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reenkaThis may seem like a stupid question, but... why should anyone care about writing in-character fic?
I mean, it's a philosophical stance, almost, isn't it, and therefore debatable and of subjective importance? It's easy to get caught up in the innate superiority of 'canonical correctness', but it's not like anyone's going to win a prize. People say, 'but why write fanfic if you don't care about writing OOC', but what does it matter what someone's reason is? It's not like anyone's is infringing on anyone else's personal rights (except maybe the author's, depending on the author's feelings) by writing whatever kind of fanfic they want.
So leaving that alone... why should anyone care if they don't? And yet... it does annoy me to hear claims about characters I know that I find unbelievable (like... uh... Harry's always had a crush on Lucius, why not), I admit, because... I hate it when the world doesn't make any sense on a basic level. Like, a fic needs to make basic sense, and of course everyone's definition of 'basic common sense' differs, clearly.
I'm specifically talking about the idea that people should care though, not why anyone would want to in the first place. Obviously, there are plenty of reasons, like that writing fanfic is an exercise in using another author's world, and to write that successfully, you'd need to use as much of it as you can. So to complete the exercise, the idea is that one does certain things... it's a linear process. Add writing ability, attention to the events and behaviors in canon to an intriguing and believable plot-line and you've achieved a Pretty Good Fanfic, right.
My own reason is that it seems like OOC fanfic is that much more likely to suck, and evidences the writer's disregard for what passes for 'reality' in the fictional world they chose. This sense of carelessness can't help but create a sloppy fic, right? And yet it doesn't seem to work that way. Sure, plenty of OOC fics do seem sloppy and ridiculous on a basic level of psychological believability, but my favorite fics in HP are actually rather OOC in enough ways anyway. They're psychologically insightful and in-depth and always well-written, but not necessarily a full extrapolation of canon as I see it. So they succeeded as fics in my mind, but they didn't succeed as fanfiction exercises, and it didn't matter, though ICness does matter to me.
Partly, I'm thinking of this because of the meme going around where one of the questions is whether people care whether what they read is OOC. Most people say they care, and yet if you look at what's popular in fandom at large and what those people like in terms of fic, it doesn't pan out since most stuff out there isn't really that rigorous in terms of being IC as far as I can tell, in any large fandom at least. So it seems that the common view is that ICness is a good ideal, but whatever works as a fic is basically more than good enough. And what's wrong with that, if that's what the main fandom audience wants, since fanfiction is a fannish activity in the first place?
That is, if more fans seriously wanted to write/read IC fanfic, wouldn't more of it be written? I'm not sure whether I'm right to apply the idea of supply & demand to fanfic writing, but it seems to fit. If the fic that people are producing is satisfying enough people, then that's what the people want and thus it's what they'll get in the future, or until another fandom trend begins, and trends seem to be like fads in that they don't necessarily have a clear logical origin.
I reserve the right to be really annoyed by fic that makes no sense to me, but it's inevitable that making that into a theoretical construct (like 'it shouldn't be like this') is only a rationalization.
I was also thinking about why I don't tend to hate original fiction, where I get really pissed at fanfic sometimes, and I think it's because I rarely think original fic is wrong before I just notice that it's badly written and stop reading-- that is, there's more of a constant correlation between well-written and utterly believable. With fanfic, it's pretty easy to write well-done crap and also well-done beautiful enjoyable (OOC) fic... which is rather confusing to me. It's also possible to write badly written IC fic, which happens more rarely but I've seen it too, mostly 'cause I can tell what the writer is -trying- to express and think it's 'correct' in so far as that goes, but they just... can't express it very well yet, which sucks. Perhaps I don't get the same level of insight into the workings of any given original story, and don't have the same sense of what the writer was trying to say-- or what they should have been trying to say (there's that word again)-- I just know if it works for me or not.
