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So the fanfic debate is raging again, and the latest entry is this post from Robin Hobb. Hobb admits right at the beginning that she is less than rational about the subject, but in her essay, as well as many of the anti-fanfic comments on Lee Goldberg's, I'm struck by the stream of analogies that completely don't work. Just because you're a writer doesn't mean your metaphors are logical, apparently. Granted, I've read plenty of comments from the pro-fanfic side that didn't hold up either. Basically, the entire argument drives me up the wall because everybody keeps jumping from one position to another, and it makes me feel like both sides must like to deny certain personal feelings. Some authors, whether they are or not, wind up sounding incredibly threatened by people they claim are pathetic. Some fanfic writers sometimes seem like they want to be the author or the author's buddy a little more than they'll admit.
For instance: fanfic is bad because you're not allowed to write about somebody else's character. But even fanfic writers that have the author's permission suck because they are talent-less, unimaginative wannabe writers who live in their parents' basement and can't get dates, because only those people would ever write about characters they didn't create. Unless they're doing it for money, or they're Shakespeare, or they're published.
Or: fanfic is great because we all are just flattering the author. Creativity should be encouraged! Except in those people who write things I don't like, who don't count. I think people writing about sex should be forbidden from writing fanfic. Unlike me, who is writing stuff the author would love, even if s/he doesn't know it yet.
It's like please, guys, take one position and stick with it, and if it doesn't hold up, just admit it already.
But rather than add to the conversations already going on well elsewhere, such as here, this has started to make me think about something I almost never get to think about because I'm too busy defending fanfic, which is
The thing is, sometimes I wonder why I don't. See, I think fanfic is a perfectly natural reader response. As somebody who writes for children I can't imagine trying to tell a 9-year-old reader that s/he couldn't imagine his/her own stories about the characters, or that writing them down would be a bad thing that would keep him/her from ever being an author. On the contrary, many schools encourage that exercise. I remember in high school having the assignment of re-writing a favorite scene from a book. I wasn't there the day after they were handed in, but I heard the teacher really liked mine, which I thought was kind of funny because he seemed to be praising me for recognizing a good scene when I saw one. Though at the same time I think I definitely was doing the point of the exercise, trying to figure out how to convey a scene well in my own words. How else do we all start to do things as kids except by copying others? As![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
conversant stated so clearly: this is called "play." When JKR and George Lucas sell action figures to children, what else are they for but for making up further adventures for the characters and acting them out, possibly in front of an audience of your peers?
I understand that the internet makes things more complicated and threatening for the author, in that she's more likely to come across these stories that once would have been more private. But at the same time I think having the author right there can sometimes be an infringement on the fan's space, you know? It used to be that if you wanted to talk about Star Wars with someone you had to know somebody who loved it as much as you did. You role-played with the kids on your block. The internet, while public publishing in some ways, is in other ways just a virtual community, at least that's how it's used (as evidenced by the amazingly private comments people sometimes drop). You are still just seeking out a bunch of your friends with the same interest to talk about this stuff, only you do it through letter-writing on the 'net. Having an author suddenly break in on those private conversations, to me, can be kind of annoying. For many people it may be exciting to think that the author is listening and can acknowledge and so validate them as fans and that's true, but it can also be like inviting somebody to the party who's just too powerful to not disrupt the conversation. And then you get into this whole idea that you're supposed to react to a book in a way the author would like-and some authors seem to think this is something they are owed.
Fanfic, imo, is very much a fan activity much of the time. That is, it's really not something that's supposed to stand alongside of canon on the same level. Hobbs claims she doesn't like people "fixing" the story, but that fixing is often a compulsion that has nothing to do with wanting to change canon. The clichés we see so often in fanfic, like hurt/comfort, torture, angst, porn--there's a reason those appear in every fandom. I started making up h/c scenarios for Batman and Robin long before I knew there was such a thing as slash. It's just a personal itch a lot of people need scratched once in a while. Hobbs says she dislikes fanfic writers "filling in" missing scenes or writing out set endings where the text is ambiguous because it robs the read of the ability to come to his or her own conclusions, which is odd, since fanfic *is* the reader coming to a conclusion and playing with it just enough to write it down. How can you write an ambiguous ending and expect the reader to not naturally fill in some possibilities?
I'm totally going off on a tangent from what I was first thinking about--see what I mean about being distracted from it? The thing is, like I said, I've never written fanfic. I've done it in my head, as I said before, but I've never felt really moved to write it. When it comes to other peoples' work, I'm more about analyzing it to death. But I wonder, since I don't want to be denying my own fears the way so many people seem to do when they talk about this subject, if I honestly don't feel right about using someone else's characters--thus siding reluctantly with Hobbs and Goldberg to an extent. Sort of feeling like, I would never write it, but it's okay if other people do.
But then, I have written tie-in books, which work much the same way (sorry, Lee!). You take someone else's characters, come up with a new story for them, and write it. True you have to stay within the guidelines of the series and you can't take the kind of creative license fanficcers do, but still, you're writing someone else's characters. I've also adapted a story into a musical, which also involved taking someone else's characters and making them my own. One of my first tie-in books was even based on an episode, which my partner and I then had to add to in order to hit the right word count. I've seen both sides of the argument try to take the high ground on artistic merit: I've seen fanficcers pretend a "real writer" wouldn't just write for money (yeah, right) and professional writers claim a "real writer" would never write about someone else's characters, even while they're writing tie-in novels, as if money washes away that stain. Or they want to deny obvious fanfic-type work like Wicked
Then I thought, maybe it was just with book-based canon it seemed like it should stay in the author's own voice, because the author's voice is often tied to the characters. But I didn't want to write XF fanfic either. And there are plenty of fanfic writers whom I love *because* of their voice. They simply create an alternate version of the canon world. In fact, I tend to prefer writers who more blatantly diverge from canon because in my experience it's often the "fanfic should stick close to canon!" crowd who seem to be closer to bestowing the author's validation upon themselves by separating themselves from people having a different conversation with canon. Anytime a fanfic writer has to marginalize other fanfic writers by giving themselves more rights than those writers get, I think their argument is falling apart.
