Tropes are tropes for a reason. I would be very inclined to think that 'poor communication' is one of the most common reasons for a serious relationship to end. With that in mind, i suggest we explore these tropes even further.
"I've saved my friends from situations, and guess what - we didn't then BANG!" Ah, I see where you've gone wrong. You must - you MUST - do the sexing after saving someone. It's just convention.
Honestly, if someone literally saved my life, esp. as a stranger, a little sexing is the least I could do. But that's the differentiation between a sense of obligation and just... not being a narcissist.
One of the things I LOVE so much about Tolkien's works (you know, besides loving every single bit of it) is that there is so much platonic and filial love, not just romantic! Thank you Daniel for emphasizing that those relationships need to be developed and appreciated too
It honestly drives me nuts how often I see people point at Sam and Frodo and go "Look, they have emotions about each other! They must be in love!" Instead of just "These are two really close friends that have been through hell together, and it would be weird if they didn't feel any emotions towards each other". Close friends can love each other without it being romantic. I'm a straight bloke, but I'm not ashamed to say I love my mates. Doesn't mean I wanna bang em. They're like brothers and sisters
I honestly can not thank you enough for this video. Might I also add: does every book NEED romance? Most of sff deal with apocalyptic end of the world scenarios where there is enough drama to keep readers engaged. Love stories are almost always unrealistic/ not needed. I want more books with main characters who are single at the beginning and remain so throughout the story, because there're more urgent things to deal with. Sigh.... I have lots of feelings about this topic 😑
I feel like this would have been good advice for Vin and Elend in Mistborn. There was no romance described in Mistborn between them. We were told that they loved each other but it was never shown (they should have been hormonal teenagers but they acted like 50 year olds after their third divorce). Would have been a good opportunity for a friendship rather.
I completely agree with you with love at first sight it’s so frustrating. I actually have one of my characters think he’s fallen in love at first sight, only for him to realise he knows nothing about that person & he’s just infatuated/ obsessed with her. And he quickly learns that that’s not such a great to be.
Spoiler alert if you haven't read this book... That's kind of how it falls out in Mercedes Lackey's The Firebird, one of my favorite of her stand-alone fairy tale/ballet retellings. Ilya, our young hero, has a history of not exactly thinking with his brain where a pretty girl is involved. He infiltrates the palace of the Katschei, an evil sorcerer with a dozen captive beautiful maidens in his thrall, and falls instantly in love with Tatiana, the most beautiful of them. Every time she does or says something, he tells himself "how wise she is! How kind!" But once he's defeated the Katschei and freed his captives (one of which is Ilya's dim-witted, hot-headed brother who'd tried and failed to rescue the maidens), he realizes that Tatiana is a stupid, selfish, spoiled brat, and the things he'd built up her imagined personality around were all just brief, fleeting moments that had nothing to do with her real personality. He decides to go through with the upcoming marriage anyway, because he gave his word and won't break it, and besides, a woman as beautiful as she is would only be bound to end up a captive to some other evil wizard or villain if no one protected her. But it turns out that she's cheating on him pre-wedding with the aforementioned brother, who is her (shallow) idea of "a man". He's relieved to have the out, and flees to the woman he realizes he really loves--the titular Firebird, a shapeshifting fairy queen.
I hate it so much when the hero leaves the love interest to protect them or for their own good… Even though the love interest always says that they will stick by the hero no matter what… It is the stupidest shit and I can’t stand it
or medieval eastern europe. actually, lgbts where normal and where accepted in eastern europe until the 18th century when a csar wanted to modernise the east and took the homophobic west as an ideal. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_Europe
They didn't exist in the modern sense. Man-man relationships were generally teacher-student or older-younger in nature, and it was a great embarrassment if anyone found out you were the "woman" or submissive one of the relationship.
It is interesting how many of the conventionally accepted "truths" about mediveal times are actually misunderstandings by early Victorian archeologs, historians and writers.
Which makes me wonder why people think this current movement is so "progressive." It's not. It's the same thing that's been happening for thousands of years. It's cycling, not progressing.
Love at first sight can work if the character thinks they're in love but the reader knows they're not. You can have their arc be about realizing they were never truly in love, which would be a fun twist on a cliche.
"He stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she was the Sun. Yet he saw her like the Sun, even without looking." -Sincerely, a non-fantasy book
My reasoning for having non-racist medieval societies in my fantasy stories is that, in a world with elves and dwarves and all kinds of other races, humanity has a more unified mindset. Essentially, they aren't racist against humans because they perceive non-humans as a bigger threat.
Really? Cause if things were different I would totally date him after watching this. Polite, eloquent, well read, good looking, clearly has morals and standards isnt spineless.
I have such a great dislike of love at first sight I'd actually refuse to read a book that has it. I do agree infatuation is okay, especially in YA. Teenagers get infatuated a lot. But love? Especially thinking you found your true love at 16-18? It's a no for me. Same with love triangles. If I see a hint of a love triangle, I won't pick up the book or dnf it if not done well. I just got so tired of it, especially since bad boys are so popular and I hate bad boys a lot.
I get it and also if not done well don't like it, but I feel like love at first sight is basically infatuation at first sight, teenagers always say I'm in love when they're not really in love. Bottom line if it's not done well then 👎
The bad boy trope if done correctly is fine. But let him be a bad boy, not a good guy who just has a motorcycle and a heart of gold hidden by rough angles. Case study. Frank Castle (The Punisher) is a bad boy. Jacob from Twilight is not lol
Yeah, but it seems like the authors agree with them. The author doesn't seem to know it's not true. A book that does this well is All American Girl, the main chracter is just as bad as most YA characters, but the author KNOWS it. They know that she is a hormonal teengaer that is bad at thinking about consiquences and is easily influenced. But because the author knows it, she grows as a person, and learns that she is WRONG in most if not many aspects and gets over herself. Another example of this is the Besty-Tacy series, especially the high school books. It as all the tropes that I hate, immature girl that's obbsessed with her looks, love triangles, crushes, and other things. But it's written by a fifty year old woman looking back on her high school years and knows how trivial these struggles are. Most of all, even the main character, though she is niave and a bit thick, she is well rounded and feels like a real teenager. One of the many reacoring themes is how she has grown each year, and how she wants to improve. Not to mention she's genuinly a nice person and wants to be better. Most YA chacracters do not do this. The authors plays it as the romance is the biggest deal ever, even though it isn't, because they want to appeal to teenagers. So that's why it's bad.
Love at first sight spoils the whole part about getting to know the characters and seeing their dynamic. Like if the narrator just sees someone and BAM fireworks well then we're already running on the assumption they'll get together. Kinda takes the journey out of it.
Absolutely agree! I just want to add how uncomfortable it makes me that in some fantasy books, the only notable women are prostitutes. Nice to know that women are only good for paid sex. Can you make a video about a positive examples of romances in fantasy books in the future? From recent years I only found two examples I enjoyed and I'd like to find more: the love triangle turned polyamory in Fifth Season is done extremely well, and the Final Empire actually has really good and consent-based buildup for Vin and her significant otter (haven't read further since then, so if it goes horribly wrong I'm unaware, please don't spoil).
Another trope I hate is everyone being paired up in a couple at the end of a series just to reinforce the idea of a happy ending. And I say fuck that because being in a relationship doesn't entail happiness and you don't have to be in a relationship to be happy. This trope really bores me cause it's so expected, so recycled, so boring and it leads to authors forcing romance when in reality the characters have no real chemistry. I'd rather read a series where characters start as friends/enemies and end as friends. Or a character that remains single at the end of the series because again, you don't need to be in a relationship to be happy. I just want some strong friendships, two characters don't have to bone just cause they're in the same room.
For the record, love at first sight is a real thing. The first time I saw my wife she was walking down the hallway in school, dropped a book from the stack she was carrying, bent over to pick it up, dropped two more while trying to pick up the first one, then dropped another while getting those two. I didn't even approach her. I just watched as one of her friends ran over to help, who then promptly asked her, "You have a backpack on your back, why don't you put some of these in there?" To which she said, "I can't. It's full of books." Just the serious and almost defeated tone in how she delivered that response burned her into my brain. I instantly thought, "This chick is my destiny." We started hanging out that day, were dating by the end of the week, and have now been married for 22 years. So, love at first sight in fiction can happen. It just has to not be done lazily, which, if we're being honest, is how all of your writing should be anyway. No shortcuts. My own personal experience aside, I don't want "modern world representation" in my fantasy story. It comes across like you're checking a box and immediately ruins the immersion. Especially if the story deals with countries with defined kingdoms and territories.
Damn jim zimmer, that's a little rude, don't you think? @kamuelalee If it was from a spell or curse, (in my opinion) it wouldn't be real love. Someone's emotions is being messed with magic, and that feeling wouldn't happen without it. Like a lot of the comments here, it's basically a variation of "character thinks they're in love, but they're actually not."
I’m writing a dark modern fantasy novel and pretty much the whole thing is gay art students at an international college in Hong Kong because I just snapped. I’m writing what I want to read.
Preach! I will say I am ok with a certain level of “ownership” if it is equal between the couple and out of love, commitment, spirit of oneness and not control or the feel of a threat. Not the crazy “you can’t talk to her” or “we do what I say because I’m in control” way. I mean, my husband is MY HUSBAND, I am HIS WIFE and we are a unit. And our relationship is to be honored and respected by others. I’m not worried about him acting some kind of wrong way but best you believe I’ll be all over some hooker who thinks she can disregard that ring on his finger. Because that is my right and visa versa. We’re not controlling or demeaning one another in day to day life with feeling possessive over each other because we are grown adults with our own respected agency. Some levels of relationship do predicate a bit of possessiveness...and that’s ok. I hope that makes sense.
@Lori Ann White The husband. If someone insults your friend, do you defend them, or fuck off and let your friend deal with it alone? After all, don't you trust them to be able to handle themselves? Any time you associate people, you establish a level of "ownership." It's not "treating someone as not their own person" to not be protective of your associates. As Traci mentions, there's a difference between what's being described here and defense out of insecurity, lack of trust, and/or unhealthy controlling behaviour.
@Lori Ann White If you feel the need to attack others because they want to feel like someone cares about them, you might need that help yourself. Nobody likes people who take out their insecurities on other people, Lori.
Regarding interracial relationships in fictional worlds. Yes, you can believe in anything that happens in a fantasy universe. That doesn't mean that fantasy worlds have to be perfect inclusive utopias or the authors are (racist/sexist/whatever). Authors have a right to explore whatever kind of fictional universes they wish. Including ones that aren't nice. I'd argue they mostly want to explore not-nice universes, because conflicts are what makes stories interesting. I agree it's bad writing if they then fail to use these conflicts in any way. It especially drives me crazy when cultures that rarely have their 5 minutes of attention of worldwide audience have their work of art called racist because it doesn't relate to demographic of modern USA... Just like portraying violence in a book doesn't make author violent nor does it mean that author is promoting violence - same thing applies to any other aspect of a fictional world. Portraying racism in a book doesn't mean book or author is racist. Same with sexism, drug abuse, anything. For one example - in The Witcher books interracial relationships (human-elvish as opposed to black-white because people of color live in other continent in this universe) are mentioned as persecuted. Elves complain in "The Edge of The World" that they are hanged for sleeping with human women, and Yarpen Zigrin mentions in "Blood of Elves" that interracial relationships are also considered bad by elves, mostly because they see them as one of the causes of them "losing competition" to human. I think it doesn't make the books racist, it makes them more interesting, because they show how racism arises and how it works. And I much prefer that these books don't say "by the way racism is EVIL, don't do this". Readers are plenty smart enough to deduce it on their own.
