Stories that age poorly

[tachikoma]

I've noticed there are certain stories by some authors that are very transparently from a different time. It's especially clear pre- and post-internet, and more generally how culture has changed over the past 50-odd years. Two writers standout in particular, one that wiped their stories from the site (alwayswantedto) and one that's still around and writing (wayneandanntriskelion).

Both will sometimes make make reference to transformative technologies like the internet and smartphones, but more often they don't and seem to slip into writing about the world pre-IT revolution.

But what stands out more is the moral or cultural mores of the characters in their stories, especially wayneandanntriskelion. Their characters, the world their in, is deeply steeped in the 80s from the music they reference, treating sex acts like anal or orientations like being gay as taboo, or obsessing over religion. It's interesting to read their stories as a lens into the past where sex was so heavily policed, unlike today where anything and everything is available on the internet with almost no restrictions. Their characters have the weirdest hangups, at least when viewed from today. As religiosity has declined across the western world, the constant references to the cultural power of religious groups like catholics or mormons also stand out.

Are there other stories out there that have aged poorly, or that you think will age poorly as we march into the future? What about authors that clearly date themselves? Do you think authors should try to avoid writing stories that will age poorly, or should they write what they know?

 

[KeithD]

You are posting about two different things. A story written about a particular historic time isn't the same thing as a story aging poorly--and I don't think you make a differentiation well here.

I do often date my stories to before 1985, which was when the AIDS effect hit, at least where I was at the time. Condom use changed then--at least where I was at the time.

 

[tachikoma]

You are posting about two different things. A story written at a particular historic time isn't the same thing as a story aging poorly--and I don't think you make a differentiation well here.

That's a fair point, I didn't distinguish between setting a story in a particular time versus leaving it up to the reader to interpret things.

In the case of Alwayswantedto, his stories were disconnected and so some did take place in other time periods, while others took place 'now'. But from what I gather of what I've read of the Transformations series by wayneandanntriskelion, they take place in a contemporary setting though most of the characters feel like they've been pulled from the 80s, along with their period specific hang-ups.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Are there other stories out there that have aged poorly, or that you think will age poorly as we march into the future? What about authors that clearly date themselves? Do you think authors should try to avoid writing stories that will age poorly, or should they write what they know?

If a story is well written it won't "age poorly", it will become a reflection of that age, and should give those that read it "now" some appreciation of "then". The expression " age poorly" is very now-centric, with an implication that "now" is somehow superior.

Such a view means a half-life of five minutes on any contemporary story, because any story set "today" will have aged by tomorrow.

It's an odd thing to worry about, I'd have thought. It's in effect saying early John Le Carre novels have aged "poorly" because they were set In the nineteen-sixties, and set during the Cold War. Which is of course nonsense - they're set in another historical era, sure, but they are still superb pieces of literature.

I'm currently writing something set in the late seventies - it will be interesting to see how it's received. By the OP's logic, I shouldn't even be writing it, because it will already have "aged poorly".

 

[RoperTrace]

If a story is well written it won't "age poorly", it will become a reflection of that age, and should give those that read it "now" some appreciation of "then". The expression " age poorly" is very now-centric, with an implication that "now" is somehow superior.

Such a view means a half-life of five minutes on any contemporary story, because any story set "today" will have aged by tomorrow.

It's an odd thing to worry about, I'd have thought. It's in effect saying early John Le Carre novels have aged "poorly" because they were set In the nineteen-sixties, and set during the Cold War. Which is of course nonsense - they're set in another historical era, sure, but they are still superb pieces of literature.

I'm currently writing something set in the late seventies - it will be interesting to see how it's received. By the OP's logic, I shouldn't even be writing it, because it will already have "aged poorly".

One of my more recent stories was during the summer of 1969, and it gathered views quicker than all my previous 19 stories.

 

[ElectricBlue]

One of my more recent stories was during the summer of 1969, and it gathered views quicker than all my previous 19 stories.

There you go! Not aged poorly - one assumes an overall favourable response?

