reader: omg I’m so curious what happens next chapter!!
writer: me too haha!!
The thing about reading fanfic (and original slash fic) is that you get used to that particular writing/reading culture after a while. You get used to the frank discussions of sexuality and kink, the close attention to diversity and social justice issues in the text, the unrestrained creativity when it comes to plot. The most amazing, creative, engaging stories I’ve ever read have almost all been fanfiction, and I think part of that is because there’s no limitations placed on the authors. They’re writing purely out of joy and love for the world and its characters, with no concerns about selling the finished product. The only limit is their imagination.
Next to that, most mainstream fiction starts tasting like Wonder Bread, you know?
“WRITE IT BADLY. Write it badly, write it badly, write it badly, write it badly. Stop what you’re doing, open a Word document, put a pencil on some paper, just get the idea out of your head. Let it be good later. Write it down now. Otherwise it will die in there.”
— Brandon Sanderson on overcoming writer’s block to create a first draft as a professional author (via almost-always-eventually-right)
The real writer experience is standing in the shower and coming up with the most authentic dialogue with perfect phrasing and raw emotion in your head, then stepping out and drying your hair, putting on some clean pajamas and opening a word document to write down all your perfect ideas only to realize everything has evaporated.
I FEEL CALLED OUT
Never lose a perfect shower line again.*
*Remember to erase promptly if you share a bathroom with anyone.
I’ve used these to outline term papers. nothing like a bath to get your brain to finally kick into gear and figure out your damn thesis
There are a lot of fic questions that float around online, but rarely do they ever ask specific questions about the fics themselves. Ask any writer one or more of these ten questions to learn more about the fic and show support.
1. Of the fics you’ve written, which is your favorite and why?
2. Which scene was your favorite to write in [title of fic]?
3. Which part of [title] was hardest to write?
4. If you could change anything in [title], what would it be?
5. Did you make an outline for [title]? Did you stick to it?
6. Which scenes did you cut, and which were added in [title]?
7. Who was your favorite character to write in [title]?
8. Which came first, the title or the fic?
9. Which idea came to you first in [title]?
10. What are some facts readers may not know about [title]?
But I’m not an ancient either. A lot of fandom debates, I’ve noticed, are made a lot more complete and a lot less polarized with the addition of actual context–but from what I’ve seen, unless we’ve lived through said context, most of us just don’t know it exists. For example, I came into fandom shortly after LJ stopped being a big hub, so I never knew about the strikethroughs and boldthroughs until very, very recently. Knowing about them paints things like ao3 in a whole new light. History is important.
First of all, I’ve done some searching in the hopes of finding a relatively centralized thing with an overview of general fandom history. The closest I could find was a couple fanlore pages on the history of specific fandoms. If somebody *does* have a centralized something, that would be wonderful and it would also be super cool if it could be copied somewhere visible for newer fans, in the interest of spreading our history and culture. I would be happy to help edit it if you want?
If not, I would be glad to help compile something, but again: I don’t have the full story.
If anybody would be willing to help me with this project, whether by talking about the old days or pointing me to existing resources, or volunteering to help write stuff up, please, *please* message me
I understand that research like this can be a lot of work, but your contribution doesn’t have to be much. I can find literally nothing, for the most part, beyond the basic Sherlock, Star Trek, and Tolkien founders of fandom story, and certainly nothing about modern fandom as a whole. Even a brief sentence telling me what events specifically to google would help.
History is important.
I want to learn about our history, and I want to enable other people to do so too.
And because that was fucktastically long, I saved the Fanlore suggestions for this post:
History of Scanlation (mostly cribbed from Inside Scanlation, an example of an excellent history site with nothing to do with Fanlore, AO3, Tumblr, etc.)
If you want to document K/S–>AO3, there’s kind of a Canon of what that history looks like. It has been codified by academics and OTW, among others. Henry Jenkins et al. would be the place to look for that, and the same things are well documented on Fanlore.
This history comes up often on Tumblr because it’s the way people refute antis’ claims about what we should change on AO3. It’s my fandom history (well, aside from all my time in anime fandom). It’s a fandom history. It’s not the whole of fandom history, however.
If you want to do all of fandom history ever, you need a format like a wiki.
If you want to look at major historical trajectories that get left out of the K/S–>AO3, I would look at anime first of all. Second, I would look at fandoms that had very little m/m and big m/f or f/f juggernaut pairings. (The history of gen fic and the history of slash fic are closely entwined because both tend to be from mainstream media with lots of men bonding.) Third, I would look at what was going on on FFN after the LJ crowd jumped ship, what was going on on Quizilla, what is currently going on on Wattpad, etc.