Maybe it's just that the kind of "stories" I make up to myself about other canons are always too obviously of the "personal itch" variety--that is, I'm less interested in fleshing out a story to draw other people in when I can just grab my action figures and amuse myself with a sketchy backstory that doesn't need to hold up to much scrutiny. That, I guess, is what always amazes me when I hear people talking about how fanfic writers are lazy or uncreative--Jesus, I'm amazed at the stuff people come up with for something that is a hobby for fun. I've got no problem admitting there are fic-writers whose style I admire above many original writers. I can do that without going too far to the other extreme, as I've unfortunately seen people try to do, and pretend that there's no difference between fanfic and original fic. This is not meant as a way of ranking one against the other, just me saying I see no reason in ignoring the differences that gave us those different names. I've written both types of things, so I know they are different to write. Similarly, I remember being annoyed when LOTR Purists wanted to call the movies "fanfic" basically as an insult. I agreed that there were plenty of things that adaptation has in common with fanfic, but there's no reason to call adaptations "fanfics" when there is already a word for what they are: adaptations. They are defined by how they are different from each other, just as tie-in novels are defined by the ways they are different from fanfic, and original fic is defined by what makes it unique.
Still, despite being surrounded by fanfic and happily reading it, I don't want to write it. When people occasionally tell me they'd love to read it if I did I get nervous--probably because I don't think anything I wrote would live up to their compliment. Not that this is a problem--plenty of fic writers have no desire to write Meta, plenty of essay-writers don't do fan art. But sometimes I think it's more than that, because when people have issued challenges for fun that I'm included in I think I do feel almost like that's something I (as opposed to anyone else-I don't have any problem with people doing it in general) should do. I don't know...maybe it's that I'm so into meta and picking apart the characters as they stand I'm all too aware that if I were to write fanfic I'd be creating a whole other version of the character, one who has not yet been analyzed and is, at heart, completely different.
I just can't help but wonder about that tinge I feel at the idea of writing fanfic myself. Maybe it's nothing more than feeling it wouldn't be any good, but sometimes I wonder if I don't share some of the same feelings as those other original fic writers in feeling I “should” be writing original fic. I just can't convince myself this is much of a badge of honor. Recent discussions just seemed to make it clear that a lot of people have strong feelings about fanfic and are less-than forthcoming about what they really are, so it made me wonder about my own possible conflicted feelings on the subject, and sometimes I found myself wanting to say, shyly, "hey, sometimes I wonder if I feel like there's something wrong with it, but you're all such jerks I don't think there's any point in discussing it with you."
For instance: fanfic is bad because you're not allowed to write about somebody else's character. But even fanfic writers that have the author's permission suck because they are talent-less, unimaginative wannabe writers who live in their parents' basement and can't get dates, because only those people would ever write about characters they didn't create. Unless they're doing it for money, or they're Shakespeare, or they're published.
Or: fanfic is great because we all are just flattering the author. Creativity should be encouraged! Except in those people who write things I don't like, who don't count. I think people writing about sex should be forbidden from writing fanfic. Unlike me, who is writing stuff the author would love, even if s/he doesn't know it yet.
It's like please, guys, take one position and stick with it, and if it doesn't hold up, just admit it already.
But rather than add to the conversations already going on well elsewhere, such as here, this has started to make me think about something I almost never get to think about because I'm too busy defending fanfic, which is
The thing is, sometimes I wonder why I don't. See, I think fanfic is a perfectly natural reader response. As somebody who writes for children I can't imagine trying to tell a 9-year-old reader that s/he couldn't imagine his/her own stories about the characters, or that writing them down would be a bad thing that would keep him/her from ever being an author. On the contrary, many schools encourage that exercise. I remember in high school having the assignment of re-writing a favorite scene from a book. I wasn't there the day after they were handed in, but I heard the teacher really liked mine, which I thought was kind of funny because he seemed to be praising me for recognizing a good scene when I saw one. Though at the same time I think I definitely was doing the point of the exercise, trying to figure out how to convey a scene well in my own words. How else do we all start to do things as kids except by copying others? As
conversant stated so clearly: this is called "play." When JKR and George Lucas sell action figures to children, what else are they for but for making up further adventures for the characters and acting them out, possibly in front of an audience of your peers?I understand that the internet makes things more complicated and threatening for the author, in that she's more likely to come across these stories that once would have been more private. But at the same time I think having the author right there can sometimes be an infringement on the fan's space, you know? It used to be that if you wanted to talk about Star Wars with someone you had to know somebody who loved it as much as you did. You role-played with the kids on your block. The internet, while public publishing in some ways, is in other ways just a virtual community, at least that's how it's used (as evidenced by the amazingly private comments people sometimes drop). You are still just seeking out a bunch of your friends with the same interest to talk about this stuff, only you do it through letter-writing on the 'net. Having an author suddenly break in on those private conversations, to me, can be kind of annoying. For many people it may be exciting to think that the author is listening and can acknowledge and so validate them as fans and that's true, but it can also be like inviting somebody to the party who's just too powerful to not disrupt the conversation. And then you get into this whole idea that you're supposed to react to a book in a way the author would like-and some authors seem to think this is something they are owed.
