Do you have to have been to a place to write about it convincingly?

Right now I'm revising a science fiction novel set in Cuba, which I've never visited physically (but I have done some research and I have spent time in rural areas in tropical countries- Malaysia, in fact). The research I've done makes me feel as if I've been there though.

What do other tropers think? Can you write convincingly about a real place without having been there?

If you have to be to a place to write it convicingly then my entire writing career is a lie (virtually all of my works are set somewhere in Europe, but I have never set foot on that continent), so I would say, no, you don't need to travel to where you write to write it convincingly, but you must always compensate for that with copious amount of research.

That, or know someone who knows about your desired location and is okay with you spamming them with questions.

I don't believe so. Having stayed in Geelong and frequented the area I can write accurately for the location in my novel. I can refer to the stadium by the highway, the train station and specific shops that were in operation. However Melbourne I would not be as familiar with but thanks to research and the influence of how it is portrayed in Australian television and the media I can provide a pretty accurate description. Just the same as the setting for Dead Island is not supposed to be Papua New Guinea yet it is an accurate resemblance in tone and style if not Morsby meant as a stand in for Port Morsby.

I've been to Melbourne but my memories are vague...

If, so then welp. I've set half my story on Mars.

This is actually one of the things that I have the most problem with as the research never seems to give me what I want and so I'm always critical of what I've written - knowing full well how much I had to leave out or gloss over because I wasn't able to find the info.

And the fear that someone who's actually from wherever it is will read it and say "but why didn't the hero just cut through the back of Henderson's factory and out into North Street instead of wasting time running all the way around the block?"

Unless your hero is a local then I think most would accept they wouldn't have the local knowledge to come to such a conclusion. If it is something that is such an interest to you then Google Earth is one option I can think of where you can think along the lines of, say after the shooter had opened fire they can cut in between these houses and over the fence to the highway.

I've been to Melbourne but my memories are vague...

I'll give an example that might help put things in perspective. When I was younger and staying in Geelong we had to go to Melbourne, and we were in Chinatown and my father really didn't want me to go to these video game arcades. I remembered that when we stayed in Chinatown a few years later and past midnight I went out and looked around Melbourne, including the arcades, and this was right when the Melbourne gangland wars occurred. Reading up on it I remembered my father saying something about drug deals and in my head I put two and two together and the likes of Dino Dibra, PK and Benji Veniman would have been there in 2004 (well they would have been long gone by then but if these were the hot spots my father had every reason to be worried.) It might not have been the case or I might have it wrong but based on what I knew and read I could extrapolate the information to something, hopefully, reasonably accurate.

No, otherwise fictional towns, countries, continents, planets, etc., wouldn't exist.

This. Researching stuff like geography and climate can be useful, but unless you're going for ultra hardcore realism, make shit up. Preferably an entire region if you can. And even if you're trying to be Like Reality, Unless Noted, then no one's going to have a hard time buying the existence of some small hamlet, town, or city in a mostly urbanized country. Unless it's a major metropolitan area, stuff like that tends to slip through the cracks irl.

And on the subject of 'making shit up', how viable a strategy would exaggeration and mixing made-up stuff with genuine stuff be towards convincing others of your creative liberties?

For instance, I've set my story in a fictional town located in rural Wales. To help sell its isolation and ruralness, I described the town as being surrounded by ancient woodlands (something Wales, and the UK in general, is somewhat lacking) and situated over an hour's drive from the next town (which is something of an exaggeration since there are usually small villages in between in reality).

The Sierra Maestra in eastern Cuba (the whole of eastern Cuba was once a huge province called Oriente. Now it's 5 different provinces: Las Tunas, Granma, Holguin, Santiago de Cuba and Guantanamo) plays a big role in the plot.

As far as making things up goes; that leads into the related question of how much geographical license can you take before it becomes unbelievable? As in "that kind of landscape doesn't exist there?"

edited 24th Mar '14 10:05:54 PM by MorwenEdhelwen

That's why some works use fictional settings as opposed to real places. Resident Evil have a city in the mid west but area codes are from New York and the layout is more akin to something like Japan, they wouldn't have the research or level of detail to accurately depict a real town, plus something that had been mentioned for my own work. If you place it in a real place and there are several shootings, a gang problem, a zombie outbreak (not in my work but that you'll see where I'm going with this) those who actually live there might feel uncomfortable. A prime example would be Mercenaries where the ruling dictators saw it as an attack on them, they thought Pandemic were encouraging their overthrow. Same for something like Command & Conquer: Generals where China did not like their army destroying a real dam or attacks on Tienanmen Square. So it might be worth considering whether one could make where a setting is placed as accurate as possible and whether it should. Making where your story is set the crime capital of the world might not go over so well with the residents of Swan Hill for example.

