Are you more factual or creative?

[SageFury]

Obviously when we write we try to keep logic within our perception.

When writing your novels/short stories do you try to base your writing on more fact base rules, events that have or can happen in this world or do you try to pull your own world and rules within if not completely taking your world over this one?

A. Factual
B. Creative
And Why?
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B. I'm more if not completely creative when it comes to my novels. I don't like much of anything this world has in it to ever really include it in my stories. I like mythical environments and creatures among the shadows with people overcoming their fears striking down the evilness engulfing a dieing world.

The only real things that I ever use that relate to facts of this world is the sun, Moon, humans, 75% clothes, 55% buildings, 85% English, and the Calender...

[Shady Lane]

I assume most people will say creative.

I'm saying factual.

[SageFury]

I assume most people will say creative.

I'm saying factual.

Actually I'm on the fence on that opinion, because even if people have there story based on another world they can still have the same rules as this world, like medical, technology, landmarks and etc. If they have more facts than creative inspiration then they are more factual than creative.


I think it may be more of a 50/50 myself

[ChaosTitan]

I write urban fantasy, so I think I've got a mix of both. Basic factual rules and realities, with an overlayer of creative stuff.

[mada]

At this point, I still consider myself to be extremely new to writing and I've been focusing on factual. I would love to be more creative but for now I will settle for getting something interesting written down!

[kristie911]

I'm definitely more factual. I can't write anything that involves making up worlds, words or the like. Sci Fi/Fantasy is not something I can do...nor do I care to read for the most part.

[David I]

I think of myself as "creactual."

Sure, it sucks, but it's more fun to say than "factative."

[Mel]

Creative. My own worlds are more fun than this one. For me. :)

[Chickenscratch]

Factual.

Things are funny because they're true. Because we identify with them.

Unless you're talking about the South. That's just funny in general.

[Danger Jane]

Well, I'd say I'm decently creative...but the scientific side of me logicizes everything, even to the impossible. And I draw a line somewhere and tell myself, "This character is the child of fricking ANCIENT DEITIES. There doesn't HAVE to be biological LOGIC!"

the little voice still nags, though. "Couldn't the calcium channels in the cell membranes just..."

NO.

Other people procrastinate by googling their characters or drawing them or something. Me...I figure out how to scientifically justify fricking mermaids turning into people.

Also, though, I root that mythological fantasy strongly in real history--real people and places. I hate making stuff up.

[EelKat]

This is a hard one. I tend to write mostly fantasy, with non-human characters... merfolks, etc. So I have to rely heavily on my creative insight to come up with stuff, esp when dealing with underwater scenes; however, I also do a lot of research into everything I write before I write it. For example, I study up on differant water types, aquartic habitats, and various marine life. I want to blend a good does of real world in my fiction, because I want readers to believe it could happen, even if it couldn't. So I'd say I use a mix of both.

[Shadow_Ferret]

This is an issue I've always struggled with. How much leeway are we allowed as writers in the creative department? I mean, can we just make anything up? When I read books or see movies I often find myself asking, is this real? Is the backstory behind the Maltese Falcon true? Were there these gifts of falcons given to this king and did the Templers finally create the Maltese Falcon and has it been lost in time? Or is that all a fiction? I don't know.

The same is true for say Buffy television shows. When they face a demon and look in these ancient tomes, are those tomes real? Is the information found real? Or is that all a fiction created by the writer?

I don't know these things and it drives me crazy.

So until I get that answer, I am restricted in my writing by trying to be "factual." Or as factual as I can be.

[WendyNYC]

I am factual, logical, and sometimes very very sarcastic. In writing and in life.

[icerose]

I'm first creative but have a very strong factual side. If things don't, they don't work for me. There has to be a reason. I can never do "Just because" things without it bugging me to death.

[NeuroFizz]

Are you more factual or creative?

I refuse to believe the two are mutually exclusive, or even so consuming that the word "or" is appropriate in the question.

[Esopha]

Are you more factual or creative?

I refuse to believe the two are mutually exclusive, or even so consuming that the word "or" is appropriate in the question.

You took the words right out of my mouth.

I need a mixture of fact and creativity in everything I write, because you can't be 100% creative while writing fantasy. Disbelief is harder to suspend in a fantasy world. Once you lay down certain rules for your world (which I often borrow from this one) you cannot break them.

