Fanfiction/speculation

[Hillman, Lee]

No: HPFGUIDX 31221

As I was finishing up my Snape responses something occurred to me and I
thought I'd explore it in its very own thread.
 
I know folks have had the fanfic/canon discussion before, but I still find
it interesting that people draw out elaborate speculations and theories and
in some ways stray well out of what canon confirms, but because they don't
explore their ideas in a narrative, they don't call it fanfiction, and they
state that they don't read fanfic.
 
To me, writing fanfic in the HP verse is one way of organizing my thoughts,
theories, and speculations into a framework that takes into account as much
of canon as we've been given, and addresses those issues and questions which
are left unanswered at the present.
 
I know some of the arguments non-fanfic readers/writers have stated in the
past. Most are entirely valid and completely understandable. For example,
when this discussion came up last (oh, maybe 3-4 months ago?), Steve
mentioned that he avoids all non-canonical interpretations (movie excepted)
because he wants to keep as pure a picture as possible of the material
Rowling has provided. (Correct me if I'm misparaphrasing you, Steve.) And
with the priceless work he does on the Lexicon, I'm sure we're all grateful
that he's able to keep that vision pure.
 
Others have mentioned a variation on that theme: that they don't read fanfic
in order to keep from getting confused as to where they read what. 
 
Both these reasons, if memory serves, sparked a counter argument that by
being on the list at all, we are colouring our perceptions of Rowling and
the Potterverse. Because we are constantly exposed to theories, ideas,
schemes, plot points, and interpretations of our members, are we not
therefore allowing our vision of the world to be mingled with and even
changed by others'?
 
For a quick example, how many times has a new person popped up to say
something like, "Is it just me, or are there other people who hate character
X?" And then what is the response of the list? A number will invariably
argue, "Oh, no! You just don't *understand* character X!" And a number will
chime in, "Bravo. I really dislike character X and can't forgive his actions
in A, B, and C cases. You're not alone at all!"
 
But by jumping in, either to back up the new list member or more
significantly to try to broaden his understanding of the character, aren't
we then trying to change that person's vision of the Potterverse?
 
Or the recent discussion on photographs. There were good points, I thought,
that haven't had a whole lot of screen time here at the HP4GU list. I jumped
in with a theory that I had come up with *for a fanfic,* but it wasn't just
for the plot device of the fic that I decided to address paintings in the
Potterverse. The point was, it was something I needed to understand in order
to go on, and thus I was forced to think about them--and to think about
their mechanics. Furthermore, I had to reconcile what I already knew about
paintings at Hogwarts with how they could have been created in order to
allow them to function as they did there.
 
Ditto werewolves. Lots of questions unresolved about werewolves, many with
conflicting canonical evidence (i.e., the plot-hole-that-must-not-be-named).
Are they contagious all the time or just in wolf form? When exactly does
transformation occur? How quickly do they heal? Are they immune to other
diseases or illnesses? How strong are they? Do they have supersensitive
hearing and smell all the time, or just near the full moon? What are the
procedures and regulations that govern the Werewolf Registry? When does a
werewolf change jurisdiction from the Registry to the Support Offices, and
from either to the Capture Unit? What exactly is the Werewolf Code of
Conduct, and how did it come to be? Is this an international standard of
control or just Britain's way of doing it?
 
Huge questions. IMO, we could sit around our computers and debate the merits
of answer after answer after answer, each one as potentially valid as the
next. But I don't think one necessarily is faced with all the consequences
of any decision on any issue until one tries to weave those decisions back
into the world JKR created. Frankly, I don't think she was necessarily faced
with all the consequences of earlier decisions until they became important
later.
 
I guess that's the part of the writing process, the search for internal
consistency, that makes it difficult to think "What if" without also
examining how the world and the characters in that world would incorporate
the new and often arbitrary decisions that must be made in order to proceed.
And by internal, I mean reconciling the derivative work or, in this case,
theory, with the original set of information and clues, not just making sure
that the derivative work is consistent with itself or even that the
canonical work is consistent with itself (we know it's not always). I'm
talking about a theoretical consistency that enables the derivative writer
to be *fairly confident* that he is not removing the theory from the
framework of the original altogether.
 
In writing or reading fanfic, one must accept beforehand that it's not going
to be right. It's not going to be exactly the way it turns out in the books.
To me, the fun is seeing how close I'll have come, and where I'm way off
base, when my copy of books 5-7 find their way to my grubby paws.
 
For those of you who can speculate and theorize without turning to the
actual writing of fanfiction, how is it that you keep track of all the
interwoven details to keep things straight? How do you determine your handle
on the characters and how they'd react to the kinds of questions we at HP4GU
attempt to answer? How do you keep your speculative colourization from
tinting the limited black-and-white print of the books? Where do you decide
to cut off your horizons and edges and place your vanishing points so that
you keep everything in perspective without creating a canvas that is either
too widely or too narrowly focused?
 
Gwen