Fanfic, imo, is very much a fan activity much of the time. That is, it's really not something that's supposed to stand alongside of canon on the same level. Hobbs claims she doesn't like people "fixing" the story, but that fixing is often a compulsion that has nothing to do with wanting to change canon. The clichés we see so often in fanfic, like hurt/comfort, torture, angst, porn--there's a reason those appear in every fandom. I started making up h/c scenarios for Batman and Robin long before I knew there was such a thing as slash. It's just a personal itch a lot of people need scratched once in a while. Hobbs says she dislikes fanfic writers "filling in" missing scenes or writing out set endings where the text is ambiguous because it robs the read of the ability to come to his or her own conclusions, which is odd, since fanfic *is* the reader coming to a conclusion and playing with it just enough to write it down. How can you write an ambiguous ending and expect the reader to not naturally fill in some possibilities?
I'm totally going off on a tangent from what I was first thinking about--see what I mean about being distracted from it? The thing is, like I said, I've never written fanfic. I've done it in my head, as I said before, but I've never felt really moved to write it. When it comes to other peoples' work, I'm more about analyzing it to death. But I wonder, since I don't want to be denying my own fears the way so many people seem to do when they talk about this subject, if I honestly don't feel right about using someone else's characters--thus siding reluctantly with Hobbs and Goldberg to an extent. Sort of feeling like, I would never write it, but it's okay if other people do.
But then, I have written tie-in books, which work much the same way (sorry, Lee!). You take someone else's characters, come up with a new story for them, and write it. True you have to stay within the guidelines of the series and you can't take the kind of creative license fanficcers do, but still, you're writing someone else's characters. I've also adapted a story into a musical, which also involved taking someone else's characters and making them my own. One of my first tie-in books was even based on an episode, which my partner and I then had to add to in order to hit the right word count. I've seen both sides of the argument try to take the high ground on artistic merit: I've seen fanficcers pretend a "real writer" wouldn't just write for money (yeah, right) and professional writers claim a "real writer" would never write about someone else's characters, even while they're writing tie-in novels, as if money washes away that stain. Or they want to deny obvious fanfic-type work like Wicked
Then I thought, maybe it was just with book-based canon it seemed like it should stay in the author's own voice, because the author's voice is often tied to the characters. But I didn't want to write XF fanfic either. And there are plenty of fanfic writers whom I love *because* of their voice. They simply create an alternate version of the canon world. In fact, I tend to prefer writers who more blatantly diverge from canon because in my experience it's often the "fanfic should stick close to canon!" crowd who seem to be closer to bestowing the author's validation upon themselves by separating themselves from people having a different conversation with canon. Anytime a fanfic writer has to marginalize other fanfic writers by giving themselves more rights than those writers get, I think their argument is falling apart.
Maybe it's just that the kind of "stories" I make up to myself about other canons are always too obviously of the "personal itch" variety--that is, I'm less interested in fleshing out a story to draw other people in when I can just grab my action figures and amuse myself with a sketchy backstory that doesn't need to hold up to much scrutiny. That, I guess, is what always amazes me when I hear people talking about how fanfic writers are lazy or uncreative--Jesus, I'm amazed at the stuff people come up with for something that is a hobby for fun. I've got no problem admitting there are fic-writers whose style I admire above many original writers. I can do that without going too far to the other extreme, as I've unfortunately seen people try to do, and pretend that there's no difference between fanfic and original fic. This is not meant as a way of ranking one against the other, just me saying I see no reason in ignoring the differences that gave us those different names. I've written both types of things, so I know they are different to write. Similarly, I remember being annoyed when LOTR Purists wanted to call the movies "fanfic" basically as an insult. I agreed that there were plenty of things that adaptation has in common with fanfic, but there's no reason to call adaptations "fanfics" when there is already a word for what they are: adaptations. They are defined by how they are different from each other, just as tie-in novels are defined by the ways they are different from fanfic, and original fic is defined by what makes it unique.
Still, despite being surrounded by fanfic and happily reading it, I don't want to write it. When people occasionally tell me they'd love to read it if I did I get nervous--probably because I don't think anything I wrote would live up to their compliment. Not that this is a problem--plenty of fic writers have no desire to write Meta, plenty of essay-writers don't do fan art. But sometimes I think it's more than that, because when people have issued challenges for fun that I'm included in I think I do feel almost like that's something I (as opposed to anyone else-I don't have any problem with people doing it in general) should do. I don't know...maybe it's that I'm so into meta and picking apart the characters as they stand I'm all too aware that if I were to write fanfic I'd be creating a whole other version of the character, one who has not yet been analyzed and is, at heart, completely different.
I just can't help but wonder about that tinge I feel at the idea of writing fanfic myself. Maybe it's nothing more than feeling it wouldn't be any good, but sometimes I wonder if I don't share some of the same feelings as those other original fic writers in feeling I “should” be writing original fic. I just can't convince myself this is much of a badge of honor. Recent discussions just seemed to make it clear that a lot of people have strong feelings about fanfic and are less-than forthcoming about what they really are, so it made me wonder about my own possible conflicted feelings on the subject, and sometimes I found myself wanting to say, shyly, "hey, sometimes I wonder if I feel like there's something wrong with it, but you're all such jerks I don't think there's any point in discussing it with you."
