1:05:08 Can you imagine having Brandon Sanderson tell you “That’s a good idea, you should write that story”? Like shit dude, now I really gotta

"My real life is boring" probably my favorite answer

By the way, this man is not only a genius author, he's a brilliant educator with wonderful inflection, masterful pacing, and positive examples. Bravo.

Shout out to the guy who said Avatar: the Last Airbender and everyone went AWWWWW YEEEEEEEEAAAAAH

Has anyone else become swiftly addicted to these videos?

Love the fact he's upfront about what he can and can't spell, because it really eases my mind over the idea of "because I write, I should know all the words in my language, and how to spell them."

13:03 "The murder happened at Comicon and it was Naruto day" *The detective is a mom* Watch in agony as she asks every person in the place if they are Naruto.

"Avatar: The Last Airbender" -*Everyone liked that*

"The weather disintegrating their clothes" Are you sure that doesn't belong to romance? XD DYING

As someone writing her first Fantasy series and can't afford to go back to school for creative writing/English, this kind of education is priceless. Thank you Brandon for sharing your knowledge.

Very grateful for two things: 1. Sanderson's fab lectures. 2. The positivity of the comments in this thread! It is wholly refreshing to see peoples energized and thoughtful reactions to the work of others and to see selfless and respectful sharing of opinions, jokes, and joy for writing. Thanks for the ray of light, y'all!

Nice to be able to watch these without incurring into CRIPPLING DEBT.

1:05:29 "The coronavirus destroys China, so the economy is in chaos" And it comes with a plot twist!

The section on abstract vs concrete information is such a nugget of gold! I'm planning on using this to help me become a better DM for D&D. Notes: Concrete: all of the readers/listeners are imagining the same thing in their head. The benefits of this information is that there is less dispute or confusion among readers, and it puts them more in the minds of the characters, and less in the mind of the author. A negative is that it can slow down a story when you explain too much, often leading to boredom. Abstract: all of the readers/listeners are imagining different things based on personal biases and life experiences. The benefits are that you can easily talk about the themes in your story, and the reader can make their own conclusions about the subject. A negative is that it can feel like a lecture from the author instead of the character's point of view, and it often leads to disparity about what the author meant. - More words often equals more concrete information, less words often means more abstract. -Anytime you can use less words to make something more concrete, do it! -You should be writing in concrete terms most of the time, but the reader still needs some abstractness.

1:40 What does World Building mean to you? 6:00 World Building in the context of Sci-Fi and Fantasy 8:08 or 8:40 World Building in service of Story > Info Dumps/Ways to Conveying information in an interesting way 13:42 Pyramid of Abstraction > Showing vs Telling > 22:04 >Grounding you into the World First/Through the Eyes of a Character > Mistborn/Ways of Kings/Robert Jordan 25:19 mini Q&A. Watson/Apprentice Characters, Portal Fantasy, Journal Entries The List: Examples of World building Enhancing the Story 30:40 John Wick 33:00 Avatar The Last Airbender 38:19 Firefly 41:32 The Expanse 42:25 Dune 43:56 Physical Setting and Cultural Setting 55:39 Exercise: Enhancing Genre(/Plot Archtype) by coming up with ideas that focus on one Aspect of Setting 1:08:11 Debriefing the exercise, Pick a Narrow Focus and Interconnect them

Just purely from a teaching standpoint it was fun to see how animated the class got when they were allowed to shout out the physical or cultural aspect of different genres, and suggest their story concepts. Really fun teaching technique to get the class involved.

Coming to this video two years later, its interesting to hear Brandon talking about how he's never done a fast blitz release where he announces an entire line at once... before the Secret Projects happened. Also really wierd to hear someone shout out "Coronavirus destroys China's economy" as a horror idea. That must have been super early days in the pandemic before it got everywhere.

Two Sanderson Lectures in a week? Easily the best thing that has happened this week.

Economic horror: Monster's Inc. But make it scary

I picked flora and mystery and then thought: what if the trees started killing people? Before I knew it I had a declining career as a filmaker. Thanks Brandon....

