FF: Why I write Fanfiction

[Queer as John]

Hi all,

I thought you all might be interested in reading my Fanfiction Writing
Manifesto, since we have in the past discussed motivations and reasonings
for writing fanfic.

It can also be found on my site and LiveJournal @ www.queerasjohn.com.

Direct link is here --
http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=johnwalton&itemid=89337

A plain-text version starts under my sig line.

Enjoy, and comment if you'd like,

--John
______________________________________

Queer as John || john at queerasjohn.com
          www.queerasjohn.com

AIM & YM @ QueerAsJohn

"There's nowt as queer as folk."
    --English proverb
______________________________________


Why do I write fanfic?

A friend of mine asked me why I write fanfic last year. I thought about it
for a while, and realised that there are many different reasons. Let me
explain...

"If you wake up in the morning, and all you think about is writing, then
you¹re meant to be a writer."

Recognise the quote? It¹s from Sister Mary Clarence (played by Whoopi
Goldberg), in Sister Act II. Okay, so I was eleven (possibly twelve) when I
saw it first. But I took that quote to heart. Also the ³If you want to be
somebody, if you want to go somewhere, you¹d better wake up and pay
attention² song/warmup, which is great.

Anyway. So, when I wake up in the morning, all I think about is writing.
Writing fic. Writing slash. Writing het. Writing my original novel. Not
writing my essays. Or my dissertation. Yet.

But why fanfiction, you ask. Why, Queer as John, do you write about these
children¹s book characters? Well, I adore the books. I just love them. They
resonate in so many ways with me, and I identify with the characters so much
and on so many levels. That¹s why I participated in HPFGU for so long. But
then...I found I was sated, replete of academic canon discussion. I didn¹t
want to participate to the extent I had been. So...I started reading fanfic.
The first thing I read was Lori¹s Paradigm of Uncertainty. Damn, was it
good! So good, in fact, that I wrote a fairly abominable piece of fic of my
own. Which I ditched, because it was awful. But I do remember some great
advice from CLS at the time, which I really appreciated. I caught the bug
from that first piece of awfulness at FFN. You can probably find it under
Crazy Ivan if you look hard enough. *wince*

But why HP, you ask? Why these kids? And why slash them? Well, HP because I
love it. I identify with the kid who, at eleven, is transported away from
home to boarding school in Britain. (That¹s me!) I identify with the spoddy
best friend who always has too many books in her bag, and who always reads.
(That¹s me!) I even identify with the daft best friend. (I tried to be him!)
Part of my love, I think, is that identification. The other part is fantasy.
I love the entire HP world so much that I want to immerse myself in it, to
really know it from the inside out. So I write stories about characters from
it. Characters I identify with.

I also think that I write slash because this fandom is so open to it, like
I¹ve never seen before in any other fandom. (Possibly Smallville, but I
don¹t have too much experience of that.) The number of (primarily) women and
(all ten of us) men who read, write and love gay themed writing is just so
open and new that I really feel creative and excited about the writing
process.

Anyway, back in time, but a while later, I read Cassie¹s DD, and possibly DS
too. And I was really hooked. I emailed Cassie in typical fanboy way, asking
if I could use her Draco in a spinoff. And so the Song of Time was born. I
was writing it while I was coming to terms with my own sexual identity, in
my second year of university, which contributed to the way I looked at the
characters, their depth, their personalities. What made them tick? Why was
Hermione with Harry and not Ron? Who knows. But, over time, my
interpretation changed. I came to see Draco as very much a ³me² character.
Not a Mary Sue, but an ³inspired by². (Okay, Rita, slightly Mary Sueish. But
I¹m changing that in rewrites.) Draco in SoT is the Ideal Me. He¹s witty.
He¹s intelligent. He¹s not quite sure where he fits in with everything. And
he¹s gay, and although he knows it, he¹s not ready to tell everyone yet.
Sound familiar?

Anyway, SoT got stalled in September, 2001. I was writing a chapter about an
Ivory Minaret that is knocked down by aerial attack, in a chapter that was
released in August. Yeah. It threw me for a loop, and my muse wandered off.
I don¹t remember much of September, or October. November? Hell yeah. HP
Movie. But I¹m ahead of myself.

Anyway, I kept writing SoT, kept Modding HPFGU, helped FA start up, until I
saw the film. Fuck, Sean Biggerstaff is gorgeous. Surely, though, he¹s
straight! Yeah, that¹s what people said about me when I was his age. Even my
best friend didn¹t guess until I came out to her in September 2001, although
she now looks back on the Cher music with the 20/20 of hindsight. Mind you,
I also hid it quite well. So, I ended up in the position where I was coming
out myself, and I had this person who I wished fervently were gay, and who
was in this world I identified with, and so why not write about it? Why not
transfer my experiences, my fears, my dreams, to the Oliver character? Or
the Percy character, who he ends up in love with?

As I developed my own identity, as I formed it and tried to fit it into the
Me that already existed, I wrote about my feelings. But I didn¹t write them
in a journal. I wrote them in prose. With other characters. And not just
one. Both Percy and Oliver have experiences which happened to me. I won¹t
tell you which ones, although my own coming out experience was neither
Percy¹s nor Oliver¹s. (Somewhere in the middle, actually.) But this is the
perspective from which I come to the HP series now. The perspective of a gay
man, who led a life very similar to Percy¹s at school.

See, I was a Prefect (a School Prefect, indeed). If I¹d had brothers, they
would have thought I at eighteen was uptight and a teacher¹s pet. But I
wasn¹t, I was just really mature for my age -- having a Deep Dark Secret
does that, y¹know -- and insecure. The insecurity manifested itself in the
rule-following and the authority-seeking as some form of validation, I
think. Now, to explain that in an academic post about identifying with is
terribly dull, not to mention totally subjective. Plus, I don¹t care much
for canon Percy. He is quite irritating. But the possible Percy? And to
explain it over several chapters of actions and dialogue, not just
description? That sounded like something I wanted -- and perhaps as a person
I needed -- to do.

So, of course, here came this Oliver/Percy fic wanting to be written. And,
in December 2001, that¹s just what I did. Ebony was running the Twelve Days
of Paradise on HP_Paradise, so I offered to do a daily excerpt of the
Oliver/Percy fic which was floating around my head at that point.
Unfortunately, I caught gastroentiritis in December, which sort of scuppered
the daily excerpt plan, but I released it in conjunction with the Twelve
Days. 

I was writing a story about eighteen-year-olds who fall in love with someone
they¹ve been in love with for several years. An unrequited/requited love
story, that¹s what Keeper¹s Secrets is. And, in a way, it¹s something else I
identify with. Or, at least, something I¹d like to identify with. I¹ve never
had requited love yet. But I¹m looking forward to it when I do, and I¹ll be
well prepared.

So. That¹s why. If you¹re a real life friend, now you know what I do when
I¹m not working on my degree. It means a lot to me that you read this far.

If you¹re an internet friend, thanks for reading. I hope that this gives you
an insight into what makes me tick. Feel free to leave comments...

--Queer as John, October 2002