An article celebrating fanfic

JediNemesis · Nov 17, 2008

Amazingly In the Guardian (a British newspaper).

The Guardian said:

Reading Rowenna Davis's piece about the fears surrounding the World of Warcraft's extension pack release reminded me of another internet pastime cherished by uber-geeky teenagers and young adults alike: fanfiction writing. The genre is sadly either ignored or mentioned when tasteless stories surface, which is a crying shame: it tells us a lot about the complexities of youthful obsessions and our taste for escapism.

I first heard about fanfics a couple of years ago, when my best friend and I stayed at his 13-year-old cousin's house in France. We were chatting about music in her bedroom when she confessed to being a rabid fan of the boy-band Blue, whose rise to fame in 2001 was as quick as their demise in 2005. Seemingly unfazed by our teasing, she proceeded to grab an enormous folder packed with pictures and handwritten pages. "Those are my fanfictions," she proudly said. "I've been writing about Blue for some time now and I also share my stories with other girls on the internet. They're mostly about me and Lee Ryan, he's my favourite member of the group."

A few minutes (and forceful pleas) later, she consented to reading one story out loud. And oh boy, it did not disappoint: having miraculously turned 18, blonde and bilingual overnight, the fanfiction described her moving to London to train for a tennis scholarship. Shortly after having settled in a posh new household she meets Lee Ryan, flirts mercilessly and ends up having a lot of steamy sex with the singer. My friend and I barely kept ourselves from exploding with laughter, and I soon forgot everything about the genre until last summer.

In July, the X-Files movie came out. Having been a devout and somehow obsessive devotee of the show since 1994, I decided to join the fan-fuelled hysteria by reading a journaling site used by many fandoms. One of the group I decided to follow syndicates fanfiction writers composing their own X-Files episodes and movie scripts featuring the "sexy and fearless" Agent Scully flirting with the "sensual and witty" Fox Mulder. Some of the stories are brilliant, others are frankly painfully embarrassing.

As much as I first felt ashamed to enjoy stories written by what I imagined to be lonely acne-ridden teenagers hiding in their parents' basement in central Idaho, it didn't take me long to get hooked. I am luckily only faithful to one show; I could otherwise spend days reading Harry Potter, Jane Austen, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Battlestar Galactica, Star Treck, CSI, Sherlock Holmes or even Brokeback Mountain fanfictions (which Annie Proulx disapproves of). While most stories obey structures and rules and are classified in categories such as fan poetry, drabbles or slash, anything goes content-wise if you can imagine it.

A couple of hours surfing those pages is enough to observe that fanfics aren't just about teenagers beaming about their favourite stars, but an extraordinary community of aspiring writers able to draft better scripts than the series' originals. They know the minutiae of each work of art's twist and turns so well that they seem to know the characters better than the original scriptwriters themselves. Fans from all walks of life are proofing each other's chapters, editing their copy and giving constructive feedback to one another, and academics are salivating at the thought of fanfictions involving philosophers such as Foucault and Habermas (what would happen if the two of them were to meet in a Berlin bar in 1968, debating Kantian theories?). Writing pages upon pages of fanfiction is a labour of love, and should be celebrated as such.

Criticism aimed at young people seems to rely on a very adult aversion to the concept of obsession, which we associate with fatal excesses and addictions. But isn't delirious obsession part of the growing up process? And isn't it fun? Some of us kept every article ever published about a particular singer, or organised Dungeon and Dragons-themed sleepovers. Others were rabid sports fans, collecting every
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mavjade · Nov 17, 2008

I'm glad to see fanfic painted in a better light than it normally is, as long as you don't read the majority of the comments!

Thanks for sharing!!

ardavenport · Nov 17, 2008

Wow, nice article. Usually stories about fan-fiction are about whether or not there are copyright problems with it.

Idrelle_Miocovani · Nov 17, 2008

This is a breath of fresh air! Very nice article. It's a change to see something that writes about the positive side of fanfiction.

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An article celebrating fanfic

JediNemesis Jedi Padawan

mavjade Former Manager VIP - Former Mod/RSA

ardavenport Jedi Grand Master

Idrelle_Miocovani Jedi Grand Master