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I myself can't seem to really write fanfic for anything but HP (I tried, pathetically, for Gundam Wing and Buffy and I think I failed miserably, being unable to capture that essential -something- about the world/characters to make them come alive in a way I'm happy with-- and I think I did all right with my one Peter Pan fic, more all right-- that is, Barrie-like-- than my HP fic, I think, and why?? I have no clue). I'm not really inspired to write much fanfic-- even in HP, I barely write about anyone but Harry & Draco, and I feel it's part of my overall fanfic block. It's damned -hard- writing fanfic; it takes a certain sort of inspiration, a certain sort of muse, I guess? And of course some people write 'bodyfic'-- that is, don't care about the validity (talking about one's personal judgment, not any objective measure) of the characterizations as long as they hit their own kinks, but I think that's sloppy writing, forget fanfic.
Hehe, I think analyzing & creating are two different things; I also would love to see your analysis!Draco (since you do have a particular vision of him that I think is distinct-- like an analysis-muse) in his own fic, y'know, but I don't think writing & envisioning always go together-- my feeling is that they don't. Some people probably write analytically like that, but not most, I would guess. It's just a different process, interpretation of canon & creation of your own fusion of canon/fanon in a particular fic. You have to add & take away from your meta-analysis!Draco version to make a particular-fic!Draco, for instance. You can't really write a 'normal', non-meta story about the uber!Draco, I guess. Only original fic (that is, only JKR) could write her own uber!Draco, because he is defined by whatever happens-- the meta accrues from the fic. Or something. I have no idea if that made sense.
I have to say that any reasonable person would defend fanfic as they would defend all forms of artistic self-expression, and I'm not afraid to call anyone who quibbles with sub-categories of 'okay' & 'not okay' self-righteous. You cannot define okay & not-okay art, though of course that doesn't stop people from trying. It makes them feel safer, I guess, cutting up a little piece of the pie to call their own-- this is 'my' art, 'my' writing, this is legitimate and not worthless kiddie porn fanfic. *snort*
People do it even within the fanfic community-- as in, relationship-based porn is okay, maybe, and channish watersports PWP fic about Filch & Hagrid is not okay-- that's just worthless trash. Everyone needs a scapegoat, 'cause after all, people are uncomfortable not drawing that line between 'trash' and 'art', between that -thing- people do (scribblers! porn-meisters! amateurs!!) and this thing we do, which is respectable, safe, artistically interesting and also justified.
I like how you call them jerks in quotes & hypotheticals ;) Heheh. Though the jerks are everywhere, man. Eh. All degrees of narrow-minded self-righteousness, lesser or greater, even within fandom. Such is human nature.
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I'm glad that Robin Hobb is finally posting on her own official site (not the sff.net message board where her posts get lost quickly) about her statement on fan fic.
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This is a wonderful point. It's not that big of a leap (in my mind) from talking with friends and saying, 'ooh, I wonder what would have happened if Character X didn't make it to Location Y in time for Event Z?' and then writing down that idea. Because sometimes, just sometimes, there's someone else out there who might have had that same idea as well. Or someone else who might not have even had that idea, but who thinks it's an interesting one all the same. And then the story is out there, available for far more people to read and think about and discuss. So the idea is somehow Not Good because it's been written down and possibly posted or printed somewhere?
I just can't help but wonder about that tinge I feel at the idea of writing fanfic myself.
I, personally, don't see anything weird about that. Not all fans should feel obligated to write fanfiction -- or worse, act as if only fanfic writers are permitted to call themselves 'true' fans. (Considering some of the stuff that gets written and presented as fanfiction...well, I won't go any farther than that lest I say something regrettable.) I'm in quite a few fandoms that I would never consider writing fanfiction for, for one reason or another. I'll use the Narnia Chronicles as an example -- I dearly love the books, but I can't see myself writing fanfiction for them. I don't see that that makes me any less of a fan. It simply means that the writing muse doesn't prompt me to create a story about Narnia, the way it currently does with The Dark Is Rising. *shrugs* No particular reason for it...it's just how I feel.
On another note, I do so love your meta, because it helps me sort out some of the meta thoughts that I have that I find myself unable to phrase coherently. (Viz. above.) And boo on fic writers who look down on non-fic writers -- that's the sort of thing that gives fanfiction in general a bad name.
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However economy just. Does. Not. Support the bardic tradition. When you start to jump from 'it's my story' to 'it's food from my table and my children's mouths', well yes. There is a very, very good reason to protect your intellectual property in a world where corporations and individuals can rip you off if you don't stick to the letter of the law. That is a very very good reason to defend original fiction, the publisher/editor/house system that supports it, and the audience that pays for its stories. And not to mention, you are surrounded by people who depend on your producing stories and *protecting* your stories for their salary, insurance, pension?
Yeah. I can understand both sides.
The thing is, the shape of story is changing so quickly, that we may move into an economy that takes advantage of bardic tradition. Fanfic is such a powerful gateway to getting people into entertainment franchises. Authors would be crazy not to take advantage of it. Napster changed. Joss Whedon coined a verb. Fandom can only move into a more interactive phase, which means there can't *just* be sound and fury, there have to be new groundrules. What is clearly okay and what is not.
(Before corporations and states make those rules for us.)
Like one group of artists -- they tell their fans that copying official work and putting it online is not allowed. But fan-art is. And because they did this respectfully, and they do have fandom clout? The fandom is just about ninety percent compliant. And the fandom *says*, clearly, that they are compliant. It is way too difficult to be an artist in this world unless you elicit the help of your audience.
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Personally, I've long been convinced that metaphor is just a particularly useful way of lying. It's a powerful tool, but logical in the strict sense it usually is not.