 

[MrHereWriting]

I've noticed there are certain stories by some authors that are very transparently from a different time. It's especially clear pre- and post-internet, and more generally how culture has changed over the past 50-odd years. Two writers standout in particular, one that wiped their stories from the site (alwayswantedto) and one that's still around and writing (wayneandanntriskelion).

Are there other stories out there that have aged poorly, or that you think will age poorly as we march into the future? What about authors that clearly date themselves? Do you think authors should try to avoid writing stories that will age poorly, or should they write what they know?

The truth is Alwayswantedto's stories are better than 99% of the stuff in I/T, with no one's being better, but some being just as good. If he hadn't removed his stories due to illness, I would have never written I/T. In fact, I probably would have never gotten back into writing after stopping for 17 years. His passing reminded me that "I used to like doing this" and I/T would be a good place to wipe off the rust for the genres that bring me the most enjoyment.

Authors, writers, poets, etc., should write what they want and nothing else.

If a story is well written it won't "age poorly", it will become a reflection of that age, and should give those that read it "now" some appreciation of "then". The expression " age poorly" is very now-centric, with an implication that "now" is somehow superior.

Such a view means a half-life of five minutes on any contemporary story, because any story set "today" will have aged by tomorrow.

Aged poorly is the same as saying, "I don't like that." People who use it think they're standing on the high ground. It's a worthless viewpoint that offers no actual insight.

Anyway, well said.

 

[RoperTrace]

There you go! Not aged poorly - one assumes an overall favourable response?

Probably all boomers like me are my readers, lol.

 

[KeithD]

The truth is Alwayswantedto's stories are better than 99% of the stuff [here].

I think this is true.

 

[tachikoma]

The title might have been a bad choice of words. But some of the stories I read have elements that stick out like a sore thumb, for example treating anal or being bi as taboo. As a relatively younger reader at 32 that's been raised on the internet, things like that are so mainstream it's weird from my perspective when characters act like they're going all out.

It doesn't mean the story can't be amazingly well written, I've read through a few of Alwayswantedto's stories and they were great. But it took a minute to slip into a mindset from a different time.

 

[ElectricBlue]

It doesn't mean the story can't be amazingly well written, I've read through a few of Alwayswantedto's stories and they were great. But it took a minute to slip into a mindset from a different time.

Educational then, as well as effective. That's the sign of good writing, is it not?

As a writer though, I'm thinking this might be a reflection on the reader, not the writer. Just saying.

There was a time when anal sex was a huge taboo, unheard of, especially for women. Now, you can sit on the bus and think, "Yes, it'll be her, and her, and him," until you've counted up a third of the bus or whatever, and you think, Jesus, "mainstream" is so fucking boring, where's the spice?

 

[RetroFan]

As a writer who writes a lot of stories set in the past, there is a difference between stories with a setting in a previous time period and stories that age badly.

For example, my story 'Banging Cousin Becky In Blackpool' takes place in 1955, with the narrator Ian looking back in time to the Second World War on a number of occasions. The story is set in the past, many years before I was born, and if I had published it in 2010 or 2015 it would still be set in the past. It hasn't aged poorly, just set in a very different time and world than the world of today.

In more recent years, I have been setting my 'present day' stories in the mid-late 2000s as a means of avoiding the pandemic, and while obviously not historical their setting in the recent past is clearly referenced. One story series among mine that admittedly hasn't aged all that well is 'Body Swap With Sister's Boyfriend' from 2019 which doesn't have a specific year setting, just sometime in the late 2010s. The pandemic made the events of the story, such as scenes in busy tourist centres look most anachronistic just a year after it was published. It also references the nerdy brother and his friends watching Game of Thrones which ended later that year with a maligned finale, and that the elderly great-grandmother will get a telegram from the Queen for her century birthday the next year. The sister's dim-witted jock boyfriend asks if she will also get one from the King, the brother having to explain there hasn't been a king in England for many years, and that the Queen's husband is a prince not a king.

