Wednesday, February 13, 2019
Fanfiction: The Tumblr Side of Publishing
To what extent does fanfiction influence the literary field? Like, I'm interested to see if authors bothered to read fanfiction from their novels and had inspiration or regrets on what they wrote. And how much of fanfiction is recognized in the publishing field? I think there was a literary magazine that did "publish" fanfiction. After all, the term "Mary Sue" did originate from fanfiction of Star Trek. Given the face value of a fanfiction is... well, a fanfiction, I'm interested to see what an author or publishing company would consider a work written by a fan
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Wasn't 50 Shades of Grey originally a Twilight fanfiction? Or was that just a rumor?
ReplyDeleteIt did indeed start as fanfiction. If anyone's heard of Cassandra Clare - she writes YA stuff, though I've never read it - she also started in fanfiction (though didn't just directly turn it into "original" fiction like 50 Shades, as far as I know). If you can get a big enough following with fanfiction, it seems like you can go and jump the gap to original writing without too much trouble.
DeleteI don't think authors read fanfiction of their novels, at least not if the series is still ongoing. There are potential legal issues there, if the author publishes a new novel that seems too similar to a fanfiction that they're known to have read, then the fan could get them tied up in litigation over it. There was a case where that actually happened, once, but I don't remember what it was called.
ReplyDelete(Does the fact that I've commented on this twice show that I've got a little bit of my foot in that sphere...?)
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ReplyDeleteI am definitely curious if authors read fanfiction about their work. I remember reading or maybe watching an interview with J.K. Rowling (that I of course can't find now) and she was asked about it: I don't think she commented on whether or not she'd actually read any fanfiction but Rowling is definitely aware of it and has consented to fanfiction being made as long as it is not sold for profit and she has stated she prefers it not be pornographic or something like that. I guess she's lucky that the author of 50 shades - EL James - was a fan of Twilight rather than Harry Potter. Side note on that actually, the author of Twilight, Stephanie Meyer is Mormon and has commented that she has not read 50 shades (which is 100% confirmed fanfiction of Twilight) on account of it being "too smutty" and not innocent enough - article if anyone is interested:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/twilight/9921818/Stephenie-Meyer-I-havent-read-Fifty-Shades-of-Grey.html
Personally, if I had written something that got popular enough to be made into fanfiction I'd be flattered but I do not think I would want to read it. I don't know how else to phrase it but I think it would just be very weird to read about characters you have envisioned one way being represented or interpreted drastically different, especially if they are characters you have created.
Admittedly I have not sought out much fan-fiction online for this reason but I have read published fanfiction as works that are within the public domain can be adapted and published as their own works. For example (I would not recommend it) but I have read what is basically fanfiction of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice: Pride, Prejudice and Zombies - I regret reading this for quite a few reasons but it basically just takes the original text and makes it ridiculous by adding zombies. There are many other spin offs just of Pride and Prejudice and of plenty of other works within the public domain although before this year it had been 21 years since a mass expiration of copyright in the US so there was a bit of a hold on works entering the public domain, once they are in the public domain or are released on creative commons anyone can build on these works including publication. I could go on and on about this as public domain is something I have strong opinions on but this comment is already long enough without a rant! So here's an article if anyone is interested:
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/first-time-20-years-copyrighted-works-enter-public-domain-180971016/
Anyway, I am interested to see where copyright laws regarding literature end up as lately this is an evolving debate in the music industry- at the moment if one artist samples another's work they credit the original artist but if one artist is just inspired by another's work, it's up for debate how similar the new work has to be to the old in order for the original artist to get credit. There's a great documentary on this called "RIP: A remix manifesto" that makes a point that we are always building on the past and so we should allow everyone the freedom to "remix" culture- this argument is centered around music but in theory the same could be applied to film or literature.
Sorry if my comment was posted twice, I really need to start editing these before posting but I generally don't so then I read it back get annoyed with my mistakes and fix them by re-posting/deleting the original but not sure that worked!
ReplyDelete