In fiction that takes place in our world, people are more likely to suspend disbelief because the world is real, so why shouldn't everything that happens (within reason) real?

[NeuroFizz]

In my mind, suspending disbelief is for the big stuff of the story. If the reader is asked to do it, the author owes it to him/her to get all (or most of) the small stuff right.

[DeleyanLee]

I've got a mantra when it comes to facts vs creativity: "Never let facts get in the way of a damned good story."

So, both. Gotta know the "rules" to bend them into pretzels.

[HourglassMemory]

Both, really.
I try being factual in a creative way.
And I try being creative with little factual things in there to mesh both worlds.

but I would say Creative....WAY Too Damn Much creative.

[Haphazard]

I used to believe that I must be entirely factual in my writing or write fantasy.

And then I learned to pull that stick out of my bum and add some creativity. It's worked for me thus far.

[Willowmound]

I tell the truth of my story.

[IceCreamEmpress]

Is the backstory behind the Maltese Falcon true? Were there these gifts of falcons given to this king and did the Templers finally create the Maltese Falcon and has it been lost in time? Or is that all a fiction?

All a fiction.

The same is true for say Buffy television shows. When they face a demon and look in these ancient tomes, are those tomes real?

Nope.

[veinglory]

Both. I spent most of my career in scientific research which is 100% factual whilst also being 100% creative, in my opinion. I see creation as the ability to generate ideas, innovate and try things out and play. I see facts as understanding the consequneces of what you do and learning from it to become more effective in acheiving your goals. I seeing writing for a market as also being equally factual and creative without the two being in competition. It is like writing a sonnet, do you choose a word for its meaning or the rhyme? It has to be both equally and without those elements competing and one winning over the other.

[BlueTexas]

Isn't the trick to be as creative with circumstances as you can while in a confined set of facts?

[S.H.P.]

Factual, having such a rich and complex family has left me with material that I don't want to use, but there's an urgency to acknowledge it.

[KTC]

I place my totally made-up characters and events into a factual world. Sometimes hard. My hardest experience was the one I wrote for the novel marathon. I think I grew the most writing that one. I placed the story in the Beaches district of Toronto...so it was heavy with place facts. I placed it in the 70s and included real people...I had to get Gordon Lightfoot's permission as I used him as a character. I used France and had to check the facts later...I used a TV show and had to research after writing. I'd say it was a completely creative world tightly wedged within the real one.

Usually, I am more into creative...I just wanted this one to have points of fact that were immoveable. I felt it important to weigh it down with facts. I just didn't realize how extremely difficult and time consuming that is. Authentic is hard to fake and harder to create.

[Zelenka]

I'm about half and half. I usually write stories in made-up worlds but I like those worlds to feel consistent and 'real', even if there's magic involved. I always like to make up strict boundaries and laws for that magic to work by.

[Sage]

I write urban fantasy, so I think I've got a mix of both. Basic factual rules and realities, with an overlayer of creative stuff.
Stop stealing my answers, Chaos :tongue

But, yeah, I've been doing urban fantasy (and urban sci-fi?) set in today w/ the fantasical elements in it, so a good mix of the two.

[SageFury]

Are you more factual or creative?

I refuse to believe the two are mutually exclusive, or even so consuming that the word "or" is appropriate in the question.

As I explained i'm more creative, I didn't feel titling this do you use the left side of your brain more or the right side...

Your digging to literal into the question, It's simple really... You either make up more things in your book then actually relating to this world or vise versa...

(I'm asking what do you feel you do more of? I mean your either making more stuff up or your trying to play by our worlds rules and keep everything the same.)

Obviously everyone is doing both but what side do you fall on more than the other...

[orion_mk3]

I do a ton of research for my newer stuff (not so much the older sci-fi entries), even the short stories, so I'm tempted to say factual.

But it's not really good research, and certainly never would have passed muster in the writing class I used to teach--internet-based, Wikipedia-centric, quick n' dirty. Save on the rare occasions when books are needed (I had to check out a book from 1910 to find out about Neutral Moresnet, for example) I just poke around the interweb, and anyone with real knowledge would be able to poke holes in my knowledge rapidly and assuredly.

So I tend to use the researched details sparingly for color and verisimilitude without doing into too much detail, which would betray my lack of real knowledge. For instance, I know the name of the Soviet-era naval reactor that powers my icebreaker and that the merchant marine of that era was called MORFLOT, but don't talk about rank structures or coolant tubes.