...I don't think I've come to any conclusion, but then, I'm not really good at that whole essay-writing thing, more just the babbling thing. Mostly, I'm frustrated because people are like, 'yeay, ICness!' and then like, 'yeay! pairings-that-wouldn't-happen-in-a-zillion-years!' and I'm like.... whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy, etc. And I suppose any pairing -could- happen... no, okay, I'm sorry, okay, but some wouldn't. And this was my attempt to say, eh, who cares. It's not as if this is a science, especially given how science, or things that are actually supposed to be logical, aren't supposed to constantly contradict themselves.
Perhaps it's just that in good fiction, when characters contradict themselves, they usually still have a reason, and that's why it's not really real life-- 'cause in real life, a bunch of stupid things happen that have causes but they aren't necessarily the causes you'd think, and you may never know. In fiction, if you don't know what the cause of someone's behavior is at all, you're just confusing and frustrating your readers-- and whereas life is supposed to be like that, fiction is supposed to be a respite from that sense of utter chaos. Or something.
Perhaps, though, some of us go overboard in trying to make fanfiction too orderly-- because it doesn't just adhere to the rules of fiction and (vaguely, hopefully less-than-vaguely) real life, but also exists in comparison to another text. It's all so confusing but in a totally different way-- that is, a successful fanfic and a successful story aren't necessarily the same thing. And I suppose I'll take a successful story over a fanfic any day, it's just... hard to get away from the idea that some things are just impossible and don't make any sense (to me) so they shouldn't be done... like (consensual) Harry/Lucius or say, uh, the supposed glory that is fandom!Blaise (WHY??). I shall never understand these things on a gut level, but maybe I don't need to. That's such a revelation to me: maybe I don't need to. It doesn't make sense to me, but... duh, that's why I don't write it.
I mean, it's a philosophical stance, almost, isn't it, and therefore debatable and of subjective importance? It's easy to get caught up in the innate superiority of 'canonical correctness', but it's not like anyone's going to win a prize. People say, 'but why write fanfic if you don't care about writing OOC', but what does it matter what someone's reason is? It's not like anyone's is infringing on anyone else's personal rights (except maybe the author's, depending on the author's feelings) by writing whatever kind of fanfic they want.
So leaving that alone... why should anyone care if they don't? And yet... it does annoy me to hear claims about characters I know that I find unbelievable (like... uh... Harry's always had a crush on Lucius, why not), I admit, because... I hate it when the world doesn't make any sense on a basic level. Like, a fic needs to make basic sense, and of course everyone's definition of 'basic common sense' differs, clearly.
I'm specifically talking about the idea that people should care though, not why anyone would want to in the first place. Obviously, there are plenty of reasons, like that writing fanfic is an exercise in using another author's world, and to write that successfully, you'd need to use as much of it as you can. So to complete the exercise, the idea is that one does certain things... it's a linear process. Add writing ability, attention to the events and behaviors in canon to an intriguing and believable plot-line and you've achieved a Pretty Good Fanfic, right.
My own reason is that it seems like OOC fanfic is that much more likely to suck, and evidences the writer's disregard for what passes for 'reality' in the fictional world they chose. This sense of carelessness can't help but create a sloppy fic, right? And yet it doesn't seem to work that way. Sure, plenty of OOC fics do seem sloppy and ridiculous on a basic level of psychological believability, but my favorite fics in HP are actually rather OOC in enough ways anyway. They're psychologically insightful and in-depth and always well-written, but not necessarily a full extrapolation of canon as I see it. So they succeeded as fics in my mind, but they didn't succeed as fanfiction exercises, and it didn't matter, though ICness does matter to me.
Partly, I'm thinking of this because of the meme going around where one of the questions is whether people care whether what they read is OOC. Most people say they care, and yet if you look at what's popular in fandom at large and what those people like in terms of fic, it doesn't pan out since most stuff out there isn't really that rigorous in terms of being IC as far as I can tell, in any large fandom at least. So it seems that the common view is that ICness is a good ideal, but whatever works as a fic is basically more than good enough. And what's wrong with that, if that's what the main fandom audience wants, since fanfiction is a fannish activity in the first place?
That is, if more fans seriously wanted to write/read IC fanfic, wouldn't more of it be written? I'm not sure whether I'm right to apply the idea of supply & demand to fanfic writing, but it seems to fit. If the fic that people are producing is satisfying enough people, then that's what the people want and thus it's what they'll get in the future, or until another fandom trend begins, and trends seem to be like fads in that they don't necessarily have a clear logical origin.
I reserve the right to be really annoyed by fic that makes no sense to me, but it's inevitable that making that into a theoretical construct (like 'it shouldn't be like this') is only a rationalization.
I was also thinking about why I don't tend to hate original fiction, where I get really pissed at fanfic sometimes, and I think it's because I rarely think original fic is wrong before I just notice that it's badly written and stop reading-- that is, there's more of a constant correlation between well-written and utterly believable. With fanfic, it's pretty easy to write well-done crap and also well-done beautiful enjoyable (OOC) fic... which is rather confusing to me. It's also possible to write badly written IC fic, which happens more rarely but I've seen it too, mostly 'cause I can tell what the writer is -trying- to express and think it's 'correct' in so far as that goes, but they just... can't express it very well yet, which sucks. Perhaps I don't get the same level of insight into the workings of any given original story, and don't have the same sense of what the writer was trying to say-- or what they should have been trying to say (there's that word again)-- I just know if it works for me or not.
...I don't think I've come to any conclusion, but then, I'm not really good at that whole essay-writing thing, more just the babbling thing. Mostly, I'm frustrated because people are like, 'yeay, ICness!' and then like, 'yeay! pairings-that-wouldn't-happen-in-a-zillion-years!' and I'm like.... whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy, etc. And I suppose any pairing -could- happen... no, okay, I'm sorry, okay, but some wouldn't. And this was my attempt to say, eh, who cares. It's not as if this is a science, especially given how science, or things that are actually supposed to be logical, aren't supposed to constantly contradict themselves.
Perhaps it's just that in good fiction, when characters contradict themselves, they usually still have a reason, and that's why it's not really real life-- 'cause in real life, a bunch of stupid things happen that have causes but they aren't necessarily the causes you'd think, and you may never know. In fiction, if you don't know what the cause of someone's behavior is at all, you're just confusing and frustrating your readers-- and whereas life is supposed to be like that, fiction is supposed to be a respite from that sense of utter chaos. Or something.
Perhaps, though, some of us go overboard in trying to make fanfiction too orderly-- because it doesn't just adhere to the rules of fiction and (vaguely, hopefully less-than-vaguely) real life, but also exists in comparison to another text. It's all so confusing but in a totally different way-- that is, a successful fanfic and a successful story aren't necessarily the same thing. And I suppose I'll take a successful story over a fanfic any day, it's just... hard to get away from the idea that some things are just impossible and don't make any sense (to me) so they shouldn't be done... like (consensual) Harry/Lucius or say, uh, the supposed glory that is fandom!Blaise (WHY??). I shall never understand these things on a gut level, but maybe I don't need to. That's such a revelation to me: maybe I don't need to. It doesn't make sense to me, but... duh, that's why I don't write it.
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no subject
Date: 2005-01-25 02:04 pm (UTC)so the frustration over what i think you just posted about is also about different povs.
and i hate them and they are all wrong why can't they see why are they all so fucking stupid argh kill kill killno subject
Date: 2005-01-25 08:14 pm (UTC)Though I still think some of the biggest problems aren't just 'cause we view canon differently but because people don't really follow through on their own premises enough and don't have enough insight into human motivations and how people really act and so on. Not that I'm god-like and all-knowing or anything, but... I know it's wrong when I'm constantly being handed pat explanations and rationalizations and plot-devices in fanfics and so on ^^;;
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 04:01 pm (UTC)what frustrated me last night was a good example, because "monk" and sexual acts simply are ver hard to handly. and to have a man who washes his hand if he has to shake another suddenly stick his tongue into another man's mouth is not simply ooc, it does not follow their own premise established earlier in the fic.
i want unaroused people now.
i want fanfic where seduction fails
don't mind me.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 04:25 pm (UTC)...Usually, I have to suspend my disbelief (for the sake of smut, omg), but sometimes people do sell a very tightly controlled or repressed Heero becoming a sex maniac 'cause... when these people snap, they SNAP. Or sometimes he's very methodical and emotionless even with sex... or is like, 'okay, I have sexual needs I need to release'. Or maybe he goes a little insane-- I totally find that believable-- and his conscious mind gets totally suspended.
It's all in how skillful the writer is. I mean, this set-up is -possible-, you just need to show the repercussions and why the person lost their mind or whatever :>
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 04:34 pm (UTC)but heero is not a clinical manic disorder patient. i forgot the word. obsessive compulsive paired with autistic, coz that's what monk is. he could not overcome his fears if it meant the life of his best mate, as had been shown. so that fic was beyond bad. beyond arghkillkill.
and then, having left it next to bed, it gave me a papercut first thing in the morning as well! evil, i tell you
no subject
Date: 2005-01-25 02:30 pm (UTC)Now mind you, I say "usually" because sometimes people really don't care, they're just there for the smut/shmoop/image of the character in their brain while they write their Original Fic/inherently greater audience than if they were posting original fic.
Some of it also comes down to how one DEFINES IC. Like, for some people a character is IC if they act like the canon version of themselves - Snape is IC as long as he's bitter and passionate-but-mostly-subdued and snarky, for example. Whereas for someone like me, IC is a much deeper idea - it goes to internal logic even more than external behavior.
And I think that non-characterized characters, the minor people like Blaise, they become big because people are interested in staying IC with characters who have a C to stay I. Which is to say, it's the characters who exist only as a name, or only as five lines of dialogue and a physical description, that allows these people to create something new/original, without the stigma of creating an OC in a fandom that really really hates OCs.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-25 08:06 pm (UTC)I'm all about internal logic, man. In fact, when it comes to writing fanfic, internal logic is like my GOD. My absolute GOD. Though it's pretty important whether someone's fic bears some resemblance to canon fact or whatever, none of that matters if once I start reading, I realize that it falls apart at the seams anyway. Psychological realism is where it's at, and oh-so-many people don't seem to realize that it's not enough, for instance, to just state things that are 'true' in the beginning of the story (usually put in the mouth of a professor or say, Hermione) & then not actually use them again. Argh.
I've seen this idea of surface ICness before, and it's always struck me as odd in a 'huh??' sort of way, but I guess I haven't thought much deeper about it (heh). People say things like they can't stand sappy!Draco (because clearly Draco's not a sap in canon), or that they can't stand it when a character changes at all, basically, whether or not the circumstances might force him to-- nevermind whether or not that particular story pulled that off well (and of course, most fics don't). Perhaps it's just that the people who think that don't make a habit of thinking about human motivation and the many causes for behavior...? Or maybe they don't put themselves in others' shoes that much, so they just observe the end result in terms of behavior and thusly can't predict/imagine any changes or at least modulations...?
...Yeah, if I think about it, the Blaise thing is just a way of having an OC, but... actually, enough people write Draco, say, as if he were an OC too, and I can tolerate it if it's a new character that's interesting and deep and so on-- but usually they fail spectacularly at this. What bothers me isn't the idea of writing about a minor character (since I've done that myself, though not so much... but Pansy is a pretty minor character, almost as bad as Blaise, isn't she)-- what bothers me is that people then create this... connection between what they think of Blaise and canon, and even ship him with people... and how could you ship a character everyone sees differently and with reason, like with -anyone-?
Basically, it's not the idea of writing what's effectively an OC that's the issue, but rather the fandom phenomenon of then making him a part of 'canon' almost as an afterthought. There's not much originality at work here, just like with Zacharias (who's the convenient Draco Lite a lot of times or whatever. Ugh.)
It's the shallow approach that bothers me moreso than the presence or lack of ICness. And ranting about shallowness is a fool's errand, I know. Especially since I do so enjoy certain types... as long as one's not shooting to be anything else :>
no subject
Date: 2005-01-25 03:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-01-25 08:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-01-25 05:30 pm (UTC)Anyway. I suppose to a certain point if you claim your story is the original character canon, then it should make sense; on the other hand, if the point of a fic is to be impossible, is to be from another canon, etc, then I suppose it's really not necessary for it to adhere to classic ideas of right-ness.
Though I can't stand stories where characters have no reason to be out of character, which goes right back to your essay.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 02:03 am (UTC)It's interesting because I suppose sometimes people in HP don't even realize that what they're writing/reading is really fanon, because it's just become so accepted and wide-spread... and it makes me rather amused to wonder just how much Double Cross, say, affected Draco fics in general (as far as RPGs go), though I doubt there's been a similar effect with non-minor characters.
I think it's like... not that different if there's a reason to be OOC, but it's a really stupid or at least hard to believe or under-developed reason. If you don't develop it and sell it to the reader, who cares if it could theoretically work, y'know? ...But maybe I've just gotten cranky in my old age :))
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 05:20 am (UTC)What's my problem is that I feel pressured. I feel pressured to call something good because if I call it bad, I get people projecting their anxieties about writing kink fic on me. It's like, intellectually I find OOC bad. Morally I don't give a damn. It's not morally wrong for people to write it, I'm not trying to drive people out of the fandom because they enjoy themselves in a way I don't. I just think the result of their enjoyment is 1) bad qualitatively and 2) fulfilling socially. Badfic is already apologised in which it doesn't try to be good, and in the context of wish-fulfillment, it fulfills wishes so it does its job. It just doesn't do its job as a fanfic.
If judged by standards of quality, it's bad. ICness is a standard of quality when it comes to fic. The most-engaging writing style can't save a fanfic where I can't recognise the characters or their environment. For me, it ends there.
Though I am so with you with the claiming an investment on ICness and then praising stuff that makes me want to throw out overemotional catchphrases as "character-rape"... bah. See me censor myself, eh.
if more fans seriously wanted to write/read IC fanfic, wouldn't more of it be written?
People love romance, and look how they keep failing at writing it. It's just that most people aren't that good.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 05:31 am (UTC)Now I've read the other posts, I want to add... why not apply internal logic to extrapolate a character's motivations while you write his outside IC? It's not that you can't apply internal logic to canon Draco. Why make up a completely new character and THEN analyse his internal logic? What's the point? I realise there may be conflict between two different interpretations of a character's motivations, and they both can be valid, but if he's IC, on the outside he's... like in the canon source, right? It's not because many people write IC but with no logic that the other side is automatically redeemed for writing OOC but at least logically. You can apply logic to the canon platform, too.
Bah. This is a hot button.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 01:38 pm (UTC)ICness is a standard of quality when it comes to fanfic, which is why I was separating seeing fic as fanfic and as just a piece of writing. That was one of my main points-- that one can read fanfics as just pieces of fiction, and they'd succeed as that even if they don't succeed as fanfiction. And as I said, I'd pic fiction over fanfiction because that's just my priority. In that case, if the writing is good enough, I could just not care if it's sucky fanfiction 'cause it's great fiction to me. And that's a personal call, y'know-- whether you can read fanfic as just fic.
As far as doing it (expressing things about human nature) in the wrong place....
I don't know. I get annoyed when things are ridiculously improbable, in lots of ways besides just the obvious in terms of characterization, but.... I've also had the experience of enjoying lots of fics that 'sold' me even though they're 'incorrect', by the ability of the writer to just write convincingly-- basically, I believe you can write in-character but unconvincingly, if you're not a good enough writer.
Anyway, I'm not saying ICness doesn't matter, but maybe I'm saying that it's so hard to come to a consensus on what that -means- within a fandom, and so hard to find anyone who matches one's personal sense of ICness, and the actual experience with writing doesn't seem to support the idea that 'correct' = 'well-written & enjoyable'.... maybe the emphasis on it that everyone agrees is important just muddles the issue in some way rather than clarifying things for most people.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-27 01:06 pm (UTC)Plus, I think there's a difference between say, a good imitation of canon and the story of how Draco would have been if his mother hadn't dropped him as a child.
So I have a limited attention span. So what.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 03:31 pm (UTC)I am sorry I can't say anything Deep and Important right now, but I keep meaning to come back and reply. I will soon, really.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 03:35 pm (UTC)