Another reason a story might not age so will is if it is set in the near future, but the predictions of the world a few years on prove wildly inaccurate. For example, say an author published a story in 2015, where an 18-year-old guy secretly loves his 18-year-old female friend, but she has a boyfriend, and the boy and girl lose contact when they graduate high school in June of 2015, and go their separate ways to different colleges. Then five years on, in June 2020 they have a chance meeting by which time the girl has broken up with her boyfriend, and this time they find love. In this 2020, written in 2015, the young man's parents are enjoying themselves on a cruise, the girl herself has just returned from a vacation in Australia, Hilary Clinton is US President, King Charles III is King of England and the Chicago Cubs' World Series drought is 112 years.

Although not strictly aging poorly, a story can appear anachronistic if not aged correctly. For example, say an author attended college in the late 1990s, and 20 years later and now approaching middle age wrote a story set in a college in the present time. However, the way the college is organized plus the behaviour and attitudes of the students and faculty are based on the author's memories and experience at college two decades earlier, and as a result the story becomes very anachronistic.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I like the name Karen. It's not my name, but I used it and derivatives for a female protagonist with similarities to me, in a few early stories.

Then I worked on a series, got it nearly ready to post - and suddenly The Karen, the racist middle-age bossyboots, became a meme across the world. My Karen would have to have her name changed. She became Laura, which helped change her personality away from mine, eventually got her own series. The stories with Karen probably now look as dated as if the characters were called Pamela and Gene, or Kevin and Sharon...

A lot of my stories take place during the phone/internet revolution. There's a Geek Pride one which dives into the detail of being at the cutting edge in the early 90s (Usenet! Early instant messaging! Smoking rooms in the tech company office!) which is intentionally dated, but others I try to make the tech not the focus - I had one plot point where fingerprint phone unlocking is crucial, had to move the whole story back in time 5 years, was hugely relieved that the character was the kind of guy who would have had a top of the range iPhone back then so the plot still worked.

I had a series which I didn't want to emphasise that it was pre-2000, but it was. I gave the characters mobiles (cellphones) with no detail, and there was action dependent on being in a rural area with no coverage, which is still plausible today.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

the music they reference, treating sex acts like anal or orientations like being gay as taboo, or obsessing over religion. It's interesting to read their stories as a lens into the past where sex was so heavily policed, unlike today where anything and everything is available on the internet with almost no restrictions. ...As religiosity has declined across the western world, the constant references to the cultural power of religious groups like catholics or mormons also stand out.

Let me guess: you're a white American male, not from a particular religious background?

Yes, everything is viewable online now. But how many more people are doing those things? I would bet that the number of people that have tried anal sex - either way round - and will admit it in surveys, has rocketed since the 70s. By the 80s and 90s you had Cosmo and Forum mags and phone lines publicising it, not to mention novels and porn mags. But it wasn't until recently you had teenage boys thinking it was something to push for on a second date.

Thing is, now it's something people who don't want to be penetrated have to make clear they don't want. Not sure that's progress - in my day we'd just got as far as reviling men who went 'oops, wrong hole!' and men who now assume anyone should want anal if not repressed is hardly an improvement. Men who will happily consider anal on either end for themselves? Now we're talking, but I'm not aware of mainstream (straight) society being there yet.

Plenty of high schools where coming out as bi is practically de rigeur , but equally many areas where anything queer isn't much safer than a generation earlier. Given the current repression of sexuality and women's rights across parts of America (Florida's don't say gay, the trans rights filibusters, Roe v Wade overturn and consequences resulting in substandard healthcare across entire states...), I only wish religiosity was declining! (I'm American but never lived there)

Some stories are set in a time and place even when they try to be general, but sometimes it's the reader who is unaware of other parts of their own country, even just other families, in the current day.

 

[ColinPiper]

Lots of stories written in the 1990s/early 2000s that are still around on forums would have plot devices that wouldn't work now due to mobile phones, GPS tracking and online maps, and the ability to access the internet from just about anywhere. There would be situations that could be resolved almost immediately compared to then. A younger reader may take such technology for granted and think, what a dumb plot.

