May 10th, 2010
by
Yonmei
George R. R. Martin wrote a post about the latest greatest Fanfic Stormlet:
And if I can feel that strongly about characters created by other people, can you possibly imagine how strongly I feel about my own characters?
That’s why I liken them to my children. I can care about Newt and Gwen Stacy and Frodo and Captain Ahab and the Great Gatsby and on and on… but I care about the Turtle and Abner Marsh and Tyrion Lannister and Jon Snow and Haviland Tuf and Daenerys and my own guys a thousand times more. They are my sons and daughters.
There are lots and lots and lots of people like me, I think. And it’s that which accounts for the emotional vehemence of these debates on fan fiction, on both sides.
The fan fictioneers fall in love with a character or characters, and want to make things come out right for them… or come out the way they want things to come out.
He’s right, and he’s wrong.
It is about love, but it’s not just love that turns me on to writing fanfic.
It’s thinking about the story, where thinking involves telling a story. Martin gets that:
I would strongly suspect that out there somewhere there must be ALIENS fanfic where Newt does NOT die horribly too. It’s love of the characters that prompts people to write these things. Hell, if I was ever hired to write a new ALIENS film, the first thing I would do would be to say, “Hey, remember how at the end of ALIENS Newt asks if she will dream? Well, she will. All the films from that moment have just been her bad dreams. We’ll open my new movie with Newt and Ripley waking up…” Which would be a sort of retconning, I know, which I just denounced. So sue me. Consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds. It would also be the most expensive fanfic in history, I guess.
(And it would be great! I’d go see that film in a heartbeat.)
But. There are plenty of non-storytellers who would never think of that. Newt died at the beginning of Aliens Cubed. That’s that and nothing can change it. They wouldn’t do what a storyteller does: think about what happened and think about what happened next and it’s a story that’s coming into being, a narrative force that’s building like a whirlwind, all the metaphors and cliches to describe the moment when you feel the living alien stir inside you and you know that either the story ends now or else the time comes when you feel it burst out of your chest… and if you are a writer, you write the story down. Or you put it away. Forever. The alien doesn’t burst out if you take care to end the story before it quickens. It’s an abortion, but that’s the writer’s choice: there’s nothing wrong with aborting a story if you know you can’t write it as it should be written. It’s no fun, but abortions never are. It’s just necessary, sometimes.
I understand what Martin means when he says
I don’t want those pictures in my head. Even if they’re nice pictures, if you love my characters and only do nice, sweet, happy things to them. You’re still messing around with my people. I won’t use any analogies here, I know how that upsets people… but there is a sense of violation.
Any writer would understand that, I think (well, okay, nothing says a writer has to have any empathy for other writers, but if you are a writer with empathy for how other writers feel as well as how you yourself feel, you know that you feel that way about your characters and that this is how other writers feel too…) With one or two exceptions in giftfests like Yuletide, I’ve never written fanfiction in another writer’s universe when the writer was alive and I knew s/he didn’t want that to happen, because I do appreciate how they feel about it. (That’s print universes. TV and film have way too many creators for me to worry if any one of them doesn’t like fanfic: no one of the creators involved can really have that kind of intimate connection with their characters.)
But the real problem, as far as I’ve ever been able to tell from the occasions when a writer bursts out in horrified verbal rage at the other writers messing around with their people (and fanfic writers are not immune from this: it’s not legal ownership that gives you that feeling of connection!) is not the fanfic itself – it’s the actualised proof that fans of your work are reading your stories and yet they’re thinking things about your characters that you didn’t want them to think.
Look. I’m a writer. I am arrogant enough to believe that I can make you think what I want you to think with the power of words. I’m sane enough to know that even as you read what I write you may be arguing with this not agreeing with it – just because my words are entering your mind as you read, doesn’t mean your thoughts are falling into line beside them. But if I didn’t believe that I can change your mind with words, why would I be writing this?
Fanfic is visible evidence that although you read and loved the story that the writer wanted you to get, you didn’t think about that story as the writer wanted you to think. Love isn’t all. It’s a great deal, but love is never enough. The need to tell the story is what gives birth to the story, nothing more, nothing less. And it’s only copyright and legal ownership that has made some of this storytelling separate from the rest of the written word and called it fanfiction.
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- More blogging by
Yonmei at
http://yonmei.insanejournal.com
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Filed under Writers & Artists, fandom, fanworks, slash | Comments (20)
I think there are a few other aspects to this discussion.
First, there is the issue of money and rights. Allowing other people to play in your personal universe weakens your trademark, opens you up to lawsuits, and generally hurts your ability to earn a living as a writer. This may only apply to one fanfic in a million, but that one could destroy the original author’s career, so it’s not in the author’s best interest to take that risk.
Copyright isn’t some cowardly shield to keep others from playing with your toys, it’s a tool that allows writers to become professionals and to make a living as an arist. It’s primarily to protect the author from predatory publishers. Isn’t that a good thing?
Second, I don’t think most authors would get so upset about fanfic if the fanfic writers were simply writing logical extensions of the original universes (although some authors would obviously still object).
For example, I don’t think George Lucas’s head would explode if you wrote a story in which Luke Skywalker flies to planet X to fight the evil Y monster and save the Z people. However, George’s head might explode if you wrote a story in which Luke Skywalker has a drug addiction (or kills all his friends for money, or has graphic sex with his enemies).
And the difference is clear. The first example is a Star Wars story, no matter how poorly written. The second example is not a Star Wars story yet it still uses the Star Wars universe for no reason other than to indulge the writer’s whim. The first story may grate on George’s nerves. The second will give him a heart attack and cause him to unleash a horde of lawyers.
If the fanfic writer is a really a “fan,” then why distort the original material so much?
If the fanfic writer has read a story differently, or wants to tell it differently (which is perfectly okay!), then why can’t they write it using different names / settings? If you have the creative energy to write about drug addiction, why not apply that energy to creating a name other than Luke Skywalker?
And you may say, “Well, then how would the other Star Wars fans know that the fic was about Star Wars?” and the answer is they wouldn’t because the fic isn’t about Star Wars at all; it’s about drug addiction.
Because if the fanfic writer’s entire purpose is just to distort an existing universe, as opposed to telling a “better” story, then the fanfic writer isn’t a fan at all, just a person who wants to abuse the original content at the expense of the author and real fans for some personal agenda.
And where’s the social or artistic good in that?
After all, STAR WARS itself is basically a fanfic retelling of Frank Herbert’s DUNE, with all the big ideas replaced with laser swords and Wookies.
George clearly thought that DUNE would be “better” if they spent less time talking and more time shooting, which is fine. But at least George changed the names of his super-powered characters, and his twins, and his desert planet, and his giant sand worm.
Thank you for mansplaining that to us, Joseph.
I’m sorry that you found my comment offensive, it certainly was not meant as such. I am asking questions about the nature of fanfic because I really don’t get it. I thought I might get some helpful discussion here.
I might not have tried to have this discussion, except that the issue seems to be a serious concern for authors, and I’d like to be an author one day.
As a writer, I’m trying to wrap my head around both sides of the argument. But I don’t understand why a fan would want to fundamentally alter the object of their fandom.
I guess I don’t understand the impulse to write an entire story in someone else’s universe with someone else’s characters, and yet modified because you didn’t like the original author’s story in some way.
If a person has this fundamental need to tell a story, as you aptly describe it, it seems very strange to me that they would want to tell their story in someone else’s world.
If you’re going to make so much effort to fulfill your desire for the “right” story or “your” story, why not fully realize your creation with fully original content?
Or are you advocating the notion that no content should be “owned” by an individual, even its original creator, and therefore everyone should be free to tell any story in any universe?
I’m sorry that you found my comment offensive
I’m sorry you don’t understand the word “mansplaining”, or “to mansplain”. Let me suggest you google it.
I am asking questions about the nature of fanfic
No, you’re mansplaining fanfic. To a fanfic writer! It’s amazing how that happens so often.
And please – don’t try to claim you “wanted to have a discussion” when you mansplain. Mansplaining isn’t how you start discussions or how you enter discussions. It’s how you try to end a discussion – in this instance, sadly, before it even started! – because mansplainers already think they have the answers.
