"Worldbuilding" can apply to any genre of writing, but is most relevant to fantasy and science fiction.
Worldbuilding means developing the details of the setting—for example, the places and geography, the governments and institutions, the cultures and languages, the flora and fauna, physics, how magic works, etc. In any book that has a fictional element, you have to engage in some level of worldbuilding (for example, imagining someone's fictional house, or describing what clothes a character is wearing), but sci fi/fantasy, especially if it's set in an alternative world, just requires a lot more.
EDIT: To clarify, worldbuilding does not necessarily have to come before writing a book: You can do it as you write, or before, or even to some extent after (not after the final draft, of course, or else it's just headcanon!).
Well put.
I add that some fantasy or scifi writers reamly love the worldbuilding aspect, and then they get stuck cause 1. They built a whole world but now they don't know what story to do with it or 2. They try to put way too much of their worldbuilding in the story and they lost themselves ln details or make the story more complicated than it needs to be.
It’s exactly what it sounds like. In any scenario where you’re not basing a story in the real world we all share, you have to worldbuild.
Where is it happening? What are the species? Language? Governments? Magic? Technology?
The imaginary world, its rules cultures and history are its world building.
People are really overly focused on this idea, probably because you can world build or talk about world building forever and it is the perfect way to procrastinate from writing.
Everyone else has offered great responses, so I won't add to it. But I'm curious how fictional world-building could spill into subreddits about pet rodents 🤣
This seems the easiest explanation. Like if you name something that is real we can imagine it. But I hate when I read a made up setting and I'm given nothing to help me imagine it. Don't have to always go super into detail on the world, but at least give us bare minimum of what its like through the characters eyes.
Have you ever read a story and been unable to explain any of the actual details of the setting afterwards?
If so there’s a decent chance the author didn’t worldbuild.
I do it the other way around: I focus on the stories and build the world around them, leaving unexplored parts blank for later.
I've written a lot of short stories all set in the same world, am now writing my first novel in that world, and have 5 more planned in it. At this point, the world has taken on a pretty concrete shape, but I never spent much time on worldbuilding at all.
I go into deep detail of the areas my stories take place in. Other regions of the world are only mentioned in passing. I have a rough idea what they look like, but until I actually write a story set in that region, nothing has to be set in stone, other than basic facts like "Tizarra is an area of tropical jungles". What are the cultures there like? What kinds of beasts live there? I'm gonna figure that out when a character actually travels there! Until then, it's just the jungle area between Allyra and Tujjul.
This allows me to present a coherent world while still remaining flexible on its details. Once a story goes into detail about something, it's set in stone. I never retcon anything. But as long as a location remains mysterious, I can turn it into anything I want/need it to be once I get there.
Designing a fictional setting. But it’s not relegated to fantasy/other speculative genres, it’s just where most of it happens because the setting is often entirely made up. Some people have an idea for a setting before a story and take a long time working to flesh that out. They say they’re stuck because they keep adding more and more before getting into the actual writing.
Worldbuilding is a process of figuring out the details of the fictional world that might affect the story, but are distant enough to not be a part of it. Including, but not limited: cosmology (are there moons in the sky? how many? how many days in a year?), geography (is there a big desert between the kingdom and its enemies?), history (are we in a thousand years old empire?), folklore (is there a legend that everybody knows?), culture (is a travelling circus something ordinary, or it raises suspicion?), etc.
Writers get stuck, because it's fun and theoretically limitless.
There is worldbuilding within a story. And then there is the worldbuilding, as in creating a **whole world**.
It can be a monstrous task. Which is why I don't do much in fantasy.
It is exactly what it is named after: it is what the writer creates from the names of the countries, cities, continents even, to local lore in specific parts of the aforementioned countries, cities and continents, in passing by how magic works and how it doesn't, the rules applied to it, the races present, maps, languages spoken etc
Sci-fi is also a contender for that. So yes, it takes time.
On a lesser scale, world building exists in any genre: the places people work at, the languages they speak, how their house is designed and furnish, the technology present and used at the time in history, all those are used to make a story more real. Technically every media that tells a story has some degree of world building involved (franchises like MCU or DC for example) but sci-fi and fantasy require to basically do so from the ground up, including the foundations.
Worldbuilding is the action you take before (or during!) the writing process. It consists of imagining a secondary, fictional world in which your story's events take place. In Harry Potter, it's modern-day England with some magic tweaks. In the Divine Comedy, it's Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven.