I actualy put down Stormlight midway through Kalladin's apearance. (i think that is the third prologue) I was SO burned down with the other two that I just didn't care anymore. Now the problem was that that was the first time I read something from Brandon. After reading mistborn first era, the reckoners, warbreaker, elantris and a bit of mistborn era two, I begun stormlight again and it became one of my favorite series now. I understand why he says that was a big risk.

48:56 "if your first book is pretty popular, that moves to once every 10 years. no names mentioned" me: ROTHFUSS 🤬

I appear to be the only one cursed with the knowledge that Thomas and Friends has worldbuilding lore second only to The Lord of the Rings

I don't know why the tax one got me so hard. I was laughing so hard. "You wake up on April 16th, the day after taxes are due... and they aren't done." True economic horror.

The encouragement Brandon offers is amazing. A lot of literary educators teach in the manner of "don't do this, don't do that" whereas these lectures are so full of positivity. Very grateful this is publicly available.

Brandon: How does Avatar: The Last Airbender use worldbuilding to enhance its story? me: this is gonna take awhile...

This came sooner than expected Storming Beautiful

I'm a romance writer and this class is still very useful to me. This is just a very good writing class - scifi or not.

I'm not even a writer (just watching these videos for fun), and the part about the abstraction pyramid was so informative about communication in general.

I've never wanted to participate in a lecture more - found myself wanting to ask and answer questions as I'm watching this. Very envious of the students!

Romance by combat. "Kaguya Wants to be Confessed To" is a fantastic example of this.

And here I was thinking I’d have to wait a week for part two. Silly me.

Honestly, we're so lucky that these lectures have been uploaded for free!

Honestly this guy is the first Mormon I've ever heard of that doesn't immediately give me bad vibes . What a professor ! Excellent stuff , thanks sm for making this resource available to the general public !

It's nice to see Brandon have trouble spelling words, he is human!

I like that there are two notes on the board that say "Good" and "Shameful" that point to two sets of markers.

I fell asleep, in my dream I was getting a lecture that was helping me put together some ideas for my dnd setting that I’ve been working on but was stuck on a road block of inspiration. I woke up, had to write down my ideas, and continue the lecture awake. Brandon Sanderson is so overflowing with creativity he not only helped me get past a dam of inspiration but he blew that damn apart while I was sleeping. That’s pretty bad ass. Totally random but Brandon if you read this, there’s a magic system in you revolving around sleep.

This is really really awesome!

The pyramid of abstraction bit is some of the best writing advice in the history of writing

Two in a week? I don’t know what we’ve done to deserve such kindness but thank you sir!

Brandon Sanderson a day, awesome book not far away

I love the fact that the peeps attending the lectures are now way more confident than they were initially P.s I am referring to them completing Brandon's sentences!

Brandon Sanderson is the teacher I always wished I had ❤️ Awesome Lecture

18:08 This is some excellent advice, and an interesting way of presenting this. I call this "being a Mandalorian author", because that's who taught me that there comes an ability to command respect with being a man of a few tactfully chosen words.

55:06 - and yet Sanderson himself manages to get almost everything on the board into the Stormlight universe in some way or another. That's the true mark of his brilliance as a writer, being able to stuff so much into a book series without it feeling overwhelming for the reader!

One of the greatest "worlds" for me has always been Starship Troopers. That novel felt so much larger than the book actually was when twelve year old me read it.

Love that respectful call out of Patrick Rothfuss

Thank you so much for making this publicly avalaible. Thank you, thank you.

Brandon Sanderson seems like such a sweetheart, and very passionate about his craft. I would love to attend these lectures in person

I remember how impressed I was in one of the WoT books, in Siuan Sanche’s POV. They way she spoke in fishing village idioms and themes… it was so concrete and solidly placed her as a lowborn who has gone up in the world without dumping lore on the reader.

Never thought I’d get to be in a writing class. This is marvelous.

It would be fun if Brandon actually writes the book about Elvis and killer penguins as one of the fun relaxation projects. =D

I thought these world building episodes were going to be the least useful to me as I'm not really writing a whole fantasy world at the moment, but this was amazing to think about how the environment can impact the story, and is still really relevant for setting things in the real world. The whole series has been amazing so far!