Throughout my comments, I have repeatedly said “I think X,” and “I don’t understand Y,” and I have asked questions.
I’m sorry that you find sincere questions to be “patronizing” (according to the first definition of mansplaining I found). I thought I could get some helpful insights from you, judging from your post.
I’ll leave you to your discussions with the other commenters here.
To Joseph and anyone else who might be thinking of bringing up the legal aspects of hating fanfic passionately: please can you first go to the Google machine and type in “the difference between trade mark and copyright law”?
And then, but not before then, you may come back and discuss why it is necessary for authors to denounce fanfic and attempt to prevent its being written on legal grounds — as opposed to simply, say, refusing to read it.
Yonmei: I like this post! Also I owe you an email — must get to that.
Joseph wrote: I thought I could get some helpful insights from you, judging from your post.
Okay, let me give you some.
I think there are a few other aspects to this discussion.
Helpful insight: this sounds like rather than engage with what I wrote, you wanted to change the subject. (It wasn’t by itself a red flag: you might have come up with some intelligent reaction and still begun with this comment.)
First, there is the issue of money and rights. Allowing other people to play in your personal universe weakens your trademark, opens you up to lawsuits, and generally hurts your ability to earn a living as a writer. This may only apply to one fanfic in a million, but that one could destroy the original author’s career, so it’s not in the author’s best interest to take that risk.
Helpful insight; explaining copyright and trademark law in a patronizing manner, assuming total ignorance on the part of the fanfic writer, is mansplaining. You don’t come across as someone sincerely seeking information in this paragraph: you come across as a mansplainer.
Copyright isn’t some cowardly shield to keep others from playing with your toys, it’s a tool that allows writers to become professionals and to make a living as an arist. It’s primarily to protect the author from predatory publishers.
Helpful insight: explaining the purpose of copyright law in a patronizing manner, assuming total ignorance on the part of the fanfic writer, is mansplaining. Especially when you’re actually wrong about the primary purpose of copyright.
Isn’t that a good thing?
Helpful insight: Asking a loaded question at the end of a mansplaining paragraph does not make you come across as someone sincerely seeking information: you come across as a mansplainer.
For example, I don’t think George Lucas’s head would explode if you wrote a story in which Luke Skywalker flies to planet X to fight the evil Y monster and save the Z people. However, George’s head might explode if you wrote a story in which Luke Skywalker has a drug addiction (or kills all his friends for money, or has graphic sex with his enemies).
Helpful insight: Mansplaining what will and will not make George Lucas’s head is actually quite amusing, but again – it doesn’t come across as if you were sincerely wanting a discussion: it comes across as if you thought you already had all the answers. Which, unless you are George Lucas, no, you don’t.
And the difference is clear. The first example is a Star Wars story, no matter how poorly written. The second example is not a Star Wars story yet it still uses the Star Wars universe for no reason other than to indulge the writer’s whim. The first story may grate on George’s nerves. The second will give him a heart attack and cause him to unleash a horde of lawyers.
Helpful insight: Mansplaining to a fanfic writer what will or will not cause George Lucas to unlease a horde of lawyers is a particularly good example of the mansplanation. You really have no idea how litigious George Lucas is about fanfic, or how a Star Wars fan might define what is or is not a SW fanfic, but you’re going to mansplain it to me anyway, presuming total ignorance on my part, despite your own plain ignorance of Star Wars fandom and the effect on it of the George Lucas legal team.
If the fanfic writer is a really a “fan,” then why distort the original material so much?
Helpful insight: A loaded question is never a sincere question. Trying to claim that your loaded questions were “sincere” is both patronising and directly insulting of my intelligence.
If the fanfic writer has read a story differently, or wants to tell it differently (which is perfectly okay!), then why can’t they write it using different names / settings? If you have the creative energy to write about drug addiction, why not apply that energy to creating a name other than Luke Skywalker?
