Interview: Journey to Equestria · 1:32am Jun 13th, 2013
Journey to Equestria is the kind of historical adventure story I wish we saw more of. It has original worldbuilding, interesting OCs, and a plot driven by a cunning, cruel, and relentless villain.
Most of the time when people reach back into the past, they either A) get bogged down in worldbuilding and forget to tell a story, B) don't have interesting characters, or C) retell something that's been done to death, like Nightmare Moon or the origins of the alicorns.
In this interview, I had a chance to talk with Aldrigold about some of the things that made Journey to Equestria different.
Bold is me; regular text is Aldrigold.
What inspired you to write Journey to Equestria?
Funny story—it started with a blind bag toy. I was collecting them and focusing specifically on random pony blind bags, because I have always liked toys that had no backstories. I wanted a world to fit them in that was still the pony world but somewhat unique.
I also liked the idea of exploring the world before the order of Equestria came into being. I remember seeing a clip, I think at the end of A Canterlot Wedding, where the changelings "blast off" and are thrown into what looks like dingy, dark forests beyond the borders of Equestria. It made me wonder what's out there, and how the world may have been different when Equestria itself was smaller. It's obviously still expanding, as evidenced by the Appleloosa episode and the Family Appreciation Day episode.
I wondered more about gryphons, since we've only seen two. I wondered what it would be like if gryphons ruled, and what the role of ponies would be, especially without their leaders.
And of course, I wanted a story that involved travel and discovery as well as overcoming a big obstacle.
You seem to be very good at designing OCs. How do you do it?
Part of it is that I have some practice writing OC's—I write as a hobby and have for a long time. But usually, when making an OC, I pick a set of character traits and think of them as like a veil for that character. Everything that character does is done through that veil. So if a character is very passive or nervous, and a different character is very aggressive, the same situation through that veil is going to read and develop very differently. The more practiced you get in writing, the more complicated and real the characters can become.
Of course, the character traits themselves have to make a convincing whole.
You say you’ve been writing for a long time?
Besides Journey to Equestria, I have over a dozen projects ongoing, mostly original fiction. I'm trying to publish some young adult and middle grade novels. Unfortunately, getting an agent is harder than getting on EqD.
Right now, though, since I'm in grad school—fifth year, neuroscience—most of my writing time goes into my dissertation, but I hope to make good progress on the story over the summer.
How much did you have to revise this story? And what was the hardest part to get right?
I have an editor who helps with local problems—fixing sentence structure, word choice, and sometimes fixing logistical issues. He also gave me the idea for Rikarr's speech patterns, which was one thing that changed significantly between the first and second draft.
As for revising the story as a whole, I struggled the most with pacing the beginning. I wanted to start the story quickly while still giving enough context that readers could fully appreciate it.
Can you give me a specific example of working out a pacing issue?
The first few paragraphs before the scene where the unicorn is killed in chapter one. At first, I wanted to jump right into the death scene and start with a bit of a bang. However, I also realized that it was important to establish the setting and give readers a bit of tension before the action. Eventually, I added a part showing Blue's exhaustion and the small scene with the unicorn slave. It helps provide context and build tension at the same time. It also introduces Rikarr, the primary antagonist.
So the added scenes let us get used to the idea of ponies as slaves to the grypons, and then you have Rikarr show up for his pre-execution speech and explain how the world works:
Rikarr dove to the center of the circle, landing with his back to the unicorn. “We give you food,” he said to an attentive audience. “We give you shelter.” Blue looked to the small tents and hovels that made up the pony’s homes. “Most of all, we give you protection from predators and other dangers of the outside world. All we ask in return is that you work the mines and fields,” his gaze swiveled to the earth ponies, “serve us,” now he looked to the few unicorns who were present, “and keep the weather under control.” He looked straight at Blue as he spoke, and Blue swallowed hard.
Usually, we don't like info dumping, and we don't like villains monologuing, but here, it worked. I think that it's because there was tension to the scene, and it was something that he realistically would be saying.
Yeah. It wasn't a villain monologue so much as a propaganda speech, as much for the benefit of the slaves as to the reader. It was fun to write.
You mentioned Rikarr's speech patterns earlier. What can you say about that?
When I first went into it, I wanted him to be a bit of a brute—a dumb, powerful gryphon who was obsessed with his own power and control over the ponies. My editor thought it would be more fun if, instead of simply overpowering the ponies physically, he played mind games. He pretends to be kind, knowing full well that he isn't, essentially daring anyone to challenge him so that could make things worse through the guise of kindness. The whole thing with going from a dehorning of Green to a mercy killing to making them watch the mercy killing was all wrapped up in that interpretation of the character. Plus if the gryphon master is smart, it makes it harder for the ponies to rebel.
I loved that scene. I also loved the way he justifies dehorning Green’s father. It really establishes him as a villain, making him both eloquent and cruel:
“You all have magical gifts that can help us,” Rikarr continued. “But you are weak, and need our protection to survive. Our arrangement benefits us both, which is why I feel shocked, even betrayed, on those rare occasions when a pony like this Yellow chooses to turn his power against us. When this happens, we have no choice but to remove that pony’s gifts so that we may continue serving the remaining ponies without being hindered by the dissenter.”
One thing a lot of fanfic writers have trouble with is creating scenes with enough conflict. But besides "have a strong antagonist," what can you say about creating conflict?
Writing conflict or tension into a scene is a matter of identifying what force is impeding your character and how it affects them.
Obstacles can come in many forms, not just having an antagonist to overcome. It can be external forces—like hunger or the threat of capture, or even difficult a homework assignment—or internal forces, like a character's uncertainty or fear.
Tension can also make scenes interesting. It can be elicited in several ways, like a character being afraid of being captured. It can also come from a positive thing, like the thrill of finding new information and how that new information may change the character or world. That was the case when Blue learned about Equestria.
For the first several chapters, all your ponies are known only by the color of their coats; they have no names. I found it a very effective piece of worldbuilding, but how did you avoid confusion?
That was tough. I was very worried that it would sink the story, but I wanted to use it to show how complete the gryphons' control over the ponies was. First thing, I had to make sure none of the main characters had the same color coat :D
Second, when referring to other OC ponies, I would use phrases like "a red" or "the purple" to stress how little most ponies knew of each other and keep the reader from getting confused as to why random colors were being thrown at them.
Is there anything you'd like to add before we finish?
Other than thanking you for giving me the opportunity, not much. But thanks! This was fun!
:(
*deletes story*
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The stories I'm complaining about have only one or two ideas in them, one of which is something we've seen over and over again. Sometimes it's done well, like Celestia in Excelsis, since the author made it about so much more than just the origins of the alicorns. In that story, we saw an ancient race of phoenixes, Celestia being Star Swirl's apprentice, Celestia becoming a kind yet unpopular child ruler, racism, and Luna's origin being vastly different from Celestia's.
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Hopefully my epic comedy and meditations on the end of pre-Equestrian patriarchy will cover over the world-building and origin of the alicorns. D: