rthstewart | Fan Fic and the Boy Who Lived Forever

Entry tags:

Fan Fic and the Boy Who Lived Forever

So, I found an article via Dunc at Club Jade, in which Lev Grossman of Time takes on fan fic in this article. I really enjoyed the article and thought it brought out some nice things about fan fic. I especially liked this quote:

[Fan fiction is] also an intensely social, communal activity. Like punk rock, fan fiction is inherently inclusive, and people spend as much time hanging out talking to one another about it as they do reading and writing it. "I've been in fandom since early 2005, when I was getting ready to turn 12," says Kelli Joyce. "For me, starting so young, fanfic became my English teacher, my sex-ed class, my favorite hobby and the source of some of my dearest friends. It also provided me with a crash course in social justice and how to respect and celebrate diversity, both of characters and fic writers."

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,2081784,00.html#ixzz1RTc56Xgo

And this speaks precisely to me, why I adore fan fic so much, and, as I've said before, the women I meet along the way. (There might be a few men, but it's mostly women). As it turns out the blogger who directed me to that article, Dunc, is a woman I met through my first fic, in about 1995 when I had a lot less grey hair and she was still in high school and we were hanging out on AOL on the Who Luke Should Marry Star Wars board. I've met Dunc in real life lots of times. The last Harry Potter film opens next week and I've traveled to distant cities to see those films (and Star Wars films and Lord of the Rings films and Pirates films and others) with women I met in the 90s when writing fic. This time, everyone is distant and I'm not going anywhere and no one is coming here and it makes me a little sad because I see the films as a bit of fan fiction (though licensed) that is, as the quote says, "inherently inclusive" and enjoying them is part of an ongoing fandom conversation among friends. As Dunc observes on Club Jade,

I particularly love Grossman’s explanation of fanfic as a conversation, because it captures all the aspects. There’s doing it for the sheer love of the original work, but there’s also a great deal that comes from disappointment with what’s being offered by the creators (or, in our case, some of their hirelings.)

The last point is more applicable to other fandoms than to Narnia, and yet, there are plenty of fics, my own included, that are centered on 'fixing' something in the films.

Oh, and FYI, I'm trying really hard to finish the final Lone Islands chapter. Really. Current word count is 9,000 words and I have to get it done soon because I've got a blessed week next week to write my NFE.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

This is the quote I really love:

Fan fiction is what literature might look like if it were reinvented from scratch after a nuclear apocalypse by a band of brilliant pop-culture junkies trapped in a sealed bunker. They don’t do it for money. That’s not what it’s about. The writers write it and put it up online just for the satisfaction. They’re fans, but they’re not silent, couchbound consumers of media. The culture talks to them, and they talk back to the culture in its own language.

Dunc mentioned that quote too in her Club Jade post. It is wonderful, isn't it? It's also not just that fans talk back, but that they talk to one another. It's a very interactive process. Also the article emphasizes the transformative nature of fan-derived works, and that is so very true as well.

One of the best things fan fiction has done is made the whole writing process extremely interactive. I love it. And actually, thinking of interactive, that reminds me of Pottermore. Obviously, we don't know exactly what that's going to be like, but the whole idea of such an interactive reading experience for an established, published work is fascinating. And it will be so interesting to see how fans react to it (through fanfiction, especially!)

Oh, I do agree. There's something so inclusive about fandoms, and there are often surprisingly strong friendships that are built within them. I certainly count myself lucky to know everyone I've met in the few fandoms I do dabble in!

Thanks for sharing!

I've only met one genuine crazy in all the years I've been writing fic. As odds go, that's pretty good!

The nice thing about that article is that Grossman came to us and talked to us (via

lg_interview) and asked useful questions like “What do most articles about fanfiction get wrong?” and so forth. I'm very pleased: it's by far the best mainstream article on fic I've ever seen.

Whoa. Thanks for the link. Those comments were worth a few hours of perusal. Such a lovely, lovely group and yes, he really got it right.

It's funny how I never considered what made me love fanfic besides the obvious of good stories until now. I absolutely adore it, I think, because of the things you mention: the inclusion, the back and forth with authors (or at least the good ones that actually think about what's in the reviews instead of just acknowledging them and moving on. Thanks for being brilliant about that Rth!), the amazing feeling of looking at a fandom and thinking "I helped shape this", the knowledge that you can help someone else while entertaining. Fanfic has introduced me to other cultures, languages, music, art, everything pretty much! Some I'd eventually learn anyhow, but many things that I wouldn't have. I'm constantly astounded by how much I feel included, though I only know one writer in person, and she's the one who introduced me to fanfic! So, I guess what I'm saying is, thank you, both for pointing it out and making me think, but also for contributing to that sense of warm, fuzzy, inclusion-y happiness!

