worldbuilding, unnecessary?

[dragonimp]

Y'know, if you make a blanket statement about writing which lumps everything under a few poorly executed examples, you're likely to irritate a bunch of writers. Heh.

I get that his reaction is most likely to the kind of thing that would make your novel read like a D&D manual, but calling worldbuilding in general dull, numbing, and unnecessary? What sort of writer does absolutely no worldbuilding? (Well, yes, I'm sure there are books that take place in a complete fog, but really.) For me, it's like character design and that incessant internal narrator; there's no freakin' OFF switch!!

The problem is not in worldbuilding - which is unavoidable - but in poor writing and infodumping.

Comments

[dragonimp.livejournal.com]

Pern is a good example; insane amounts of worldbuilding. But the books work because the main focus is still the characters and the story. I think this guy's problem is when worldbuilding overshadows the story, but that's not what he said.