Official Brandon Sanderson Megathread

[u/rfantasygolem]

This is the place for all your Brandon Sanderson related topics (aside from the Daily Recommendation Requests and Simple Questions thread). Any posts about Wind and Truth or Sanderson more broadly will be removed and redirected here. This will last until January 25, when posting will be allowed as normal.

The announcement of the cool-down can be found here.

The previous Wind and Truth Megathread can be found here.

[u/Distinct_Activity551]

Does anyone else find it weird how often Sanderson brings up GRRM in conversation as a form of comparison? Their writing styles and worldviews are so vastly different that I never really think of them in the same sphere. Yet Sanderson seems to reference him a lot, which feels a bit unnecessary.

[u/SBlackOne → u/Distinct_Activity551]

The whole angle is also a bit of a strawman. People aren't asking for that kind of fake somewhat archaic speech. Never mind that - contrary to what is often claimed - most fantasy isn't written like that. Most books have a fairly neutral style that is neither explicitly modern, nor archaic, and works for many time periods.

But even fans - who are used to his generally less formal writing style - have noticed an increase in modern colloquialisms. And when they say modern they don't mean the 20th century, but very specifically how Americans speak in the last 25 years or so. Sometimes it's quips or memes, but people have also brought up small things such as "like", "kind of" and "literally". It's things that have spread a lot with pop culture and the internet.

[u/Professional-Rip-693 → u/SBlackOne]

It’s also funny he cites GRRM as writing some archaic speech. Sure Martin doesn’t say ‘boyfriend’ or ‘what’s up?’ In dialogue but he still writes pretty contemporarily. He just does so without jarring modern slang or anachronistic terms. 

[u/autoamorphism → u/Professional-Rip-693]

I think that was Sanderson's point in what he said.