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Is Fanfiction really that bad?


The Crow

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[MOD]

Just a reminder of the rules about fanfic on this forum:

Q. Can I post fan fiction?

A. Definitely not. Short stories set in Westeros or using characters from "A Song of Ice and Fire" are not to be posted here (and if you've written one, don't even _mention_ the fact). GRRM doesn't approve of fan fiction, so we honor his wishes on the board concerning this. Taking this a step further, individuals who are aware of fan fiction elsewhere should not point users of the forum to it. This includes linking to fan fiction in your personal profiles, or linking to a site that links in turn to fan fiction. Failure to observe these rules will lead to a warning at minimum.

As long as these rules are respected, this thread will continue.

[/MOD]

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Some of the most hilarious things I have ever read have been fan-fiction. So for that, I am glad that it exists.

But at the same time, I never read it unless someone links it to me first and have no interest in it other than something amusing my friends have linked me.

I don't think it's inherently bad, but it's not something I really take notice of at all.

It becomes incredibly creepy when people start to write ''fan-fiction'' about actual, real people though...

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Nothing intrinsically wrong with fan-fiction.

I've read some entertaining (an in some cases excellent) fan-fiction based on RPG settings.

Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality is one of the best fan-fictions, and some consider it far superior to the original work.

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Some of the most hilarious things I have ever read have been fan-fiction. So for that, I am glad that it exists.

But at the same time, I never read it unless someone links it to me first and have no interest in it other than something amusing my friends have linked me.

I don't think it's inherently bad, but it's not something I really take notice of at all.

It becomes incredibly creepy when people start to write ''fan-fiction'' about actual, real people though...

One of the funniest I ever read was "Day of the Barney" and it's sequels.

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In most cases, yes, fanfiction is awful. Whilst there is no barrier to really well-written fanfiction being out there, there really isn't a huge amount and what there is is usually buried under a ton of absolute crap.

That said, there are a few websites which act as reasonable filters and promote the good stuff when it appears. Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, for example, came to attention that way and is generally well-regarded. There's also some oddball things, like Stephen Brust's official Firefly novel which was finished but never published, so he released it to the Internet as de facto fanfiction, despite him being a professionally-publshed novelist (I hear the book is okay, but not outstanding).

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A single read of "my immortal", by the unforgettable Tara G, and you will have to forgive fan fiction as a genre, and understand how it should be approached.

A dramatic reading:

That being said... GRRM has requested that we don't do it, for his stuff. So we shouldn't, for his stuff.

It's just simple courtesy.

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I'm quite fond of fanfic. That is, it is mostly terrible as literature, but the point of reading - and even more, writing it - is not to create something that can be enjoyed and consumed exactly the same way as an original text. Rather, i've come around to the point of view that it's a way of engaging with a given work, analyzing it, complaining about it, arguing about it, deconstructing it, etc. Even when it's not done in a conscious way (like "Methods of Rationality",) it's still people basically describing how they feel about something and how they're reading it, and even if what you get is a pornographic Mary Sue/Draco fic set in outer space, well, that's what the book made someone think of. (and to take this example, for an adolescent girl that's probably a safe and comfortable way to explore sexuality, and that strikes me as an entirely legitimate "use" for a YA book.) That's their relationship to the text, and that's their way of expressing it and liking that text. I respect authors not wanting to see that stuff, but for the most part I don't think there's anything heinous about it. To the contrary.

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I have a soft spot for legolas by laura. There is some material that is truly So Bad It's Good.

I will always have a soft spot for The Eye of Argon, which if not strictly speaking fanfic, is a "tribute" to Conan the Barbarian.

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I remember reading and enjoying Nora Jemison's DBZ fanfic back when I was in high school. I liked those stories more than her later published work, although it's probably just that my tastes have changed.

But I personally think that fanfic is a fine place to start as a writer. You can take some characters and situations you already like and play around. Nonetheless, I understand the criticism that fanfic is sort of like training wheels. You don't have to invent characters or settings or anything, because that is already done. Making interesting characters and settings is obviously a huge part of good writing. It is sort of like making a cake from a box instead of from scratch: it's usually not as good, but it's a helluva lot easier, and in its own way can be satisfying. But if you want to make a really great cake, you probably should start from scratch.

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