estella_c said, But the corruption of our beloved characters into seductive exhibitionists struck me as darn funny. I have no writer's guilt, nor do I think of Mulder and Scully as real people, important as they may loom in our shared imagination.
to which wendelah1 said, Maybe this is a writer's disease? I know I am not alone in this madness.
and i think this is precisely why i felt like i was straining when i read this fic. because as a reader i completely agree with estella, but as a writer thhat's not how i feel. as a fan and a person i feel that the single most important thing about fandom is that nothing is automatically undervalued, or judged based on a prejudice, or heaven forbid disallowed.
but as a writer i have a strong (-"drive" is too soft a word so i'm going to go with-) obsession to write the characters as they are, or as near to it as i possibly can. since conversing with tree i have come to think of this as "presumptive consent"; that one is not doing anything to the characters that would be abrasive or degrading to them (though please don't quote her on that, because my interpretation of the term "presumptive consent" is my own).
usually, when reading fic, i am capable of seperating my writer's mind from my reader's mind, which is why i can adore stories like Iolokus, even though they alter the characters profoundly. but Jess has "plunked herself spang in the middle of it. No passive-aggressive MarySue, she appears under her real name and reveals her own story ambitions and secret fantasies." this makes it impossible to seperate writer's mind and reader's mind, because the fic is actively engaging both.
other fics like Our Scullys by Punk Maneuverability have a kind of reverence about them, whereas Untitled Random Casefile is, truly, irreverent. and while i firmly believe that there is nothing whatsoever wrong with this kind of irreverence - that it can actually be extremely constructive and important in the maintenance of a healthy fandom - as a writer i want to cringe away from this fic, because it is unnerving. like watching someone cut open a pair of bodies that look like Mulder and Scully, smiling, saying, "it's okay, look, i made these ones - it's not them."
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winterfish
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Date: 2009-12-19 04:04 am (UTC)to which
and i think this is precisely why i felt like i was straining when i read this fic. because as a reader i completely agree with estella, but as a writer thhat's not how i feel. as a fan and a person i feel that the single most important thing about fandom is that nothing is automatically undervalued, or judged based on a prejudice, or heaven forbid disallowed.
but as a writer i have a strong (-"drive" is too soft a word so i'm going to go with-) obsession to write the characters as they are, or as near to it as i possibly can. since conversing with
usually, when reading fic, i am capable of seperating my writer's mind from my reader's mind, which is why i can adore stories like Iolokus, even though they alter the characters profoundly. but Jess has "plunked herself spang in the middle of it. No passive-aggressive MarySue, she appears under her real name and reveals her own story ambitions and secret fantasies." this makes it impossible to seperate writer's mind and reader's mind, because the fic is actively engaging both.
other fics like Our Scullys by Punk Maneuverability have a kind of reverence about them, whereas Untitled Random Casefile is, truly, irreverent. and while i firmly believe that there is nothing whatsoever wrong with this kind of irreverence - that it can actually be extremely constructive and important in the maintenance of a healthy fandom - as a writer i want to cringe away from this fic, because it is unnerving. like watching someone cut open a pair of bodies that look like Mulder and Scully, smiling, saying, "it's okay, look, i made these ones - it's not them."