I'm so glad to see another Dear Authors! I just re-watched the first one yesterday. And yeah... Romance is usually handeled badly. I'm hoping to write about two women who've been in a (turning into) a long term relationship (inter-racial, strange how you mentioned that both) and certain internal and external conflicts that causes (made worse by both of their personalities). The other romance plot i'm hoping to do is a subversion of the classic, hero's journey boy meets the beautiful princess (kind of objectifies her & view her only as a romantic interest, rather than a person) and in a John Green Paper towns/ Looking for Alaska way- subvert the boy's expectations where he learns that maybe a relationship isn't for the best for either of them atm & that he should really put the effort into learning more about HER as a person and become a friend.
Just because I am a woman that does NOT mean I need female leads or strong female characters!!!!! Some of my favorite books and movies have male leads and bland female love interests or no female characters at all and I'm fine with that! I'm not an idiot who has to see my gender "represented" in order to feel validation in who I am! Let me say that again. I do NOT need to see other women being "strong" or "heros" or "independent" in order to be those things myself. I am a hospice nurse who cares for the dying and who sword fights in my free time. I am a normal person who doesn't want to be pandered to or coddled. In fact I find it far FAR more insulting to shoe horn in "strong" female leads or "independent" women into stories that don't need them. People demanding "representation" in media is retarded. A plot calls for what it calls for and no one should apologize for that or change it to PANDER to a certain demographic. Come on I am so sick of seeing people say this. Do YOU need see your specific demographic represented in a positive way in order to validated in who YOU are as a person? If you answer yes then you need some serious therapy because you have some serious issues to work through.
@@WhitneyDahlin I think the whole point of such characters is to show that not all people are cut from the same cloth. I.E. there are so many different type of people in the world so why are there only few in fiction. Granted many of these supposed representation tend to fall flat on its face and make them less human, thus failing at their intended purposes, kinda why I like WoT because it explores very different people in different cultures.
I feel this video has two different themes. The first part is explaining how realism in writing is needed (I.e. falling in love at first sight is improbable and illogical) yet the second portion is explaining how realism in writing is a problem (I.e. less sexism than reality). This confuses me. Of course this is essentially your opinion and completely subjective, but I would ask when should the author be simulating reality and when should the author delve into fantasy? (wish fulfillment or other desired occurrences). From my take on people who disagree with the prevalence of race and gender focus in many stories, it might be a differently aligned desire for escapism. The current world is very vocal regarding racial and gender issues, many people might want to escape this in their fantasies. However, I agree romances in fantasy generally suck and are usually the parts I wish to skip. It might be because of a disconnect to realism, I do not care because the relationships are forced or unreal, but where should an author be real and where shouldn't they be? Take for example the joker from the Dark Knight. Many love this villain since he is completely surreal but not cartoonish and the dark gritty feel makes him more relatable. When should this be adopted? Is it all subjective? And if so, why do we care?
This is an old comment but the difference between love at first sight and including racism is that the author is asking the readers to care about a romance. Romance takes up a lot of pages and we're obviously meant to care whether the relationship works out. We're supposed to feel sad when the protagonist is fighting with a love interest and keep turning the pages to see what happens. It is very difficult to give a fuck about a romance when you can't wrap your head around why they even care about one another in the first place. Including racism in a plot where it doesn't mean anything is just including racism. It doesn't make the story better. It doesn't keep me turning the pages to see what happens. It's just there. I just know that some races are treated like shit while it has no effect on the protagonist's adventure.
I think the difference is that relationships are a real thing, and your fantasy world is not. Meaning, we KNOW how real relationship feels, and therefore it feels weird to see authors write unrealistic things like "love at first sight". However, magic doesn't exist in the real world, and so it's not cringey for not being realistic, because there isn't a reality of magic to compare it to. Your fantasy world is entirely created by you. It doesn't exist. You have the opportunity to create things from scratch, and so it's strange that is extremely rare to see interracial/same-sex relationships in fantasy books. I'm not saying that people shouldn't create worlds with racial tensions and homophobia (in fact, that would be interesting in terms of world building and also addressing real world problems) but if your world only has white/straight people with no real reason for it, it can feel (at least for me) a little creepy... Like you're reading about the world of a white supremacist's wet dream.
It’s realism to the human experience for the sake of an emotionally fulfilling read we can all relate to vs realism to a specific time period that no one alive today can relate to and therefore really doesn’t need to be there
I love wheel of time, but I don’t think he got relationships right at all. It may not directly be love at first sight, it’s very much sudden and out of nowhere in a lot of situations, such as Nyneave and Lan, who just suddenly decide after having maybe three scenes together with just the slightest amount of interaction together discover they are just so hot for each other, it always bothered me. Same with Elayne and Rand, I think they have one or two chapters in the first book together and then she is just head over heels for the rest of the series for him. I can excuse Rand’s thing a little via the wheel being a very real thing that makes people do things they wouldn’t, but it just felt like most relationships were like that. Mat and Tuon were good though, at least they were explicitly shown to be slowly building a relationship and spending time together.
*Major Mistborn spoilers* 1:45 I was so happy when the teased love triangle between Vin, Zane, and Eland (or Elend, i forget) turned into Vin killing Zane, rather than falling into the trope of trying to turn the bad boy good
Tbh the Elend Vin relationship felt out of place, cheesy, and downright cringy at times. The fact that it was pretty much insta love doesn't help either, and the whole character of Elend was just meh, biggest downside of the trilogy imo
Yeah, as a young black Brazilian woman who enjoys fantasy I agree with you ( : and thought I know it won't come out any time soon, I'm looking forward to reading your book. I really appreciate the fact you are always speaking about those important themes in your channel. I also believe that when we, as the readers, start pointing out that we do care about diversity in fantasy books, the authors will be compelled to inckude it into their books. That's why I think it's important for us to bring awareness, so other people will start realising how important it actually is.
I like romances that never conclude. The two are left without their happily ever after and have to either take up a greater responsibility or the SO dies.
Yess!! This makes me love you even more! In the same vein, let's talk about the normalization of jealously and jealous behavior in Fantasy novels (and IRL too)! I'll DNF a book the second a character exhibits some sort of jealous behavior, like negging, or "fighting for the relationship." When will we start viewing jealousy for what it is? A entire box of red flags.
The sexism in fantasy is one of the biggest reasons why it's hard for me to read more books in that genre.More often than not the woman are poorly written or when they do something that it's out of the norm of their representation the backlash from the fan base is insane.I am not saying make the male characters inferior to them but I wish I could see better representation for women.
Forced representation and diversity are the cancer of modern new authors, seeing everything through the political lense (although most of the times such stories are nothing more than ways of entertainment) is beyond pathetic. Most of fantasy settings take place in medieval times, and like it or not medieval times societies were deeply racist, xenophobe, classist and gender roles were almost set in stone. If you don't like that type of setting don't read it, but changing that setting and applying sXXI politics or modern morals will only harm the setting of your story. Why is it that in sci-fi or futuristic settings there's not much of an issue with inclusion or representation? because in those settings is easy to understand that the morals or behaviors of such societies are more similar to the ones we have.
@@francesccampos1343 Excuse me but unless it describes a historic event you can take the liberty of making changes.Because in those times as well there were people that made the difference that changed the course of history that were women or people or color. A lot of fantasy is about magic or creatures since we know those never existed fantasy should not have them right?? Because it goes against of that time.Right???? Everyone is calling forced representation or woke anything that is not following the classic formula white male savior, damsel in distress and barely there people of color.Our books need to change for the better and not perpetuate racist stereotypes.
@@mariapol17 Wrong nº1, you are putting politics and s.XXI morals into stories that don't match such ideals, it doesn't matter if it's fiction, coherence is an important point of any good story. Wrong nº2, magic and creatures in fantasy act most of the time as neutral creatures and systems that make the stories "special" otherwise that wouldn't be part of the fantasy genre. Specially in medieval times there were mythos generated due to the ignorance of the popular masses, that's why using magic and monsters fit in medieval settings. Wrong nº3, forced representation is when people DEMAND to the author that they include X gender or X race portrayed as important or good just for the sake of it, no matter the plot or the coherence of the story. That's just both racist and sexist because you show that you don't care about the plot or the core of the story but only about your s.XXI morals being portrayed in the story from someone else. Those are not YOUR books, they are the author's books, if you don't like them just write your own story or support someone who does what you like, but DEMANDING someone to write as you please is both egocentric and selfish. Stop telling authors how they must write, only absolutist and dictatorial regimes try to force culture to follow their believes.
There's been a lot of great fantasy by female authors coming out that treats female characters a lot better, and it's been good to see. I love my classic sausage fest fantasy books but even I can admit that how fantasy has treated women has been a blind spot for a good while. (Just gonna ignore the guy claiming that because fantasy is sometimes loosely inspired by medieval times that means you should have no creativity in worldbuilding whatsoever and just take a milder version of sexism of tge time, because you know damn well fantasy authors almost never show the true horor of misoginy in the middle ages, and put it in your books without thought. It's boring and unimaginative. I'm not sure how someone with such little creativity can call themselves a fantasy fan)
And this is why if I ever become an author I'll just avoid romance as much as I can, since I've noticed that in some stories people are far more concerned about who's going to be paired with who than the overall plot or the conflict! It drives me nuts, and if we go by diversity then one could argue single people need to be portrayed more often.
“Misunderstandings” in Romance drive me ducking insane! But I don’t mind Romance as a sub plot but please don’t make it the goal of a character. Also, once the couple are together, don’t change their personality! I’ve read books where the girl is bad ass and smart, but as soon as the couple gets together, she becomes a totally different character... like seriously, sure people act a bit different with their significant other, but their whole personality doesn’t change that much, this is a sign that the author may have only had wrote that character for the protagonist to fawn over and the other character to be a “trophy”.
Got to the part about friendships and hit the subscribe button immediately. Man, I WISH there were more stories about buddies, like... please... it can't be that hard.
As for the whole withholding information and causing a misunderstanding thing, I can let it pass if I can understand the logic behind that decision. However, so often, I see characters withholding the information without proper reasoning. Nothing drives me crazier than characters acting out of character for no reason at all. I give slight leeway since miscommunication does happen in real life but it does need to be justified. If they’re acting out of fear or mistrust, I want to see those emotions and understand the decision, rather than a contrived device to make a plot work.
I like it when people put dark ideas into their stories and worlds, showing it's not all nice. Having bad, abuse relationships can be interesting to see, but it shouldn't be seen as good by the readers, however the characters could see it as ok because it's normal in their world.
Nothing grinds my gears more than the miscommunication-leads-to-conflict trope. It's such a lazy plot point and just makes me mad and dislike the couple than actually feel sorry for them. And you're right, it often goes against the characters' personalities, so it just makes even less sense.