~LotL

I (obviously) completely buy into the entire premise of fic as bonding. I met a lot of amazing women through the first fic I wrote. I've mentioned here before how it provides a framework and context for the conversation. Also, of course, what turns out is that if people like a story, they often share other similar interests in other fandoms, books, films, etc. If you like a friend, you'll probably like HER friends too, right? FEEL THE FAN FIC LURVE

Oooh, interesting!

Grossman is a good person to write this, seeing as his books are practically Narnia/Harry Potter fanfiction themselves.

I appreciated the talk about the conversational aspect of it--for me, it's a lot of lit crit and discussion and meta, only in story form instead of essay.

I know that for me, were it not for fan fic, I would be very much associating mostly with people of my own age, education, life experience and social milieu. Fandom has enormously expanded my horizons and I know that even as an old lady, I've continued to grow morally and intellectually as a result of it. And you are so right about the lit crit, meta, and discussion. The stories provide the framework for the ongoing conversation.

I agree with that. And it levels the playing field in a lot of ways--gets rid of a lot of the age barriers, for example.

And a much more interesting framework, I think!

I think fanfic has come a long way since when I first started delving into them (for me, it was over 10 years ago; for you, even longer). I mean, there are lots of things that remain the same but it does seem to be more generally accepted than before. Back in the late 90s and being involved in running a fanfic site, I remember all the hoopla and discussion that arose when the C&D letters came from the big studios. It's great that there are authors who are accepting of these things because it really is a way for fans to show how much they adored the original work.

it's so odd to think of t hose days of fear of the C&Ds and shut downs. We were so worried and I remember the day I heard that starwars.com was hosting fan fic and I had that moment of shock. It was a scary time and there was that belief that if anything crossed some ephemeral line, it would all be shut down. Now, the content creators recognize it as a way to keep their own franchises alive and vibrant. And so many good, well known authors have crossed over to pro as well.

it has come a long way but I'm still not prepared to tell my real life associates that I do it. Sigh. I can only come so far out of the Wardrobe.

What an awesome article! It's one of the few where I've felt someone writing about fanfiction doesn't think the writers are freaks or less entitled to do what we do than any other art form that's a derivative or an homage or what have you. And he's also the only person I've ever read on fanfic who actually understands the difference between trademark and copyright--even a lot of the authors who decry fanfic (like George RR Martin) have them mixed up.

Writing is a lonely business, whether it be a profession or a hobby. Most people in RL don't get how it works, what's required of a writer, the process, what goes on in a writer's head, etc. Fandom is a place where, in addition to all those things mentioned in the article, I'm surrounded by people who understand where I'm coming from. They know what it's like to have writer's block, to be frustrated by RL getting in the way of creativity, to struggle to put the story in my head into words that mean something to other people. So I feel like even when I'm taking a hiatus from original writing, I'm still doing something productive here, that I'm learning the craft, because I'm constantly having this conversation on writing--even if it's filtered through the lens of a given fandom. I've been doing this since I was 15, and now I'm pushing 30. At this point, I've resigned myself to the fact that I'm never going to grow out of it. And I'm excited about that. It's a unique bond you don't form with other people who don't do it, too. And it's legit.

You are so right about that shared experience of understanding the solitude and frustrations of the writer. The community can be so very supportive and the bond is very powerful. When I left fandom the last time, it was because some of those bonds had soured and for a long time, I really resisted throwing myself into those intense fic relationships again. I was very reluctant to get committed again. yet, here I am, older and hopefully a bit wiser. It's just so much fun and it was one reader, Miniver, who pointed out that we do need a creative outlet and for some it's knitting or crafts and for others, it's fan fic.

I loved the article; too bad his book The Magicians felt like fanfic written by someone who hated the stories. :(

I didn't read it, in part because so many people I know disliked the book so much.

That's a fascinating article, with lots of stuff to think on. For me personally, creative writing is not one of my particular gifts, but I love to read and analyze and to think about 'why', and if it comes to that, I adore a good conversation, and diversity of opinion. It's like a community of practice, only much more fun.