I've noticed a lot of movies and TV series recently that have been set in previous decades. I wonder if modern technology is a contributor to this trend.

 

[ronde]

The title might have been a bad choice of words. But some of the stories I read have elements that stick out like a sore thumb, for example treating anal or being bi as taboo. As a relatively younger reader at 32 that's been raised on the internet, things like that are so mainstream it's weird from my perspective when characters act like they're going all out.

It doesn't mean the story can't be amazingly well written, I've read through a few of Alwayswantedto's stories and they were great. But it took a minute to slip into a mindset from a different time.

I've written stories that take place in the 1500's all the way through centuries in the future. Yes, the morals and norms of each time period do differ, but it's only when we begin to compare those times to today's morals and norms that they seem "outdated". Why is it so inconceivable that a character in 2023 might find anal and being bi-sexual as a taboo? While probably more people are aware of the further reaches of sexual activity that in other decades, that doesn't mean they necessarily embrace those activities just because they know about them.

 

[RetroFan]

Some stories are very much a product of their time, and don't age well because of this. For example. werewolf and vampire stories were very popular from around 2007-2012, but not now more than a decade later. Stories written about these themes during the vampire/werewolf craze of the late 2000s/early 2010s would be quite dated now, while stories posted to the site about vampires and werewolves today would probably attract little interest.

 

[RoperTrace]

Some stories are very much a product of their time, and don't age well because of this. For example. werewolf and vampire stories were very popular from around 2007-2012, but not now more than a decade later. Stories written about these themes during the vampire/werewolf craze of the late 2000s/early 2010s would be quite dated now, while stories posted to the site about vampires and werewolves today would probably attract little interest.

The thing about werewolves and vampires is they recycle every 20 or 30 years. Very popular when I grew up, then a long break, then back in vogue. Zombies were/are the same way. Here's hoping musicals don't return, but who knows.

 

[Bramblethorn]

But what stands out more is the moral or cultural mores of the characters in their stories, especially wayneandanntriskelion. Their characters, the world their in, is deeply steeped in the 80s from the music they reference, treating sex acts like anal or orientations like being gay as taboo, or obsessing over religion. It's interesting to read their stories as a lens into the past where sex was so heavily policed, unlike today where anything and everything is available on the internet with almost no restrictions. Their characters have the weirdest hangups, at least when viewed from today. As religiosity has declined across the western world, the constant references to the cultural power of religious groups like catholics or mormons also stand out.

Are there other stories out there that have aged poorly, or that you think will age poorly as we march into the future? What about authors that clearly date themselves? Do you think authors should try to avoid writing stories that will age poorly, or should they write what they know?

William Gibson wrote "The future is already here, it's just not very evenly distributed".

That applies to the past, too. There are still plenty of pockets of the western world whose attitudes to such things today are close to what might have been considered mainstream in the mid-1980s.

 

[tachikoma]

Let me guess: you're a white American male, not from a particular religious background?

Not white (brown), nor American (Canadian), but I was raised Catholic (now an atheist, the blacksheep of the family that ended up leading the pack in that regard).

Yes, everything is viewable online now. But how many more people are doing those things? I would bet that the number of people that have tried anal sex - either way round - and will admit it in surveys, has rocketed since the 70s. By the 80s and 90s you had Cosmo and Forum mags and phone lines publicising it, not to mention novels and porn mags. But it wasn't until recently you had teenage boys thinking it was something to push for on a second date.

The availability of anything and everything about sex online is one reason I thought about this post. Both technologically and socially it feels like the world is changing faster than ever. Which means stories from as little as a few decades ago can seem outdated.

Thing is, now it's something people who don't want to be penetrated have to make clear they don't want. Not sure that's progress - in my day we'd just got as far as reviling men who went 'oops, wrong hole!' and men who now assume anyone should want anal if not repressed is hardly an improvement. Men who will happily consider anal on either end for themselves? Now we're talking, but I'm not aware of mainstream (straight) society being there yet.