Helpful insight: Had you begun your comment with these two questions, leaving off the previous seven paragraphs of mansplaining and loaded questions, I would have assumed you were a non-fanfic-writing fan who had wandered into a fanfic discussion, and probably ought to be politely steered to another site where you wouldn’t interrupt the discussion with newbie, ignorant questions about why people want to write fanfic. You kind of cut off any possibility tht you’d get that kind of kidgloves treatment with your first seven paragraphs, though.
And you may say, “Well, then how would the other Star Wars fans know that the fic was about Star Wars?” and the answer is they wouldn’t because the fic isn’t about Star Wars at all; it’s about drug addiction.
Helpful insight: More mansplaining! Or: Gee, how smart you are to know about things that never happened! This following paragraph undercuts any thought I or another fanfic fan might have had that you needed to be steered to another site or to have fanfic gently explained to you: because (this is another helpful insight for you!) by giving your own answer to your question, you convinced me that you didn’t want to know what I think: you want to mansplain to me what you think.
And where’s the social or artistic good in that?
Helpful insight: This is another loaded question. Loaded questions are not sincere questions. If you want helpful answers, do not ask loaded questions!
I make that eleven helpful insights for you. I hope this will help you avoid mansplaining and loaded questions next time.
You might have simply engaged or not-engaged with me on any given aspect of this topic, but instead you chose to criticize me and your perception of the tone of my comments.
I didn’t come here to get into an argument, I came here to discuss and learn. As you said, I’m a non-fanfic-writing fan who wandered in here looking to talk about something I know little about. I expressed some opinions, which you might have either ignored or corrected, rather than criticized.
If you’re not interested in discussing or “teaching” (which you have no obligation to do), that’s fine. You might have just said so.
And copyrights were created to protect authors from predatory publishers, who were originally the only people with the means to profit from artistic works at the author’s expense.
You might have simply engaged or not-engaged with me on any given aspect of this topic, but instead you chose to criticize me and your perception of the tone of my comments.
Thank you for mansplaining that to me, Joseph.
I didn’t come here to get into an argument, I came here to discuss and learn.
And aren’t you grateful I’ve given you all these helpful insights into how, next time you want to discuss and learn, you can do so, rather than provoking an argument with your loaded questions and your mansplainin’ ways?
If you’re not interested in discussing or “teaching” (which you have no obligation to do), that’s fine. You might have just said so.
What, rather than thanking me for my lesson to you in good manners and avoiding mansplaining, you reject the lesson and accuse me of not being interested in “teaching” you? *sigh* *tear*
And copyrights were created to protect authors from predatory publishers, who were originally the only people with the means to profit from artistic works at the author’s expense.
…and more mansplaining!
So much ‘yes, this!’ to you, Yonmei.
(That’s print universes. TV and film have way too many creators for me to worry if any one of them doesn’t like fanfic: no one of the creators involved can really have that kind of intimate connection with their characters.)
Is it just me, or is this an aspect to pretty much every single fanfic hoohah ever? In spite of the fact that only a very, very small proportion of fic fandoms are for books (offhand I could name only three self-sustaining fandoms for book series that have no TV/movie adaptation, and ASOIAF is one of them), novelists appear to be the only people who get seriously upset about the existence of fanfic. Maybe it is because they see themselves as sole creators whereas people who make videogames or comics or TV shows are keenly aware of the fact that their creations are communal experiences.
This begs a question of GRRM, though; why is he okay with someone writing a TV adaptation of his work if he’s so very touchy about people touching his precious characters? Because writing an adaptation is a not dissimilar process to writing fanfic. Nor is professional writing for an established world (eg. writing for Marvel Comics, writing gaming materials for the Forgotten Realms, or writing books or TV scripts for Dr Who). If you can understand how a writer could get a kick out of doing that kind of stuff for a living, then you understand fanfic.
Fanfic is visible evidence that although you read and loved the story that the writer wanted you to get, you didn’t think about that story as the writer wanted you to think. Love isn’t all. It’s a great deal, but love is never enough. The need to tell the story is what gives birth to the story, nothing more, nothing less.