Autumnia's and your point regarding C&Ds and acceptance got me thinking, too. Is the broader contemporary acceptance of fic simply a reflection of the ubiquity and mainstreaming of the Internet (i.e. it's accessible in a way that was never previously possible)? Or is it more a reflection that we live in a remix/mashup/Creative Commons world? Maybe a bit of both and more besides. Chicken-and-egg argument, maybe. Anyway it's interesting to consider.

I actually think it's both the broader use of the Internet and the mashup world we now live in. :-)

With regards to the C&Ds that we received, it was just when the studios were beginning to figure out how to use the Internet to their advantage in promoting their films, tv series, etc. So of course, they see the fans were using their copyrighted content and made a big fuss over all of it even when the original content creators weren't so strict about what the fans were doing.

It's been a slow process for the studios and networks to let up on this stuff. I think it's been more of a 'watch and see' before they realized how powerful the fan base can be. We can pretty much thank the little cult shows (Buffy, Roswell, Firefly, etc.) for showing that it's best to work with the fans than against them.

Yes, that's very much the conclusion that I had arrived at, too, but you were inside the process, so it's nice to have a theory confirmed :-). I had also been thinking of the HP fansites after Warners got involved. There was a bunch of C&Ds sent, many went to kids, so there was a tremendous fan backlash. WB pulled their heads in and watched for a while, and suddenly they realized that these sites were a major asset.

Autumnia, did you all actually C&Ds for fic, or was it for the mixed content sites? As far as I heard, at the time, there were never any fic sites that got C&Ds, though we were all very nervous about any "inappropriate" content. There were reports that a fanzine with a very racy Luke/FOC story got a C&D in the 80s, and there was this belief that Lucasfilm would shut down anything with objectionable content. We further assumed that they had fleets of lawyers scouring the net for said content -- which turned out to not be true at all. They were clueless about fic and didn't know it existed until people who knew the editors began telling them about it. We really felt that we were on the edge for a few years, though, because the fans saw what the content owners did not -- just what would happen with fan fic once it went from limited distribution zines to the Internet. I know that tenthirteen got aggressive with content on XFiles sites and Paramount did the same with Trek. Again, my impression is that, in the end, it was not the fic that was the problem, but images, vids and the like. I'm sure there are review articles on this. I remember a wiki article that said that at some point, the proprietors of the force.net actually had a conversation with LFL to obtain at least an oral commitment to not take action against the site for fic.

Hmm. For the site I was involved in, it was 95% fanfiction. The 5% which probably got the studios' attention was because we were hosting fan-transcribed episodes. I'm trying to remember all the details but it's a bit murky since it was so long ago... There's actually an article in Entertainment Weekly that talked about it. (I have it from the original magazine issue, but I don't think it's in any of their online archives.)

The transcripts eventually came off the site but I don't remember if we were still getting C&Ds by that time (I wasn't involved in most of that since I was not the site owner and I was working more on the fic side of things). As I was approving stories to be published, I made sure every chapter had some sort of disclaimer -- if it wasn't provided by the author, we had a generic one inserted.

Aha. Found the article.

Oh, and another thing. I play in a few reader/reviewer sites for a few flavours of published genre fiction. Various authors come to interact all the time, and sometimes agents, editors and publishers poke their heads around the electronic door too. So Grossman's comments about fic filling the gaps resonated very strongly. In recent years, I've learned far more than I really wanted to know about how things are chosen for publication, what sits in the slush pile, and what never sees the light of day. Sure, I get that not writing is created equal, but it's got me thinking rebellious/subversive thoughts about the nature of publishing, and the corporatization and homogenization of culture and creative output.

So that's another big point for fic in my view - yay for going there, in all it's wondrous variety. I am a voracious reader, and always have been, and in the last 3 years, my reading habits have skewed dramatically to the fic side - so much so, that my published fiction reading has probably reduced by between half and two-thirds. Part of it is the 'serial' nature of fic (instant gratification, and all that), part of it is sheer perverseness about having my reading options dictated by some big corporate, and the rest comes back to the original point about interaction.

I'm glad you are not the only one who reads less "legit" published fic now, though in my case it's also that if I'm writing so much, I'm not reading. And yes, with publication, been there, done that, got the tax returns to prove it. I sort of stood at a place where I might have tried harder, pushed harder, and tried to take it the next step beyond the beginning I had. But, in the end, I live with the real world of editors and clients and writing to spec now, and I don't want to do that in my spare time.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Fan Fic and the Boy Who Lived Forever

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject