Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Steven Brust and "cool stuff"
I told my students today I planned to approach this physics class the way Steven Brust approaches fantasy writing, and I shared the "How to write like Steven Brust" quote from below. Here's the quote, along with Brust's two theories about literature.
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From the author’s note in Brust’s novel, The Paths of the Dead
How to write like Steven Brust
Steve has two theories about literature and one set of instructions on how to write it.
First theory: “The Cool Stuff Theory of Literature is as follows: All literature consists of whatever the writer thinks is cool. The reader will like the book to the degree that he agrees with the writer about what’s cool. And that works all the way from the external trappings to the level of metaphor, subtext, and the way one uses words. In other words, I happen not to think that full-plate armor and great big honking greatswords are cool. I don’t like ’em. I like cloaks and rapiers. So I write stories with a lot of cloaks and rapiers in ’em, ’cause that’s cool.”
Second Theory: “The novel should be understood as a structure built to accommodate the greatest possible amount of cool stuff.”
How to write like Steven Brust: “It’s really simple. What you do is put up a sign on whatever wall you face when you’re writing. The sign says, And now, I’m going to tell you something really cool.”(*)
(*) Steve adds that he got that last one from Gene Wolfe.
___
From the author’s note in Brust’s novel, The Paths of the Dead
How to write like Steven Brust
Steve has two theories about literature and one set of instructions on how to write it.
First theory: “The Cool Stuff Theory of Literature is as follows: All literature consists of whatever the writer thinks is cool. The reader will like the book to the degree that he agrees with the writer about what’s cool. And that works all the way from the external trappings to the level of metaphor, subtext, and the way one uses words. In other words, I happen not to think that full-plate armor and great big honking greatswords are cool. I don’t like ’em. I like cloaks and rapiers. So I write stories with a lot of cloaks and rapiers in ’em, ’cause that’s cool.”
Second Theory: “The novel should be understood as a structure built to accommodate the greatest possible amount of cool stuff.”
How to write like Steven Brust: “It’s really simple. What you do is put up a sign on whatever wall you face when you’re writing. The sign says, And now, I’m going to tell you something really cool.”(*)
(*) Steve adds that he got that last one from Gene Wolfe.
# posted by John Colton @ 4:02 PM 