I’d suggest Francesca Coppa’s “A Brief History of Fandom” (2006), which I can view in its entirety on Googlebooks (https://books.google.com/books?id=UgZsi_DOKoQC). If you can’t see it, send me an ask and I’m happy to send the PDF. It tells *a* history and it ends in the middle of LJ, but it’s brief and concise and mirrors (and has helped generate) much of the academics/OTW version of our history.
She also offers a great background to the creation of the OTW/AO3 in her “An Archive of Our Own! Fanfiction Writers Unite” (2013). I can’t get it upon Googlebooks (https://books.google.com/books?id=GBwVAgAAQBAJ), but again, happy to send the PDF if anyone wants it.
I thought along with Fanfic Rec Day it’d be a good idea to start up an ask meme for writers so they can gush about writing and words and everyone can have a platform to ask writers some burning questions about their work.
Be proud and spread word about your hard work all around, writers! Today’s a day for all of us to appreciate you and your efforts : )
What is your favorite fic you have under your belt?
What is your favorite snippet of dialogue?
What inspired [insert fic]?
Do you prefer writing long or short fics?
What’s your favorite headcanon you use in fics?
What’s the detail you wait on bated breath for readers to notice?
How much do you like symbolism in your fics?
How often do people catch onto your little details?
What’s the fic you like the least?
What would you change if you had it all to do again?
What’s a fanfic idea you haven’t done yet?
What’s the hardest thing to write for you?
Do you have a favorite character to write for?
What’s your favorite shipping fic you’ve written? Favorite gen fic?
Most of the writer ask posts I come across are only like ten or so questions long so I thought I’d try to make a longer one because we like talking about our writing! Feel free to reblog!
1) How old were you when you first starting writing fanfiction?
2) What fandoms do you write for and do you have a particular favourite if you write for more than one?
3) Do you prefer writing OC’s or reader inserts? Explain your answer.
4) What is your favourite genre to write for?
5) If you had to choose a favourite out of all of your multi chaptered stories, which would it be and why?
6) If you had to delete one of your stories and never speak of it again, which would it be and why?
7) When is your preferred time to write?
8) Where do you take your inspiration from?
9) In your xxx fic, what’s your favourite scene that you wrote?
10) In your xxx fic, why did you decide to end it like that? Did you have an alternative ending in mind?
11) Have you ever amended a story due to criticisms you’ve received after posting it?
12) Who is your favourite character to write for? Why?
13) Who is your least favourite character to write for? Why?
14) How did you come up with the title for the xxx? – You can ask about multiple stories.
15) If you write OC’s, how do you decide on their names?
16) How did you come up with the idea for xxx?
17) Post a line from a WIP that you’re working on.
18) Do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them?
19) Are there any stories that you’ve written that you’d really love to do a sequel to?
20) Are there any stories that you wished you’d ended differently?
21) Tell me about another writer(s) who you admire? What is it about them that you admire?
22) Do you have a story that you look back on and cringe when you reread it?
23) Do you prefer listening to music when you’re writing or do you need silence?
24) How do you feel about writing smutty scenes?
25) Have you ever cried whilst writing a story?
26) Which part of your xxx fic was the hardest to write?
27) Do you make a general outline for your stories or do you just go with the flow?
28) What is something you wished you’d known before you started posting fanfiction?
29) Do you have a story that you feel doesn’t get as much love as you’d like?
30) In contrast to 29 is there a story which gets lots of love which you kinda eye roll at?
31) Send me a fic recommendation and I’ll post it for my followers to see! (The asker is to send the rec not the answerer)
32) Are any of your characters based on real people?
33) What’s the biggest compliment you’ve gotten?
34) What’s the harshest criticism you’ve gotten?
35) Do you share your story ideas with anyone else or do you keep them close to your chest?
36) Can you give us a spoiler for one of your WIP’s?
37) What’s the funniest story you’ve written?
38) If you could collab with any other writer on here, who would it be? (Perhaps this question will inspire some collabs!) If you’re shy, don’t tag the blog, just name it.
39) Do you prefer first, second or third person?
40) Do people know you write fanfiction?
41) What’s you favourite minor character you’ve written?
42) Song fic – What made you decide to use the song xxx for xxx.
43) Has anyone ever guessed the plot twist of one of your fics before you posted it?
44) What is the last line you wrote?
45) What spurs you on during the writing process?
46) I really loved your xxx fic. If you were ever to do a sequel, what do you think might happen in it?
47) Here’s a fic title – insert a made up title. What would this story be about?
48) What’s your favourite trope to write?
49) Can you remember the first fic you read? What was it about?
50) If you could write only angst, fluff or smut for the rest of your writing life, which would it be and why?
hannahbelleeeebackup 