It's progress, of a kind. Which doesn't mean there aren't new problems to solve. In the early 20th century people thought that literal horse shit was going to overwhelm cities. Then came the car, which alleviated on set of problems and left us with another (and frankly worse).

Plenty of high schools where coming out as bi is practically de rigeur , but equally many areas where anything queer isn't much safer than a generation earlier. Given the current repression of sexuality and women's rights across parts of America (Florida's don't say gay, the trans rights filibusters, Roe v Wade overturn and consequences resulting in substandard healthcare across entire states...), I only wish religiosity was declining! (I'm American but never lived there)

I think those actions are a conservative backlash to an overwhelming surge of progressivism. Culture can't really be legislated, and even if some of the more excessive elements are pulled back I don't think something like marriage equality will be repealed in the States. Gays are just too normal to fear anymore, only the most extreme conservatives are still afraid of them.

Some stories are set in a time and place even when they try to be general, but sometimes it's the reader who is unaware of other parts of their own country, even just other families, in the current day.

Yea, part of this is that things we may assume are normal or omnipresent are not and depend on your particular cultural milieu.

 

[MrHereWriting]

Not white (brown), nor American (Canadian), but I was raised Catholic (now an atheist, the blacksheep of the family that ended up leading the pack in that regard).

You just ruined their day. Good. The world needs to move past generalizations.

Anyway....

Aging poorly is just a bad phrase for creative works. Cars, homes, machines, people, they can age poorly due to wear and tear, but creative works just ... are. Some are good, some are bad, some fall between good and bad on the quality spectrum. "Aging Poorly" is a pejorative for creative works, not an observation on the changing of the times.

Let's face it, Alwayswantedto wrote stories that involved anal sex between a mother and her son; I don't think that will ever be accepted, so in the sense that you used the phrase "aged poorly," did it really age poorly? In that sense. Online, you can find thousands of women who willingly do anal and enjoy it, but out in the real world, I've found less women are into anal than are, and I used to bartend, which gave me access to good-sized pool in which to survey. Things aren't taboo because we have access to them. They are taboo because we fantasize about them, but we'd either never do them, or never tell people we would do them.

The question that would better fit the feel of what you were going for was something along the lines of: What stories contain themes that no longer appear taboo in today's erotic world? (But that's only going to be true for other people who share your same perspective.) So, maybe even ask: What stories are obviously set in the past?

As to the other things, especially music, everyone I know listens to everything, with 80s and 90s being big in their top 100 list.

 

[TheArsonist]

"Age poorly" isn't perhaps the right term, but I have occasionally noticed that some writers seem a bit out of touch with contemporary life, so that they're not able to portray it convincingly in stories supposedly set in the present, but fall into anachronism. In these cases I think it is safe to assume that the writer is significantly older than the characters in the story.

It can be details like how applying for a job works, normal dating practices, sense of humor, or forgetting about (or being unaware of) the existence of smart phones, social networks, streaming, etc. Or characters making dated pop-culture and celebrity references from long before they would have been born (and I don't mean Marilyn Monroe and The Godfather, but things no young person today would be familiar with). Sometimes it's subtle and subjective, and other times very obvious.

One egregious example that comes to mind was a story where the main character (a young man still living at home) had to hide his porn mags from his family. That would make sense in a period piece. It does not in a story set today.

There is definitely something to be said for "write what you know."

 

[gunhilltrain]

I've noticed there are certain stories by some authors that are very transparently from a different time. It's especially clear pre- and post-internet, and more generally how culture has changed over the past 50-odd years. Two writers standout in particular, one that wiped their stories from the site (alwayswantedto) and one that's still around and writing (wayneandanntriskelion).

Both will sometimes make make reference to transformative technologies like the internet and smartphones, but more often they don't and seem to slip into writing about the world pre-IT revolution.

