Have Your Taste in Fiction Gotten Better in Age?

It's a simple question: Since your teen years, have your taste in art/literature/music/television/cinema/whatever gotten better, worse, or stayed the same?

If you're under eighteen, do you think you have good or bad taste in fiction?

It's probably gotten worse, if anything. But that has more to do with having enough depression and depth in non-fictional stuff that I no longer want seriousness in my fiction. Dark humor and light drama, that's how I roll.

Ehh. Unless the work of fiction is a real steamer, I tend to enjoy anything put in front of me. To hell with the concept of taste!

Well, I kinda liked The Clone Wars when it started...

Depends on what you call fiction, I suppose. And I am screeching away from the first thing that comes into mind.

When I was younger, I read Leo Kessler and Sven Hassel books almost religiously. Now I can't read the first guy's books but still love Sven Hassel.

I also used to love the Harry Potter books, but had them completely ruined for me by a couple of works I considered to be far better than canon, so "better" for me is highly subjective.

Think that's the best I can come up with this early in the morning/late at night.

It's...pretty much stayed about the same.

This.

Honest query: Define "good/bad fiction".

Every day I grow closer and closer to perfection, and my taste in fiction follows suit.

About ten years ago, I was playing computer games and reading sci-fi novels.

Now, I play computer games, read sci-fi novels, and watch ecchi anime.

Judge for yourself.

One thing that's changed; I've learned how to consume works I don't actually like, analyze them and figure out why other people like them. Also, I've stopped caring about what other people think of my taste in fiction.

Finally, I read less sci-fi and fantasy than I used to.

If "better" equals "more picky", then yes..

I'd say "better" equals "less picky", considering you can find more stuff that way...but I guess it takes all kinds.

I'm incredibly picky when it comes to books. If it doesn't grip me in the first ten pages, if the characters are unlikeable or the side characters are more interesting, and if the plot isn't solid, I stop reading.

edited 22nd Apr '13 11:47:31 PM by PeacefulApocalypse

I keep reading until it is done unless the author manages to bore me so bad I fall asleep or offend me so much that the book goes out the window. This does not happen often.

I think my taste in fiction is directly related to how much money I have to spend on books/movies/DV Ds/TV Shows at the time. Because when I have a lot of money taste goes out the window.

Case in point, when things started to get really grim, I started to discover Barry Manilow. I like Barry Manilow, but nobody would accuse him of being any weightier as music than Andrew Lloyd Webber. Whose filmed anniversary stage musical of Phantom Of The Opera I own in a Blu-Ray two pack with Les Miserables. Because it was cheaper that way.

To be honest as I get older I'm more willing to read non-fiction, I'm-AN-ADULT grown up stuff but that's mainly for researching my novels so the SJ-bloggers of Tumblr don't eat me alive like the Tree People from Cannibal Holocaust they can be sometimes.

It rather depends on how you define "better".

While my primary interests have remained the same (fantasy and pre-1880 or so English-language "classics", with romance thrown in on the side), I no longer read as much outside those interests because of a lack of time. That's not really better, and I miss having the time to read pretty much anything put in front of me, rather than having to pick and choose what I most want to spend my limited time on and thus defaulting to my top preferences.

If you're asking whether I've become better at discerning quality/better at noticing flaws, then I definitely have. And while that probably technically means I have better taste, there is something positive in being able to pick up a work and enjoy it even if it's technically not all that great.

I'm not sure about "better" (since I'm quite fond of a few things considered So Bad, It's Good), but it's definitely broader. My teenage self would probably find my recently-discovered love of horror to be surprising, anyway.

edited 24th Apr '13 11:32:58 AM by DrFurball

That depends on the definition of "better". "Objectively" speaking, it might be worse - I have developed a fondness for overly cheesy, silly, So Bad, It's Good works, and became even more fond of lighthearted and idealistic works than before. On the other hand, I have learned to recognise genuinely bad writing.

When I was younger I used to read books a whole lot more.

Then college happened and reading for fun is a thing that at best I fondly remember. At worst I've built up a negative response to any and all reading as inherently painful.

Its not so much that I have better or worse taste, its that I don't have as large an appetite and and no time to even eat.

edited 24th Apr '13 10:39:19 PM by imojee

Long time no see Beholderess.

I still manage to read for fun, though far less than I used to.

That's pretty accurate for me. The last time I got to read something for fun—and the first time in years, I believe—was during Hurricane Sandy.

(It was American Gods BTW. Awesome read.)

I, too, find myself reading for fun much less than I've used to. I really should do it more, since it tends to be more satisfying for me in the long run than idly browsing the web. However, it is less conductive to multitasking

After a certain point, not really, because I knew bullshit when I saw it.

I think as I grew a bit older, my tastes kinda hovered around the same, with a couple shows swapping positions. (Namely growing to dislike the powerpuff girls, and liking My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic in some odd air of hypocrisy, but otherwise, I've stayed the same, avoiding Twilight, romance novels that have too much smut, and anything not safe for work. (Take what you will of it.)