I’ve written fanfic because I want to show how the ethics of a text are compromised by the text itself. I’ve written fanfic because I wanted to apply Donna Haraway’s philosophical work to my favourite videogame. I’ve written fanfic because I found an existing retcon really, really unsatisfactory. I’ve written fanfic because the original text was interesting but full of terrible plot holes. Love is sure as hell not all; it’s often intellect, it’s critical engagement. (Other times, it is porn.)
And it’s only copyright and legal ownership that has made some of this storytelling separate from the rest of the written word and called it fanfiction.
Yes, this. In pre-modern times different writers working with the same characters and the same storylines was called culture. These days, it’s called fanfiction.
(I’m totally perplexed by the notion that people shouldn’t ever write unless they’re making up original characters and original settings. If that’s true, you can junk all the myths, all the classical texts, all the historical novels about dead royalty, right now. Seriously, it’s like saying that people shouldn’t ever cook unless they want to create a five-course meal. What if you just want to make pie? Because sometimes I just want to make pie – good, overintellectual pie – and I think that a culture in which anyone who wants pie can make pie is a strong creative culture, and that a culture in which only people who make five-course meals can make pie is a dull, top-down elitist place where I am very glad I do not live.)
And hey, I just found a really good dw post about this, which briefly sums up just about everything that GRRM et al need to know.
It used to be that the Anointed Few stood at the front of the room – sometimes a tiny classroom, sometimes a giant lecture hall with video cameras catching each golden word for those not lucky enough to hear it in person – and spoke. And everyone else was just audience: the listeners, the readers, the passively entertained. Fandom has turned your lectures into seminars. We keep speaking up. We keep having our own ideas. We don’t even have the courtesy to raise our hands and ask to speak. And sometimes we lock you out of the room altogether.
@Thene – I was just about to link that terrific post!
As for Martin licensing his work, this post and comments on LJ have further information on exactly how little control he can expect there.
Thene: novelists appear to be the only people who get seriously upset about the existence of fanfic.
Well, no. (I mean, yes as a general rule, but no.) George Lucas is famously the guy who gets seriously upset about fanfic (and it may be the money he thinks he’s not making by fans doing it for themselves, or it may be that Lucas is jealous of superior writing skills): and I’ve known of several actors who got seriously upset about fanfic about “their characters”. (In general, though, even back when fanfic wasn’t nearly so publicly known and an actor might be surprised by it at cons, most actors seemed to have a healthy sense of detachment about the difference between “People writing stories about a character I play on TV/in a movie” and “People writing stories about me“.) I don’t know of any instance of a scriptwriter getting upset about fanfic in the sense of “people messing with my characters”, though several have said explicitly that you must never send a fanfic story directly to a scriptwriter. (I’ve known instances where fanwriters/editors who got into scriptwriting felt it necessary to formally divorce themselves of their connections with other fanwriters – “We’ll be writing scripts, we can’t read your stories any more”.)
Maybe it is because they see themselves as sole creator
Well, in a sense, a writer of stories is a sole creator. Of course we are all linked into the global web of creativity that extends over the world and back into history and forward into understanding, but – I put down words on the page and they’re mine.
Whereas any of the creators involved with films or TV or videogames, writer or actor or director or artist, knows their contribution is both essential and dependent on the contribution of all of the others, creators and craftspeople (not to make a false distinction between the two, indicating a spectrum rather).
This begs a question of GRRM, though; why is he okay with someone writing a TV adaptation of his work if he’s so very touchy about people touching his precious characters?
Well, I think there’s two reasons; One, they’ll pay him, and he needs the money. (And that’s a perfectly good reason for accepting it, and one I applaud: I want GRRM to keep writing for AS LONG AS POSSIBLE, please. Sometimes you just take the money, squinch your eyes shut, smile politely, and avoid watching the actual thing.) Two, I think there is a difference between the transformation of film or a TV series and writing a sequel or a spinoff in more words – the film of a book is not the book.
If you can understand how a writer could get a kick out of doing that kind of stuff for a living, then you understand fanfic.
Well, except… we’re not doing it for a living. It’s possible they don’t understand why we’d do it just for fun.
Love is sure as hell not all; it’s often intellect, it’s critical engagement. (Other times, it is porn.)