I absolutely agree with the strong friendships thing. A friendship shouldn't be stagnant, and many friendships in fantasy are. And it's also pretty sad if your friendship with someone is based entirely on you saving them whenever they are in a life and death situation. I understand the dynamic of two brothers in arms, but a dynamic like that usually starts out with both characters being warriors and having trained and fought together. The dynamic I have seen in countless tv, books, and movies is "you're an idiot and you wouldn't be this close to death if you weren't, but I'm going to save you anyway because I care about you for some reason". It was also funny to hear you talk about interracial romance, because in my book the one romance I have is between a big black guy and a petite white girl. They are elves, so they don't have the same history or cultures, which changes their relationship dynamic if they were humans in our world with different colored skin, but the idea is the same. Romance is way overdone. A lot. But I enjoy a good, healthy romance, especially when the two characters are like best friends and they can sit and talk about nothing for four hours.
As a lesbian who adores high fantasy i cringe so much when i see how gay romance is written (when it is written at all ), the only reason i still sometimes read YA books is cause they have good number of lgbt characters so i can find at least couple of them that are decent...the problem is i don't like ya that much anymore so i hope adult fantasy gets better at gay romance and romance in general...anyhow thank you for this video so many good points : ))
Thank you so much for this video, I could not have said it any better!!! I HATE the "love at first sight" and "friends having to become lovers" tropes!
Could you do a video comparing the relationship of bridge four from Stormlight to the relationship of the wolf pack from Red Rising Trilogy? Think it would be a cool video because I think both of those show great development of friendships Also highly suggest the Red Rising audiobook as the narration is top notch
4:18 You described Harry Potter and Ginny's Romance in The Movies 6-8. Thr movies basically just say they are gonna be together with no real Relationship progression and Ginny barely has any screen time throughout the Entire Harry Potter Movies series.
And the relationship with Cho was shown to develop on both sides over time, but then suddenly dropped like a hot potato, but with Ginny it was: Suddenly they were a couple, but we saw nothing of their feelings develop, unlike Cho, until the announcement of their status as a couple. It was really stupid.
The only thing that bothers me about RJ women is when they are wrong, they almost never apologize. The boys are regularly called out on being stupid for doing stupid crap. Which should be the case and they are made to apologize. Mostly by women. But when the women do stupid crap or need help to get them out of their stupid decisions they almost never apologize or are admonished for it by men. And even if they are made to apologize for something it has to be dragged out grudgingly or to say thank you for that matter. Mat, Elaine and Nynieve as an example.
It's always a little bit frustrating that there seem to be an absence of LGBT romances in fantasy and sci-fi. Even writters that claim to be quite liberal miss the chance to diversify a little bit, JK Rowling being an example of that. It wouldn't be a problem if there wasn't too much focus on romance on the HP series but from the 4th book onward it seemed as if everybody was getting a couple and the only gay person in the whole world was Dumbledore, a character who was outed once the series finished. The only fantasy author so far that I've seen done actually something to add more diverse relationships is Rick Riordan; say all you want about that guy (yeah, I know, even for me his writting stylehas get stale a little bit; his book centred on Norse Mythology were a bit boring) but you don't see that many books (and aimed for younger readers) that shows same sex and interracial couples as he does as those he writes. Certainly you won't see that from JK, she's too busy writting about how Wizards go to the bathroom (By the way, I love Rowling, she's much better writter than Riordan in almost every aspect, that just a little issue I got with her, nothing more; I mean, Harry Potter got me into reading in the first place).
Love at first sight is rare but real. We tend to think of love in one way but other cultures have different kinds of love. I have a friend, her aunt and uncle met on a vacation and it was love at first sight. They married a week after meeting and 40 years later they are still in love with one another.
The point of relational ownership is an important one. However, I'd find it odd if it weren't present even in the most benevolent of characters. That's because even at our most elevated level we are flawed and in my opinion, the most interesting characters are one that is still flawed in spite of their framing within prose; like Kaladin. Human relationships will never be perfect and while I agree that this seems primitive and problematic I still prefer characters and their relationships to be reflective of what's real about people rather than what should or could be. I should say that mine is an argument about framing and your point about how these relationships are framed is spot on.
misunderstandings certainly do suck a lot to read/watch. BUT i have seen this shit happen to so many different people in real life, its not even funny. So while it is frustrating like 99% of the time, its certainly based in reality. tho tbh i wouldnt mind having less of it in media
The best way to subvert the first trope of love-Have it be a magic based mental manipulation, as in Arthurian legend there is a lot magic love relationships.
The problem with how female characters are written in modern media isnt that they have agency. To often they are written to be rude and angry like the modern feminist. They don't come across as having good ideas or great insight. I'd love it if they were. But modern writers tend to think that making a female character spiteful and demeaning is the same as giving her agency.
I am a romance fanatic and I happen to like healthy relationships. Sometimes I would have to just put a good book down because of toxic character. The most well-done romances I have ever watched in fantasy genre are Snow and Charming and Hook and Emma from once upon a time the tv show. I want to read well-done romances. Romance novels don't have healthy and interesting romances worth cheering for. Also nailing romance is harder than it seems. I just have the lowest expectations when it comes to finding good romances in fantasy genre. Dialogues are the soul of romance. Witty banter, flirting back and forth, awkward small talk, being vulnerable can happen only through good dialogues. This is so difficult to find in romance books. Beach Read does do some of it extremely well.
In Oathbringer, Navani describes how relationships really work and that sealed the deal for me. (Even though I’ve never been in a romantic relationship before so I can’t actually say anything other than observations here)
the reason for all this things should be obvious. Young authors writing because of their love of literature but are too young to have actually life experience. I know that sounds harsh but its true. The number one advice i give aspiring authors is to go out and live life. Travel the world; take chances; move out of your comfort zone; do the unthinkable. Be unpredictable. Be spontaneous.
I feel like the best approach to writing romance is by not ever intentionally making your characters get together. Just write their interactions (and maybe some romantic/flirty undertones) but always write the characters as individuals, and then later if you recognise that they may be getting closer to one another, then you can start to lean into it.
Pips is just sitting back there, thinking how different cat relationships are and how love at first sight can happen with cats because they never blink and look away, it's just one continuous sight
One thing I hate is rapid, onset relationships. You need a relationship arch, not a cliff.. Looking at you Adeyemi. "Kill her. Kill magic." (2 days later) "LET'S. MAKE. BABIES!!" Like.... I can't....
I don't mind the love triangle too - if it's done right. I mean when a character is claiming he/she (usually she) loves two others romantically at the same time and/or can't decide which one he/she should "choose" for longer than a chapter then I put the book down. It makes the character childish. But a love traingle where a character is just not fully aware of her/his feelings to two other characters is fine with me. My favourite romantic plot is "friends into lovers". Maybe because every good relationship I know in the real life has such beginnings, including mine.
I blame the over use of bad romance in books the reason why I so damn confused growing up… turns out I’m Aro-Ace, didn’t even know they existed till I was 18, then I took another 5 years to actually feel comfortable with the identity. I’m still a romance junky, which just makes me hate bad romance even more!
I love your opinions here, I love the style and the editing and the sense of humor.. Great video! I don't believe you btw. You're definitely trying to get a date or something. Humans *can't* empathize with others just for the sake of empathy. Impossible.
My wife and I are in an interracial marriage but it doesn’t bother me that it isn’t common in fantasy. Races emerge because of fairly complete and long-term isolation allowing genetic drift to vary. Anywhere that there are races there will be diverse cultures with long-term separation. Relationships require adopting a common culture between two people and it is much tougher when there are different and even opposing cultural values brought together. It wouldn’t be awful to see more but don’t bother being offended for our sakes, being underrepresented makes sense and I wouldn’t want ‘our cause’ to detract from an organic story.
I often hang around these kinds of videos to get a free do's and dont's on writing well-fleshed characters. Thanks a bunch, Daniel! If I ever get started on my writing, I'd try to suck less at romance.
Dunno... I believe in love at first sight. My parents met, they fell in love, they got married after 18 days and here we are 30 years later. Its rare, but it exist
Great video! wish more people would talk about this and more authors listen to this. I also don't like the coupling of every single character. Ow, the main character has a best friend, well lets set him/her up with the best friend of the love interest because that's how this works right?! And no one is alone and happy. everyone needs to be settled or they are miserable.
In regards to the point about more diversity in regards to interracial and LGBTQI+ romances being needed, I'd also like to add that when included in a story, more authors should have the main character being involved in such a relationship. So very often, in those cases where it IS included in the story, it is secondary characters or side characters that don't have a lot of importance plotwise. I would LOVE a good fantasy (or sci-fi) book or book series where a good romance is developed between the main character and another character of the same sex or gender.
Dear Daniel, love your channel man, but regarding the inter-sex relationships... if the context is pre-modern (i.e: medieval for example, race, religion, ideology, place of origin etc.) DO matter. It's because of what Durkheim called Mechanical Solidarity, based on similarity and common ground. Inter-sex couples would not only be considered wierd but either socially awkward or frowned upon, at the least. Acts such as these would, in fact (and sadly) result in what sociologist call retributive justice, violence against the wrongdoer (as opposed to restutive, which seeks to right the wrong and is modern). Mechanical Solidarity is established by commonalities, race being a quite evident one, so... yeah. If a writer wishes to create a pre-modern society that is at least sociologically sound, he/she should definitely take this in mind. Not to say, I insist, that this is morally adequate. But it is historically and sociologically accurate.
Sorry but why have to exist so much forced diversity in a book? I don't need a character of a book to look like me or be from my same culture to enjoy the book. In my head I can change how it look however I want him/her to look. If the story is good I don't care how they look. If is not important to the plot, I don't care what sexuality they are. I really hate the fact that authors are being force to add characters diversification by force and most of the times it doesn't affect the plot. I only like diversity if that is something that is important for the plot if is not then why try to add something that doesn't exist, or shouldn't exist.
Daniel, while I completely agree with some of your points(love at first sight and no communication about a misunderstanding), I have a different view on some of the others. For example, love triangles and unrequited love, though done in almost every story, is, I believe, realistic and can resonate deeply with the reader. Doesn't everyone experience one sided love at least once in their lives? Of course, if the triangle(or polygon) is forced, it can be quite cringy. As for your argument about diverse and open minded society with medieval tone-if the author can explain properly of how the society became like that, then I am all for that. If not, then I would ask myself-wait, how does a society where almost nobody is literate, farthest that most people traveled is the next village, where, if there is any info about the countries far, far away comes in a form of a fairy tale, where anything can get you killed-from hunger, unknown disease, robbers, your own neighbor or the soldier from another country, who wants to take away everything you have., can be so open minded? Such conditions breed fear, mistrust and hatred for everything strange and unknown. It is not called "dark middle ages" for nothing. On the other hand, because there are such strong emotions in the medieval setting, I think it is a great setting for social and human exploration and experimentation, search for what is wrong and how we can improve as humans. Because most of the conflict does arise from such social problems. However, if, as you said, the setting serves no purpose(which I would think is such a missed opportunity), then I agree with you. One last thing. Maybe I am biased because I am reading some children fantasy atm, but I think that friendship is better developed in the children fantasy(in general) then it is in an adult fantasy. :)
No interracial couples in fantasy? I honestly have no idea what you're talking about. Show me one single story with Elves that doesn't have some kind of elf/human relationship somewhere in there. One. Just one. Can't do it, can you?