Personally, there are a few reasons that I don't write fanfic, some of them probably 'acceptable' (I'd rather spend the time I do get to write on my orginal fics) and some not so much (frankly, I worry about entering an arena where one needs to be validated by each individual reader rather than by one editor, and there's an embarassment factor relatedly to my own tendencies in interpreting characters - I'm afriad it would lay my psyche too bare (as if my current writing doesn't!) if I told the world about my inverterate hurt/comfort addiction.)
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I really enjoyed this essay! Thank you for writing it. :)
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Great essay, and you have many good points! I think I agree with it all really.
Hobbs says she dislikes fanfic writers "filling in" missing scenes or writing out set endings where the text is ambiguous because it robs the read of the ability to come to his or her own conclusions, which is odd, since fanfic *is* the reader coming to a conclusion and playing with it just enough to write it down. How can you write an ambiguous ending and expect the reader to not naturally fill in some possibilities?
Yes, that's exactly how I feel. Everyone does this, and some of us write it down. Just because you read someone elses version doesn't rob you of your own.
Since you know of GW, you must have heard of doujinshi, right? The fan comics that exist in uncountable numbers. Twice every year there is an event called "Comics market", where these fan comics are sold (yeah, the fans making them are even allowed to make money from them! Though from what I hear it doesn't amount to much in the end...). There are around 30 000 circles making them (a lot of it is original though). Some manga artists even make doujinshi of their own manga!
Now, apparently this is allowed to exist because, despite it being as illegal in Japan as it would be here, all the new talented artists usually start out making doujinshi. But more importantly, it keeps the fans interested. Old series can still sell merchandise if the interest is kept up, so mostly the copyright holders turn a blind eye.
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What I experienced surprised me - I felt like the original canon was a weight bearing down on me that prevented the story from doing what I wanted and needed it to do. The characters - and I was fully aware all throughout the process that they weren't my own - were suffocating because I didn't feel that I had the freedom to take them where the story needed to go. But perhaps that's because I'm neurotic.
If I ever write another, it will be with the conscious decision to leave 'canon' behind as much as I can. If it's a hobby, and I'm doing it for my own amusement, then adhering so strictly to 'canon' shouldn't matter so much, should it?
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Gee, I'd have thought one of the reasons a person might be drawn into becoming a writer is the desire to be heard, have an impact, become an inspiration, even reach out to such a degree to the world that your characters/story are absorbed into your reader's psyches and made apart of them. It would then seem quite natural for readers to be inspired and/or compelled to "play" with these - "your" characters - a bit, rather like George Lucas hopes your children will with his little figurines. I'm rather taken aback that this impulse hasn't been more commonly interpreted as a COMPLEMENT to authors rather than a mark of disrespect, but maybe its just me.
Speaking of George Lucas, what about those collections of published Star Wars novels that have been out for years (which of course have his blessing else they'd not be published). Timothy Zahn and Keven Anderson and others borrow Lucas's galactic worlds, their soc-political reality, alien races and even his MAIN CHARACTERS, then sprinkle in some of THEIR original characters, sift in a new plot and "bake" it before an editor and - eh voila - a "novel" is born (and I use the term loosely) which, of course, they get paid for.
Now maybe I missed it, but I don't remember there being much wank calling these authors talentless hacks riding anyone's coat-tails... and I think those criticisms apply more readily here than they do respecting fanfic. For the record, with a few notable exceptions, those novels aren't really my "thing" (thematically I find them rather hollow for all the details they offer don't do justice to "mythology" of Star Wars. But that 's besides the point. I'm just interested in having someone explain to me how is it, exactly, that these novels are considered a legitimate excercise of a writers imagination using a borrowed subject while fan fic is not. And please frame your explanation in LITERARY terms (no cheating by discussing copywrite law, okay?)
I contend that most artistic endeavors BY THEIR VERY NATURE lend themselves to borrowing, stealing, and exchange of ideas, concepts and the like. If you test this theory against - say = the PERFORMING arts - music, like music perhaps, it is easier to see the point. Was Ralph Vaugh Williams (British 20th century composer of beautiful choral works and symphonies) less of an artist because he wrote "Fantasia on Greensleeves"? without having written "Greensleeves" itself? Operas and ballets are commonly written around well known folk tales and legends. I could go on and on, but you get the point.
I believe anyone indistriminately indicting of fan fiction/fan fiction writers is doing nothing more than adding yet another layer to the rubbish of writing that already exists.
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I also felt the weight of canon that
It's interesting, though, that you're a writer professionally, so you must know how to get around the sort of blocks that keep me from writing any fiction at all, most of the time.
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Oh dear...
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http://www.livejournal.com/users/superversive/5947.html?
I think that this person is reaching a bit by using "the Matter of Britain" to justify the existance of fanfic, but I take his point. It's a bit of a straw man argument: everyone knows that literature is derivative, but it is still a leap to equate Tolkien's use of medieval Eddas to a fan writing HP incestuous rape chan and declaring them equally worthy.
"Publishing" is about money, but writing is about more than just $$$ and copyrights. IMO, the other major differentiators between pro-fic and fan-fic are talent and intent. I won't belabor the "talent" part of this. But IMO there is a huge difference in the intent of pro and fan writers.
