Comments on: What is Fanfic and is It Really “Writing”?

By: Elijah Lewis

Elijah Lewis — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 06:30:24 +0000

Joss Whedon is a great director, most of the science fiction series that i love are created by him.,”.

By: Wolfie

Wolfie — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 21:09:24 +0000

Thank you! I’m SO going to force my friends to read this, it explained so f**ng well what I’ve been trying to tell them for ages! As I am very much a fanfic-lover (or fanfic-addict), I really enjoyed reading this! It’s hard enough being a writer, but writing fanfiction is… well damn, I can’t even count the number of times I’ve been accused of having “no life” and the likes… :3 Not that I care, of course, but it’s still frustrating, you know? Oh well, I’m getting of topic :P It’s just that this really triggered my entusiasm as a fanfiction-writer ^^

A world without fanfiction would be… shitty, to say the least! ^^

By: Emily Smith

Emily Smith — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 21:39:41 +0000

I am humbled and honored. I hope I did the genre justice. *bowing* Thank you for your kind words.

(And you did fine with English!) :)

By: Emily Smith

Emily Smith — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 21:38:58 +0000

I have confirmation from ah…a pretty…um..reliable source that one can make money writing fic. ;-)

Staff writer on a TV show…that’s absolutely genius! I wish I’d asked you for an analogy when I was writing this! LOL

By: Emily Smith

Emily Smith — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 21:35:23 +0000

Brilliant? You’re just being kind….and it’s working! ;-)

Nothing worse than reading Buffy!fic where Buffy is more Hannah Montana than Buffy! ;-)

By: Emily Smith

Emily Smith — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 21:33:25 +0000

Novelists do, indeed, consider fanfic the red-headed stepchild of “real writing”. But I challenge any of them to write Harry Potter slash! ;-)

By: Emily Smith

Emily Smith — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 21:32:22 +0000

Thanks! Check your email! ;-)

By: Emily Smith

Emily Smith — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 21:32:07 +0000

Thank you for the comment! Psst…check your email! ;-)

By: Hannah

Hannah — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 14:32:27 +0000

Fanfic is the shit. That’s pretty much all I have to say.

Love to read/write/do a happy dance when an author updates – everything.

Fanfic has definitely helped me develop my writing skills and has advanced my vocabulary and because of that I’m kicking ass in my english class. It’s fabulous.

I found a talent from being obsessed with a TV show (AN AWESOME TV SHOW) to the point where I youtubed the crap out of it and wrote a comment about how two characters should hook up. It’s amazing what the internet can do for you.

I’m totally with Elise. I got her hooked and now we’re addicted.

Fanfiction is fabulous and because of the anonymity people are able to post without having the fear of someone they know judging them. Most of the people who review are writers themselves so they’re not going to sit there and textually berate you for something. They give you constructive criticism and definitely boost your confidence/self esteem.

High five for fanfiction. What would we do without you??

By: Elise

Elise — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 14:05:59 +0000

I have been addicted to fanfiction for about two or three years now, and i think that it is a great tool for improving ones writing when you don’t have your own characters and story lines yet. I see it as a step towards becoming a published writer one day, putting out stories which other people can read and give me feed back on. and it gives me a great sense of pride when people enjoy what i write!

And i most certainly agree that it is not at all easier than creating your own characters. I love trying to capture an already existing character and using little quirks and traits I know they have in my stories.

I very much enjoyed reading this article. it was quite interesting, raised some good points and was over all amusing, especially seeing as I was worried at first that it was going to be attempting to disprove fanfiction as a real form of writing.

By: MissM

MissM — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 11:03:04 +0000

Thanks for this!!! I’ve fallen into the trap of not considering fanfic real writing– not when I hang around novelists and people who write articles for a living. I’ve often found myself saying ‘I need to finish this so I can do some real writing.’

I do agree, so much, that fanfic is harder than original fiction in some ways. You’re limited to characterization established by someone else and though you can veer slightly in your interpretation, you can’t go too far or anyone who reads you will protest. You can’t have a beloved character turn evil, unless you do it very very well.

I imagine authors of original fiction have the same issue if they write a series– one of my favorite authors John Lescroart uses the same Chief of Police and Attorney in all of his books. If Dismas Hardy suddenly becomes an S.O.B. and decides Abe Glitsky ISN’T the same friend he’s been for the past 20 years, I’m totally not reading Lescroart anymore because he’s ruined previously established characters.

Anyway, thanks for this article, very well written on such a relevant topic.

By: Rob

Rob — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 22:49:19 +0000

Wonderful write-up indeed. It is nice to see someone taking up and talking about fanfic. It is definitely a niche that is driven passionately. And as you so brilliantly pointed out, it is so much harder to write someone else’s characters than your own. Having read some Buffy stories where the characters voice didn’t quite fit made the read difficult and at times undoable.

By: Angie Bowen

Angie Bowen — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 22:29:27 +0000

I think a lot of people don’t consider it “real” writing because you can’t make money on it. Unfortunately that’s how many people define “real” art. But I see writing fanfic the same as being a staff writer on a tv show. You’re writing characters that were created by someone else but it still takes a lot of talent to get those character’s voices right.

By: Isa

Isa — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:55:51 +0000

Hi!

(First of all, I want to apologize, because English is not my first language and maybe I don’t write ir well at all)

I really liked your post. I’m a fanfic writer about, well, two years maybe, and though I realised that fanfiction is another genre of writing, a little diferent from the others, I knew that if I had the conversation you said up there, I could’t explain why sometimes I prefer fanfics rather ‘original’ writing.

So, when in the future someone ask me about this, I’ll take them here. So maybe they will understand :)