thorny thoughts

[swan_tower]

There's a lengthy entry up by one cupidsbow discussing fanfic in the context of Joanna Russ' How to Supress Women's Writing. I spent a good fifteen minutes attempting to write a comment in response to somebody over there, but I've decided I'm better off doing so over here; the thought I'm trying to articulate is thorny and awkward, and I'm having trouble figuring out how to phrase it, and if I try to do so over there, odds are I'll just piss multiple people off and find myself at the bottom of a verbal dogpile I didn't mean to start. So I'll chew on my thought over here, and see what I can get out of it. Warning; what follows is rambling and unfocused, and not entirely thought-out.

The proximate comment that set me off is: And, of course, if you're a really good fanfiction writer, you're encouraged to write original fic - and this is seen as a step up, despite the fact that a lot of fanfiction written by experienced writers is better than published writing. But it also is colliding somewhere in the back of my head with: But what I'm wondering is if I've been encultured to think that my fun isn't worth being paid for. See, men write stuff they want to read and get paid for it. Why is my work less valuable?

buymeaclue has already made the obvious response to that latter one, so I don't need to. Instead, let's start chewing on the thoughts in my head.

I've seen several comments recently in various places on the topic of encouraging fanfic writers to turn their hands to original fiction. All of those comments (which are by fanficcers) have been negative. And I'm increasingly feeling like there's a hostile backlash happening within the fanfic community against this very suggestion.

I can understand where that would come from: if you run into people who think the worst of paid original fiction is inherently superior to the best of unpaid derivative fanfiction (I'm using "derivative" in the technical sense, not as a value judgment), then yeah, you're going to be pissed off by the continual suggestions that you'd be much better off spending your time and effort on something worthwhile.

But for the love of little fishes, people -- not everybody encouraging you to write non-derivative fiction is doing so because they think fanfic sucks. In fact, sometimes they're noticing that it doesn't suck, and encouraging you to bring the cool things that are happening over in that sandbox into this one. Because, as cupidsbow notes in that post, there are a lot of ways in which the institutional factors of fanfic contribute to its marginalization and suppression (and with it, the marginalization and suppression of those largely female voices) -- so I think it's helpful to bring some of the innovation of the marginalized community into the non-marginalized one. It'll liven up the textual discussion over here, and draw eyes toward what's going on over there, instead of leaving it in a ghetto the rest of the world tries to ignore.

There's thornier stuff still in my head, though. Like the ways in which some of the fanfic community seems to want to do backflips in order to avoid noticing the fact that what they're doing is illegal. We can have arguments about the problems with our copyright laws until the cows come home -- I'd be the first to point out some of those problems -- and yes, some authors give it a tacit or implicit thumbs-up anyway, and yes, there are fanfic writers out there whose craft kicks the stuffing out of some professional writers, and yes, there's awesome stuff happening on a community level, but the point is, creating derivative works based on a text currently under copyright is illegal. Please don't jump down the throat of anybody who brings that up. It's relevant to the social position of fanfiction: yes, part of the reason it's ignored is that it's mostly written by women; it's non-hetero-normative; it focuses on issues devalued by the (masculine) establishment; etc etc; but the reason you can't get paid for it is that the law says you can't. Which is another reason for encouraging fanficcers to try original fiction: what happens when we push the boundaries of the status quo with similar work that isn't illegal? Then the legitimate reason to disregard it is gone; then we have to face up to the illegitimate reasons.

The tendency of the fanfic community (in a deliberately generalized sense) to valorize their own activity is entirely expected, and in some cases important. Where I get irritated is when it goes too far. Frex, when people act as if all fanfic is wonderful -- face it, folks, it's got its share of crap, just like everything does, but fanfic probably has a higher proportion of crap for the simple reason that there aren't any barriers to entry; familiarity with a spell-checker is not a prerequisite for posting your work. You don't need to pretend the bad stuff doesn't exist, though.

I think I'll leave it there, not because I've arrived at any conclusion, but because my thoughts have ceased to have anything resembling forward momentum, and rambling on even more aimlessly won't suit anybody's purpose. Now let's see how many people I've managed to offend . . . .

Comments

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

But in my experience, LARPers are less touchy about someone saying, "have you thought about trying out for a play?"

[teleidoplex]

But I do get really annoyed when my parents ask me why I spend all this time thinking up ideas for a LARP or a table-top, rather than writing them as stories I can sell.

[ancientwisdom.livejournal.com]

RE: LARPers are less touchy about someone saying, "have you thought about trying out for a play?"

Yes, but I'd be annoyed if someone asked me (as a LARPer) "why aren't you doing REAL theatre?" And that's the appropriate equivalent parallel question. Asking someone "have you thought about trying out for a play" tends towards a compliment on his or her performance abilities. Asking "why aren't you doing REAL theatre" is an insult to the entire premise of a LARP (an insult masking itself as a compliment), because it communicates that the person asking has deep presuppositions about what is "legitimate" and "valuable" that preclude "LARPing" from ever, ever, EVER even being considered in those categories.

Ditto for fanfiction.

Yes, fanfiction is illegal (and thus technically "illegitimate" in the eyes of the law -- but we're not talking about the law, we're talking about the way people experience the value of their own experience). Yes, fanfiction is a paraliterary activity. But as moonandserpent points out, the point isn't about the fanfiction writer -- it's about the assumptions about "value" that are held by the person asking "why don't you write original fiction?" And those assumptions can be based in (at best) a deep misunderstanding about how fan fic writers value their own practice and experience, and (at worst) unquestioned prejudices about "originality" and "authenticity" based on class, gender, and economic elitisms (among others!)