But what stands out more is the moral or cultural mores of the characters in their stories, especially wayneandanntriskelion. Their characters, the world their in, is deeply steeped in the 80s from the music they reference, treating sex acts like anal or orientations like being gay as taboo, or obsessing over religion. It's interesting to read their stories as a lens into the past where sex was so heavily policed, unlike today where anything and everything is available on the internet with almost no restrictions. Their characters have the weirdest hangups, at least when viewed from today. As religiosity has declined across the western world, the constant references to the cultural power of religious groups like catholics or mormons also stand out.

Are there other stories out there that have aged poorly, or that you think will age poorly as we march into the future? What about authors that clearly date themselves? Do you think authors should try to avoid writing stories that will age poorly, or should they write what they know?

It seems to me that the 1980's were already quite a bit looser sexually than, say, what was going on about thirty years earlier. (For me, that decade covers the ages of 25 to 35.) True, there was no Internet and and thus no Internet porn, so "information" about some sexual practices was harder to find. Without smartphones and then dating apps, the pace of personal encounters was at a slower pace, but that wasn't so bad perhaps. Probably the "dating scene," for lack of a better term, is much more dysfunctional today.

Gay culture was certainly quite out in the open since about the early 1970's. If anything, the lack of AIDs before about 1983 made for a less restrictive environment. You would think that somebody would have invented a better condom than those that have existed for decades now.

Sex was not heavily "policed," as you put it, for college students and even high school students since about the early '60's. Roe v. Wade seemed untouchable, a fact of life at that point. Organized religion had been losing power for a while, although there are always new moralizing groups showing up. Were you even alive during that time?

 

[MateoParks]

I've noticed there are certain stories by some authors that are very transparently from a different time. It's especially clear pre- and post-internet, and more generally how culture has changed over the past 50-odd years. Two writers standout in particular, one that wiped their stories from the site (alwayswantedto) and one that's still around and writing (wayneandanntriskelion).

Both will sometimes make make reference to transformative technologies like the internet and smartphones, but more often they don't and seem to slip into writing about the world pre-IT revolution.

But what stands out more is the moral or cultural mores of the characters in their stories, especially wayneandanntriskelion. Their characters, the world their in, is deeply steeped in the 80s from the music they reference, treating sex acts like anal or orientations like being gay as taboo, or obsessing over religion. It's interesting to read their stories as a lens into the past where sex was so heavily policed, unlike today where anything and everything is available on the internet with almost no restrictions. Their characters have the weirdest hangups, at least when viewed from today. As religiosity has declined across the western world, the constant references to the cultural power of religious groups like catholics or mormons also stand out.

Are there other stories out there that have aged poorly, or that you think will age poorly as we march into the future? What about authors that clearly date themselves? Do you think authors should try to avoid writing stories that will age poorly, or should they write what they know?

As not exactly a counterpoint, but more a different point of view, I find that stories are more erotic when characters do things that the story has set up to be taboo.

If the characters are just going on about how sodomy is a sin and that dude dresses like a sissy, and it has no relevance to the story itself, then that's when it's problematic and certainly is just in there to insert the author's viewpoints for no reason, but if that character being so closed minded is part of the kink, then that can be very hot. Or rather, what I mean is, it's more about whether or not its good storytelling rather than about the actual morality of it.

And it's a good gauge of how far we've come in what's actually a really short period of time.

I love open expressions of sexuality, but it just hits different when it veers into the taboo. Maybe it's just my jaded internet brain.

Ironically, I do see a lot of comments steeped in old school conservative rhetoric on some of the most taboo stories. So, even they long to express their repressions behind closed doors.

And, I absolutely loathe the "write what you know" criticisms. That's so limiting for the author. I've learned and expanded my own viewpoints just by doing research into things I didn't "know", and it's so ironic to me that more liberally minded people who push to break outside of norms also can have such a narrow worldview in regards to what is and is not acceptable based on the immutable features and life experiences of the author.

Even if their subject matter is presented poorly, as long as the author accepts the criticisms and uses them to improve, there should be no restrictions about "writing what you know." Most of the fun is putting yourself in the shoes of people you'd never otherwise meet, at least, to me, living out their world vicariously through them. There's a lot of empathy in that, even if the author's own views are clearly not all the way there.