I love the fact that I'm watching this after several months of COVID, when a student suggested it as the horror theme...like bro you had no idea. None of us did.

"My vampires aren't like these other vampires" Looking directly at you, Twilight.

I can’t believe this is actually a series. Thank you so much master Sanderson

And another excellent lecture by an amazing author. Brandon sharing his own methods is incredible. Few authors are willing to give away their secrets. Thank you Brandon!

Literally just put my hand up at a question, I’m that immersed 😆

Brandon, I want to vehemently thank you for trading your knowledge for my time. Every minute I spend on your lectures is 1 day I save in writing my books.

I've watched these about 10 times now. Great to revisit when you are stuck.

Am I the only one who loves how down to Earth Brandon is? Like he can't spell some easy words. I've always thought professional writers to be on some next level. Makes me feel better about being a writer and not knowing my alphabet.

Amazing how he has seemingly read/watched everything and can talk about it.

I just read the Broken Earth series and it has some of the best world building I've ever seen.

Wow, this will actually help a lot with my worldbuilding. Thanks for the great lecture! I will now go forth and build some worlds.

More than the educational content of all these lectures, watching Brandon struggle with penmanship and spelling like I do gives me the most hope that I can write some day.

It makes me so happy that I'm not the only author who can't spell to save his life.

I think that one of the most compelling aspects of worldbuilding in Fantasy/Sci-Fi is that it allows you to exaggerate aspects of the real world to a degree that those exaggerated aspects (or themes) can pose a much greater danger, or have a much larger impact, than they normally would. It also allows us to create contexts where a character _could_ exist (air benders can't exist unless elemental bending where a reality). This sets stakes in a story higher than you could reasonably find in a more realistic setting.

im doing my best to tell a story that ive had in my head for a while now and this lecture series has been really encouraging me to keep going, sorta demystifying the art

I have always thought about worldbuilding and fantasy aesthetic in general as a way to explore the human condition in a way that emphasizes aspects the author wants to focus on. The aesthetic and world of middle earth calls the conflict between industry and nature. Its a way of exploring very human concepts in a fantastical way

You’re spoiling us at this point Brandon! I’m so grateful for these videos ❤️

Thank you so much to whomever captioned these lectures!

I subscribed because I learned more in six hours than I did in a year watching other lessons. Bravo!

The Butlerian Jihad is like the greatest background event ever created in science fiction

My favorite example of effective world-building, perhaps strangely, is Dark Souls.

Economy and horror idea: spirit world currency is human souls after you have died. The story can be called: The Afterlife. (Sharing because I'll probably not write it. If you write it, please just share a copy with me).

Thanks for making these accessible! Your classes have been incredibly helpful 💛

The old Greek story you meant is that of Atalante. Men who want to be her husband need to defeat her in a race or die. Coincidentally, I just brought that up under reviews to Jenna Moreci's "The Savior's Champion". 😊

Surprise to be sure, but a welcome one.. thanks for two vids in a week

Love the fashion concept of everyone has to wear face masks. Perhaps this lecture was more than sci-fi instruction, but is actual Prophecy!

I love that these are here, I feel very fortunate to be able to watch these like this!

As for understanding the "show vs tell" rule, the book that was most illuminating to me was The Rhetoric of Fiction by Wayne C. Booth. Booth was a literary critic. Curiously his parents where Mormons from Utah, where he was born. He introduced many interesting things in that book. The basic idea of the book was the vision of writing as a form of rhetoric. Another idea was the argumentation against the dogmatic vision of that "show vs tell" rule. It was also in that book that the "unreliable narrator" was first officially introduced, or so i think. And probably most important and maybe paradoxically, it was the fact that the author of the book was an essential part of the story in the mind of the reader. I really recommend this "old" book to anyone, be it reader or writer.