One of my favorite series of all time. I won't say it's a literary masterpiece, and there are certainly things to criticize, but man, it's such a fun read! Like reading a movie.
I agree with alot of stuff you said, I just have mixed feelings about the interacial/ samsex romantic relationships. Is it mandatory that is have to write these in? Will I be deemed a ignorant bigot sexist if i I choose not to explore. You said in a video that there is no limits to what an Author could/should explore? Shouldn't that mean I have my creative write to do so or not? Tbh, I do feel you are projecting your ideals on onto others to make it a standard. Writing can mirror the real world, when the fantasy genre gets more diverse then people who naturally are passionate about these aspects will do better service then those who are *pressured* to do so. Just IMO, still a major fan.
While I agree on one hand, I don't on the other. There are so many ways fantasy makes "Love at first sight" not only possible but really cool. Jim Butcher didn't want to spend a whole book to develop a love interest for Tavi, he made a "magic" system that made the people soulmates. Substitute "Love at first sight" for "soulmates" and there literally isn't a problem. It's not a problem with the writers, it's a problem with the biases of the reader in this case.
"Why do you have to carry over these ugly elements when they don't serve a purpose?". I could counter that with "Why would we ever read a story that isn't relatable?", And here we have an answer: If you want to be astounded by fantasy you are more than welcome to, but a story doesn't always have to be about getting away. People don't read historical fiction AND fantasy AND every other genre "to get away". They read the stories to learn about humanity. The humanity you want to get away from sometimes. You can try and eschew the past or humanity, especially the ugly parts, but you'll never learn from it if you do. I agree, there really are stories out there where these terrible ways of thinking are normalize but there are probably 20 times as many whose intent was to hold a mirror up to the reader. We learn a lot from examples of humanity that we've never seen before and driving a point home isn't a bad thing. We all love fantasy and are really irked about some things sometimes, but if we can't take the story for what it is instead of judging it on the basis of what we know now then there's no reason to read fantasy anyway. There's nothing wrong with looking back at where we've come from and redigesting. And just because you read those things too much doesn't mean that the process is invalid. Anyway, love your content, even when we don't agree on this specific point.
I fully agree that in these world's interracial realitionships could, and absoultly should exist more. But I can see why in a lot of the world's, not all but a lot, that same sex realitionships don't or not often.ost of these fantasy world's are in a medeval setting, and with that often comes a much smaller population. And as such, much more pressure for people to have children. And with that pressure, anyone not filling his vital role, possibly by being in a same sex realtionship, will be looked down on to a degree, even in the most accepting kind of world. Though it would still be interesting to see this explored more. To have a story where someone deals with that pressure. But just my 2 cents.
I hate controlling relationships, I hate possessiv characters and I have a really hard time reading about it. To me that isn't love at all that is just the controlling person being insecure. I just detest those characters (mostly male) and the (mostly female) characters that think: "Oh, he wont let me leave the house by myself, he must really love me!". Horrible!
Thank you! I love romance in books, but there are so many problems with so many and you explained them really well. As well as the continued sexism/homophobia/racism seen in Fantasy to this day I’m honestly fine reading a book with all straight, white men but don’t give me an excuse like “it’s just the time period” for why it wasn’t more diverse or turn women/non-white/LBGTQ+ into caricatures
I hate romance in most everything. Mainly because it is he most most unrealistic thing of the story line. The dragons, aliens, whatever are more realistic than the relationships.
I agree with most of the things you say, but I must oppose you in the part “You belong to me”. It is quite natural for people to misunderstand this part because of history, but to fully understand this word, it is necessary to look at two things. Relationships and the effect of relationships on freedom. Let's start with freedom. Freedom is a huge word; we can stretch it as different as we want. The kind of freedom we should focus on here should be the part you belong to yourself. This is a word that gained so much power in the 21st century. We can say the basis of the individualization trend is this word. When we look at the extremes of this freedom, we see that it begins to be limited by relationships. When do we stop acting for us and start acting for others? When love comes into play. In our childhood, we are beginning to limit our movements so that our mother or father doesn’t get upset. As we grow up, the limits of our friends are added to these limits. Later, our wife and then our children come into this equation. If we love the opposite side, we begin to follow their limits, and these limits change our way of life, chaining us to a certain path, like the roots of a tree chaining it to a certain area. Some hate these chains, but some need these roots to reach higher. Here we will focus on the second human type. Let's continue with relationships. Every relationship is essentially an exchange. Of course, there are people in this gentle world who can love without expecting anything, but it is a very difficult thing to love without getting any kind of feedback. That's why I believe the shopping method is more common. You want to give time and take the time of the other side, you want to give your memories and get the memories of the other side, you want to give respect and receive respect from the other side. As long as both sides participate in this exchange in a balanced way, the relations continue. The limits placed by others in our lives comes from the expectations in this exchange. Some people want sharper borders, thicker chains, or deeper roots. For some people, the uncertainty of freedom is more frightening than being fixed on a particular path. When these people say, "You are mine" they do not imply the meaning in the sentence "I have a shoe." This is the individual's desire to have control over the life of the other party. Provided that the control of the individual's own life is given to the other party. The rate of this control may vary, but I believe that as long as both sides participate in this exchange at the same rate, healthy relationship dynamics will occur. Considering that we need to fully trust the other party to leave even a small part of the control of our life, we can see how beautiful this kind of relationship can be. Of course, all this is my perspective on these words. True, the expression 'you are mine' can be used as a way of objectification, but it can also have a very nice chain of thought behind it in the right context.
Are you multilingual, by chance? English is a very limiting language. There are languages that differentiate between alienable and inalienable possession. Meaning “my arm” and “my shoe” are differentiated. In English, it is the same regardless. That unfortunately means that words that imply “ownership” are then also used on people (“my boyfriend”) as well as property (“my house”) and bodily autonomy (“my body”). It’s an unfortunate reality of English.
@@eb5381 Yes, my main language is Turkish. There aren't any different words for 'belonging' in our language, but in our literature, there is an aspect of love that was born in the 13th-century middle east literature. According to this thought when your love for the other party grows too big, the other party becomes a part of you. As someone who grew up with the stories and poems of that period, words of belonging usually means becoming a part of the other party to me.
As far as love at first sight goes...I can suspend my disbelief in it for Romeo and Juliet, since, you know, SHAKESPEARE. (Besides, back then they really believed that true love happened at first sight, so one can look at it through that lens.) I can even suspend my disbelief in it for West Side Story, since that sort of takes place in a heightened version of our reality. Or for Les Miserables--though a bit more for the novel than the musical, since in the novel, although Marius and Cosette do fall for each other at first sight, they "date" secretly for a few months, getting to know one another. But it's harder to do so for a lot of modern fiction--and as for the tacked-on subplot in the Hobbit movies, forGET it.
It's also worth noting the characters in romeo and juliet are both fairly young. Juliet is 13, and Romeo is ambiguous, but also fairly young as far as these things ago. They're young enough they might just take infatuation for love.
Here are some well developed romances and friendships in fantasy books if that is what you are looking for right now. 😂 Kushiel’s Dart series by Jacqueline Carey, YA series Cat’s eye chronicles, and for more popular series... Outlander and Game of Thrones. Let me know if you would like more.
If someone comes along and starts hitting on my girl, and their response to me informing them that she's taken is "Dude why you so possessive, she can make her own decisions." I am going to punch him in the face. For his own edification. And my girl will approve because she understands that our relationship is a collaborative goal that we both have the responsibility, and therefore the right, to defend. Committing to a relationship and honoring committed relationships is a virtue, and an acknowledgement of the person's agency, not a denial of it. Good video otherwise. I especially agree with the criminal neglect of vibrant friendships in imaginative literature.
The bad communication trope that causes unneeded conflict drives me crazy. In fantasy, in tv or in movies. It drives me up the wall
Yes! So many times problems only occur because of bad communication.
And yet amazingly, is probably the most realistic trope in romance; I'm sure many of us have been on the end of that, or even guilty of that ourselves
in some movies it's the whole reason the plot exists.
Especially when half of the story is unnecessary drama because of that, that's very cheap storytelling
Tropes are tropes for a reason. I would be very inclined to think that 'poor communication' is one of the most common reasons for a serious relationship to end.
With that in mind, i suggest we explore these tropes even further.
I'd rather have strong friendships than flimsy romantic relationships
Gods yeah, please. I need more friendships that have heartbreak and makeups and friends going to the ends of the earth for eachother.
this sounded sarcastic but I mean it
Same.
The moment Romance is introduced, I'm out.
A Synopsis of Most Fantasy Romances:
"I hate you"
"I hate you"
"It feels weird without you"
"I love you"
Basically.
Everybody is a tsundere
i hate sand
Imperial Diplomacy are anakin and sand enemies to lovers
Or replace "It feels weird without you" with "Damn I shouldn't have introduced you to that other attractive person"
"I've saved my friends from situations, and guess what - we didn't then BANG!"
Ah, I see where you've gone wrong. You must - you MUST - do the sexing after saving someone. It's just convention.
Idk i'm pretty sure i'd be at least 62% more inclined to want to bone someone if they saved my life
Ah yes, the sexing. Truly, the sexing is most important.
Wise words, @@elazarsinger4187 . That's a quote from Confucius, right? Or was it Marcus Aurelius?
@@zechariahbryan1568 both
Honestly, if someone literally saved my life, esp. as a stranger, a little sexing is the least I could do.
But that's the differentiation between a sense of obligation and just... not being a narcissist.
One of the things I LOVE so much about Tolkien's works (you know, besides loving every single bit of it) is that there is so much platonic and filial love, not just romantic!
Thank you Daniel for emphasizing that those relationships need to be developed and appreciated too
It honestly drives me nuts how often I see people point at Sam and Frodo and go "Look, they have emotions about each other! They must be in love!" Instead of just "These are two really close friends that have been through hell together, and it would be weird if they didn't feel any emotions towards each other".
Close friends can love each other without it being romantic. I'm a straight bloke, but I'm not ashamed to say I love my mates. Doesn't mean I wanna bang em. They're like brothers and sisters
I honestly can not thank you enough for this video. Might I also add: does every book NEED romance? Most of sff deal with apocalyptic end of the world scenarios where there is enough drama to keep readers engaged. Love stories are almost always unrealistic/ not needed.
I want more books with main characters who are single at the beginning and remain so throughout the story, because there're more urgent things to deal with.
Sigh.... I have lots of feelings about this topic 😑
I feel like this would have been good advice for Vin and Elend in Mistborn. There was no romance described in Mistborn between them. We were told that they loved each other but it was never shown (they should have been hormonal teenagers but they acted like 50 year olds after their third divorce). Would have been a good opportunity for a friendship rather.
lust is a very primal emotion, and will exist in any scenario. So no, romances in these situations are not unrealistic.