Interesting chat -- thanks for bringing it over to LJ! =)

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

That's only true if the question is phrased, "why aren't you writing REAL fiction?" or if you assume that's the true subtext of the question, "have you thought about writing original fiction?" I feel like I'm increasingly running into a hostile reaction that does assume such a subtext. And when that happens, it closes off a possibility of dialogue between the two: I'm supposed to stay in my sandbox and leave them in theirs, or maybe go play in theirs, but never encourage them to come play in mine. Which results in a one-way traffic between the two worlds, if there's traffic at all.

I'm sure many people out there are that condescending. But it's frustrating for those of us who want to express honest interest without getting jumped on.

[ancientwisdom.livejournal.com]

Hmm... I do get where you're coming from. I guess the thought for me runs like this: Imagine that you encounter someone who didn't like to read fantasy novels (they though fantasy was generally crap), but they liked the quasi-magical realism of TV shows like Lost. They then read your book, and to their surprise, they discover they enjoy your writing, and they say to you:

"Wow! You're such a surprisingly good writer for someone who works in fantasy! You seem to have a lot of serious potential -- why don't you try your hand at writing 'Lost' fan-fiction, where your talent could really shine?"

How would you respond?

That's obviously a silly example, but perhaps, to imagine a more realistic context and reverse the hierarchy, how would you feel if someone said to you:

"Wow, your writing is quite thematically rich for someone who writes in, you know, fantasy -- especially mass market fantasy. You're at the top end of a field that basically filled with crap. With all your potential, why don't you write fiction? I mean real fiction, the stuff on the "fiction" shelf at Borders -- you'd make a lot more money, and you could win an award that actually matters. I mean, why shoot for a fantasy-writing award when someone with your background (and a Harvard education) could probably win a Pulitzer, if you put your mind to it!"

How would you respond then?

What if it wasn't just one person asking, but a LOT of people? Most people? Would you become hostile if most people you spoke to who saw "potential" in your work also automatically assumed that you were "wasting" that potential by working in fantasy? And what if those people were pretty universally NOT trying to condescend to you -- they just honestly assumed that if you have skill, you'd want to shoot for the Pulitzer, and were honestly interested in your work, despite the whole fantasy thing (which they didn't really understand because their only exposure to fantasy EVER was the Dungeons and Dragons movie?)

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Oh, trust me, I've already translated the situation into that scenario in my mind for comparative purposes; I'm well familiar with that kind of prejudice. What I'm trying to get at is, can we please have some way to conduct a dialogue without an assumption of bad faith being involved?

And I think the reason I want this dialogue is, there are barriers to entry in professional fiction that don't exist in fanfic. Printing out a manuscript with a cover letter and mailing it off to an authority figure is a lot more intimidating to many people than posting something on a fanfic archive is, and once you've sent off that story, odds are good that you'll get a rejection, and will continue getting rejections for a while. This can scare people off from even trying. Mentoring is a critical resource for a lot of newbie writers in the pro-fic world, that gives them the encouragement they need to give it a shot, and keep giving it a shot until they succeed. People in the fanfic world already have a proven interest in writing (if not always for the same reasons), so it stands to reason that there are probably people over there who might be interested in original fiction, if someone were to encourage them or give them advice. And we on this side of the fence want to find those people, because "pay it forward" is perhaps one of the most universal parts of the writerly ethos, if such a thing can be said to exist. See a promising writer? Help them, if you can.

So it hurts a little when we hold out a helping hand, and it gets slapped in response. And when the slapping becomes a pattern rather than an occasional thing, it starts making people think that maybe they shouldn't bother trying.

And no doubt there are people who would read what I've just said and see it as more condescension, more assumption on my part that they need help or want help or have any interest in the thing the help is being offered for. That reaction is exactly what bothers me. I want to be able to seek out people who might want what I have to offer, without having to run a gauntlet of people who assume I'm automatically an elitist bitch.

[ancientwisdom.livejournal.com]

[Chuckles] I get you, and I totally *don't* think you're an elitist bitch, just for the record. =) I completely see the "pay it forward" thing.

It's humorous to me, though, because I can also imagine how "pay it forward" can look like a condescending literary equivalent of "white man's burden" from the fan fic writer's perspective. (The successful writer, reaching out into the darkness to offer the light of publication to the poor savage, scribbling genius with her own poop! Cue music! Can you blame the fan writer for giving the successful writer the bird?)

I like what you're saying about trying to find a mode of dialogue that doesn't get caught up in this mutual misunderstanding. Seems like an admirable problem to tackle.

One that has uncanny resonance in lots of contexts, come to think of it. My mind spins off into the different (almost universally unsuccessful) ways that America has attempted to "offer" help building democracies in the middle east ("Here, let me help you! Your civilization has such potential!")

Obviously a WAY different context, but I see a similar core problem -- how do you "offer" something without inadvertently communicating a basic disapproval or critique of how someone is living their life? How do you offer someone a hand without the possible insult of communicating that YOU think they need a hand? A really excellent question there.

[(Anonymous)]

Why would you even want fanfic writers to become pro writers? Heaven knows, there's no shortage of pro writers -- somebody linked to a blog of hollylisle's explaining how the pro publishing system is effectively designed to kill a midlist pro writer's career in three books, and it's not a problem for the publishers or bookstores because there are always plenty more where they came from. I don't have any way of doing a statistical analysis to prove or disprove her argument, but I have three personal acquaintances who have gotten books published. They each managed to sell three, and that was it. Fortunately, none of them had quit their day jobs. It seems like the endless supply of aspiring pro writers would just drive down pay rates and "job security" for the current pro writers -- why on Earth would you want people who are happy with their own little illegal playground of fanfic to try to make the transition?

And it may be true that 99% of fanfic is pure crap, but so is at least 80% of the stuff that makes it onto the shelves. At least we're not killing as many trees.