~~ pain. angst. woe. fictional, of course.

It's funny that how I forget myself, sometimes, trying to be all reasonable and "hey, I can take it". When Maya wrote that post about needing brightness in stories, needing some sort of hope, some sort of redemption, just because that's what stories are -for-, they're such potent catalysts for change, and it's almost unbearable to think of this ever-expanding fictional universe, which, unlike the "real" one will never change unless the author says so....

I wasn't sure I myself thought I needed stories to be prickled with light in that way, to inspire me, to basically function as escapism. I don't always want escapism-- I can be mesmerized by the beautiful ways one can bear the most unbearable pain, I can appreciate darkness, something like heavy drapes drawn against the world. It's an aesthetic.

The interesting thing is, that Maya wrote two of the fanfics that I'd consider most hopeless and nearly unbearable in this fandom. `Your Every Wish' and `Dark Side of Light', of course. Both of them completely drained me in their complete dessication of any sort of hope for relief. I suppose the thing that redeemed them for me was the aching presence of strong emotion, of love, of need, of passion, even though it was all misdirected and unrequited and doomed and too little too late. Even so, both of these stories were -taut- with the possibility of light, always denied. It was much more powerful because it had an awareness of what it was missing, not just implied but somehow present.

There were the threads there of how the hopeless tangle wound itself-- it didn't just come into being fully-formed before the beginning of the story. It wound itself up -within- the story, and I think I find that essential as well. If I read a fic with such a dearth of hope in it, I think I want to see it bleed. Not incidentally, but as a major part of the driving force behind the story. I want to see the emotional arc, even if it ends in despair.

Which is why I think fics which start in utter despair and end in utter despair just completely don't work for me. I wait and wait (if I keep reading) for the shift to occur, for that essential (for me) narrative change, where it doesn't matter what, but something's not the same anymore. Pain that is constant and at a high pitch throughout a story wears me out without giving me anything in return. It casts me down without illuminating me, without telling me -why- and allowing my emotions some sort of outlet, a release.

( At this point I just go off on a bunch of tangents based off of the example of Amanuensis' latest fic. In which I'm not anti-darkfic, btw. Really. No. )