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This is partly a follow-up to my MZB vs. Fanfiction post from last week, and partly a response to a much-linked post at http://bookshop.livejournal.com/1044495.html which answers author criticism of fanfiction by saying, “You’ve just summarily dismissed as criminal, immoral, and unimaginative each of the following Pulitzer Prize-winning works…” The post presents a list of works including the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds anthologies, the Tina Fey skits of Sarah Palin, Gaiman’s brilliant Holmes/Cthulhu story “A Study in Emerald,” and many more.
A recent (now deleted) post by a commercial fantasy author described works like Gregory Maguire’s Wicked, among others, as fanfiction. Though when I asked about my princess novels (fairy tale retellings), she stated that they were not fanfiction.
I’m officially confused. To me, this feels like a very broad definition. I’m not going to try to argue that my personal definition of fanfiction is the right one … but it’s difficult — almost pointless — to have a conversation when you can’t agree on what the words mean.
Do we define fanfiction from a legal/licensing standpoint? If so, anything published either with the legal permission of the copyright holder (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds) or based on public domain works (”A Study in Emerald”) would not be fanfiction.
Almost every fanfic author I’ve spoken to has explained that the culture of fanfiction strongly condemns commercialization of fanfic … if that’s so, then isn’t the bookshop LJ post violating that fundamental tenant by listing so many commercially published works?
For a much deeper legal analysis, see http://scrivenerserror.blogspot.com/2010/05/a528x.html
Or is fanfiction a matter of originality? If so, my understanding of the term becomes so fluid as to make it almost meaningless. What is a truly original work vs. one that takes inspiration from elsewhere? Are my Goblin Quest books fanfiction because they riff off of Dungeons and Dragons tropes? Is 90% of the fantasy genre nothing but Tolkien fanfiction?
I couldn’t find a fanfic definition on the Organization for Transformative Works site, but I did find this statement: “While some transformative works legitimately circulate in the for-profit marketplace — parodies such as The Wind Done Gone (the retelling of Gone with the Wind from the perspective of a slave), critical analyses that quote extensively from an original, ‘unauthorized guides,’ etc.—that really isn’t what fanfic writers and fan creators in general are doing, or looking to do.”
When I think of fanfiction, I think of two things:
- Fiction written using another author’s (usually copyrighted) characters and/or world
- Fiction which is may be shared, but never sold commercially (exceptions being quickly squashed by the fanfic community)
I also agree with scrivnerserror about excluding parody from fanfiction (the Tina Fey skits). I see them as two different kinds of storytelling. (Parody has its own legal definition as well.)
Like I said, I’m not saying my definition is the Right one, nor will I argue that it’s complete. (It wouldn’t include the Scalzi/Wheaton fanfic fundraiser, for example.) But it’s my starting point for understanding fanfiction.
What about you? Do you buy bookshop’s claim that all of these works are fanfiction, or does that stretch too far in an attempt to defend fanfic? Does commercialization really matter? What’s your definition?
Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.
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And every single one of them is right
As you see already, I think, anyone trying to put forward an exclusive definition is going to fail. Fanfiction as written by those of us who identify it as such is taking part in the same literary tradition as the authors on bookshop's list. I would hazard that is the same tradition that copyright law has, very clumsily, attempted to acknowledge with clauses about parody and transformation, and the limits on what can actually be copyrighted. So one way to describe it is as part of a much larger tradition.
On the other hand, as Kaigou has pointed out, that list misses a lot of what goes into creating fanfic (as self-identified), which involves fandom--as a community, as an ethos, as an economy. So another way to describe it is as a result of the community of fans, a hallmark of which is the gift economy.
One can describe fanfic as anything that deliberately uses and refers to another writer's world and characters. One can equally well describe it as anything that overwrites the original with a different (sometimes vastly different) version to suit the writer's own desires.
Anyone trying to come up with a total definition is instantly going to fail when someone pops up to say "but that doesn't cover /this/", which I suspect may be why OTW didn't try.
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Re: And every single one of them is right
Hm ... I can see where there's unlikely to be a single standardized, universal definition. On the other hand, I do think it would be helpful in some discussions to at least preface a conversation with a working definition. Otherwise, at least for me, too many of these debates just crumble into contradition.
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Re: And every single one of them is right
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Re: And every single one of them is right
I'm gonna go tell my author friends that we've solved the fanfiction argument :-)
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Fiction (and creative meta-fictional endeavours) which comes from and is shared within that community of practice.
However, when people object to 'fanfiction' they are usually objecting to a (perceived or real) practice of that community. (They may be objecting to a specific piece of fanfic, or to the actual existence of fanfiction on the internet, but these people are silly, and I ignore them.) In this case, it is usual to point out that the practice in question is not unique to, or condemned outside, the fanfiction producing community.
Therefore, when someone says "God, I hate fanfic, why can't these people do something creative!?" I think it is reasonable to point out that no one objects to the practice of speculative fiction transforming existing works when it is done by published authors of classic works, or in a hundred other cases.
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"Why can't these people do something creative/original" is picking on one aspect of fanfiction. (It's also silly, in my opinion, but that's another rant.) In that context, I think it's perfectly appropriate to point out that many, many other respected works weren't exactly original either. But making that point =/= all of these other works are fanfiction, either.
Does that make sense? I've been chatting about this a lot today, and the brain's starting to go a little fuzzy.
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But if the author wants to call it and treat it like fanfic, then who am I to tell them they can't call it that?
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