@tsstevens: In my case, though having Cuba be a Gangsterland does reflect reality to an extent. Pre-revolutionary Cuba was basically a Gangsterland controlled by American business interests (gambling, sex industry) and the Mob. President Batista was basically a little gangster himself; even his cabinet was corrupt and one of his senators was a drug dealer on the side.

edited 25th Mar '14 4:20:14 AM by MorwenEdhelwen

Didn't Call of Duty: Black Ops have something about Castro having issues with his depicted assassination? I'm not saying don't do it, I'm saying it might be worth looking into whether the idea would fly in real Cuba or if a Banana Republic would need to be used as a stand in.

Another idea, if location accuracy is considered important. What about accuracy in other areas? How Special Operations Group or a Swat Team would operate for example? Sure you could get as much information as you can and depict them rather accurately but you would only be able to go so far in that there would be some things that could not be depicted, lest they read as a guide to criminals.

That might be comparing apples to oranges, but I guess what I'm trying to say is MST3K Mantra could apply to some things.

It wouldn't work in a fictional country. It has to be set in Cuba, because Che Guevara is a big part of the plot (the main character, a 13 year old boy is literally his clone) And since it's told from the perspective of a clone of the famous revolutionary, the Revolution is portrayed in a pretty positive light.

And as a matter for fact, the assassination attempt in the game you mentioned wasn't on Fidel but on his Body Double.

Forgive the comments if they read like they are from a mushy brain, on account of they are from no sleep. I think America attempting to assassinate Castro was brought up just the same.

Using a stand in for Guevara wouldn't work? Well I wouldn't worry about the sensitivities of someone like Castro or where you set your work too much. As I said just because there have been complaints about it before doesn't mean you shouldn't do it, the low down dirty trick he pulled by opening up the prisons and sending all the undesirables to America was rightfully pointed out in works such as Scarface as it should regardless of his protests. Just something to think about. Personally I wouldn't bat an eye, and were it something like covering the drug problems of Indonesia I would be cheering over the howls of protest trying to keep the issue secret.

It's not just that using a Guevara stand-in wouldn't work. Using stand-ins for everything (the Sierra Maestra, Guantanamo Bay...) doesn't work the same way setting it here in Australia doesn't work. We don't have the same kind of national attitude to revolutionary activity or the same kind of difficult political history as in Cuba. There are Australians and people in other countries who have no idea who Che Guevara or Fidel Castro are. Everyone in Cuba knows who they are. Che is more than a national myth there.

There is actually a supporting character who is a literal clone of Fidel Castro.

bump

As I said I don't have an issue with using a real place, I think you would get away with it. It's just some might take exception to the way Castro or Guevara are portrayed, but I wouldn't class it as a big enough issue to negate what you would write in any way.

Another way of looking at it would be to bring up the example of Al Capone. Some works treat him as a complex man capable of incredible generosity or incredible violence, others depict him as a cartoon villain stripped of any redeeming qualities. I don't recall any recrimination for the way such a figure was written regardless of the portrayal, at worst they can complain or if they had the power to do so blocked in their country, so again I wouldn't be too concerned about it.

As far as research into a place to write about it convincingly let's look at how the pros did it. When the Gunsmith Cats series was produced the writers actually went to Chicago to do location work, they studied and drove the Shelby and did research at a gun shop. But you don't have to do that yourself, look at what Infinity Ward were able to do with studying photos of Pripyat and Chernobyl. They didn't have to go to into the hot zone to accomplish their goal, and what they made was so accurate a lot of people were freaked out because when they played their game how closely they matched the real location made it clear this was not how someone imagined the nuclear meltdown, this is what really happened.

I've have to agree that the key is research—close and in-depth. It's a poor substitute for actually having been there, but actually having been to a place is a very rare luxury for writers, so research can substitute. Start with Wikipedia, see what sources it cites, and go after those sources. Make sure you're familiar with all the important factors—the "feel" of the place, how its geography and history affects the way it is today, et cetera. This applies even if you're doing a fictional expy. Once you understand how the past affects the present for the real-life location, and not just the famous past either but also the recent past, you can start applying that to a fictional place.

Yeah it depemds on who the person. Often there's no middle ground on figures like these.

Exactly, Sabre.

edited 27th Mar '14 2:05:08 AM by MorwenEdhelwen

Also

@Crystal: Is there anyone on TVT who fits that description? Last time I checked there were no tropers from Cuba.

Dunno, man. Maybe there's a subreddit for Cuba, or something?

It can...help. People who tend to have been to places tend to know small things about the place that would otherwise not show up. Basically, broad strokes wise, you're good, but if you really wanna get a feel for the place, then either do buttloads of research, or visit the area. It's why movies tend to start with traveling adventures, at least along the disney line and whatnot.