📂︎🗄︎📄︎♊︎📂︎🖰︎′🗐︎⌛︎″🕈︎🖴︎
- 4. “But It’s Still Magic–“ – Is it? Is it, though?
- 5. Brief Reflections – TL;DR, I think I came up short but I ain’t quitting;
- TTLY… – Old posts.
“The…” Fantasy, As Yet Untitled – Workshop #5: Borrowing
- 1. Keeping it Real: Table stakes;
- 2. Beginning Borrowing: Literary writers like borrowing from genre – someone ought to ask what we should borrow back;
- 3. A Village After Dark: Litfic creates contexts where problems cannot be cleanly resolved;
- 3.5 Derailed (or, ‘Easter is Harvest time for the University’): Making up for the seminar that wasn’t;
- 4. Much Ado About Borrowing: Thinking of a philosophy for how to borrow
“The…” Fantasy, As Yet Untitled – Workshop #4: Plot (and Story)
- 1. Cleaving Plot and Story: Plot and story as fine distinctions;
- 2. Beginnings: On threshold moments;
- 2.1 Orc City: Scrutinising the hottest orcshitpost of Summer 2025;
- 3. Middles:
- 4. Endings: Before You Land:
- 4.1 Endings: After the Crash:
- 4.2 Endings: Deus Ex Chartis:
- TTLY…: Old posts.
“The…” Fantasy, As Yet Untitled – Workshop #3: Characterisation
In twenty-seven minutes (or your money back), you will read:
- 0. Preramble: What characterisation (and character arcs) mean;
- 1. Characterisation as… Structural Analysis: Walking across to the anthropologists’ aisle, to see what we can learn;
- 1½. *I move away from the keyboard to let Future Me edit*: Applying structural analysis in the classroom;
- 2. Characterisation as… Discovery: Fuck planning and shit – characters are vibes, baby;
- 3. Characterisation as… Meaningful Choices: OK, but how are you gonna make them different from everyone else?
- 3.1 Dialogue and Its Functions: Dialogue reveals change;
- 3.2 Changing the Font?: Exploring a Pratchettism in Jingo;
- 3.3 Point of View and Narration: Narrators have more to do with characterisation than you think;
- 3.4 Body Language and Actions: “What can the body say that speech would otherwise diminish?”
- 3.5 Thoughts: Keep it to yourself;
- 3.6 Appearances: I said, keep it to yourself;
- 3.7 The Other and Schismogenesis: Why look for the Other in the exotic? What’s stopping you from starting closer to home?
“The…” Fantasy, As Yet Untitled – Workshop #2: Worldbuilding
Twenty beautiful minutes on:
- 1. Telling Details and Incluing: or, “Pulverising the Boulder of Exposition;”
- 2. Pellargonia: A cautionary tale of worldbuilding getting out of hand;
- 3. Knowing Your Noinos: When vegetables aren’t vegetables;
- 4. Where’s My Thirty Magic Systems, bm?: If everyone knows a spell for fire…
- TTLY: Old posts.
“The…” Fantasy, As Yet Untitled – Workshop #1: Factfinding
My triumphant 28-minute return to blogging, and it concerns:
- 0. Preramble: On Pedagogy of the Oppressed;
- 1. Introduction to Factfinding: Who am I, and who are my students likely to be?;
- 2. Library of Babel and the Ur-Literature: What IS fantasy, anyway?;
- 3. Magic Kingdoms and Tremendous Trifles: Finding fantasy in the mundane;
- 4. Eggs-istential Problems (Or, “What’s the Fucking POINT??”): It’s the telepathy, stupid;
- 5. Finally! Finding Facts!
- TTLY: Vintage posts.
Two Years of Brologueing
- TTLY: Old posts
I Think I Get Silksong Now
Can I bother you for six minutes to discuss…
- The
quiet sadnessHORRENDOUS, HEART-WRENCHING, SOUL-DESTROYING epiphany Silksong has made me experience; - God I fucking hate Silksong but I fucking love Silksong;
- TTLY: Old posts.
CW: VERY very minor allusion to lategame content that could still be spoilery
Continue readingDan Davies’ ‘The Unaccountability Machine
A 20-minute long haul. Strap in for:
- Squirrels!
- Cybernetics!
- A man with a beard!
- Neoliberalism!
- TTLY: Old posts.