I don't read many fiction books anymore. My preference now is for non-fiction. However, I have been significantly influenced by many of the quality historical fiction books that I have read. Aside from learning about history through travel and experience, reading historical novels has been my preferred way to learn the history of many countries, regions, and cultures. Does reading a lot of good fiction make a person better? I believe it does.
Certainly, I would think, a more well-rounded one. Your experience with history in fiction is similar to mine with the science in science fiction. A lot of my first science training came from SF books. They certainly ramped up my interest in it!
Damn, this sounds like something I would have written! Your connecting the visual to "shallow" fiction rings true to me. I just read a mystery novel that felt like watching TV. It did actually become a movie or show, or at least that's what the cover said, and after reading it, I can't help but think it was written for that purpose, which explains why it felt like merely entertainment. The characters lacked depth in just the way they do on TV, but more to the point, the novel didn't take full advantage of its form. Novels should be novels, not movies. Movies that are adapted from novels tend to rely on voiceovers to convey something like what the novel was about. That really says something about what novels are capable of: reaching deep into interior thought and emotion, into places the video camera can't touch.
I know what you mean. I’ve read any number of modern genre fiction that has that same feel, as if the author was hoping for an adaptation. A strange feedback loop from filmmaking to writing.
On the flip side, there is a lot of older genre fiction, especially SF, that would make outstanding movies. My SF friends and I can’t understand why Hollywood doesn’t make better use of it. One good example: the movie Ender’s Game (2016) is based on the same-named 1985 novel by Orson Scott Card. There are thousands more that would make amazing action SF movies.
As far as shallow, I do think visual media operates on a different level than text. And live action is different from animation. There is more distance in the latter (which I think is good when it comes to violence).
I think full-length novels are usually too much for one movie. Arrival (2016) is a really good SF movie based on a short story, which seems a good fit. Movies, like short stories, are often based on a single premise and not a ton of character development.
And the icing is that you have to wonder how the shift in how we enjoy stories, from books, to TV, to movies, affects the way we think.
"As far as shallow, I do think visual media operates on a different level than text."
Definitely. I don't expect a movie to get deep into a character's mind. That's the particular challenge for visual media, getting interiority across through the exterior/behavioral, which is a good thing and forces creativity. A novel doesn't have that particular challenge. You could have a character doing essentially nothing for a long stretch, just thinking. Imagine if someone made a movie where all you see is someone sitting in a chair thinking. Even if you give that voiceover, that would still be insanely boring to watch.
Interesting thought about full-length novels being too much for movies. Short stories would give filmmakers some leeway, too, I would think, in that they would have some breathing room to elaborate various elements that weren't described by the story.
Dune is one of those novels with considerable interior monologue that many fans long believed made it unfilmable. David Lynch tried in 1984 — most consider it pretty bad (parts of the beginning aren’t horrible). But then the SciFi channel did a miniseries that wasn’t awful, and now Villeneuve has done a pretty decent adaptation, although the first film is a bit slow. But even this last effort necessarily loses so much. Villeneuve just made a fairly watchable movie from what remains.
A better example might be Ender’s Game, which, despite being a watchable movie, arguably left out all the real meat of the book — much of which is internal, what’s going on in Ender’s mind.
It’s also apparent going the other way, novelizations of original screenplays. Most such add a lot to make a full-length novel. More backstory or internal monologue or just plain filler. Most films, if you write out the plot, aren’t long stories. Not compared to novels!
I suppose you could get away with a movie of someone sitting in a chair thinking, but you’d have to make the movie about what they were thinking. Visualize their thoughts.
Flashbacks are like this, and as an aside, have you noticed the modern tendency to have a character experience a flashback and then the other characters act as if they have seen it, too? As if the person having the flashback described it in great detail. (Scrubs used to do this all the time.)
I don't read many fiction books anymore. My preference now is for non-fiction. However, I have been significantly influenced by many of the quality historical fiction books that I have read. Aside from learning about history through travel and experience, reading historical novels has been my preferred way to learn the history of many countries, regions, and cultures. Does reading a lot of good fiction make a person better? I believe it does.
Certainly, I would think, a more well-rounded one. Your experience with history in fiction is similar to mine with the science in science fiction. A lot of my first science training came from SF books. They certainly ramped up my interest in it!
Damn, this sounds like something I would have written! Your connecting the visual to "shallow" fiction rings true to me. I just read a mystery novel that felt like watching TV. It did actually become a movie or show, or at least that's what the cover said, and after reading it, I can't help but think it was written for that purpose, which explains why it felt like merely entertainment. The characters lacked depth in just the way they do on TV, but more to the point, the novel didn't take full advantage of its form. Novels should be novels, not movies. Movies that are adapted from novels tend to rely on voiceovers to convey something like what the novel was about. That really says something about what novels are capable of: reaching deep into interior thought and emotion, into places the video camera can't touch.
I know what you mean. I’ve read any number of modern genre fiction that has that same feel, as if the author was hoping for an adaptation. A strange feedback loop from filmmaking to writing.
On the flip side, there is a lot of older genre fiction, especially SF, that would make outstanding movies. My SF friends and I can’t understand why Hollywood doesn’t make better use of it. One good example: the movie Ender’s Game (2016) is based on the same-named 1985 novel by Orson Scott Card. There are thousands more that would make amazing action SF movies.
As far as shallow, I do think visual media operates on a different level than text. And live action is different from animation. There is more distance in the latter (which I think is good when it comes to violence).
I think full-length novels are usually too much for one movie. Arrival (2016) is a really good SF movie based on a short story, which seems a good fit. Movies, like short stories, are often based on a single premise and not a ton of character development.
And the icing is that you have to wonder how the shift in how we enjoy stories, from books, to TV, to movies, affects the way we think.
"As far as shallow, I do think visual media operates on a different level than text."
Definitely. I don't expect a movie to get deep into a character's mind. That's the particular challenge for visual media, getting interiority across through the exterior/behavioral, which is a good thing and forces creativity. A novel doesn't have that particular challenge. You could have a character doing essentially nothing for a long stretch, just thinking. Imagine if someone made a movie where all you see is someone sitting in a chair thinking. Even if you give that voiceover, that would still be insanely boring to watch.
Interesting thought about full-length novels being too much for movies. Short stories would give filmmakers some leeway, too, I would think, in that they would have some breathing room to elaborate various elements that weren't described by the story.
Dune is one of those novels with considerable interior monologue that many fans long believed made it unfilmable. David Lynch tried in 1984 — most consider it pretty bad (parts of the beginning aren’t horrible). But then the SciFi channel did a miniseries that wasn’t awful, and now Villeneuve has done a pretty decent adaptation, although the first film is a bit slow. But even this last effort necessarily loses so much. Villeneuve just made a fairly watchable movie from what remains.
A better example might be Ender’s Game, which, despite being a watchable movie, arguably left out all the real meat of the book — much of which is internal, what’s going on in Ender’s mind.
It’s also apparent going the other way, novelizations of original screenplays. Most such add a lot to make a full-length novel. More backstory or internal monologue or just plain filler. Most films, if you write out the plot, aren’t long stories. Not compared to novels!
I suppose you could get away with a movie of someone sitting in a chair thinking, but you’d have to make the movie about what they were thinking. Visualize their thoughts.
Flashbacks are like this, and as an aside, have you noticed the modern tendency to have a character experience a flashback and then the other characters act as if they have seen it, too? As if the person having the flashback described it in great detail. (Scrubs used to do this all the time.)
That's funny about the flashbacks. I haven't noticed it. That's just bizarre!