How Shave Off Those Serial Numbers: De-fanficcing Fanfic

[icarus]

Okay, discouraged and frustrated at the moment.

The process of "de-fanficcing" a story, i.e., sawing off the serial numbers and turning fanfiction into original fiction, is much more than simply changing names and developing some backstory.

1 - Character development in fanfic is based upon prior material. It's a little like starting in the middle of a book. Alas, you need to reinvent your characters, including their histories together: why do characters X and Y interact the way they do. The first story I de-fanficc'd, the character interaction did not make sense without the canon background.

2 - Fanfic plots can be borrowed for original fiction without too much difficuty; however, if you have relied heavily on allusion to canon (next point) you might have to slow the pace, expand the length, or focus on just part of the plot. You have some 'splaining to do, Lucy.

3 - Allusion to canon in fanfic becomes the major stumbling block in "de-fanficcing," depending on the sort of fanfiction you've written. There are three (general) types of fanfic in terms of difficulty in translating them.

a) The first is the fanfic author who sticks a Mary Sue into Hogwarts or Atlantis or wherever. This is easy to translate because all you need to do is stick the Mary Sue someplace else (my, some of you have some creative suggestions as to where). I no longer have my Mary Sue Andre Norton rip-off I wrote in 1977, unfortunately, so you guys may breathe a sign of relief. :)

b) The next type takes a dangling thread in canon, say, "why did Snape join the Death Eaters?" and writes that story. It slots neatly to fill a hole in canon. To de-fanfic it is a little tricky, but mostly you just need to tidy up the beginning and end, and make sure it can stand on its own. Check that it doesn't reference events and characters outside its boundaries. I may have one of these, I'm not sure.

c) The final type is brutally hard to de-fanfic. Unfortunately, most of my fanfics (and I'm gonna guess almost everyone's fanfics) fall in this category. Here the author has capitalized on the strength of fanfiction: their audience. The writer can layer in allusions to canon and create a densely packed story.

What do I mean?

Let's take an example. Snape. The loyalties of Snape are an open question in the Harry Potter world. It's hanging out there in the ethers. Instead of directly explaining why he joined the Death Eaters, the fanfic writer can write a story of Snape peacefully brewing potions.

The story can jump back in time to show Snape learning to brew potions as a child. In the process the writer shows us how Snape wanted to fit in with the "cool kid" pure-bloods.

Ping! The educated Harry Potter fans get the allusion, the subtle reference to Snape's motives. Could this be why he joined the Death Eaters?

A later part can show Snape the adult interacting with one of these same "cool kids" now. Perhaps he's creating that potion for Lucius Malfoy. The writer then shows Snape being treated like an outsider still, a lesser being.

Ping! The Harry Potter fans see that even joining the Death Eaters made no difference. Maybe that's why he left, disillusioned. Ping! They also know that Snape isn't a popular teacher, so leaving the Death Eaters made no difference either.

Finally, the writer can show Snape angry at Lucius for treating him like a house-elf. The author can make it clear he still wants desperately to be on the "inside." But then, the story closes on his sense of satisfaction in his potionswork.

He's miserable because of what he think he needs, due to envy, totally unaware that he's happier alone, brewing potions. Ping! The reader recognizes what he's done with his life, all those bad decisions based on trying to join the "upper eschelon."

You have a thoughtful piece on human nature and the inability of a bitter man to see what's best for himself.

In fanfiction this can be a short story. You can afford to be subtle. But to unpack all those canon allusions and turn it into original fiction, you'd have to write a novel. Yet this theme is too delicate for a heavy novel-length story.

The fanfiction writer's greatest asset is their reader. Like with any highly specialized educated audience, the writer can reference a shorthand of shared ideas.

Even though fanfiction uses the same writing techniques as original fiction, within the restrictions of canon, the fanfic writer has this extra tool. It's a slightly different technique. Which doesn't tell us whether the writer can or cannot write original fiction. It just means you'll have to write differently.

As for "de-fanficcing": If you have an AU, with plenty of original characters (or at least a unique backstory for those characters), and aren't closely tied to canon, then maybe it's worth the effort.

The last question is: how attached are you to that fanfic? *Icarus starts the chainsaw.* Be ready to take it apart.

Comments

[wikdsushi.livejournal.com]

Heheheh. Now you know why the Hellogy isn't the Book.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

They seem like such simple ideas, don't they? To start? Of course, even with allusion to canon you wrote Civil War, so.... *waggles eyebrows*

Seriously though, it works different muscle groups, writing-wise.

Icarus

[enname.livejournal.com]

'.. and one, two, three streeeeeeeetttttccchh those authorial arms. Now the correct place to make an incision along the tendon so as to dissect neatly is...'

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

*chuckles* True, very true. I hadn't thought of it that way.

Icarus

[webbapettigrew.livejournal.com]

I hear you totally!

When I decided to turn my fanfic into an original series, I had to rework much more stuff than I thought I'd have to. Each character's mindsets were totally wrong, now, and I had to come up with backstories I hadn't even contemplated before, because as other people's characters, your readers knew what their backgrounds were and why their characteristics made them uniquely them.

