Fedcomic Posted March 9, 2015 Report Share Posted March 9, 2015 (edited) So, Brandon is making some changes to new editions of Elantris and Words of Radiance. What do you think of authors doing this? He points to "Tolkien’s after-publication tweaks" as an example of how changing the text of a beloved story can be a good thing. And I do agree that the changes to Riddles in the Dark were good-- but even better was Tolkein's meta-textual explanation, namely that Bilbo had been lying. That's awesome. But there are definitely other examples of post-publication meddling. Ray Bradbury (though I love him) just couldn't leave Martian Chronicles alone and was constantly tinkering with it. I find that kind of thing annoying. Anyone have other examples? And when are you (or would you be) okay with this? Edited March 9, 2015 by Fedcomic 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bort Posted March 9, 2015 Report Share Posted March 9, 2015 Raymond E. Feist's Magician. He rewrote sections of it for the tenth anniversary release, to clear up a few errors, and introduce a few new elements to the story to bring it in line with some of the other happenings in the Riftwar novels. For example, he added some comment about the Lady of the Acoma into Magician. The Lady of the Acoma was the main character in a trilogy he wrote with Janny Wurts in the years after he originally published Magician. Usually, I'm alright with this, unless the author does something drastic which alters a lot of the story. About the only thing Brandon has planned which might do that is the Kaladin/Szeth fight at the end of WoR, but I've already looked at the changes made. They are not too bad, and will provide for some interesting interactions between those two characters in future. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vineyarddawg Posted March 9, 2015 Report Share Posted March 9, 2015 (edited) I think Tolkien probably is the best "good" example of an author tweaking their story. A more modern "bad" example towards which I naturally gravitate is Orson Scott Card and the Enderverse (the universe of books that started with Ender's Game). OSC wrote the full novel version of Ender's Game in the early 80's when the world was a very different place than it is today, and in the decades since, his newer books have significantly conflicted with the original story in several areas. (He admits that in some books, most notably Ender in Exile, that he just "forgot" some critical continuity contradictions, which is just crazy.) Not only that, but with the EG audio play he released last year, he did far more "tweaking" of roles and dialogue than Brandon has in this instance. OSC justifies this by essentially saying "I changed my mind" about the story, and as its creator, I guess that's his prerogative, but IMO he gutted so many parts of the story with the "small, but huge" changes he has made. (And I'm not even talking about his newest "first Formic war" series, which is just straight-up rewriting the history that had been presented as canon in the entire rest of the series before it.) IMO, Brandon's changes are closer to Tolkien's changes than OSC's changes, because Brandon has a very solid, logical in-world reason that he wanted to make the changes, much like Tolkien, and those changes are keeping in line with the characters' original story arc as it existed in the rest of the story. OSC's changes, on the other hand, materially change the essence not just of Ender, but other key characters, as well, and feel very disjointed and out of place. Edited March 9, 2015 by vineyarddawg 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laxrulz777 Posted March 11, 2015 Report Share Posted March 11, 2015 I'm perfectly fine with the elantris changes. Those are simply corrections of geographical errors and a great editor would have already caught them. They're essentially story telling typos. The WoR changes are a more slippery slope. I need to read them before I judge, however. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orlion Blight Posted March 11, 2015 Report Share Posted March 11, 2015 If it's not out of control, I'm fine with that. To illustrate, consider Henry James: the guy loved to "update" and make his works "better"... what happens now? If I want to get into Henry James, I am now faced with the "which edition should I get/is the best" conundrum. I doubt this will happen with Sanderson, if for no other reason than "the best editions are the one that are most consistent with each other". Another example (and it was coming) is George Lucas. Sometimes a creator think they are doing the best for their fans and creations, even as these two are yelling "NOOOOO!" right at them. I doubt this will happen as well because Peter will smack Brandon upside the head if this madness were to ever take him. Really, the only problem I have is that I have not read Words of Radiance yet, but have bought the book. So the question becomes: is this going to happen often enough that I need to wait to see if something substantive will change? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vineyarddawg Posted March 11, 2015 Report Share Posted March 11, 2015 Nah, you won't miss anything by reading the book you have and then just reading the (extremely small, considering the size of the book) list of changes that WeiryWriter posted in a thread in the Stormlight Archive subforum on this site. There's only a couple of substantive changes (all of the others are either grammar or fixing continuity disconnects), and reading those changes after you've already read the book once doesn't spoil the entire experience of reading the book in the first place. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orlion Blight Posted March 12, 2015 Report Share Posted March 12, 2015 Glad to hear it! Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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