*applauds*
What if you just want to make pie? Because sometimes I just want to make pie – good, overintellectual pie – and I think that a culture in which anyone who wants pie can make pie is a strong creative culture, and that a culture in which only people who make five-course meals can make pie is a dull, top-down elitist place where I am very glad I do not live.
Exactly. Mmmm, pie.
(Oh, and the post on DW? Classic, yes. “From now on, we’re going to have a little less Anointed One…and a little more fun around here!”)
afrai: please can you first go to the Google machine and type in “the difference between trade mark and copyright law”?
That would be a good idea in general, but I looked at Joseph’s blog: his status as published writer appears to rest on an e-book coming out with Rockable Press on how to give powerpoint presentations, but he’s also trying to get published via WEbook, and one of the fairly well-known issues with WEbook is a draconian transfer of copyright from author to publisher. Which suggests that he’s too fond of mansplaining about how copyright works, for anyone else to be able to tell him that if WEbook publishes him, he’ll lose his copyright to a predatory publisher…
I can’t believe how often this argument boils down to, “Well I don’t like it or understand it, therefore no one else ever should either!” Why can’t people just live and let live? Fandom is happy to stay off the radar (whether or not you think that’s a good thing), it’s the anti-fic people who keep dragging us out thinking they’re going to have an easy target and then discovering that’s not true in the slightest.
If more people would just learn “your kink is not my kink; your kink is OK,” (or whatever is applicable for “kink”) the world would be a much happier place.
Let’s see if I can kill a lunchbreak on ya, Joseph.
First, there is the issue of money and rights. Allowing other people to play in your personal universe weakens your trademark, opens you up to lawsuits, and generally hurts your ability to earn a living as a writer. This may only apply to one fanfic in a million, but that one could destroy the original author’s career, so it’s not in the author’s best interest to take that risk.
This is untrue on several levels. First off, fanfiction doesn’t destroy demand, it generates demand. (IE: it makes more people want to buy or watch the original product.) Many people who have no idea how fanfiction works find this very surprising, but I assure you that it is true, and saying that it isn’t true makes you look like you don’t know anything about fanfic-writing communities. You can read lots lots more about this elsewhere, but to give you an example: I *started* watching Stargate: Atlantis because of the fanfiction written about it. I got into it and kept watching the show long after it had gotten, frankly, bad, because I found it fascinating what fanfiction writers did with it. Then when the show finished I started watching shows and reading books recommended by writers and readers I’d met through SGA fanfiction. Fanfiction generates community, and community generates product loyalty – even when it’s way, way better than the original show or book (see also: Smallville.)
Second, I don’t think most authors would get so upset about fanfic if the fanfic writers were simply writing logical extensions of the original universes (although some authors would obviously still object).
For example, I don’t think George Lucas’s head would explode if you wrote a story in which Luke Skywalker flies to planet X to fight the evil Y monster and save the Z people. However, George’s head might explode if you wrote a story in which Luke Skywalker has a drug addiction (or kills all his friends for money, or has graphic sex with his enemies).
And the difference is clear. The first example is a Star Wars story, no matter how poorly written. The second example is not a Star Wars story
This is exactly what Yonmei is talking about: writers who get upset because their audience is interpreting their story in a way they didn’t expect or find surprising – for example, your suggestion that ‘Luke beats up Sith’ is a Star Wars story, but ‘Luke gets addicted to drugs’ isn’t a Star Wars story. First off, the Star Wars Extended Universe would like a word with you! Secondly, as a measure of how subjective what is and isn’t a logical extension of the original material, I feel exactly opposite to the way you feel about these two potential stories. I think the second story, the drug addiction story, is much more a Star Wars story because it relies on a knowledge of Luke, his character, and his surroundings (plus, actually, the Dark Side is portrayed as an addictive drug in the films, so um, I REALLy don’t know what you’re talking about.) The first story is trite action fiction which is as applicable to any other vaguely actiony universe as Star Wars. (Although, in fact, it could be brilliantly successful as a Star Ears fic – but it would really depend on the writer.)
