Report on the Symposium: Role of Setting
By Daniel Abraham.
If a story is set in the world that the reader is familiar with — either by walking out into it every morning or vicariously through our shared knowledge of history and consumption of media — the writer has a very powerful technique available to bring the readers into the setting. You just say it. Watch this:
1930s Berlin.
I expect some of you to be unconvinced at this point. To say (as that homunculus in my head) that just gesturing at a place and time might have some effect, but it ain’t much. So on with the experiment.
620s Parrinshall
Compare for a moment the difference between your own reaction to a setting with a shared cultural background and one that doesn’t have the weight of context behind it. If I haven’t convinced you with that, I’m not going to.