@@Ben-xj2rf... clearly you don't know the difference between the two and also you didn't pay attention/missed the point of what I said.
Amén with that
THANK you for saying this. I thought I was the only one who felt that way.
I completely agree with you with love at first sight it’s so frustrating.
I actually have one of my characters think he’s fallen in love at first sight, only for him to realise he knows nothing about that person & he’s just infatuated/ obsessed with her. And he quickly learns that that’s not such a great to be.
Ryan Ratchford i just want to say thank you for writing that character 😆
Spoiler alert if you haven't read this book...
That's kind of how it falls out in Mercedes Lackey's The Firebird, one of my favorite of her stand-alone fairy tale/ballet retellings. Ilya, our young hero, has a history of not exactly thinking with his brain where a pretty girl is involved. He infiltrates the palace of the Katschei, an evil sorcerer with a dozen captive beautiful maidens in his thrall, and falls instantly in love with Tatiana, the most beautiful of them. Every time she does or says something, he tells himself "how wise she is! How kind!" But once he's defeated the Katschei and freed his captives (one of which is Ilya's dim-witted, hot-headed brother who'd tried and failed to rescue the maidens), he realizes that Tatiana is a stupid, selfish, spoiled brat, and the things he'd built up her imagined personality around were all just brief, fleeting moments that had nothing to do with her real personality. He decides to go through with the upcoming marriage anyway, because he gave his word and won't break it, and besides, a woman as beautiful as she is would only be bound to end up a captive to some other evil wizard or villain if no one protected her. But it turns out that she's cheating on him pre-wedding with the aforementioned brother, who is her (shallow) idea of "a man". He's relieved to have the out, and flees to the woman he realizes he really loves--the titular Firebird, a shapeshifting fairy queen.
Daniel: I've saved some friends from certain circumstances and guess what? We DIDN'T BANG!
Daniel's friends: sad :(
Lol
Your cat is so cute 💚
Ikr, just chilling in the background heh
Was it love at first sight?
@@thehoogard I chuckled
It's a cat so maybe.
@@kmk1225 readying itself to pounce.
I hate it so much when the hero leaves the love interest to protect them or for their own good…
Even though the love interest always says that they will stick by the hero no matter what…
It is the stupidest shit and I can’t stand it
"LGBT relationships don't exist back then"
Ancient Greeks: Are we a joke to you?
or medieval eastern europe. actually, lgbts where normal and where accepted in eastern europe until the 18th century when a csar wanted to modernise the east and took the homophobic west as an ideal. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_Europe
They didn't exist in the modern sense. Man-man relationships were generally teacher-student or older-younger in nature, and it was a great embarrassment if anyone found out you were the "woman" or submissive one of the relationship.
It is interesting how many of the conventionally accepted "truths" about mediveal times are actually misunderstandings by early Victorian archeologs, historians and writers.
Which makes me wonder why people think this current movement is so "progressive." It's not. It's the same thing that's been happening for thousands of years. It's cycling, not progressing.
@@3dreamsequence I guess moving on from pedestry can be seen as progressing, at least
That " STOP IT" was literally a demonic screetch from hell. Love it :'D
Love at first sight can work if the character thinks they're in love but the reader knows they're not. You can have their arc be about realizing they were never truly in love, which would be a fun twist on a cliche.
Or it can be a tragedy, about how your romance won’t work with a dude you literally just met, like Romeo and Juliet
Our Chemical Hearts did that. (not fantasy though)
"He stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she was the Sun. Yet he saw her like the Sun, even without looking."
-Sincerely, a non-fantasy book
Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina. :-)
@@jenniferschillig3768 Hey, I’m reading that book now!
My reasoning for having non-racist medieval societies in my fantasy stories is that, in a world with elves and dwarves and all kinds of other races, humanity has a more unified mindset.
Essentially, they aren't racist against humans because they perceive non-humans as a bigger threat.
I like this
Joel Rosenberg brings this up in his Sleeping Dragon series.
It's just a mental shortcut your brain takes.
Or, as Terry Pratchett put it: Black and white lived in perfect harmony, and ganged up against green.
Ah, the Warhammer school of sociology
Someone said you were trying to get a date?? 😂😂😂 hilarious. Booktube is not how you get dates. Usually 🤪🤪🤪
Really? Cause if things were different I would totally date him after watching this. Polite, eloquent, well read, good looking, clearly has morals and standards isnt spineless.
I have such a great dislike of love at first sight I'd actually refuse to read a book that has it. I do agree infatuation is okay, especially in YA. Teenagers get infatuated a lot. But love? Especially thinking you found your true love at 16-18? It's a no for me.
Same with love triangles. If I see a hint of a love triangle, I won't pick up the book or dnf it if not done well. I just got so tired of it, especially since bad boys are so popular and I hate bad boys a lot.
I get it and also if not done well don't like it, but I feel like love at first sight is basically infatuation at first sight, teenagers always say I'm in love when they're not really in love. Bottom line if it's not done well then 👎
The bad boy trope if done correctly is fine. But let him be a bad boy, not a good guy who just has a motorcycle and a heart of gold hidden by rough angles. Case study. Frank Castle (The Punisher) is a bad boy. Jacob from Twilight is not lol
Isn't that kind of exactly what teenagers are like though? Blowing infatuations out of proportion?
Yeah, but it seems like the authors agree with them. The author doesn't seem to know it's not true. A book that does this well is All American Girl, the main chracter is just as bad as most YA characters, but the author KNOWS it. They know that she is a hormonal teengaer that is bad at thinking about consiquences and is easily influenced. But because the author knows it, she grows as a person, and learns that she is WRONG in most if not many aspects and gets over herself.
Another example of this is the Besty-Tacy series, especially the high school books. It as all the tropes that I hate, immature girl that's obbsessed with her looks, love triangles, crushes, and other things. But it's written by a fifty year old woman looking back on her high school years and knows how trivial these struggles are. Most of all, even the main character, though she is niave and a bit thick, she is well rounded and feels like a real teenager. One of the many reacoring themes is how she has grown each year, and how she wants to improve. Not to mention she's genuinly a nice person and wants to be better.
Most YA chacracters do not do this. The authors plays it as the romance is the biggest deal ever, even though it isn't, because they want to appeal to teenagers. So that's why it's bad.
This is one of the reasons why I hated Romeo and Juliet. I always found it super annoying when people used it as an example of true love. 🙄
Love at first sight spoils the whole part about getting to know the characters and seeing their dynamic. Like if the narrator just sees someone and BAM fireworks well then we're already running on the assumption they'll get together. Kinda takes the journey out of it.
Absolutely agree! I just want to add how uncomfortable it makes me that in some fantasy books, the only notable women are prostitutes. Nice to know that women are only good for paid sex.
Can you make a video about a positive examples of romances in fantasy books in the future? From recent years I only found two examples I enjoyed and I'd like to find more: the love triangle turned polyamory in Fifth Season is done extremely well, and the Final Empire actually has really good and consent-based buildup for Vin and her significant otter (haven't read further since then, so if it goes horribly wrong I'm unaware, please don't spoil).
warbreaker has a very good romance as well.
Another trope I hate is everyone being paired up in a couple at the end of a series just to reinforce the idea of a happy ending. And I say fuck that because being in a relationship doesn't entail happiness and you don't have to be in a relationship to be happy. This trope really bores me cause it's so expected, so recycled, so boring and it leads to authors forcing romance when in reality the characters have no real chemistry.
I'd rather read a series where characters start as friends/enemies and end as friends. Or a character that remains single at the end of the series because again, you don't need to be in a relationship to be happy. I just want some strong friendships, two characters don't have to bone just cause they're in the same room.
For the record, love at first sight is a real thing. The first time I saw my wife she was walking down the hallway in school, dropped a book from the stack she was carrying, bent over to pick it up, dropped two more while trying to pick up the first one, then dropped another while getting those two. I didn't even approach her. I just watched as one of her friends ran over to help, who then promptly asked her, "You have a backpack on your back, why don't you put some of these in there?" To which she said, "I can't. It's full of books."
Just the serious and almost defeated tone in how she delivered that response burned her into my brain. I instantly thought, "This chick is my destiny." We started hanging out that day, were dating by the end of the week, and have now been married for 22 years.
So, love at first sight in fiction can happen. It just has to not be done lazily, which, if we're being honest, is how all of your writing should be anyway. No shortcuts.
My own personal experience aside, I don't want "modern world representation" in my fantasy story. It comes across like you're checking a box and immediately ruins the immersion. Especially if the story deals with countries with defined kingdoms and territories.
What if a witch's spell is cast to create "love at first sight?!"
Fuck off
Damn jim zimmer, that's a little rude, don't you think?
@kamuelalee If it was from a spell or curse, (in my opinion) it wouldn't be real love. Someone's emotions is being messed with magic, and that feeling wouldn't happen without it. Like a lot of the comments here, it's basically a variation of "character thinks they're in love, but they're actually not."
@@huaiscrblol5077 Hmm, I will ponder your magical response.
I’m writing a dark modern fantasy novel and pretty much the whole thing is gay art students at an international college in Hong Kong because I just snapped. I’m writing what I want to read.
Add the riots at well
Heck yeah, write what you want :)
Preach!
I will say I am ok with a certain level of “ownership” if it is equal between the couple and out of love, commitment, spirit of oneness and not control or the feel of a threat. Not the crazy “you can’t talk to her” or “we do what I say because I’m in control” way.
I mean, my husband is MY HUSBAND, I am HIS WIFE and we are a unit. And our relationship is to be honored and respected by others. I’m not worried about him acting some kind of wrong way but best you believe I’ll be all over some hooker who thinks she can disregard that ring on his finger. Because that is my right and visa versa.
We’re not controlling or demeaning one another in day to day life with feeling possessive over each other because we are grown adults with our own respected agency. Some levels of relationship do predicate a bit of possessiveness...and that’s ok.
I hope that makes sense.
Traci Bailey You lost me at, some hooker. Who did you marry your husband or some hooker?
@Lori Ann White The husband. If someone insults your friend, do you defend them, or fuck off and let your friend deal with it alone? After all, don't you trust them to be able to handle themselves?
Any time you associate people, you establish a level of "ownership." It's not "treating someone as not their own person" to not be protective of your associates.
As Traci mentions, there's a difference between what's being described here and defense out of insecurity, lack of trust, and/or unhealthy controlling behaviour.
I agree wholeheartedly! In fact I would feel unloved if my husband wasn't possessive to some extent and protective of me.
Whitney Dahlin if you need a husband to ‘protect’ you from words. You need the kind of help only professionals can provide.
@Lori Ann White If you feel the need to attack others because they want to feel like someone cares about them, you might need that help yourself. Nobody likes people who take out their insecurities on other people, Lori.
Regarding interracial relationships in fictional worlds. Yes, you can believe in anything that happens in a fantasy universe. That doesn't mean that fantasy worlds have to be perfect inclusive utopias or the authors are (racist/sexist/whatever). Authors have a right to explore whatever kind of fictional universes they wish. Including ones that aren't nice. I'd argue they mostly want to explore not-nice universes, because conflicts are what makes stories interesting. I agree it's bad writing if they then fail to use these conflicts in any way.
