As Others See Us: Fanfic in the Media

In the story of the week, Scientific American's website reported that A space scientist is today announcing a major cosmic discovery by telling it as a Doctor Who story.

In the fanfic-as-insult article of the week, Michael Roston, on True/Slant, made reference to the Andrew Breitbart fan fiction-blog BigJournalism.com.

( iPad-related refs )

In the Penn State Daily Collegian, Chris Zook wrote that the dialogue in Legion sounds like poorly written Bible fan-fiction.

( Fanfic as resume fodder; Lost; Trek-inspired porn )

Finally, on iFMagazine.com, in a review of last week's Heroes, Carl Cortez wrote there’s some major game-changing moments here and the ramifications, regardless of next week’s outcome, will be lingering with all the heroes if there is a fifth season or into the hearts and creative minds of fan fiction if a Season Five will never be.

In a piece carried by the websites of many NBC stations, Helen A. S. Popkin wrote This past December, Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt glibly stated in a CNBC interview, “If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place." Does that include your address, credit card statements, social security number, medical records, legal and financial documents, competitive business secrets, fan fiction, bad poetry, love letters or any ill-advised photos or videos taken in one's hormone-addled youth? Schmidt didn’t say.

In The Washington Post, Robin Wauters had an article about Wattpad, which has gotten some more private funding. Launched in January 2007, Wattpad is a YouTube-like community that allows its members to read and share e-books on the Web and on mobile devices. According to the company, the site's catalog boasts 'hundreds of thousands' of novels, short stories, fan fiction, essays, jokes and more.

On The New York Time's The Learning Network Blog, Amanda Christy Brown and Holly Epstein Ojalvo posted a lesson plan on comparing adaptions of literary characters which included Independently, students find two or three additional interpretations of this character, or another character of their choice from the same text. Encourage them to search for portrayals in film, television, art, comic books, written adaptations or satires, fan fiction or contemporary literature, etc. from around the world and across time periods.

( More )

Finally, Jenny Price wrote an article for the University of Wisconsin News about a new book by associate professor Jonathan Gray, Show Sold Separately: Promos, Spoilers, and Other Media Paratexts. Gray explores the impact of the flood of information from print media, trailers, Internet discussions, merchandising, podcasts and guerrilla marketing that viewers receive about movies and television shows. […] Audiences create some of this material, through activities such as writing fan fiction that takes characters in new directions and engaging in heated discussions about potential plot twists, actors and directors in online forums.

The article of the week is one I glanced at last week and mentioned obliquely, but didn't catch the fic references in until I gave it another look thanks to a post by farad. It's a long, fairly comprehensive article on m/m pro fic by Gendy Alimurung for L.A. Weekly; there's much in it I agree with, and much I disagree with, and some parts that are just plain wrong. Among the bits of particular relevance: Women would write stories as part of what Prof. [Constance] Penley calls a “gift economy.” In slash fandom, where almost everyone is a writer, you create something, hoping it will inspire someone else to write another story. It’s a sexed-up game of Exquisite Corpse. “In other words, I will write this really hot story, and maybe in turn you will write one for me. They’re doing it for their own pleasure,” she says.

I also really liked a True/Slant piece by Zach Dundas on Sherlock Holmes: Fan fiction, obsessive crypto-scholarship, ‘zines, clubs, conventions featuring unfortunate costumes—you name it, we got there first. Wait, I thought Harry Potter fans invented fandom! I'm so confused!

Papers throughout Florida carried a piece by Colette Bancroft on how book reading has changed this past decade, the Harry Potter series her main example. What was new was the online presence of the books’ fandom just one example of a major trend. Harry’s fans didn’t just buy the books; they gathered in legions at Web sites like the Leaky Cauldron, MuggleNet and the Harry Potter Lexicon, listened to podcasts like PotterCast and MuggleCast, wrote thousands of screens full of fan fiction and visited Rowling’s own sophisticated site.

( Merriam-Webster, Roger Federer )

Finally, The Spoof carried Philip Moon's Fan Fiction Found To Be Better, More Popular Than Original Book. Like that never happens.

In the Sunday Times, Robbie Hudson, in an interesting piece on how the sexuality of Sherlock Holmes and John Watson have been portrayed, especially on film, referenced “slash” fiction - erotic stories about celebrities and fictional characters.

According to Sam Leith in the Wall Street Journal, [t]he noughties, if they marked anything, marked the dawning of the age of the amateur in popular culture. They saw the rise of reality television, the Internet-enabled spread of mash-ups, fan fiction, viral memes and home-made music, and the harnessing of the great machinery of democracy to the cause of light entertainment.

In The Jakarta Post, Sara Veal wrote about her participation in NaNoWriMo, including meeting other local participants such as Duckie. We immediately bonded over an appreciation for handsome brothers in Supernatural, about whom she was writing a fan-fiction Nano-novel.