Additionally, you’re basically running into the doctrine in literary theory which says that ‘the author is dead’. Basically what this means is that a text is subjectively interpreted by every reader, and therefore every reader has a different perception of the shape and meaning of that text. It’s not possible for you, or me, or even George Lucas to say what is and isn’t a Star Wars story. (I think it’s possible for us to say what isn’t a good Star Wars story, mind you. See: Episodes I, II, and III!)
If the fanfic writer has read a story differently, or wants to tell it differently (which is perfectly okay!), then why can’t they write it using different names / settings? If you have the creative energy to write about drug addiction, why not apply that energy to creating a name other than Luke Skywalker?
And you may say, “Well, then how would the other Star Wars fans know that the fic was about Star Wars?” and the answer is they wouldn’t because the fic isn’t about Star Wars at all; it’s about drug addiction.
Actually, it’s a story about Luke Skywalker. Season 6-7 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer explore Willow as a drug addict. It’s a story abotu drug addiction, not slaying vampires – does that make it not a BtVS story? No. Duh. It’s a Willow story.
Because if the fanfic writer’s entire purpose is just to distort an existing universe, as opposed to telling a “better” story, then the fanfic writer isn’t a fan at all, just a person who wants to abuse the original content at the expense of the author and real fans for some personal agenda.
Seriously, saying ‘real fans’ and ‘not real fans’ is a bit like calling someone from Iowa a ‘real American’ and someone from NYC ‘not a real American’ – that is to say, it’s a) an asshole thing to do and b) wrong on every level: an American is an American is an American, a fan is a fan is a fan. Secondly, what’s your personal criteria for telling a ‘better’ story and telling a ‘distorted’ story? I’ve read brilliant fanfiction which critiques the politics of race and gender in the Stargate universe. Is that ‘better’ storytelling, or ‘distorted’ storytelling because it’s not perfectly faithful to the (racist, sexist) storytelling of the original universe?
I haven’t written any fanfic in awhile (though as I roleplay regularly on a text-based Harry Potter game, it’s probably splitting hairs to say I don’t write fanfic), but when I did, it wasn’t about loving the characters. Not nearly so much as it was about playing in the world.
And about entertaining and amusing other fans of the work in question.
Fanfic isn’t about saying ‘This happened to Character X’, it’s saying ‘What if this happened to Character X?’ Because fanfic writers and readers respect the canon. They know fanfic isn’t canon unless and until the original creator says it is.
Take a character like the Wicked Witch of the West or Peter Pan. See all the adaptations that have been made. See how many performances of that character have been done, by how many different actors, with so many different directors. Can’t some authors see how all of these are, in a sense, _different_ characters?
I’m currently playing two versions of Sirius Black, on the same game. They’re not the same person. And they aren’t Rowling’s Sirius Black either.
So I don’t really think it’s about playing with an author’s children. I’m not really sure what a good analogy is. Clones? Xerox copies? Avatars?
But here’s an analogy of a different sort. If you didn’t want your children to play with others, then you should’ve kept them locked up in the basement.
[...] Feminist SF and George R.R. Martin have yet more to say on fanfic. [...]
I see both sides of the debate myself – but as a reader of fanfic, I suppose it’s clear which side of the fence I end up on.
I do get what he’s saying – I am very uncomfortable with fics that are about real people, they make me squeamish, and I guess a writer could feel enough for their characters that it’s not any different.
But I want to make a Martin specific comment – I’ve never read any song of fire and ice fanfic, but I do love those characters and I need resolution. Though he promises he’s still writing, it’s beginning to feel like he’s abandoned those children of his – and significant neglect is grounds for putting them in the care of another, is it not? (Just using the analogy he used here after all).
Ultimately I think creativity is a beautiful thing in all its forms, and there are writers out there who would never write an original fic, but do write fanfiction, and I think it would be a tragedy to stifle that creative impulse, however it manifests. I know that saying if you don’t like it you don’t have to read it is an over-simplification of the issue, but I do believe that this boils down to telling people they don’t have the right to enjoy your stories in their own way (in this case via fanfic) which ultimately strikes me as counter-productive to whatever the writer is trying to achieve, be it money, enjoyment, etc.