And now for a break from continuing flood and/or paper progress coverage.

[icepixie]

Diana Gabaldon is Wrong On The Internet. I've skimmed a few of the comments; it looks like she's getting schooled pretty well by fandom.

I really liked this post from bookshop in response: I'm done explaining to people why fanfic is okay./List of derivative works.That post made me wonder about something. It seems that there are a lot of academics--

Comments

[amphetamine_47]

I suppose I understand Gabaldon's feelings, but a) she went about explaining it insultingly and b) no one is stealing.

I love fanfiction, and I'm proud to admit it. People have been doing this from the beginning of time, right? And for basically the reasons that you outlined above--we love it and want to explore it further than the author's taken us. No disrespect to the author, because without them we wouldn't have it to play with, but it's human nature to want MORE.

I'd be interested to know her feelings on things like Tracy Chevalier's "Girl With A Pearl Earring" which is basically published fan fiction based on a painting.

And also: stay dry and safe and YIKES :(

[icepixie]

Gabaldon seriously should've just said, "Fanfic of my stuff makes me uncomfortable. Please don't do it," and all would've been copacetic.

I'd be interested to know her feelings on things like Tracy Chevalier's "Girl With A Pearl Earring" which is basically published fan fiction based on a painting.

Given that she was cool wrote stories about Disney characters while employed by Disney and was cool with that, I think she'd be fine with it--after all, it was written for profit, and that seems to be the dividing line for her. Which I so don't agree with, ARGH.

And also: stay dry and safe and YIKES :(

Yikes indeed.

[pellmelody]

I think what Gabaldon forgets, or maybe doesn't realize, as I pointed out in another post regarding this kerfluffle, is that fan fiction has been around for centuries, both written and oral. When you get down to it, all fiction written using vampires is fan fiction, only with different names. Shakespeare himself wrote fan fiction, as someone pointed out to me, borrowing heavily from Greek plays and stories

[icepixie]

A healthier approach would have been for her to treat her audience with respect, not talk down to them like they are wayward children.

Yep.

[fallingtowers]

As much as I enjoy and admire bookshop's rebuttal, the general ease with which the term "fanfiction" is applied to everything from Homer to Joyce in fandom makes me slightly uncomfortable. Maybe it's the former nit-picking scholar in me, but I like my genre definitions precise (even though I know that an exact definition of a literary genre is as impossible as a precise peeriodization of a historical era). So, no, Sophocles wasn't writing "fanfic" of Greek myths in Oedious Rex, even though it wasn't "original" subject matter, either.

[icepixie]

I can see that angle. I'm sort of a genre-whore, and willing to assign works to anything they have the barest connection with; I guess it's the interdisciplinarian in me. But Joyce, etc., are definitely doing a different kind of "fannish" writing than most of us are, that's true.