Have readers begun to lose their imagination?  Have writers begun to become TOO descriptive, leaving nothing for the imagination?

I wonder your thoughts regarding this topic.  

(Background, or reason for the question.  I am a lover of Bradbury, Orwell, Dickens, and Hemingway, etc. and they always seemed to be less about the details or description, and more about the storytelling.  So, I just wonder.  And please again do not take this as insulting nor attempting to start a fight, it's just rarely as of late have I had the privilege of speaking with or listening to such a diverse group of people, that I wonder what everyone thinks.  And am genuinely looking forward to any sort of conversation on the topic.  Thank You.)

But there is the other element: most entertainment media is now visual. People expect more description, so they want to be shown things in a way they're used to.

Letting the readers work it out for themselves is a great approach (and it's something I know you do very well). It's a skill I need to work on - I'm prone to drawing pictures and colouring them in for the reader, which makes editing tougher, if nothing else.

When the reader gets to feel clever because they've put two and two together and figured out details you've only hinted at, they become so much more engaged in the story.

I don't think it's so much the reader has lost imagination. As stated above, styles for writing come and go, and can be genre dependent. But you can finesse giving lots of detailed visual description if it's not your thing. Filling in details that aren't there is something the human brain excels at, given the right encouragement. 

I'm not very visual--I can't really see things in my head easily. So as a reader, my eyes tend to glaze over at long visual descriptions of objects or locations. I don't "see" what's being described, so it tends to read as a laundry list. And if I try to write that kind of visual description, it sounds like a laundry list  So I rely heavily on giving just enough broad strokes visually to let the reader fill in the details for descriptions that aren't really important to the story. (If I were making a painting of a tiger in a jungle, for example, I'd focus on getting the tiger clear, but might let the jungle just be broad strokes of green and brown. The mind knows that's "jungle" and will fill in the details accordingly. But mostly I'd want you looking at the tiger.) I also pull in other senses to describe things. Smell, touch, sound.  

I'm a self ascribed description whore. It's not that I think readers don't have the imagination, but I often have a more literary style of writing. I love delicious prose, what can I say? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

That being said, it definitely depends on the genre and the story. I try for snappier, short prose if I'm writing something like a thriller than needs to be propelled faster and keep the heart racing. On the other hand, I published a story once where the setting itself was it's own character, so it was description heavy since that was the only way it could "speak."

While I do love description, I think there's a skill in distributing it - where is it important to you as a writer for the readers to really experience your vision? Every little thing doesn't need to be described to death, but sometimes focusing on something that is meaningful to the story adds depth. Also, don't forget when adding description, it is far richer when you add multiple senses - not just a laundry list of what can be seen, but smelled and felt and heard.

Also, sometimes description has to say a lot in only a few words. I write a ton of SpecFic flash, and some of my peers have mentioned that razor sharp world building in flash is my superpower. (blush) Three well chosen, strong words can sometimes be far more powerful than a paragraph of milquetoast description.  

Of course, it always comes down to taste. For example, the old editor at F&SF seemed to like a sparser prose, while the new editor has mentioned she likes a more poetic style. 

This is me as well.  It's not that we're unimaginative, it's just that our brains process differently. I was having this conversation with a friend the other day. When she reads, it plays like a movie in her head; she's on the ground, in the action, basically a character.   I read like I'm some omniscient Morgan Freeman dictating from the clouds--I don't "see" the story as much as I'm "telling" the story. As such, highly descriptive elements are usually lost on me, or take a long time to process.

The book I think of immediately is "Titus Groan" by Mevyn Peake.  Amazing book, but it took me *forever* to read because he has long (beautiful) passages of description--from characters to landscapes to the basic gestures of conversation.  That said, it's a mid-20th century piece, and I think that was the norm in fantasy writing then. 

I am visual, I have an excellent imagination and I always live in the story.  That's part of the reason they take so long to write; they play out in my imagination and I write what I see in my head.  Sometimes I have to re-imagine them to make it all seem 'real'.

With characters I never put in a description that isn't important to the story.  In some cases that includes gender, and if gender is irrelevant I go out of my way to choose androgynous names.  If what a character looks like matters, and sometimes it does, those elements get described to the extent necessary.

In one case it's important that a character is very attractive, but I leave it in terms like that (other than hair and eyes) because 'attractive' is subjective.

That goes for the environment as well.  If there's no reason to describe a place I won't waste the words on it.  In some cases, the most recent story I wrote, the place is an integral part of the story so it got quite a few words, and all you got for the characters were names.

In my world reading is all about imagination, so a few clues to get you started but I rely on the reader's imagination to fill in blanks like what characters look like or the place they're in.

Have you guys heard of aphantasia? I have next to no visual imagination (I remember visual things as verbal concepts) and what you're describing sounds a lot like how I process imagery and story

I have never had the "movie in your head" effect, but I will get an internal snapshot of an emotional moment, and my brain holds onto the echo of that feeling, that's usually what makes a story feel alive in my head

After thinking about this for a while I remembered a scene I wrote that was extremely difficult.