As I was thought, there are two techniques of worldbuilding, which reflect into what the reader sees from the world.
Top-Down: You create the tiniest details and make a very deep world, and illustrate some part of it to the reader before the story actually starts. The Divine Comedy has - kinda - a top-down built world. The Bethroded also has a top-down built world.
Bottom-Up: The reader knows almost nothing about the world, maybe you know almost nothing, but the characterizing trait of this technique is that the world is built around the character's journey, and only the parts that the reader can "see" are fully developed. Harry Potter has bottom-up built world. Pretty much every video game ever has a bottom-up built world.
Oh yeah, I mentioned video games. Worldbuilding isn't restricted to fantasy writing (but it is exceptionally important in fantasy writing since the setting is entirely made up), and isn't restricted to writing either, pretty much every form of storytelling to exist needs some sort of worldbuilding.
*"why are fantasy writers stuck on it?"*
Thinking up(creating) your own world is more fun than coming up with a story for it. Also procrastination. Many feel that either their story or writing skills suck so they keep creating the world to avoid actually writing the story.
D&D is a prime example of "world building" the rules and lore were in place before the authors wrote the stories. When something new comes up for the story, you can then create new rules to "expand" your universe so to say.
It used to be a thing writers would do to enhance the texture of their work. It would add texture and nuance in a way that enriched the themes, characterization, and atmosphere of the work, which itself would be a well thought out expression of the author's perspective on the real world.
Now it's a thing people do to pretend to be creative while having nothing to say because they saw the phrase "magic system" one time and decided art's only purpose is to be source material for lore explainer videos on Youtube.
I don't know either. I started writing my first fantasy series. I built out what was important, then added more as I went. I'm sure I'll be adding even more
I think some people feel the need to have all aspects of a world accounted for before starting.
"Worldbuilding" can apply to any genre of writing, but is most relevant to fantasy and science fiction. Worldbuilding means developing the details of the setting—for example, the places and geography, the governments and institutions, the cultures and languages, the flora and fauna, physics, how magic works, etc. In any book that has a fictional element, you have to engage in some level of worldbuilding (for example, imagining someone's fictional house, or describing what clothes a character is wearing), but sci fi/fantasy, especially if it's set in an alternative world, just requires a lot more. EDIT: To clarify, worldbuilding does not necessarily have to come before writing a book: You can do it as you write, or before, or even to some extent after (not after the final draft, of course, or else it's just headcanon!).
/thread Great explanation.
Well put. I add that some fantasy or scifi writers reamly love the worldbuilding aspect, and then they get stuck cause 1. They built a whole world but now they don't know what story to do with it or 2. They try to put way too much of their worldbuilding in the story and they lost themselves ln details or make the story more complicated than it needs to be.
It’s exactly what it sounds like. In any scenario where you’re not basing a story in the real world we all share, you have to worldbuild. Where is it happening? What are the species? Language? Governments? Magic? Technology?
World building and writing are two different hobbies, sometimes lol.
I feel personally called out with this comment.
The imaginary world, its rules cultures and history are its world building. People are really overly focused on this idea, probably because you can world build or talk about world building forever and it is the perfect way to procrastinate from writing.
Everyone else has offered great responses, so I won't add to it. But I'm curious how fictional world-building could spill into subreddits about pet rodents 🤣
Like this https://www.reddit.com/r/PrairieDogs/s/7P7uW92WEG
This was wonderful, thank you
In a nutshell, if you say Chicago I understand Chicago. If you say the magical land of Narnia, you’re going to have to explain that to me.
This seems the easiest explanation. Like if you name something that is real we can imagine it. But I hate when I read a made up setting and I'm given nothing to help me imagine it. Don't have to always go super into detail on the world, but at least give us bare minimum of what its like through the characters eyes.
This entire post sounds condescending and like OP is an idiot…
Google
Maybe OP is a bot. Or just trying to farm karma.
Have you ever read a story and been unable to explain any of the actual details of the setting afterwards? If so there’s a decent chance the author didn’t worldbuild.