IMO, professional writers are primarily concerned with plot and theme, and only secondarily concerned with characterization as a fan interprets the term. Fan-writers are almost entirely concerned with walking around inside of the interior mental/emotional/sensational world of a character, and only secondarily concerned with plot. To a professional writer, characterization is just one of many tools used to build the story. To a fan-writer, characterization is the story. I can honestly understand Robin Hobbs' frustration with fans 'filling in' the ambiguity that she purposely put into her stories. It's a piece of the overall architecture of the story. Think of a bowl: the 'emptiness' inside the bowl is what makes the bowl functional. The author puts in that ambiguous 'emptiness' on purpose. But since fan-writers are mainly interested in a character's interior/sensational life, the fan only sees a lack and tries to fill it in. They take the structure of the "bowl" and fill it full of treats. To the professional writer, crafting that "bowl" is the point. To the fan, the "bowl" is not the point, it is just an empty structure waiting to be filled.
My take on fanfic is this: If you like it, yay! If you don't, yay! It's unimportant. If a pro-writer asks that you not fic in her universe, go play somewhere else. I find most fanfic to be boring so I just don't read much of it. I am more interested in plot/theme than I am in fan-style characterization, but give me a well-plotted fanfic and I'm delighted. I think that most fan porn is pointless, be it het or slash. Slash bores me silly, but then, relationship-focussed fics in general bore me silly. I think that fans equate their right to free speech with the notion that all fics are equally worthy, and I don't believe that this is true at all.
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As for the legal issues, they seem to exist entirely outside the theoretical/meta aspect ofo things & be entirely pratical and possibly moral. Morality isn't the same as art theory, though oh, how people miss this simple point.
I really wonder if I'd not write fanfic if a writer asked. I think if the author asked rabidly, I wouldn't respect them enough to write in their world anyway. Then again, I either just don't care about canon (so who cares what the creators of Gundam Wing want, for instance) or respect the source (and would therefore be disappointed if it's stupid). Ahh. I'd rather just not interact with authors much & not know, it seems.
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That is a very interesting point. It explains, at least to some extent, why many fans react with wounded fury every time JKR makes some passing remark about canon. I often wonder why there is such a disproportionate response, particularly as her comments always seem good-humoured and she is generally pretty supportive of fandom (and fanfic).
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I've never much played with someone else's inventions; when I was a kid, I made up my own characters and worlds. Perhaps they were what I felt safest with. The problem as I see it is canon, OOC and AU. I can't really tell them apart. I don't know how much I can change a character or how the character stays the same, so I make up my own instead. I do think about the characters after reading a book or seeing a movie, but it's more private and wordless, and it's very difficult to write it down as a story, even to myself and especially so that others could read it. The link between picturing something in your head and writing it down so that it can be shared is something I can't see.
I can see why fanfiction could feel threatening - I write orig fic and picturing someone taking my characters and writing something about them I felt a bit alarmed. But I still don't see why it should be stopped, or how it could be stopped. It's a lot of fun and it's fan activity, as you said. A lot of statements about fanfiction I've seen have been narrow, somehow - I think it's a completely different thing from orig fic, it doesn't seem like rehearsing or by any means easier, as some ficcers seemed to have spent so much time interpreting canon and coming up with detailed background stories. The truth, if there's such a thing, may be somewhere in between: it could be argued that a ficcer is lazier, not inventing their worlds and characters, but on the other hand a ficcer must search canon and know it and the characters inside out.
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I like how you call them jerks in quotes & hypotheticals ;) Heheh. Though the jerks are everywhere, man. Eh. All degrees of narrow-minded self-righteousness, lesser or greater, even within fandom. Such is human nature.
:-D
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Yeah, they seemed really angry over the one pro-fanfic writer who said you could ask people not to write fanfic but they were under no obligation to obey you. They seemed to think this was a big insult but I thought she was just being honest: listen, not everybody thinks your personal wishes are more important than their own.
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Yes, part of what seems so bizarre about this is the way these authors are so shocked at the whole concept of fans discussing the books with each other and bringing their own ideas to the table. RH is carefully explaining what she wants readers to do, but it almost seems like she needs a reader to come in and explain just as simply what readers *actually* do.
This also always reminds me of a great quote a read about an appearance JKR did somewhere. People had brought their kids to see her, but the kids were really not that excited. They quoted one young boy as saying he didn't want to be there at all and he said, "That woman isn't my hero. Harry is." Sure there are some writers who have that movie star quality where they're like a character themselves, but most of them are invisible.
I'll use the Narnia Chronicles as an example -- I dearly love the books, but I can't see myself writing fanfiction for them. I don't see that that makes me any less of a fan. It simply means that the writing muse doesn't prompt me to create a story about Narnia, the way it currently does with The Dark Is Rising. *shrugs* No particular reason for it...it's just how I feel.
Oh, that makes perfect sense. It also comes down to the insults on some of the other threads about how it's always "sci-fi and fantasy geeks" that do this, or those genres that get fanfic. I think it's probably a combination of a lot of things that accounts for that, but part of it is just that some stories inspire fanfic and some don't. It's not a measure of quality.
On another note, I do so love your meta, because it helps me sort out some of the meta thoughts that I have that I find myself unable to phrase coherently.
Thanks! And I love seeing your thoughts set out in fic!:-)
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LOL--I think you're absolutely right. I can't even remember ever using a metaphor myself that didn't have lots of holes in it. They can be useful, but they're never 100% accurate.
Personally, there are a few reasons that I don't write fanfic, some of them probably 'acceptable' (I'd rather spend the time I do get to write on my orginal fics) and some not so much (frankly, I worry about entering an arena where one needs to be validated by each individual reader rather than by one editor, and there's an embarassment factor relatedly to my own tendencies in interpreting characters - I'm afriad it would lay my psyche too bare (as if my current writing doesn't!) if I told the world about my inverterate hurt/comfort addiction.)
OMG, I think I share every single one of these reasons.