I tried and failed. I had my writing program, and I watched all your videos about a year ago, and I kept writing and all my world-building ended up in large groups of paragraphs that made no sense. I finally thought maps are good maybe I should draw a map, and that wasn't very good. I kept daydreaming and actually writing was not happing. Finally, I bought a program called campfire, and that was what I needed. Everything you suggest has a card for it, and it's wonderful for staying organized. So I redrew my map and found my two-year day-dream had given me enough idea I filled an entire world, and then some. Who knows maybe I finish my book before I am 50.

The idea of being aware of abstract vs concrete vocabulary is interesting where it applies to everyday communication too! Just being aware of the words you used and how easily they can be misinterpreted.

My favorite world building is the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. The Land is a beautiful and wonderful place. But he really makes the Land exquisite by the characters that populate it. Moram's dignity, Foamfollower's laughter, Elena's extremity all make me love the place more and hate what Despite is doing to it.

I'm not going to lie, I almost put the WoK down for good. The prologue just really didn't do it for me. Luckily, my brother, who had recommended it, convinced me to go a little further. Honestly, nothing really landed for me until the Heretic chapter, where Challan's motivations are revealed. That's where the story started to get interesting for me, and I've loved it ever since.

This teacher passes the vibe check

So true about the low star reviews for Way of Kings. I put it down after a few chapters the first time. I put it down after the first arc the second time. But the third time reading it I was already somewhat familiar with the world due to the first two attempts at reading it that I was able to enjoy the story more and my god did I love it...

Action adventure with climate - my first thought was Shark Nado 🤣

I am here to implore anyone who hasn't read Mistborn, or any of the sanderson books mentioned in the series, TO DO IT. YOULL REGRET IT if you don't, he talks a lot about them as examples and they work amazingly well as tools to understand some of his points, especially in worldbuilding in service of the story AND characterization. Mistborn was such an interesting read, a unique magic system and a story that feels new, original and pristine even 30 years later. Read it before it anyone spoils it, you'll love it. So, so worth it

I really wish I could take one of your classes one day! @Brandon Sanderson I just loved all of the classes you uploaded here and are helping me write my own story! thanks for this.

What I say is Worldbuilding affects the outside challenges the characters have to face. Those challenges should generally reflect the themes. Dune, for example, in pretty much EVERY challenge they have to face, is about overcoming instinct with the power of the human mind. Instinct tells us to swing our sword faster, instinct tells us to walk on the sand with rhythm, especially when a thumper is on the ground. Instinct tells us to dive for the caves to hide from the attacks, instinct tells us to cry. Every single problem I listed is intrensically linked to the setting. In my book, the themes are how factions break us apart and individuality and self-sustaining lifestyles are squashed under other peoples quarrels. So to test the main character, a military deserter, he has to make compromises for his freedom all the time. The power system is literally dictated by your ability to think for yourself more than everyone else.

I was hoping someone would say ONE PIECE in that opening segment....man people are sleeping on this one....23 YEARS of great worldbuilding and still going strong...

My favorite nugget of wisdom: Your setting can be broken down into bullet points, created into scenes, then melded into the story just like a character. Wow. aAAAAnd now I’m thinking about when the TARDIS became an actual woman.

loving these videos! Thank you again for sharing them

Thank you so much for putting up this lecture series. I don’t go to BYU - likely never will - but even if I did, this would be the best way for me to come to this material myself and learn about it. Exceptional.

Great lecture, great ideas :) Thanks for posting these!

When he said 'One person for Dune,' I went "THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE," then he agreed with me and now I'm at peace. edit: grammar

This is one area where I often go too far, so learning to narrow the scope of things like this is extremely helpful.

I have found your videos so helpful and have discovered that im a gardener but I do what Dan Wells does I have a rough outline with a well thought out ending. Years ago I was given advice to write the ending first and go from there. The first novel I seriously tried to write I planned it out but still haven't wrote more than about half chapter because I wasn't excited about it as much as the one im now writting ( the unplanned one). After this video I want to revisit my first novel and complete it. I love the world I built for it.

Hey Brandon, love your work in the book, AND in the classroom! I feel blessed to have access to these courses. Ty for being you.