WriCampia: a space dedicated to writing, ranging from daily workshops to writing tracks. But what genres do WriCampians actually like to write? After reviewing the results of a poll, the three most popular genres this year were fantasy, poetry, and dystopian fiction. The poll, which allowed respondents to vote for more than one favorite genre, got 331 total responses from 65 respondents.
But what is so enjoyable about writing in these genres?
Ayana A., a 14-year-old Upper Camper, enjoys writing dystopian fiction because it takes place in “a different world” and presents a conflict where it’s “character versus world, and they have to overcome big obstacles.” But Ayana also likes how dystopian fiction shows different people’s points of view, and how much people can truly endure.
On the other hand, an 11-year old Middle Camper, Pri S., enjoys writing fantasy. “There’s fewer barriers to work with and there’s more possibilities,” Pri pointed out. “Right now I’m working on a story about a bunch of elves. I feel like humans in particular are very limited in what they can do, so to have characters that I can make do other things is fun. I really love character development.” Pri continued to explain that she loves her characters and wants them to be free to do whatever they want, which you can do in fantasy, but not in many other genres.
Madeline J., an Upper Camper who is 14 years old, also likes writing fantasy, but with a twist. “My favorite genre is fiction/action,” she said. “I sort of like a surreal tone to my fiction. Think of Alice in Wonderland.” She explained that she enjoys surrealism “because it’s like taking something you know and twisting it into something more lucid.”
Olive B., a ten-year-old Lower Camper, said something similar about fiction more broadly. “I mean, there are a bunch of possibilities I can do in it. In [nonfiction] you can’t explore as many possibilities, but in fiction you can.”
Finally, Alex P., a Lower Camper who is 11 years old, writes primarily songwriting, both in and out of workshop. He says, “I try to write in rock. I don’t know [why]–it’s just a fun genre. In a lot of music, like pop, which most people are writing, there’s less of a way to put in a whole instrumental place, but rock is easier to do that for me.”
Clearly, the WriCampians of this year enjoy fantasy. But how does this compare to other years? In 2023, camper Maya Savard published a similar article in the Yearly WriCampian. Then, the top three most popular genres were fantasy, poetry, and adventure–nearly the same as this year. However, dystopian has become a more popular genre to write than adventure, which may mean WriCampians now prefer more of a high fantasy take to their writing than a realistic fiction tone.
Although WriCampians may feel differently about what they actually like to write, writing is a core part of all of our lives, and we can learn a lot from studying the patterns in our genre preferences over the years.
