by Mimi Chong
Let’s say that you are a rabid X-Files fan. In order to commiserate with fellow X-philes, you take up net-surfing personal fanpages, just to see what other people think of your favorite show. One day, you inadvertently follow a link to a pageful of text. Interested, you read it – only to find that not only does Scully believe in Mulder’s conspiracy-loaded notions, but she and Mulder are on their honeymoon, and they are now referred to as agents Mulder and Mulder. When, you expostulate, did this ever happen in the show? Rest easy, for it never did. This, my friend, is the glorious subculture spawned from fandom – fanfiction. Fanfiction, or fanfic for short, is fan-generated fiction inspired by their favorite series. They come in the form of poems, scripts, and most often, short stories and novellas. Not only do TV series have fanfic, of course – the rule is, if it has a fandom and a plot, then fanfiction has been written about it, be it movie, book, comic book, cartoon, or video game. Some sprawling fandoms are Star Wars, X-Men, Ranma ½ and the Final Fantasy series. (I freely admit to being baffled that there are fanfics about N’Sync, however.) If you’ve ever written a story about something you like, involving characters created by someone else, you’ve written fanfiction. The concept of fanfiction dates back to the Middle Ages, when “fans” of the oral tradition of the Round Table added their own characters to Camelot – Lancelot, for one. By the early twentieth century, Sherlock Holmes, the most famous man that never lived, incited the birth of various “literary societies” dedicated to the promotion and continuation of the works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – in other words, writing more Holmesian stories. In the ’60’s and ’70s, the first Star Trek “fanzines” – with articles and stories written by Trekkies – were published, coining the word fanfiction as we now know it. Fanzines were printed by private means and distribution was limited only to a few hundred subscribers at most. It wasn’t until the onset of the internet and the World Wide Web that fanfiction became truly widespread and accessible. Thousands of connected people visit millions of fanfic-devoted newsgroups and websites each day; and with the increase of readers, the number of fic-writers also multiply. The reasons for writing fanfic are as varied as the people who write it, but they all boil down to this: a deep love for a favorite series. Some people call it obsession; and it’s true that it takes something akin to that to dwell on a scene, a character, or a relationship so much that it actually becomes necessary to write about them. So fanfics are often inner monologues of a character, expansions of a plot point, “might-have-been’s,” or continuations of a story after it has ended. And, of course, the ever popular soap-opera style getting together (or splitting apart) of a couple “destined (or absolutely wrong!) for each other.” In short, it is enjoyable for fans to take things into their own hands. Receiving fanmail for a story is also not at all disagreeable – it just isn’t fun to write a fanfic and not share it with like-minded people. Therefore, fanmail is the other great motivation for writing fanfiction. Sometimes one might wish, though, that the lack of fan encouragement would make some self-proclaimed “writers” stop churning out so-called “fics.” For the quality of fanfiction ranges from “better than the real thing” (which is high praise for a fic-writer) to “I can write better if I hung over a keyboard by my neck and typed with my toes.” Bad fanfic, as with all bad writing, is simply painful. Spelling and grammar, of course, are musts for good writing; finesse of style is a welcome bonus. But the criteria for fanfiction has one important rule different from that of usual creative writing: fanfic must also be faithful to the original story. If you want to make changes to the plot, the characters, or add creations of your own, it is imperative to make them plausible or else you’ll catch a lot of flak – fans are a picky bunch. Mulder and Scully should not just wake up one morning and decide to get married (or kill each other); nor should Xena the Warrior Princess find herself in the emergency room of ER (or Dr. Doug Ross in Ancient Greece – you catch my drift). Unless, of course, some evil necromancer transported Xena into the twentieth century and Doug got sucked into a time warp that appeared in the gutters of Chicago one morning when he was late for work… Fanfiction can be pretty insane at times. So are the people that write it. But that’s one of the greatest things about them – they’re usually the first to admit, cheerfully, that they need a life. You have to admire the sheer devotion; and sometimes, you are truly, pleasantly surprised by the beauty and depth of the works themselves – out there on the internet, there are unknown, unassuming people who can move with words. But mostly, fanfiction is fun. Fans write thirty-chapter epics just for the fun of it, and if you are open-minded and easily amused, chances are you’ll find reading fanfic fun, too. Where else could you get the satisfaction of seeing Mr. and Mrs. Mulder decked out in tropical shirt and bikini, blissfully guzzling daiquiris on a Caribbean cruise? a
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The Taida Student Journal has been active since 1995 with an ever-changing roster of student journalists at NTU. Click the above link to read about the authors Archives
May 2024
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