In the UAE's The National, in an article on different-author sequels and prequels and such, John O'Conell asked what distinguishes sequels from fan fiction – the kind of imaginings that clog up internet forums devoted to Star Trek and The Lord of the Rings?

In of a review of the Auckland theatre scene for New Zealand Herald News, Janet McAllister wrote Silo Theatre's New York jaw-jaw fest The Scene was exciting to witness; the zippy serial monologues put the race into racy. The gear-crashed genre change near the end means only the first three-quarters of the play make it on to this list, but if we'd left before the last 20 minutes we would happily have written a fan-fiction ending.

The Ludec Representative's Alexandra Pope, intrigued by the Twilight fan phenomena, wrote about her teenage involvement in Star Wars fandom. The boys at my high school might regard me as more friend material than girlfriend material, but when I got home, I could switch on my computer, conjure up Cace, and lose myself in an ongoing story that became less about Star Wars and more about my teenaged self exploring love in a completely safe, non-threatening way.

Finally, Hardwood Paroxysm's Matt Moore wanted your best piece of [the Memphis Grizzlies'] Zach Randolph fanfiction.

In Mormon Times, Kathleen Dalton-Woodbury wrote a favorable review of Alma, by H.B. Moore, which she compares to fan fiction.

On Examiner, Mike Seuffert reported that Newsweek is letting liberals unleash their inner 15-year-old girl with an end-of-the-decade fan fiction retrospective, “What if Gore had won?”

And in things Twilight:

The Times of India's Yamini Lohia asked So, who's to blame for inflicting upon the world this bad fan fiction masquerading as young adult literature?

And NewsBlaze printed what seems to be a press release from The Fantasy Twi-Life Tour which mentions fanfic.

(Usual warning: You diss Twilight in comments, I PM you about why I'd buy Steph a cookie.)

The most prominent ref of the week was in a piece on Henry Jenkins in the L. A. Times. Zachary Pincus-Roth wrote that Jenkins -- officially the [USC] provost's professor of communication, journalism and cinematic arts -- researches how audiences engage with media through the Internet, fan fiction and video games.

The Canwest News Service distributed a piece by Mark Medley on Cory Doctorow, whose own early attempts at sci-fi were pastiches of Conan the Barbarian stories and Star Wars fan fiction. Lest we be to happy about Doctorow's getting us, ( inappropriate metaphor alert! )

In a review of Norah Jones's new album The Fall in the Dallas Observer, Robert Wilonsky wrote Those proclaiming this album the Booker T. grad's "departure" have clearly listened to their Norah Jones solely whilst sipping frappucinos between penning fan fiction in a Starbucks.

( NaNoWriMo-related )

On E!Online, Jennifer Godwin attributed NBC's decision to extend Trauma for at least a few more episodes to nontraditional signs of popularity growth, including the existence of Trauma fanfic.

And, in the Daily Northwestern, Laura Rosenfeld admitted I’ve never read the entire Harry Potter series. Whenever I tell people this, I usually get a look of sheer terror and shock. The hardcore fans who can list their favorite books in order and create fan fiction can’t even bear to be in my presence.

( a gazillion Twilight-related refs )

In the Toronto Star, Peter Howell profiled Robert Pattinson, who said, of reading the Twilight novels as pro-abstinence, "I think it's hilarious that everyone, especially parents, are saying it's about abstinence and they're really pleased their kids are reading it. And yet so many people who are reading the books are thinking, `I want them to have sex! I want them to make me want to have sex!' And if you read any fan fiction, all of it is about Edward and Bella having sex in the same scenarios instead of stopping. It's quite amusing."

In the south-of-here Patriot Ledger, Dana Barbuto wrote, of the new movie Gentlemen Broncos, when it’s not paying homage to low-budget sci-fi films and geeky fan fiction, “Gentlemen Broncos” shows the type of unabashed heart that made the Hesses’ earlier film a cult hit.

( In the student press… )

Finally, Mark Morford, for the San Francisco Chronicle's website, dissed both my religion and my favorite hobby in one swell foop. No cookie for him.

In a Washington Post article on for-profit non-original-author sequels that was picked up by the more linkable Detroit News, Neely Tucker quoted author Eoin Colfer as saying "This is not part of the Douglas Adams oeuvre. It's very authorized fan fiction." ( Wait! There's more! )

( A con, an EW update )

A PRNewswire release that was picked up by a large handful of media outlets announced that Jackson Rathbone's band, 100 Monkeys, will be headlining the [Nashville, TN NewCon] festival, which aims to inspire people to get more involved in the arts. The weekend includes Twilight- and New Moon-inspired art competitions as well as poetry and fan fiction contests.