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And I think you hit the nail right on the head. It does sound like a lot of people are just desperately trying to put other people down to build themselves up and...it's not working. The need for these guys to talk about what "real" writers are, and keep raising the bar higher and higher to exclude more people (except themselves) seems really pointless in the end.
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Yes! Some of RH's explanations for what she expects from her readers are just so strange...it makes you wonder if she's ever read a book herself because surely her experience was not the kind she's telling us to have. Does she really think that she can not only control which scenes are ambiguous but also control how the reader thinks about them?
That's fascinating about doujinshi! I think the fact is that nowadays artists and fans are getting shoved closer together and they're both having to make compromises. Meanwhile the people in charge of the money are always going to fall on the side of what makes more money for themselves.
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But yeah, I think that the amount of time I spend trying to analyze the characters correctly based on what the real author gives me I do probably feel more boxed in than freed to do what I want. As I said above, I'm probably all the more aware of my own kinks showing through what I choose to do to the character. Not that this isn't true in original writing too, but sometimes maybe you can hide more when you've created everything. Or think you've hidden more.
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It really does say a lot, doesn't it? I mean, not to dismiss the feelings of someone who feels like their characters are doing disturbing things. There is plenty of fanfic that intentionally deconstructs characters or even punishes them. But it's amazing the amount of venom directed as just the concept of the reader daring to create something!
As I said to somebody else recently, I went over to Lee Goldberg's blog and he had another post that I thought was just mocking of the audience--not about fanfic this time, but sneering at all the people who ask him if he has the address of the stars of his shows. There again he immediately had to put the person down and claim they were trying to get above themselves.
Now maybe I missed it, but I don't remember there being much wank calling these authors talentless hacks riding anyone's coat-tails
Yeah, that's the thing. They keep switching back and forth. First they want to tear people up for writing with someone else's characters, because that's for losers, but then they want to defend tie-in novels or writers of TV series because of course that's where they make money. You can't have it both ways. Either stick to the money aspect and say yes, you fanficcers are being perfectly creative but I feel you need to be working for the copyright holder, or you have to insult tie-ins too.
Of course also, as others have pointed out, it's the tie-in writers that are probably the most vulnerable to fanfic cutting into their revenue, because even if they are insisting they are doing something different, not everyone agrees.
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Me neither.:-)
I found that it worked best when I wasn't thinking about the characters in an analytical way -- that the characters were more believable when I wasn't trying to force them to fit a particular interpretation.
That makes sense. I know even writing my own characters I have to keep the two things separate, and the analysis almost always has to come after the scenes are written in order to help. It's easier if you feel more like you're instinctively writing what a person would say or do. When you're trying to write to analysis it's robotic and stilted.
It's interesting, though, that you're a writer professionally, so you must know how to get around the sort of blocks that keep me from writing any fiction at all, most of the time.
Deadlines definitely help!:-)
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It's a bit of a straw man argument: everyone knows that literature is derivative, but it is still a leap to equate Tolkien's use of medieval Eddas to a fan writing HP incestuous rape chan and declaring them equally worthy.
Yes, it's a challenge to find a position that actually holds up. One of the things that's frustrating on the pro-fanfic side of the arguments I've read is that you often have fanfic authors trying to justify their own type of fic by putting down others. Like by claiming their work is respectful because it's genfic, unlike those awful porn writers or slashers. I think we have to just deal with the fact that the awful fanfic or the completely self-indulgent stuff is part of it.
IMO, professional writers are primarily concerned with plot and theme, and only secondarily concerned with characterization as a fan interprets the term. Fan-writers are almost entirely concerned with walking around inside of the interior mental/emotional/sensational world of a character, and only secondarily concerned with plot.
This whole paragraph is such a great sum-up of the difference between the two, and honestly, I think it's a big reason why fanfic is needed by many fans. I've heard plenty of fanfic writers bluntly point out how fanfic as a form is different from published work and this is a big part of it. Like they'll point out that most novels do not take time out for a whole paragraph inside someone's head worrying about whether the boy he likes likes him back. It's filling up the bowl, like you said, and that's something many readers want to do for their own enjoyment.
That, of course, is also why fanfic has created such a good system for itself in terms of warnings and genres. People read and select fanfic mostly based on what is going to happen in the story, because they're looking for the story that scratches their particular itch.
I am more interested in plot/theme than I am in fan-style characterization, but give me a well-plotted fanfic and I'm delighted.
The well-plotted fanfic is like surprise treasure in fanfic.:-) It's always very funny, for instance, the way you can hear about certain "classic" fics and read them and have no idea why they are classic. A lot of them really depend on your seeing your particular kinks or ideas played out. Pro-fic really doesn't work that way, despite the fact that it's got its own formulas that people look for.
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That's so true--it's very much the way I feel about it. I've just always kind of instinctively reserved writing for people I made up myself (though now that I've been paid for it I've done it that way and it was fun). I have what I consider versions of other peoples' characters in my head that I can think about, but I think I may just have this idea that if I put them down on paper I'd naturally see how they weren't the real thing in ways I don't now.
The truth, if there's such a thing, may be somewhere in between: it could be argued that a ficcer is lazier, not inventing their worlds and characters, but on the other hand a ficcer must search canon and know it and the characters inside out.
Yeah, I think they're just different things and when people insist on making one a lesser version of the other they don't really get it.
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This is pretty much how it is for me (at least with book-based fanfic) -- the ones I prefer are those that have a quite distinct authorial voice, which couldn't be confused with the real author if it wanted to. I think it may be some kind of literary Uncanny Valley (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_Valley).
