I'm not even sure he'd drink a coolata, given a) the amount of corn syrup and chemicals in the mix and b) the insanely stupid name. This is a guy who probably shops at organic markets in spite of the cost just because modern food tastes nothing like what he was raised on, even allowing for poverty, and I just can't see him thinking much of whatever horror Dunkin' Donuts is perpetrating this week.
Now I need to read an AU in which Harry, Ron, Draco, et al are office drones a la "The Office". Snape can be the VP of Sales who pops in every other week to yell at everyone. Hermione is the extremely anal-retentive office manager who hates. it. when. people. don't. replace. the. paper. in. the. printer. Dumbledore can be the eccentric CEO. Harry and Draco have epic prank wars, naturally. Lavender = Office Slut. Poor Neville just keeps his head down and his sales numbers up, but never gets promoted.
I have nothing against baristas and don't consider it 'lowering' etc, coz that's classist, (and to be honest I couldn't get through my day without baristas) BUT, so saying, I don't recognise those characters. That's a general comment on most AU fics, though. Alternative situations and alternative personalities, they are not the characters I recognise.
Unless they're mermen or some shit. I'm okay with that. Steve Rogers, the merman barrista.
I have nothing but respect for baristas, although you are right that my statement may have been unconsciously classist and I apologize for that. But what I'm saying is, these are larger-than-life characters. Why do you want to strip away everything that makes them extraordinary and put them in what you must admit is a low-end service sector job? Anyone who thinks being a barista is exciting has never spent seven hours a day slinging mochaccinos.
Basically, I don't understand the reasoning behind putting superpowered characters into non-superpowered AUs.
I'm not offended - I'm not a barrista, though. I got called 'ablist' the other day for laughing at an ehrmehgerd meme, sheesh, over sensitive much? ERMEHGERHRD ERHBLERST!)
But yeah, I can't really get them in stories that make them too AU.
Mind you, I read a Steve Rogers one where he didn't have his powers - never had the serum, he was still weedy, but he was a part of the Avengers, and leading them, and it was totally 'that's how it would go!' so that's how an AU can be successful. Slinging coffee all day, not so much.
Me, I just wanna know who's the "arguably the 20th century's true literary genius" you're referring to. I'm just a literary luddite, me. I like stories with likeable characters, plot, and resolution, ignorant peasant that I am, so I know not, by inference, of whom you speak.
Not a hell of a lot of people have, and boy oh boy is there a reason for that. I suggest you have a go at his short story collection Dubliners, which is by far his most accessible work. Particularly the final story in the book, "The Dead", which is an utter jewel. There's a Creative Commons licensed version on line here: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/j/joyce/james/j8d/
As for his other works... well, people can and have dedicated their entire lives to interpreting -- you can even call it decrypting -- any single one of his novels, so I'm not even going to start in talking about it here.
That's why I was so gobsmacked by this fic writer. It's like comparing yourself to Jackson Pollock because you're an amateur artist who dripped some paint on a dropcloth.
I like them because I like AUs that take the characters out of their normal milieus and put them into one that I could walk into--say...what it would be like to see them in my local Starbucks (or independent coffeeshop, if one prefers not to support The Man. *g*)
I actually enjoy the characters when whatever makes them special is stripped away--I'm a huge fan of well-written non-magical AUs in HP for example--and we get to see them as just people like us. As a writer, for me at least, it's interesting to work with those character dynamics.
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Thanks.
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Unless they're mermen or some shit. I'm okay with that. Steve Rogers, the merman barrista.
You know what infests fandom? WIPS. Fuck wips.
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Basically, I don't understand the reasoning behind putting superpowered characters into non-superpowered AUs.
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But yeah, I can't really get them in stories that make them too AU.
Mind you, I read a Steve Rogers one where he didn't have his powers - never had the serum, he was still weedy, but he was a part of the Avengers, and leading them, and it was totally 'that's how it would go!' so that's how an AU can be successful. Slinging coffee all day, not so much.
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http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/j/joyce/james/j8d/
As for his other works... well, people can and have dedicated their entire lives to interpreting -- you can even call it decrypting -- any single one of his novels, so I'm not even going to start in talking about it here.
That's why I was so gobsmacked by this fic writer. It's like comparing yourself to Jackson Pollock because you're an amateur artist who dripped some paint on a dropcloth.
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So perhaps you can answer the question: why coffeeshop AUs? What is the appeal?
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I like them because I like AUs that take the characters out of their normal milieus and put them into one that I could walk into--say...what it would be like to see them in my local Starbucks (or independent coffeeshop, if one prefers not to support The Man. *g*)
I actually enjoy the characters when whatever makes them special is stripped away--I'm a huge fan of well-written non-magical AUs in HP for example--and we get to see them as just people like us. As a writer, for me at least, it's interesting to work with those character dynamics.
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