I have been working on my own fantasy tale now for a little while and I’m coming to some really fun and interesting parts with some female cast members. In my setting, women -especially lascivious women – are better at magic. For various reasons, the gods like women who are looser with their morals in my tale.
And then I started reading Eye of the World, the first book in the Wheel of Time. I nearly DNF’d the book in the first 100 pages because it was so long-winded and – not dull, but it was nearly all dialogue. But the Fade and the Trollocs saved it, and now its a great read!
But as I read, the Aes Sedai (who are all women) seem to be the greatest wielders of magic.
This leaves me in somewhat of a bind. Do I change details of my own work so I’m not derivative or do I keep it the same? If I change it, some details of my story will need to change, some of the stakes will seem less grand. If I keep it the same, will I be judged as having copied off the late Robert Jordan?
In the short term, I think I might keep things the way I have them. I’m a great believer in the ‘Death of the Author’ and hopefully my story will be different enough from Mr Jordan’s so that it isn’t thought I lifted elements wholesale from his work. No chosen ones in my story, no real heroes either. And while it is the story of young people in a fantastical setting, I’m not even sure it could be classified as High Fantasy.
But as well, I think it would be hard to write something entirely unique without there being some similar tropes or content to other tales. The fact is, the similarity is coincidental since I only started reading the Wheel of Time this month. I have been writing Kingdom of the Lion for a lot longer. It is the way that the story is told that makes the biggest impact, I feel.
What would you do in my place? Would you change the structure of your tale if you found something you didn’t want to be accused of copying? Do you think that being derivative is to somehow be less?
Please let me know what you think with a like or a comment.
Imagine Erratically 