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Before I'd written any fics on my own, I used to think it was more difficult to write fanfic than original fics, just because it was about someone else's characters and universe. After having tried it myself, I would say that it's more difficult to imitate and extrapolate from existing characters than creating my own, only that it's different, and it takes somewhat different skills.
I thought about writing fics long before I actually did it. I had some vague ideas, but I just wasn't enthusiastic enough about any of them to actually follow through. And yeah, there was also that lingering feeling that even though I haven't been working on my original stories for years, that's what I should do, if I could actually get my ass out of the wagon and start to write again. However, after delurking fandom, an experience which was very new in itself, the desire to test even more new waters grew more and more. Not to mention that there was an idea I started to feel so entusiastic about that I eventually just had to write it.´
The desire to write fic and original stories stems from the same source for me, that is, I think of a story that I would like to read, and become frustrated when I realise that no one has written it yet. I was incredibly surprised when a classmate of mine exclaimed "how stupid!" when I explained to her about the concept of fanfiction, because what she found "stupid" was the fact that people would write stuff that had no way of getting published and thus bring them money. It surprised me, because that statement sort of assumes that the primary reason for any writer would be to earn money, which seems weird, considering how very few writers can make a living of their work.
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The debate amuses me because, as you said, mental fanfiction's so natural. There can be no 'THOU SHALT NOT PASS' signs for the imagination: once it's awakened it's going to fly everywhere. I can no more not think of what happened next, or what could have happened instead, than I can breathe underwater.
Yet one can't imagine Robin Hobb scolding seven year old me for sitting around having hysterics over the Secret Garden because my God! who does Mary marry?! Tell me it's Colin! Tell me she doesn't disgrace herself with the help!
(That one still bothers me. A LOT. in case, ahem, you couldn't tell.)
And had I thought of picking up a pen, I surely would have done so. People write what they imagine because they can write, and they can imagine.
Mind you, that may be undercut by the fact that (though in some ways I'd quite like to) I could never write Hobb fanfiction, because I wouldn't want to upset her. I disagree with her, I think she's being unreasonable, and as you said again I think her argument doesn't follow on logically. (colouring in, for instance, might well help a budding artist.) But she did write them, and she is emotionally invested, and I understand that enough not to want to hurt her feelings.
Perhaps I am just a soft touch. ;)
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I think JKR feels similarly, from what I've read of her comments on the subject.
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Still, looking at those discussions shows why people are going to feel uncomfortable about telling people they write fanfic. The people on Goldberg's blog think nothing of repeating over and over that writing it is the same as having no life. They even completely ignore people telling them that the average fanfic writer is a married woman with children rather than an overgrown adeolscent boy.
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LOL! I am a valuable member of the community!
Yet one can't imagine Robin Hobb scolding seven year old me for sitting around having hysterics over the Secret Garden because my God! who does Mary marry?! Tell me it's Colin! Tell me she doesn't disgrace herself with the help!
Honestly. How does one expect a child not to ask such questions? I'd love to see her telling 7-year-old you that you just put together pornographic pictures of Frances Hodges Burnett's family by asking that question, you awful child.
People write what they imagine because they can write, and they can imagine.
You would think this would be obvious, but apparently there's a whole lot of people who have never thought of this...and a lot of them write professionally.
But she did write them, and she is emotionally invested, and I understand that enough not to want to hurt her feelings.
See, that, I think, is the real reason fans don't write fanfic when the author doesn't want them to.
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If he hadn't also written those rafts of symphonies, quite likely. :)
I'm loathe, very loathe, to equivocate fanfiction on something like Harry Potter with the adaptation/treatment of more amorphous mythological/whatever material. [I deal professionally with the music thing, so it's something that we think about a lot.] It has something to do with the nature of the source material...
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I mainly agree with you. One cannot cherry-pick through fan-fic and say that one genre is "acceptable" because it most closely parrots the canon source and model, but all the rest is somehow "that other embarrassing stuff" that we will hide in the closet because it's too smutty or weird. It's all an expression of the same thing: telling a story using someone else's characters and/or world. Human beings have been spinning yarns forever. It's part of our nature. It's not going to stop simply because of modern "copyright" law.
I think that where I differ from many fans is that I do think that it's acceptable to judge fanfic by the same moral standards that I judge professionally written works. I'm not talking about judging the overall skill/craft level of the fan writer because obviously fan writers are amateurs. I think that sometimes fans are so quick to champion their right to free expression that they end up defending works that, were they written professionally, would be deplored and condemned. If I'm going to pick apart JKR's work and point out some of the ugly underlying moral messages that she has embedded in the HP series, then I am also going to turn that same gaze on fanfic. I see a lot of hypocrisy in fandom. In the HP fandom, people are quick to condemn JKR for glorifying bullying for example. Yet these same fans will champion another fan's "right" to glorify adult rape of children. Why is is "bad" for JKR to 'glorify' bullying but "good" that a fan writes a purient story in which Snape rapes Harry? Fandom wants the luxury of passing judgment on the pros while being exempt from having judgment passed on itself. The most that fandom does is to say that if story "X" isn't your kink then don't read it, but I'm not sure that's enough. Fandom is very effective at chilling any sort of judgment against itself even when such judgments may be warrented.
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I guess here, even without writing fanfic, I can relate. If I put up a meta essay I don't expect only people who are going to agree with it to read it. If someone had a problem with something I wrote I wouldn't respond by saying they shouldn't have read it. They could just as easily tell me that if I didn't want people responding to it, I shouldn't have written it. And fans do that plenty of times too. Very often someone will put up a rant or an essay and then getting angry that people challenge it.
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