In this case I had to imagine all the characters together in a room.  They walked through the scene step by step, as if at a script reading, and talked about the things they would say, or do, and how it all worked.  Everyone involved added bits and pieces to make it more 'realistic'.

It sounds totally stupid, but it was the only way I got through the scene.  I actually wrote the scene where they talked it out before I could write the actual scene.

That, I suppose, is the downside to 'living' the story in my head, like a memory, or a movie.  I get a little too close to it sometimes.

Which is probably why I like HEA endings.  I've seen far too many bad outcomes.

I have!  I really want to participate in, like, a study or something.  haha.  But also, it's not that I CAN'T visualize things, just that it takes A LOT of effort and I really have to focus on it with no distractions.

That said, I wonder how that impacts peoples' technical writing style.  I definitely focus on dialogue, and when it isn't dialogue it's usually action-focused. Not necessarily, like, sword-fighting or adventuring, but "he walks toward her" or "she tucks her hair behind her ear".  Honestly, I usually write most or all of the dialogue for a story, and then go back and fill in the other stuff. haha.

All I know is that third omniscient needs to make a comeback. haha

Yes! I was  "that's pretty much me" the first time I heard it described, and was startled that it wasn't just me. I've managed over the years to go from visualizing nothing to super limited visualization, but I'm never going to visualize anything fully let alone have movies in my head. My brain just doesn't work that way. I go by words and emotions mostly. Emotional snapshot is a good word for it, and that's what I really end up aiming for when I describe something in a story, an emotional snapshot. You may never know the curtains in the dim room are heavy blue crushed velvet hung in the latest fashion, but you will know the oppressive way they are suffocating the light.

Third omniscient needs to make a comeback. You wrote that jokingly but I wish it would make a comeback. I know it's terribly unfashionable but I love it. When I first started writing fiction (instead of writing commercials for a living) I wrote third omniscient without even understanding what I was writing. It just felt natural and so that's what I did. Readers who weren't writers liked it and told me they liked it. I had no idea I was doing writing the wrong way until a writer told me to stop writing that way. Okay, sorry I changed the subject but I got excited by that sentence.

Honestly, if we wanna talk about the way writing has evolved, the complete elimination of third omniscient is a great example.  The idea that someone is “writing wrong” by using a different stylistic approach is just plain silly, but here we are!

I also think a lot of people lump third omniscient in with “head hopping” without stopping to acknowledge the (very abundant) differences. 

Edit: I shouldn’t say COMPLETE elimination.  There are still third omniscient books being published.

Yes to all of the above. It's looked down on and I get it but I still like it. And it's not always head hopping. Of course, that brings up another type of writing which is looked down on -- fan fiction. I still read it every now and then. I'll slink away in shame now.

To circle this back to description, third omniscient/cinematic usually has the expectation of more visual description, since it isn't being filtered through a viewpoint character like it would be in first or tight third. I generally prefer writing in first or tight third because of that--if the character doesn't care about whatever it is enough to notice it, I can get away with not describing it ;).

I generally think people should read and write what they enjoy reading and writing. Just know what the common pitfalls are so you can do it well. Only reason to change is if you want to sell, and it's not selling, and people, including the ones buying, tell you it's not selling because of X.

Pajamas All Day wrote: I strive for a happy medium between sparse and lush description. This forum has been incredibly helpful to me in that regard. Reading stories by my favorite authors (one of whom won the 2021 SSC) has taught me more about this subject than any expensive courses/books/workshops/retreats. I don't always hit the mark but I at least better understand what the mark actually is now.

Awwww you made me awwww <3 I love reading your stuff. Thanks for the smile :)

I am very visual, not so much a conversationalist. I constantly get

told to shorten my lead of my stories, but the scene setting is 

something I love. If I could draw even a little I would be a painter. 

I visualize everything I write. When I go for a walk, it is all sights 

for me, looking really close at a flower, I can't get enough looking 

if it is beautiful area, or some place I have been looking forward 

to visiting.

My current story is in third omniscient.  Like, on purpose.  😆.   

I try to write what I think serves the story best, but I confess I am not the most visual thinker.  My works tend to be more dialog heavy and spare.

As a reader, I love a juicy, gorgeous, perfectly-worded description, but I also love it when things are just ambiguous enough that it takes a little work, and a little filling in, to 'get it'. I find when writing is over-described, it's too specific, and harder to relate to. If there's just enough left out, I can fill in what's unsaid with my own experiences, and the writing feels closer to my heart. When I write, I try to make sure to leave those gaps, so any reader can fill them in, too, and hopefully relate to what I'm trying to convey.

All of this!  The Book Thief and Stardust are two of my all time favorite books, and if you have a story that works well with it, I vote about forgetting "what right" or "what's in"

Also, love this conversation.  When I write, it's for myself first and my two besties second, and all of us are in the fewer descriptions the better camp.  It wasn't until a few years ago that I didn't realize that everyone didn't have a movie running in their head, and I could describe everything I'm seeing, but I always felt it would take away from other people who have movies. 

I'm the first to admit, Anne Rice level descriptions - I always skim.

I guess it's a finding a balance then?