Post 3 - Reflection and Response
TRIGGER WARNING - the works referenced within the following text may contain inappropriate themes and languages. Please note the warnings in the links provided if you wish to explore them further.
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Please note these warnings carefully and stay safe.
Stef Johnson - Good Omens Fanfiction
I am familiar with the Good Omens fandom, and I think that this is a fantastic example of a quick and fluffy little fic. It's not hard and heavy content, but frankly, that's okay. The Good Omens fandom is well known for producing an element of catharsis not provided by the series; especially in regards to Aziraphale and Crowley’s relationship development prior to the main plot, and the aftermath of the Apocalypse-that-wasn’t. I adore that Stef included an acquaintance of Crowley’s from his life offscreen, and one that Aziraphale happened to know. Harking back to Crowley’s fallen origins and reminding of the fact that the two of them come from the same place and interacted with it differently. It also indulges the concept of a wider universe outside of the plot, which is, in my opinion, what fanfiction as a whole is about. All in all, I liked it. It was a sweet little piece where all the characters were written in-character and the plot was alluded to, but not regurgitated. In my own fanfic I had to be mindful of characterisation. We know a fair amount about the characters I was working with through interaction with the creator and I wanted to do the characters justice. Stef has done a good job of staying true to the source material while adding her own flair.
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Emily Donaldson - Lord of the Rings Fanfiction
This piece is beautifully written. One of my favorite things about fanfiction is there is no ‘right way’ to write it. There’s no broadly accepted style or hard and fast rule to follow. This piece is written in a highly descriptive style with less emphasis on pre established characters. I am not familiar enough with the Lord of the Rings deep lore to say if the piece is in character or not but I do not think that was the point of the piece anyway. I get the impression that it is the aftermath of an in plot event told from the perspective of a minor unnamed character although I could be wrong. I could feel the magic of the series and the richness of the story it draws from through the fanfic, which is a tricky skill to employ without filling your writing with jargon.
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Zach Storer - Big Bang Theory Fanfiction
What a damn rollercoaster. I don’t think at any point in this story I knew with confidence where it was going. I have never watched Big Bang Theory, in fact, short of knowing the character’s names, I don’t know anything about it. That said, the story did quick work of establishing each character’s relationship, and I could follow the story without too much trouble. I know something I had trouble with in my fanfic specifically was pacing. I did some pretty significant editing and it still came out so long I had to split it into two parts. My writing style lends itself to long stories because I like to take my time establishing certain details. The fact Zach could fit so much into a story and it wasn’t novel length was admirable.
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Self reflection and Review
I wrote my fanfiction in a creativity-fueled daze over the course of about twenty four hours and have gone on to expand it on AO3. It now clocks in at 30,000 words and is growing at a breakneck pace. This was my first foray into this fandom and I think I'll be staying a while. Cracking characterization when we know simultaneously so much and so little about the universe and characters was an interesting challenge and I hope that I did them justice. As someone who regularly posts fanfic online,I'm no stranger to the concept of posting for an audience and posting it knowing it will be read by others, but writing a fanfic knowing it would be read by someone who likely has no knowledge of the fandom itself was strange, and I did find myself adjusting my writing style a little to compensate for the knowledge my audience wouldn't have. I have never been so hyper aware of the unspoken rule of fanfic that states 'you don't need to describe your characters too much, we already know what they look like', until I was faced with an audience that wouldn't.
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Fanfiction is not a new thing for me, I'll admit it readily, but watching others stumble around in my neck of the woods for the first time was interesting. I'm aware that might sound condescending, but it really isn't meant to be. It always intrigues me, watching newcomers come into the fold, armed with skill not before wielded in such a way, and seeing what they make of their new challenge. I would say everything I read was the work of people who more than rose to the occasion. This is a culture I've been entwined with for just under half my life at this point and sometimes I forget how foreign it must look to some people. What its reputation is outside of its spaces. But I think everyone hit the nail on the head with this one, because they all chose media they liked and built their stories off of that. Just as I, in this brief, ended up changing fandoms halfway through the brief and writing something totally different to what I expected, this is a community driven by passion.
I have said a few times on this blog that there are certain things that fanfiction is 'about', but this is the most crucial one. The heart of, not only the fanfic, but the fandom, and the thing that I was so staggeringly and humbly reminded of and shown through the works of my classmates.
Fanfiction is the craft of the amateur.
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Not amateur in the sense that the people crafting it lack skill, drive, or talent, quite the opposite, but in that it is the craft of the lover. Amateur is rooted in the latin word 'amatorem' which means 'lover' or 'friend'. To do something for the love of it, rather than for profit. You cannot get paid to write fanfiction, you cannot turn it into a career or make money off of it. In fact, it is highly likely that the only reason fanfiction is even legal is because you cannot make money off of it (there's a huge lecture to be had here about fandom history, Anne Rice, and lawsuits, but I'll spare you the novel's worth of fandom history). So the age old question remains. If you can't make money off of it, then why do people do it? Because they love it. Because they want to engage with it further than the source material will allow and they want to engage with others that want the same thing. Love, passion, is the backbone of fandom communities. What draws us together and helps us weather the less than stellar (and only partially deserved) reputation we have gained.
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This was a legitimately enlightening and enjoyable experience for me
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For any or all of my classmates have discovered fanfiction isn't for them, that's absolutely fine. I hope they enjoyed the experience for what it was, even if they don't plan on returning. I enjoyed experiencing your passion for your favorite media. For those of you who liked it enough to stick around, or who were already a part of it? I hope to see you around.
Reference List:
Emily Donaldson - https://vdr6987.wixsite.com/mysite-1
Stef Johnson - https://stefanieswriting.wordpress.com/blog-feed/
Zach Storer - https://zacharystorer15.wixsite.com/mysite/post/my-fanficion-penny-s-big-bang-realisation