It especially drives me crazy when cultures that rarely have their 5 minutes of attention of worldwide audience have their work of art called racist because it doesn't relate to demographic of modern USA...
Just like portraying violence in a book doesn't make author violent nor does it mean that author is promoting violence - same thing applies to any other aspect of a fictional world. Portraying racism in a book doesn't mean book or author is racist. Same with sexism, drug abuse, anything.
For one example - in The Witcher books interracial relationships (human-elvish as opposed to black-white because people of color live in other continent in this universe) are mentioned as persecuted. Elves complain in "The Edge of The World" that they are hanged for sleeping with human women, and Yarpen Zigrin mentions in "Blood of Elves" that interracial relationships are also considered bad by elves, mostly because they see them as one of the causes of them "losing competition" to human.
I think it doesn't make the books racist, it makes them more interesting, because they show how racism arises and how it works. And I much prefer that these books don't say "by the way racism is EVIL, don't do this". Readers are plenty smart enough to deduce it on their own.
You said what I thought better than I did! :)
Daj pisite srpski da vas covek razume :)
seeing same racist/sexist shit over and over again is tiring tho. make some original shit
I'm so glad to see another Dear Authors! I just re-watched the first one yesterday.
And yeah... Romance is usually handeled badly. I'm hoping to write about two women who've been in a (turning into) a long term relationship (inter-racial, strange how you mentioned that both) and certain internal and external conflicts that causes (made worse by both of their personalities).
The other romance plot i'm hoping to do is a subversion of the classic, hero's journey boy meets the beautiful princess (kind of objectifies her & view her only as a romantic interest, rather than a person) and in a John Green Paper towns/ Looking for Alaska way- subvert the boy's expectations where he learns that maybe a relationship isn't for the best for either of them atm & that he should really put the effort into learning more about HER as a person and become a friend.
Just because I am a woman that does NOT mean I need female leads or strong female characters!!!!! Some of my favorite books and movies have male leads and bland female love interests or no female characters at all and I'm fine with that! I'm not an idiot who has to see my gender "represented" in order to feel validation in who I am! Let me say that again. I do NOT need to see other women being "strong" or "heros" or "independent" in order to be those things myself. I am a hospice nurse who cares for the dying and who sword fights in my free time. I am a normal person who doesn't want to be pandered to or coddled. In fact I find it far FAR more insulting to shoe horn in "strong" female leads or "independent" women into stories that don't need them. People demanding "representation" in media is retarded. A plot calls for what it calls for and no one should apologize for that or change it to PANDER to a certain demographic. Come on I am so sick of seeing people say this. Do YOU need see your specific demographic represented in a positive way in order to validated in who YOU are as a person? If you answer yes then you need some serious therapy because you have some serious issues to work through.
You mean like Zelda & Link
You mean like Link & Zelda
@@WhitneyDahlin Thanks for saying it so eloquently. I agree.
@@WhitneyDahlin I think the whole point of such characters is to show that not all people are cut from the same cloth. I.E. there are so many different type of people in the world so why are there only few in fiction. Granted many of these supposed representation tend to fall flat on its face and make them less human, thus failing at their intended purposes, kinda why I like WoT because it explores very different people in different cultures.
I feel this video has two different themes. The first part is explaining how realism in writing is needed (I.e. falling in love at first sight is improbable and illogical) yet the second portion is explaining how realism in writing is a problem (I.e. less sexism than reality).
This confuses me.
Of course this is essentially your opinion and completely subjective, but I would ask when should the author be simulating reality and when should the author delve into fantasy? (wish fulfillment or other desired occurrences).
From my take on people who disagree with the prevalence of race and gender focus in many stories, it might be a differently aligned desire for escapism. The current world is very vocal regarding racial and gender issues, many people might want to escape this in their fantasies.
However, I agree romances in fantasy generally suck and are usually the parts I wish to skip. It might be because of a disconnect to realism, I do not care because the relationships are forced or unreal, but where should an author be real and where shouldn't they be? Take for example the joker from the Dark Knight. Many love this villain since he is completely surreal but not cartoonish and the dark gritty feel makes him more relatable. When should this be adopted? Is it all subjective? And if so, why do we care?
This is an old comment but the difference between love at first sight and including racism is that the author is asking the readers to care about a romance. Romance takes up a lot of pages and we're obviously meant to care whether the relationship works out. We're supposed to feel sad when the protagonist is fighting with a love interest and keep turning the pages to see what happens. It is very difficult to give a fuck about a romance when you can't wrap your head around why they even care about one another in the first place.
Including racism in a plot where it doesn't mean anything is just including racism. It doesn't make the story better. It doesn't keep me turning the pages to see what happens. It's just there. I just know that some races are treated like shit while it has no effect on the protagonist's adventure.
I think the difference is that relationships are a real thing, and your fantasy world is not. Meaning, we KNOW how real relationship feels, and therefore it feels weird to see authors write unrealistic things like "love at first sight".
However, magic doesn't exist in the real world, and so it's not cringey for not being realistic, because there isn't a reality of magic to compare it to.
Your fantasy world is entirely created by you. It doesn't exist. You have the opportunity to create things from scratch, and so it's strange that is extremely rare to see interracial/same-sex relationships in fantasy books.
I'm not saying that people shouldn't create worlds with racial tensions and homophobia (in fact, that would be interesting in terms of world building and also addressing real world problems) but if your world only has white/straight people with no real reason for it, it can feel (at least for me) a little creepy... Like you're reading about the world of a white supremacist's wet dream.
It’s realism to the human experience for the sake of an emotionally fulfilling read we can all relate to vs realism to a specific time period that no one alive today can relate to and therefore really doesn’t need to be there
"Just- JUSSSSSS-- *STAWPIT!!!"*
Lol! You're completely right, and i feel, but holy heck, that was a MOOD! x,D
I love wheel of time, but I don’t think he got relationships right at all. It may not directly be love at first sight, it’s very much sudden and out of nowhere in a lot of situations, such as Nyneave and Lan, who just suddenly decide after having maybe three scenes together with just the slightest amount of interaction together discover they are just so hot for each other, it always bothered me. Same with Elayne and Rand, I think they have one or two chapters in the first book together and then she is just head over heels for the rest of the series for him. I can excuse Rand’s thing a little via the wheel being a very real thing that makes people do things they wouldn’t, but it just felt like most relationships were like that. Mat and Tuon were good though, at least they were explicitly shown to be slowly building a relationship and spending time together.
Yeah, a lot of those relationships just needed more buildup.
*Major Mistborn spoilers*
1:45 I was so happy when the teased love triangle between Vin, Zane, and Eland (or Elend, i forget) turned into Vin killing Zane, rather than falling into the trope of trying to turn the bad boy good
Tbh the Elend Vin relationship felt out of place, cheesy, and downright cringy at times. The fact that it was pretty much insta love doesn't help either, and the whole character of Elend was just meh, biggest downside of the trilogy imo
Oh man, this also made me so happy. Especially since the reader could see how the "bad boy" was actually lying to Vin and using her.
Yeah, as a young black Brazilian woman who enjoys fantasy I agree with you ( : and thought I know it won't come out any time soon, I'm looking forward to reading your book. I really appreciate the fact you are always speaking about those important themes in your channel. I also believe that when we, as the readers, start pointing out that we do care about diversity in fantasy books, the authors will be compelled to inckude it into their books. That's why I think it's important for us to bring awareness, so other people will start realising how important it actually is.
I really start to become irritated when I see a love triangle developing. It might have become my most hated trope.
I like romances that never conclude. The two are left without their happily ever after and have to either take up a greater responsibility or the SO dies.
Yess!! This makes me love you even more! In the same vein, let's talk about the normalization of jealously and jealous behavior in Fantasy novels (and IRL too)! I'll DNF a book the second a character exhibits some sort of jealous behavior, like negging, or "fighting for the relationship." When will we start viewing jealousy for what it is? A entire box of red flags.
The sexism in fantasy is one of the biggest reasons why it's hard for me to read more books in that genre.More often than not the woman are poorly written or when they do something that it's out of the norm of their representation the backlash from the fan base is insane.I am not saying make the male characters inferior to them but I wish I could see better representation for women.
Forced representation and diversity are the cancer of modern new authors, seeing everything through the political lense (although most of the times such stories are nothing more than ways of entertainment) is beyond pathetic.
Most of fantasy settings take place in medieval times, and like it or not medieval times societies were deeply racist, xenophobe, classist and gender roles were almost set in stone. If you don't like that type of setting don't read it, but changing that setting and applying sXXI politics or modern morals will only harm the setting of your story.
Why is it that in sci-fi or futuristic settings there's not much of an issue with inclusion or representation? because in those settings is easy to understand that the morals or behaviors of such societies are more similar to the ones we have.
@@francesccampos1343 Excuse me but unless it describes a historic event you can take the liberty of making changes.Because in those times as well there were people that made the difference that changed the course of history that were women or people or color. A lot of fantasy is about magic or creatures since we know those never existed fantasy should not have them right?? Because it goes against of that time.Right???? Everyone is calling forced representation or woke anything that is not following the classic formula white male savior, damsel in distress and barely there people of color.Our books need to change for the better and not perpetuate racist stereotypes.
@@mariapol17 Wrong nº1, you are putting politics and s.XXI morals into stories that don't match such ideals, it doesn't matter if it's fiction, coherence is an important point of any good story.
Wrong nº2, magic and creatures in fantasy act most of the time as neutral creatures and systems that make the stories "special" otherwise that wouldn't be part of the fantasy genre. Specially in medieval times there were mythos generated due to the ignorance of the popular masses, that's why using magic and monsters fit in medieval settings.
Wrong nº3, forced representation is when people DEMAND to the author that they include X gender or X race portrayed as important or good just for the sake of it, no matter the plot or the coherence of the story. That's just both racist and sexist because you show that you don't care about the plot or the core of the story but only about your s.XXI morals being portrayed in the story from someone else.
Those are not YOUR books, they are the author's books, if you don't like them just write your own story or support someone who does what you like, but DEMANDING someone to write as you please is both egocentric and selfish.
Stop telling authors how they must write, only absolutist and dictatorial regimes try to force culture to follow their believes.
There's been a lot of great fantasy by female authors coming out that treats female characters a lot better, and it's been good to see. I love my classic sausage fest fantasy books but even I can admit that how fantasy has treated women has been a blind spot for a good while.
(Just gonna ignore the guy claiming that because fantasy is sometimes loosely inspired by medieval times that means you should have no creativity in worldbuilding whatsoever and just take a milder version of sexism of tge time, because you know damn well fantasy authors almost never show the true horor of misoginy in the middle ages, and put it in your books without thought. It's boring and unimaginative. I'm not sure how someone with such little creativity can call themselves a fantasy fan)
@@evi6629 if you have any good recommendations pls tell me.Thank u
And this is why if I ever become an author I'll just avoid romance as much as I can, since I've noticed that in some stories people are far more concerned about who's going to be paired with who than the overall plot or the conflict! It drives me nuts, and if we go by diversity then one could argue single people need to be portrayed more often.