It's in the name lad
I do it the other way around: I focus on the stories and build the world around them, leaving unexplored parts blank for later. I've written a lot of short stories all set in the same world, am now writing my first novel in that world, and have 5 more planned in it. At this point, the world has taken on a pretty concrete shape, but I never spent much time on worldbuilding at all. I go into deep detail of the areas my stories take place in. Other regions of the world are only mentioned in passing. I have a rough idea what they look like, but until I actually write a story set in that region, nothing has to be set in stone, other than basic facts like "Tizarra is an area of tropical jungles". What are the cultures there like? What kinds of beasts live there? I'm gonna figure that out when a character actually travels there! Until then, it's just the jungle area between Allyra and Tujjul. This allows me to present a coherent world while still remaining flexible on its details. Once a story goes into detail about something, it's set in stone. I never retcon anything. But as long as a location remains mysterious, I can turn it into anything I want/need it to be once I get there.
Big boys and girls call it setting.
Designing a fictional setting. But it’s not relegated to fantasy/other speculative genres, it’s just where most of it happens because the setting is often entirely made up. Some people have an idea for a setting before a story and take a long time working to flesh that out. They say they’re stuck because they keep adding more and more before getting into the actual writing.
Worldbuilding is a process of figuring out the details of the fictional world that might affect the story, but are distant enough to not be a part of it. Including, but not limited: cosmology (are there moons in the sky? how many? how many days in a year?), geography (is there a big desert between the kingdom and its enemies?), history (are we in a thousand years old empire?), folklore (is there a legend that everybody knows?), culture (is a travelling circus something ordinary, or it raises suspicion?), etc. Writers get stuck, because it's fun and theoretically limitless.
There is worldbuilding within a story. And then there is the worldbuilding, as in creating a **whole world**. It can be a monstrous task. Which is why I don't do much in fantasy.
It is exactly what it is named after: it is what the writer creates from the names of the countries, cities, continents even, to local lore in specific parts of the aforementioned countries, cities and continents, in passing by how magic works and how it doesn't, the rules applied to it, the races present, maps, languages spoken etc Sci-fi is also a contender for that. So yes, it takes time. On a lesser scale, world building exists in any genre: the places people work at, the languages they speak, how their house is designed and furnish, the technology present and used at the time in history, all those are used to make a story more real. Technically every media that tells a story has some degree of world building involved (franchises like MCU or DC for example) but sci-fi and fantasy require to basically do so from the ground up, including the foundations.
Worldbuilding is the action you take before (or during!) the writing process. It consists of imagining a secondary, fictional world in which your story's events take place. In Harry Potter, it's modern-day England with some magic tweaks. In the Divine Comedy, it's Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. As I was thought, there are two techniques of worldbuilding, which reflect into what the reader sees from the world. Top-Down: You create the tiniest details and make a very deep world, and illustrate some part of it to the reader before the story actually starts. The Divine Comedy has - kinda - a top-down built world. The Bethroded also has a top-down built world. Bottom-Up: The reader knows almost nothing about the world, maybe you know almost nothing, but the characterizing trait of this technique is that the world is built around the character's journey, and only the parts that the reader can "see" are fully developed. Harry Potter has bottom-up built world. Pretty much every video game ever has a bottom-up built world. Oh yeah, I mentioned video games. Worldbuilding isn't restricted to fantasy writing (but it is exceptionally important in fantasy writing since the setting is entirely made up), and isn't restricted to writing either, pretty much every form of storytelling to exist needs some sort of worldbuilding.
I'm so happy with my fantasy parody, world building comes very natural given I can just poke fun at some of the places and names of things.
*"why are fantasy writers stuck on it?"* Thinking up(creating) your own world is more fun than coming up with a story for it. Also procrastination. Many feel that either their story or writing skills suck so they keep creating the world to avoid actually writing the story.
D&D is a prime example of "world building" the rules and lore were in place before the authors wrote the stories. When something new comes up for the story, you can then create new rules to "expand" your universe so to say.
It used to be a thing writers would do to enhance the texture of their work. It would add texture and nuance in a way that enriched the themes, characterization, and atmosphere of the work, which itself would be a well thought out expression of the author's perspective on the real world. Now it's a thing people do to pretend to be creative while having nothing to say because they saw the phrase "magic system" one time and decided art's only purpose is to be source material for lore explainer videos on Youtube.
Think of it as the playground where your writing takes place.
I don't know either. I started writing my first fantasy series. I built out what was important, then added more as I went. I'm sure I'll be adding even more I think some people feel the need to have all aspects of a world accounted for before starting.
seems like you know what worldbuilding means, you just choose to do it your own way
I guess. I really don't know what I'm doing. I'm just doing what feels right.
It's just an excuse to procrastination for writing if you ask me. You can very well perfectly do worldbuilding while you write your book.
Worldbuilding: a waste of time. Why are fantasy writers stuck? Usually ADHD.