Fanfic writers - SHORT POLL QUESTION
Aug. 8th, 2006 01:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
timepiececlockI've been reading some interesting stuff about fanfiction today. I read a great deal of stuff about the "Cassie Claire Is A Plaigarist" wank, and had to quit at part VIII of the timeline archive because it was just that long and messy. Right now I'm reading this article and its predecessor, and for the most part I'm finding them fair and enjoyable, if a bit on the shallow side information-wise.
In reading some of the CC wank stuff, which featured quotes about fanfic from various authors (particularly fantasy), I was left wondering if there was a giant list somewhere that maybe showed how a lot of the more famous authors feel about fanfic. I know the obvious ones like Anne Rice and JKR, but if the article I linked above is true and some professional authors are/have been fanfic writers themselves, I'd love to read various opinions present by them with regards to the issue.
The article I linked also says this about fanfic, which I admit applies to me as well:
"I was fifteen years old when I invented the genre of fan fiction, a form of writing where the author takes characters or universes created by someone else and writes stories about them. ... ... ... Fifteen was also the year I attended my first convention, where I learned that fan fiction had thrived for years before me."
Although for me it was more like 14 and I discovered fanfic through a Sailor Moon fan website and not a convention, the experience was basically identical: when I wrote my first fanfic I didn't even realize I was entering myself into a long-standing fandom tradition. I just had this mental image that I *had* to write down. That urge to write the next step after the credits closed. It wasn't until a while later that I stumbled upon internet fanfic and it clicked in my brain. In many ways I've never felt guilt about the "allure" of the internet and fandom because for me, fandom and fanfic was something, first and foremost, my own individual invention. Learning that there were thousands of others out there who made that same leap was, if anything, a massive rush.
So, I have a poll for you guys on my flist who write fanfic. And I'd like to ask you to link this poll to others if you want to, because I'd really love to see what a large sample will respond with. Most of my flist I've known originally from Jossverse fandom or anime fandom, so I'm sure it will be a far from legitimate sample of LJ fic writers. But I'd love to see, anyway.
[Poll #788168]
In reading some of the CC wank stuff, which featured quotes about fanfic from various authors (particularly fantasy), I was left wondering if there was a giant list somewhere that maybe showed how a lot of the more famous authors feel about fanfic. I know the obvious ones like Anne Rice and JKR, but if the article I linked above is true and some professional authors are/have been fanfic writers themselves, I'd love to read various opinions present by them with regards to the issue.
The article I linked also says this about fanfic, which I admit applies to me as well:
"I was fifteen years old when I invented the genre of fan fiction, a form of writing where the author takes characters or universes created by someone else and writes stories about them. ... ... ... Fifteen was also the year I attended my first convention, where I learned that fan fiction had thrived for years before me."
Although for me it was more like 14 and I discovered fanfic through a Sailor Moon fan website and not a convention, the experience was basically identical: when I wrote my first fanfic I didn't even realize I was entering myself into a long-standing fandom tradition. I just had this mental image that I *had* to write down. That urge to write the next step after the credits closed. It wasn't until a while later that I stumbled upon internet fanfic and it clicked in my brain. In many ways I've never felt guilt about the "allure" of the internet and fandom because for me, fandom and fanfic was something, first and foremost, my own individual invention. Learning that there were thousands of others out there who made that same leap was, if anything, a massive rush.
So, I have a poll for you guys on my flist who write fanfic. And I'd like to ask you to link this poll to others if you want to, because I'd really love to see what a large sample will respond with. Most of my flist I've known originally from Jossverse fandom or anime fandom, so I'm sure it will be a far from legitimate sample of LJ fic writers. But I'd love to see, anyway.
[Poll #788168]
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THE EPIC STORY OF
Date: 2006-08-08 07:00 pm (UTC)... and then unfortunate enough to encounter Little House on the Prairie. Oooh, good God. *lmao* Well, I was young ((nine, I think)) and still a very impressionable tool, so I began with writing "realistic fiction", and my first story *ever* was about a little girl named Penny who ditched her friends at a pizza store and bought a puppy instead. ((The moral was something along the lines of "what you want > friends.")) And all I can remember is this huge paragraph depicting the cabin-like pet store, a description inspired by Laura Ingall's own cabin-y homes. So after that, I went on to write my own OC prairie girl named Minnie Driver - she was a Mary Sue, yes - and I was (and still am) pretty ambitious; it was supposed to be novel material. I was deluded, and I reached 90 pages before I woke up and realized it was some pretty horrible stuff.
Then I deleted it ((but I had printed the first 11 pages before then, and I recently FOUND them!!! *will type them up on LJ to FLAUNT*)), and sort of gave up on writing for a while... until I met Harry Potter ((this was at the age of 10, I think)).
By the time I was already head-over-heels for the series, I knew about the Internet ((Neopets eventually led me to Google, in some obscure way)) and I started reading the fanfiction. The urges to write some weren't strong then, but with aid from Lord of the Rings (movie and book 2) and the inevitable desire to marry Legolas, I began again; and my first fic was for LotR, I think, not HP. Odd. It was an OC Mary Sue, yeah, and she was Legolas's sweetheart for some 500 years until he had to leave and join the Fellowship. Oh; and she had the power of Foresight. ((which I just called 'psychic powers' back then))
*sigh* Yeah, I deleted that too. ((and unfortunately, none of it remains... though it wasn't as badly written as it could've been; I was an aspiring grammar-and-spelling nerd by then.))
So I just stuck around HP after that failure, writing but never uploading anything until I became somewhat decent. And I think some of that 'somewhat decent' stuff is on my FFnet profile.
Fandom, though ((message boards, LJ, and whatnot)), was something I discovered nearly a year ago through Xanga. Xanga led me to LJ, which led me to fandom; and now I'm fourteen, and hopefully a little wiser.
[/rambling -- sorry about having to spam your LJ with this... got carried away. I think I'll end up as one of those memoir-writing old people one day; you know, the ones who do it even when they aren't famous and no one knows their name. Hmmm.]
Re: THE EPIC STORY OF
Date: 2006-08-08 07:11 pm (UTC)Re: THE EPIC STORY OF
Date: 2006-08-08 07:14 pm (UTC)OOOH HAHAHA. I just remembered that I killed off Amelia Driver in the fic (she was sick). HOT DAMN.
Re: THE EPIC STORY OF
Date: 2006-08-08 07:17 pm (UTC)