In School Library Journal, Debra Lau Whelan wrote about the Chicago Public Library’s new Harold Washington Library Center, where high schoolers can take part in a variety of free digital media workshops where they can explore the creation of digital photography, fan fiction, graphic design, digital video and music production, and game design.

From the snippy author department: Kirk Read wrote a letter to the editors of The Dartmouth complaining about the content of a recent article. He called me overweight, middle-aged, hairy and with facial hair. At the time of the show, I was 34 years old, 155 pounds and didn’t have any facial hair. […] Neither of us deserved to be characters in Lambert’s imaginative fan fiction. Mr. Read, I've got news for you - to a teenager, you're middle-aged, and I'm ancient.

( And more from the college press! )

On Examiner: Sabrina Brody wrote, of some recently reported pairings-up amongst the usual tabloid fodder, Buying into these stories is sort of the same as convincing yourself that sapphic fan fiction about Cold Rush's Lily Rush and Bette from the L Word was an episode your DVR recording didn't catch.

Finally, in the Telegraph (UK), Tom Chivers listed ten of the most important rules of the internet, including Rule 34 (if it exists, there is porn of it). The spread of fanfic, slash fiction and hentai around the internet, as well as the rise of furries, are making this law more and more accurate every day.

On the Christian Science Monitor's Chapter and Verse blog, Rebekah Denn, in a piece on the new Pooh sequel Return to the Hundred Acre Wood by David Benedictus, wrote the evidence shows that human nature craves sequels as badly as candy, even with books that – like the original Pooh – have the loveliest, most final endings. Just look at how readers write endless stories set in the worlds of the books they love, in the form of unauthorized “fan fiction.” On one main site, fan-fiction.net, the Twilight books alone feature more than 100,000 registered fan-written stories. Harry Potter has more than 400,000; even Gossip Girl topped 5,000. Sigh, nice take on things, but how hard is it to check a url?

On Motley Fool, Rick Aristotle Munarriz mused, regarding Yahoo's encouraging of GeoCities users to upgrade to paid accounts, But the stuff on GeoCities consists mostly of hobbyist pages. They're not about to start paying $60 a year to host their Pokemon card collections or Harry Potter fan fiction.

Jennifer Tanko, of Towson University's The Towerlight, wrote a review of Cassandra Clare's City of Bones titled Some authors should stick with fanfic.

Also in the college press, in an op ed in the Johns Hopkins News-Letter that features a very odd reading of history, Emma Brodie wrote Yes, you can put your fanfiction out there for everyone to read, and yes, maybe one or two people would read it, but there's nothing lasting about it. Just like the early films, it will be disposed of, forgotten.

Finally, Archie Comics is expanding its footprint in India, but there's a hitch. According to Vikram Doctor in The Economic Times, There is one small problem though — an issue over use of the Archies name in India. That has long been registered in India by the Archies greetings card company. Mr Arora admitted this is a problem, but said the company will be filing a case against the Indian company. Archie Comics is a strong defender of its interests, with many successful cases of having scared off potential users of its characters. Even the fans who have tried to create free online fan-fiction sites, which most other creative copyright owners tolerate, have been told to desist.

I picked up two references to fanfic on NPR this week. On Thursday's Talk of the Nation, Neal Conan interviewed director Peter Sellars about a production of Othello he's currently staging. Sellars said that Toni Morrison is now actually working on her own play to respond to Shakespeare. And it's going to be called "Desdemona." And she is putting in things that Shakespeare himself could not have written about the black community. And this morning I heard Scott Simon interview Ralph Nader about his RPF (wouldn't it be lovely if it were RPS?) Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us!

The most annoying ref this past week was by Andy Kirby on Essential Writers. Describing the various sorts of horror fic available, he wrote We might have even stumbled across terrible fan-fiction stories in which we end up rooting for the bad guy just so we don’t have to suffer any more of what can only loosely be described as the story. Apparently his browser doesn't have a 'back' button.

( Steve Vander Ark's doing libraries now )

( Refs on TV review sites you've never heard of )

John Grooms, in a review of the new Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Jane Austen and Ben H. Winters, wrote of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Mixing two totally different fiction "industries" -- Jane Austen (or Jane Austen fan fiction) and zombies -- seemed a breeze for Winters. In the comments, he acknowledges that PPZ was actually put together by Seth Grahame-Smith. (More chatter about SSS can be found with a little googling; my favorite is Jill Lawless's in the Star (South Africa).)

On Examiner, Alan Chin wrote, of an anthology in support of same-sex marriage being put together by MLR Press, Because of the potential copyright issues, they cannot accept fanfiction.

Finally, if your spouse writes fanfic and it causes household bickering, NBC wants to hear from you!