“Misunderstandings” in Romance drive me ducking insane! But I don’t mind Romance as a sub plot but please don’t make it the goal of a character. Also, once the couple are together, don’t change their personality! I’ve read books where the girl is bad ass and smart, but as soon as the couple gets together, she becomes a totally different character... like seriously, sure people act a bit different with their significant other, but their whole personality doesn’t change that much, this is a sign that the author may have only had wrote that character for the protagonist to fawn over and the other character to be a “trophy”.
Got to the part about friendships and hit the subscribe button immediately. Man, I WISH there were more stories about buddies, like... please... it can't be that hard.
I just found your channel and I’ve binged so much videos!
New fan
I like how there's a cat just quietly hanging out in the background through the whole video.
I thought for the first couple books that nyneave and egwene were sometimes unnecessarily cruel to the boys.
As for the whole withholding information and causing a misunderstanding thing, I can let it pass if I can understand the logic behind that decision. However, so often, I see characters withholding the information without proper reasoning. Nothing drives me crazier than characters acting out of character for no reason at all. I give slight leeway since miscommunication does happen in real life but it does need to be justified. If they’re acting out of fear or mistrust, I want to see those emotions and understand the decision, rather than a contrived device to make a plot work.
God it's so nice to see video like these! I agree with every single word you said! Love your channel
"NO! We're going to fight!" haha you're videos are entertaining
I like it when people put dark ideas into their stories and worlds, showing it's not all nice. Having bad, abuse relationships can be interesting to see, but it shouldn't be seen as good by the readers, however the characters could see it as ok because it's normal in their world.
Nothing grinds my gears more than the miscommunication-leads-to-conflict trope. It's such a lazy plot point and just makes me mad and dislike the couple than actually feel sorry for them. And you're right, it often goes against the characters' personalities, so it just makes even less sense.
I absolutely agree with the strong friendships thing. A friendship shouldn't be stagnant, and many friendships in fantasy are. And it's also pretty sad if your friendship with someone is based entirely on you saving them whenever they are in a life and death situation. I understand the dynamic of two brothers in arms, but a dynamic like that usually starts out with both characters being warriors and having trained and fought together. The dynamic I have seen in countless tv, books, and movies is "you're an idiot and you wouldn't be this close to death if you weren't, but I'm going to save you anyway because I care about you for some reason".
It was also funny to hear you talk about interracial romance, because in my book the one romance I have is between a big black guy and a petite white girl. They are elves, so they don't have the same history or cultures, which changes their relationship dynamic if they were humans in our world with different colored skin, but the idea is the same. Romance is way overdone. A lot. But I enjoy a good, healthy romance, especially when the two characters are like best friends and they can sit and talk about nothing for four hours.
As a lesbian who adores high fantasy i cringe so much when i see how gay romance is written (when it is written at all ), the only reason i still sometimes read YA books is cause they have good number of lgbt characters so i can find at least couple of them that are decent...the problem is i don't like ya that much anymore so i hope adult fantasy gets better at gay romance and romance in general...anyhow thank you for this video so many good points : ))
"The Last Sun", try it
Watch/read attack on titan
Thank you so much for this video, I could not have said it any better!!! I HATE the "love at first sight" and "friends having to become lovers" tropes!
Could you do a video comparing the relationship of bridge four from Stormlight to the relationship of the wolf pack from Red Rising Trilogy? Think it would be a cool video because I think both of those show great development of friendships
Also highly suggest the Red Rising audiobook as the narration is top notch
Daniel talking:
Me looking at the kitten in the back:
😍🥰
4:18
You described Harry Potter and Ginny's Romance in The Movies 6-8. Thr movies basically just say they are gonna be together with no real Relationship progression and Ginny barely has any screen time throughout the Entire Harry Potter Movies series.
And the relationship with Cho was shown to develop on both sides over time, but then suddenly dropped like a hot potato, but with Ginny it was: Suddenly they were a couple, but we saw nothing of their feelings develop, unlike Cho, until the announcement of their status as a couple. It was really stupid.
Harry Hermione were only good in hp series
The only thing that bothers me about RJ women is when they are wrong, they almost never apologize. The boys are regularly called out on being stupid for doing stupid crap. Which should be the case and they are made to apologize. Mostly by women. But when the women do stupid crap or need help to get them out of their stupid decisions they almost never apologize or are admonished for it by men. And even if they are made to apologize for something it has to be dragged out grudgingly or to say thank you for that matter. Mat, Elaine and Nynieve as an example.
It's always a little bit frustrating that there seem to be an absence of LGBT romances in fantasy and sci-fi. Even writters that claim to be quite liberal miss the chance to diversify a little bit, JK Rowling being an example of that. It wouldn't be a problem if there wasn't too much focus on romance on the HP series but from the 4th book onward it seemed as if everybody was getting a couple and the only gay person in the whole world was Dumbledore, a character who was outed once the series finished. The only fantasy author so far that I've seen done actually something to add more diverse relationships is Rick Riordan; say all you want about that guy (yeah, I know, even for me his writting stylehas get stale a little bit; his book centred on Norse Mythology were a bit boring) but you don't see that many books (and aimed for younger readers) that shows same sex and interracial couples as he does as those he writes. Certainly you won't see that from JK, she's too busy writting about how Wizards go to the bathroom (By the way, I love Rowling, she's much better writter than Riordan in almost every aspect, that just a little issue I got with her, nothing more; I mean, Harry Potter got me into reading in the first place).
Love at first sight is rare but real. We tend to think of love in one way but other cultures have different kinds of love. I have a friend, her aunt and uncle met on a vacation and it was love at first sight. They married a week after meeting and 40 years later they are still in love with one another.
The point of relational ownership is an important one. However, I'd find it odd if it weren't present even in the most benevolent of characters. That's because even at our most elevated level we are flawed and in my opinion, the most interesting characters are one that is still flawed in spite of their framing within prose; like Kaladin.
Human relationships will never be perfect and while I agree that this seems primitive and problematic I still prefer characters and their relationships to be reflective of what's real about people rather than what should or could be.
I should say that mine is an argument about framing and your point about how these relationships are framed is spot on.
misunderstandings certainly do suck a lot to read/watch. BUT i have seen this shit happen to so many different people in real life, its not even funny. So while it is frustrating like 99% of the time, its certainly based in reality. tho tbh i wouldnt mind having less of it in media
The best way to subvert the first trope of love-Have it be a magic based mental manipulation, as in Arthurian legend there is a lot magic love relationships.
2:55 there's a song by Failure (covered by A Perfect Circle) that is this exact thing. it's literally called "The Nurse Who Loved Me"
The problem with how female characters are written in modern media isnt that they have agency. To often they are written to be rude and angry like the modern feminist. They don't come across as having good ideas or great insight. I'd love it if they were. But modern writers tend to think that making a female character spiteful and demeaning is the same as giving her agency.
I am a romance fanatic and I happen to like healthy relationships. Sometimes I would have to just put a good book down because of toxic character. The most well-done romances I have ever watched in fantasy genre are Snow and Charming and Hook and Emma from once upon a time the tv show.
I want to read well-done romances. Romance novels don't have healthy and interesting romances worth cheering for. Also nailing romance is harder than it seems. I just have the lowest expectations when it comes to finding good romances in fantasy genre.
Dialogues are the soul of romance. Witty banter, flirting back and forth, awkward small talk, being vulnerable can happen only through good dialogues. This is so difficult to find in romance books. Beach Read does do some of it extremely well.
Best romance in fantasy: Dalinar and Navani. Change my mind
In Oathbringer, Navani describes how relationships really work and that sealed the deal for me. (Even though I’ve never been in a romantic relationship before so I can’t actually say anything other than observations here)
Lmao tfw she was trying to come onto him though
This video is so funny but so true. I love your voices and your animated personality.
the reason for all this things should be obvious. Young authors writing because of their love of literature but are too young to have actually life experience. I know that sounds harsh but its true. The number one advice i give aspiring authors is to go out and live life. Travel the world; take chances; move out of your comfort zone; do the unthinkable. Be unpredictable. Be spontaneous.
I feel like the best approach to writing romance is by not ever intentionally making your characters get together. Just write their interactions (and maybe some romantic/flirty undertones) but always write the characters as individuals, and then later if you recognise that they may be getting closer to one another, then you can start to lean into it.
Pips is just sitting back there, thinking how different cat relationships are and how love at first sight can happen with cats because they never blink and look away, it's just one continuous sight
One thing I hate is rapid, onset relationships. You need a relationship arch, not a cliff.. Looking at you Adeyemi. "Kill her. Kill magic." (2 days later) "LET'S. MAKE. BABIES!!" Like.... I can't....
I don't mind the love triangle too - if it's done right. I mean when a character is claiming he/she (usually she) loves two others romantically at the same time and/or can't decide which one he/she should "choose" for longer than a chapter then I put the book down. It makes the character childish. But a love traingle where a character is just not fully aware of her/his feelings to two other characters is fine with me. My favourite romantic plot is "friends into lovers". Maybe because every good relationship I know in the real life has such beginnings, including mine.
I blame the over use of bad romance in books the reason why I so damn confused growing up… turns out I’m Aro-Ace, didn’t even know they existed till I was 18, then I took another 5 years to actually feel comfortable with the identity. I’m still a romance junky, which just makes me hate bad romance even more!
I am an aroace who has no idea how anyone can handle anyone FOREEEEVEER.
I know, right??
I love your opinions here, I love the style and the editing and the sense of humor.. Great video!
I don't believe you btw. You're definitely trying to get a date or something. Humans *can't* empathize with others just for the sake of empathy. Impossible.
My wife and I are in an interracial marriage but it doesn’t bother me that it isn’t common in fantasy. Races emerge because of fairly complete and long-term isolation allowing genetic drift to vary. Anywhere that there are races there will be diverse cultures with long-term separation. Relationships require adopting a common culture between two people and it is much tougher when there are different and even opposing cultural values brought together. It wouldn’t be awful to see more but don’t bother being offended for our sakes, being underrepresented makes sense and I wouldn’t want ‘our cause’ to detract from an organic story.
Yes!
Did anyone else forget to listen, and just watch the cat chilling most of the video?
I often hang around these kinds of videos to get a free do's and dont's on writing well-fleshed characters. Thanks a bunch, Daniel! If I ever get started on my writing, I'd try to suck less at romance.
please do more of these 'Dear Authors' they're great for up and coming writers
Dunno... I believe in love at first sight. My parents met, they fell in love, they got married after 18 days and here we are 30 years later. Its rare, but it exist
Great video! wish more people would talk about this and more authors listen to this. I also don't like the coupling of every single character. Ow, the main character has a best friend, well lets set him/her up with the best friend of the love interest because that's how this works right?! And no one is alone and happy. everyone needs to be settled or they are miserable.
Your cat is so laid back. Asif your voice is soothing the very energy flowing through his brain...if that's even enough of an appropriate observation
In regards to the point about more diversity in regards to interracial and LGBTQI+ romances being needed, I'd also like to add that when included in a story, more authors should have the main character being involved in such a relationship. So very often, in those cases where it IS included in the story, it is secondary characters or side characters that don't have a lot of importance plotwise. I would LOVE a good fantasy (or sci-fi) book or book series where a good romance is developed between the main character and another character of the same sex or gender.