And don't get me started on the canon stuff. I've had to jump hoops and turn myself inside out removing certain aspects from my stories from the HP-verse. What I ended up getting is a series with some magic, good wizards and bad, but set on a completely different level emotionally than the HP series.

I'm looking forward to finishing this series and beginning another one that's completely my own, though.

[malnpudl.livejournal.com]

It's a bitch, isn't it? As fanfic writers we don't have to create characters; our challenge is to write something that's true to canon characterization -- while still doing something interesting.

I've never tried quite what you're doing, but I did take a couple of my erotic fantasy stories featuring real people that I'd written for the Share Your Fantasies events and reworked them as original erotica for a porn-for-pay venture.

Originally I'd just used first names (or in one case no names at all, just a prefacing quote that identified the male character to those familiar with him), so I didn't need to tell the audience anything more about these guys. The people reading already knew them, what they looked and sounded like, and had a good idea of their personalities (or at least their public personae).

When I rewrote, I had to build those characters from the ground up. One story grew by about 750 words (for a total of about 2000) and the other more than doubled in length.

Really brought home what you're saying.

[zooey-glass04.livejournal.com]

Point 3c touches on the aspect that I love about fanfic. It allows writers to write the kind of story which is very difficult to produce in the modern world, where the available canon is so large. I imagine that in earlier eras, the use of subtle allusion which you referred to was used to refer to elements from the cultural canon. For example, at one point it was possible to assume that any educated reader would have a very close familiarity with the Bible, so subtle allusions could be worked in in the knowledge that most people would get them. Now that cultural references are much more diverse, it's difficult to do something like that. Writing fanfic gives you a knowledge about certain shared references, which allows you to write in this particular style. I find it very pleasing, since as you observe, it would be impossible to write the same story as an original piece of fiction, since building up all that back story would eliminate the subtlety of what you have achieved.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

For example, at one point it was possible to assume that any educated reader would have a very close familiarity with the Bible, so subtle allusions could be worked in in the knowledge that most people would get them. Now that cultural references are much more diverse, it's difficult to do something like that.

I agree with you 100%. That's what most people underestimate about fanfiction.

Icarus

[mgsmurf.livejournal.com]

I know when I find something in a fandom world I fall in love with, I find out what it is I love and then rebuild the rest myself from there, versus taking a fanfic story I wrote and re-working/de-fanficing it.

Writer Holly Lisle has a wonderful "How to" on this here (http://www.hollylisle.com/fm/Articles/wc3-3.html).

I've used this idea recently to write two orig fic stories (to later revise and market) based on things and characters I like from Firefly. One was a Mal/River story, though both characters are unique enough and the old man/young girl mentor pairing is common enough that I doubt many could tell. The other had a main character woman solider much like Zoe, though again the character and more importantly her fate and plot of the story are unique enough that the reference may only be minorly seen.

Having read many orig fic in critique groups, it's hard to hide that reference to source material that crept into fanfic. The third type of fanfic with a subtle hand and work could be de-fanficed, but it would take some work, especially if it came from a popular fandom like Star Trek, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, etc.

[valarltd.livejournal.com]

here from metafandom

I have several original pieces that started as cracked-out crossover fic, and turned original. I find those are easier to change than stuff set in canon universes.

I can't see how I could make any Brimstone fiction anything but fanfic. Almost all the fic hinges on the show's premise, that Ezekiel Stone has to track down 113 damned souls and send them to Hell.

On the other hand, crossovers by their nature lend to it. I mean, "For Love of Etarin" may have started as Star Wars/Persian Boy slash fic, but as Han Solo became pilot Ruvane Delkroy, and Bagoas turned into dancer Etarin, only certain superficial things stayed the same. The original characters took over and found their own rhythm, which is rather different from the established Han/Bagoas one from fandom_high.

[lordsmerf.livejournal.com]

Also here via metafandom.

I don't have much to say other than: yes! One of the most powerful tools that fan-fiction can utilize is shared context. Fan-fiction stories can be much more tightly focused simply because you don't have to provide all the context for the story to make sense: the reader will provide a lot of that context based upon interpretation of the canon. That's awesome.

Thomas

[theemdash]

Have you finished defanficifying? I'd be happy to take a read and offer advice. I'm sure I can be objective enough to help you fill in the gaps.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm rather discouraged with it and not sure that I'm married enough to the de-fanficced characters to want to put in the trouble. And also, quite discouraged.

Icarus

[theemdash]

I understand. De-fanficcing is tramuatizing. There's so much shorthand involved in fanfic and when you have to go in and build new backstories, or explain stuff that fanfic takes for granted, it's just exhausting.

My first fanfics after coming back from my degree were very explicit and then I realized that I could be lazy.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

That was the point -- I wanted to just give this guy something that came easily to hand. I thought, how hard could it be? I have 160 stories, I should be able to just saw off the serial numbers.

But I don't think it's laziness. Some of it is, in terms of description. However, in fanfiction we can layer in more. More meaning. More references. More subtlety. It's like someone said above. There was a time when you could count on everyone having read the Bible, so your biblical references would be caught and understood, adding a depth of shimmering meaning.

We do that with canon. We're not just short-cutting. We know when we have Daniel almost die (again) the level of irony we're building into the story.

Icarus