Dear Daniel, love your channel man, but regarding the inter-sex relationships... if the context is pre-modern (i.e: medieval for example, race, religion, ideology, place of origin etc.) DO matter. It's because of what Durkheim called Mechanical Solidarity, based on similarity and common ground. Inter-sex couples would not only be considered wierd but either socially awkward or frowned upon, at the least. Acts such as these would, in fact (and sadly) result in what sociologist call retributive justice, violence against the wrongdoer (as opposed to restutive, which seeks to right the wrong and is modern). Mechanical Solidarity is established by commonalities, race being a quite evident one, so... yeah. If a writer wishes to create a pre-modern society that is at least sociologically sound, he/she should definitely take this in mind. Not to say, I insist, that this is morally adequate. But it is historically and sociologically accurate.
Sorry but why have to exist so much forced diversity in a book? I don't need a character of a book to look like me or be from my same culture to enjoy the book. In my head I can change how it look however I want him/her to look. If the story is good I don't care how they look. If is not important to the plot, I don't care what sexuality they are. I really hate the fact that authors are being force to add characters diversification by force and most of the times it doesn't affect the plot. I only like diversity if that is something that is important for the plot if is not then why try to add something that doesn't exist, or shouldn't exist.
👏👌👏
Daniel, while I completely agree with some of your points(love at first sight and no communication about a misunderstanding), I have a different view on some of the others. For example, love triangles and unrequited love, though done in almost every story, is, I believe, realistic and can resonate deeply with the reader. Doesn't everyone experience one sided love at least once in their lives? Of course, if the triangle(or polygon) is forced, it can be quite cringy.
As for your argument about diverse and open minded society with medieval tone-if the author can explain properly of how the society became like that, then I am all for that. If not, then I would ask myself-wait, how does a society where almost nobody is literate, farthest that most people traveled is the next village, where, if there is any info about the countries far, far away comes in a form of a fairy tale, where anything can get you killed-from hunger, unknown disease, robbers, your own neighbor or the soldier from another country, who wants to take away everything you have., can be so open minded? Such conditions breed fear, mistrust and hatred for everything strange and unknown. It is not called "dark middle ages" for nothing. On the other hand, because there are such strong emotions in the medieval setting, I think it is a great setting for social and human exploration and experimentation, search for what is wrong and how we can improve as humans. Because most of the conflict does arise from such social problems.
However, if, as you said, the setting serves no purpose(which I would think is such a missed opportunity), then I agree with you.
One last thing. Maybe I am biased because I am reading some children fantasy atm, but I think that friendship is better developed in the children fantasy(in general) then it is in an adult fantasy. :)
Probably because that's the only relationship that can happen so the author focuses more on it
The problem with love triangles is that they are only triangles. Hot girls have hordes of suitors and even regular girls can have 4 or 5 pursuers.
No interracial couples in fantasy? I honestly have no idea what you're talking about. Show me one single story with Elves that doesn't have some kind of elf/human relationship somewhere in there. One. Just one. Can't do it, can you?
I think he meant like black and white racial, in this regard elves and humans would be seen more as interspecies
I haven't heard you reference this series or make any content on it but have you read any of the Riyria series?
One of my favorite series of all time. I won't say it's a literary masterpiece, and there are certainly things to criticize, but man, it's such a fun read! Like reading a movie.
Can we please acknowledge the adorable fluff-ball in the down right corner
I agree with alot of stuff you said, I just have mixed feelings about the interacial/ samsex romantic relationships. Is it mandatory that is have to write these in? Will I be deemed a ignorant bigot sexist if i I choose not to explore. You said in a video that there is no limits to what an Author could/should explore? Shouldn't that mean I have my creative write to do so or not?
Tbh, I do feel you are projecting your ideals on onto others to make it a standard.
Writing can mirror the real world, when the fantasy genre gets more diverse then people who naturally are passionate about these aspects will do better service then those who are *pressured* to do so. Just IMO, still a major fan.
and for all of these reasons, and that i can do friendships better, none of my books will contain more than best friend or family relationships
While I agree on one hand, I don't on the other. There are so many ways fantasy makes "Love at first sight" not only possible but really cool. Jim Butcher didn't want to spend a whole book to develop a love interest for Tavi, he made a "magic" system that made the people soulmates. Substitute "Love at first sight" for "soulmates" and there literally isn't a problem. It's not a problem with the writers, it's a problem with the biases of the reader in this case.
"Why do you have to carry over these ugly elements when they don't serve a purpose?". I could counter that with "Why would we ever read a story that isn't relatable?", And here we have an answer: If you want to be astounded by fantasy you are more than welcome to, but a story doesn't always have to be about getting away. People don't read historical fiction AND fantasy AND every other genre "to get away". They read the stories to learn about humanity. The humanity you want to get away from sometimes. You can try and eschew the past or humanity, especially the ugly parts, but you'll never learn from it if you do. I agree, there really are stories out there where these terrible ways of thinking are normalize but there are probably 20 times as many whose intent was to hold a mirror up to the reader. We learn a lot from examples of humanity that we've never seen before and driving a point home isn't a bad thing. We all love fantasy and are really irked about some things sometimes, but if we can't take the story for what it is instead of judging it on the basis of what we know now then there's no reason to read fantasy anyway. There's nothing wrong with looking back at where we've come from and redigesting. And just because you read those things too much doesn't mean that the process is invalid. Anyway, love your content, even when we don't agree on this specific point.
YES
I was so distracted by your cat in the background
The 'romance' - if you can call it that - really soured Kingkiller Chronicles for me.
I fully agree that in these world's interracial realitionships could, and absoultly should exist more. But I can see why in a lot of the world's, not all but a lot, that same sex realitionships don't or not often.ost of these fantasy world's are in a medeval setting, and with that often comes a much smaller population. And as such, much more pressure for people to have children. And with that pressure, anyone not filling his vital role, possibly by being in a same sex realtionship, will be looked down on to a degree, even in the most accepting kind of world. Though it would still be interesting to see this explored more. To have a story where someone deals with that pressure. But just my 2 cents.
I hate controlling relationships, I hate possessiv characters and I have a really hard time reading about it. To me that isn't love at all that is just the controlling person being insecure. I just detest those characters (mostly male) and the (mostly female) characters that think: "Oh, he wont let me leave the house by myself, he must really love me!". Horrible!
Thank you! I love romance in books, but there are so many problems with so many and you explained them really well. As well as the continued sexism/homophobia/racism seen in Fantasy to this day
I’m honestly fine reading a book with all straight, white men but don’t give me an excuse like “it’s just the time period” for why it wasn’t more diverse or turn women/non-white/LBGTQ+ into caricatures
I hate romance in most everything. Mainly because it is he most most unrealistic thing of the story line. The dragons, aliens, whatever are more realistic than the relationships.
I agree with most of the things you say, but I must oppose you in the part “You belong to me”. It is quite natural for people to misunderstand this part because of history, but to fully understand this word, it is necessary to look at two things. Relationships and the effect of relationships on freedom.
Let's start with freedom. Freedom is a huge word; we can stretch it as different as we want. The kind of freedom we should focus on here should be the part you belong to yourself. This is a word that gained so much power in the 21st century. We can say the basis of the individualization trend is this word. When we look at the extremes of this freedom, we see that it begins to be limited by relationships. When do we stop acting for us and start acting for others? When love comes into play. In our childhood, we are beginning to limit our movements so that our mother or father doesn’t get upset. As we grow up, the limits of our friends are added to these limits. Later, our wife and then our children come into this equation. If we love the opposite side, we begin to follow their limits, and these limits change our way of life, chaining us to a certain path, like the roots of a tree chaining it to a certain area. Some hate these chains, but some need these roots to reach higher. Here we will focus on the second human type.
Let's continue with relationships. Every relationship is essentially an exchange. Of course, there are people in this gentle world who can love without expecting anything, but it is a very difficult thing to love without getting any kind of feedback. That's why I believe the shopping method is more common. You want to give time and take the time of the other side, you want to give your memories and get the memories of the other side, you want to give respect and receive respect from the other side. As long as both sides participate in this exchange in a balanced way, the relations continue. The limits placed by others in our lives comes from the expectations in this exchange.
Some people want sharper borders, thicker chains, or deeper roots. For some people, the uncertainty of freedom is more frightening than being fixed on a particular path. When these people say, "You are mine" they do not imply the meaning in the sentence "I have a shoe." This is the individual's desire to have control over the life of the other party. Provided that the control of the individual's own life is given to the other party. The rate of this control may vary, but I believe that as long as both sides participate in this exchange at the same rate, healthy relationship dynamics will occur. Considering that we need to fully trust the other party to leave even a small part of the control of our life, we can see how beautiful this kind of relationship can be.
Of course, all this is my perspective on these words. True, the expression 'you are mine' can be used as a way of objectification, but it can also have a very nice chain of thought behind it in the right context.
Are you multilingual, by chance? English is a very limiting language. There are languages that differentiate between alienable and inalienable possession. Meaning “my arm” and “my shoe” are differentiated. In English, it is the same regardless. That unfortunately means that words that imply “ownership” are then also used on people (“my boyfriend”) as well as property (“my house”) and bodily autonomy (“my body”). It’s an unfortunate reality of English.
@@eb5381 Yes, my main language is Turkish. There aren't any different words for 'belonging' in our language, but in our literature, there is an aspect of love that was born in the 13th-century middle east literature. According to this thought when your love for the other party grows too big, the other party becomes a part of you. As someone who grew up with the stories and poems of that period, words of belonging usually means becoming a part of the other party to me.
As far as love at first sight goes...I can suspend my disbelief in it for Romeo and Juliet, since, you know, SHAKESPEARE. (Besides, back then they really believed that true love happened at first sight, so one can look at it through that lens.) I can even suspend my disbelief in it for West Side Story, since that sort of takes place in a heightened version of our reality. Or for Les Miserables--though a bit more for the novel than the musical, since in the novel, although Marius and Cosette do fall for each other at first sight, they "date" secretly for a few months, getting to know one another. But it's harder to do so for a lot of modern fiction--and as for the tacked-on subplot in the Hobbit movies, forGET it.
It's also worth noting the characters in romeo and juliet are both fairly young. Juliet is 13, and Romeo is ambiguous, but also fairly young as far as these things ago. They're young enough they might just take infatuation for love.
Here are some well developed romances and friendships in fantasy books if that is what you are looking for right now. 😂 Kushiel’s Dart series by Jacqueline Carey, YA series Cat’s eye chronicles, and for more popular series... Outlander and Game of Thrones. Let me know if you would like more.
If someone comes along and starts hitting on my girl, and their response to me informing them that she's taken is "Dude why you so possessive, she can make her own decisions." I am going to punch him in the face. For his own edification. And my girl will approve because she understands that our relationship is a collaborative goal that we both have the responsibility, and therefore the right, to defend.
Committing to a relationship and honoring committed relationships is a virtue, and an acknowledgement of the person's agency, not a denial of it.
Good video otherwise.
I especially agree with the criminal neglect of vibrant friendships in imaginative literature.
Hello cat from 2019 at 0:56, you're a good cat