The Aeneid and the Inferno were not fanfics

Odradek · 2016-01-26 20:37:28

"fanfiction" as a concept is defined by our modern modes of production for fiction.

Obā-san · 2016-01-26 20:37:58

retroactive

Salix Babylonika · 2016-01-26 20:39:58

they are though.

Odradek · 2016-01-26 20:40:29

Today is Tomorrow said:
retroactive

The owl of minerva may fly at dusk, but the sparrow of obnoxious nerdery flies only at dawn.

Odradek · 2016-01-26 20:41:46

Jane said:
they are though.

Baldanders said:
"fanfiction" as a concept is defined by our modern modes of production for fiction.

Odradek · 2016-01-26 20:42:18

Calling them "fanfiction" conceals more than it reveals

Obā-san · 2016-01-26 20:45:47

ok

Calica · 2016-01-26 20:59:41

the aeneid is a shitty self-insert fiction just with rome as the self-insert hth

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-26 21:05:56

Calica said:
the aeneid is a shitty self-insert fiction just with rome as the self-insert hth

also propaganda lol

"Did your school feed you any propaganda?"

"Yes, it did; my Latin class made me read The Aeneid."

Odradek · 2016-01-26 21:07:33

Okay I guess I'm just a fucking idiot then

Klinotaxis · 2016-01-26 21:14:35

It's true that they're different. The Iliad was, what, eight hundred years old when the Aeneid was composed? Writing something modern, there's a pretty clear difference between writing about Evangelion and writing about Arthurian myth, I feel

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-26 21:25:51

Klinotaxis said:
It's true that they're different. The Iliad was, what, eight hundred years old when the Aeneid was composed? Writing something modern, there's a pretty clear difference between writing about Evangelion and writing about Arthurian myth, I feel

They are different, but I guess the question is whether the term "fanfiction" ought to be used as a general term for both.

I'm fine with it being used this way. Just like how it's true that Yulia Tymoshenko, Donald Trump, Bashar al-Assad, Nana Mizuki, my high school calc teachers, Barb Mikulski, and all of you who've posted in this thread are all humans. Not necessarily a useful categorization, depending on what your purpose is, and possibly even an offensive categorization depending on who the audience is, but a true categorization nevertheless.

Calica · 2016-01-26 21:28:38

Baldanders said:
Calling them "fanfiction" conceals more than it reveals

maybe but i'm more annoyed at the aeneid than nerds who whatever

Bee · 2016-01-26 22:15:58

Klinotaxis said:
It's true that they're different. The Iliad was, what, eight hundred years old when the Aeneid was composed? Writing something modern, there's a pretty clear difference between writing about Evangelion and writing about Arthurian myth, I feel

A Kid in King Arthur's Court is fanfiction.

Bee · 2016-01-26 22:17:39

In any case who the fuck cares because I've read a lot of fanfiction I happen to really like more than most published literature.

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-26 22:29:52

I have a copy of A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court somewhere at home.

Perhaps I should read it.

Sredni Vashtar · 2016-01-26 23:35:57

Baldanders said:
Okay I guess I'm just a fucking idiot then

Technically you're correct, but... I dunno. Fanfiction is a recent concept because intellectual property is a recent concept, but writing stories with characters from older stories that were explicitly meant to either riff on the older work or simply expand upon its world go back millennia. Even in the more recent sense, one can easily argue that Lovecraft was a proto-fanficcer given the way that science fiction fandom evolved in the interwar period and his place within that nascent world.

Tachyon · 2016-01-27 00:20:54

i agree with Myr.

Like, of course you could define fanfiction to encompass stuff like the Aeneid but then you're not using the term the way anyone uses it in practice. Intellectual property *is* a recent concept, yes, and what we call fanfiction is the product of a specific set of cultural circumstances and premised on certain ideas which didn't exist until relatively recently. You can trace the history of fanfic back through various popular websites, fandoms, fanzines and so on, and the contents of fics are influenced by the aims of fanfic authors and the assumptions they make about their readers. As a genre, or set of genres if you prefer, it's definitely distinct from older poetic works that adapted or took influence from existing texts.

Calling old texts "fanfic" can be a way of critiquing the assumptions people make about fanfic, but is mostly just kinda facetious.

One-Winged Eagle · 2016-01-27 00:42:35

I agree that fanfiction is a very recent term, that what it is, the various modes and genres and so on (the kink meme, the MST-ing) are all exclusive to our modern age, a result of how people can own stories and worlds.

And maybe it's just me, but don't feel that there's anything for me in a work that isn't refined, polished, cut off from all other worlds and characters, and then sold to me. I only want "original" fiction.

One-Winged Eagle · 2016-01-27 00:43:52

Also: I feel that artists owning intellectual property is better than them not having it. Which is distinct from corporations owning artistic intellectual property.

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-27 01:33:58

The way I see it, "fanfic" or "fanfiction" is a term that means a derivative story.

There is the term "derivative work", and I guess you could say "derivative story", but I don't really see why not to use the term "fanfic". To me, it's not about who owns the work. It's simply that it's just an existing work that you're extending in some way.

I guess you could make an argument based on the term's implication of informality, but I tend not to like to make those sorts of distinctions. If it's a derivative story, it's a derivative story; notability or anything of that ilk should not be a factor for the purpose of that absolute description.

Tachyon · 2016-01-27 01:36:44

genre labels are not absolute, though, and fanfic functions as a genre label, with its own particular trends which are absent in older works of fiction that were based on existing texts

"derivative work" itself is not something you can be exact about, anyway. it's more like there's a continuum between original fiction and derivative works, and even that's oversimplifying, probably

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-27 01:41:53

If you're seeing it as a genre label, that's a different story (no pun intended). That I can understand it being a function of this age.

I am not using it as a genre label, rather I'm just using it basically as a "was this explicitly based on something else?" label.

A theme and variations is a derivative work. A cover version of a song is a derivative work. A Youtube upload of a piano transcription of a videogame theme is a derivative work. A Castlevania fangame is a derivative work. A Half-Life badfic is a derivative work. Dante's Inferno is a derivative work. Some of Shakespeare's plays are probably also derivative works. A number of Disney movies are derivative works. Basically every piece of religious art is a derivative work, in fact.

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-27 01:45:38

FYI, I am NOT implying that there is anything wrong with being a derivative work.

There is nothing inherently wrong with something being a derivative work.

Some of the greatest works are derivative works. Some of the greatest works are original works.

Some of the worst works are derivative works. Some of the worst works are original works.

Tachyon · 2016-01-27 01:45:51

i feel that if your definition of "derivative work" is that broad, then you are simply misusing "fanfic" if you treat the two as synonyms

or if you don't like my calling it a misuse, you're at least using it in a very confusing and unhelpful way

Tachyon · 2016-01-27 01:47:09

i guess i feel it makes more sense to use it as a genre label because that's how it generally works

when people say they write fanfic, they don't mean they write lengthy didactic poems based on the holy texts of their religion

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-27 01:58:38

Well specifically I use "fanfic" as a subset of "derivative work". But yeah, I use it broadly.

I don't expect people to call "lengthy didactic poems based on the holy texts of their religions" "fanfics". I just mean to see all these things on a more level playing field and avoid biasing myself in favor of notability/reputation/etc. by highlighting a fundamental attribute.

Tachyon · 2016-01-27 01:59:50

well that's fair enough, i wasn't arguing that fanfics are unequivocally trash, in case it came off that way

glennmagusharvey · 2016-01-27 02:02:12

Not saying you were.

Though this thread did sorta happen simultaneously with the TVT thread going on about people's badfics.

Tachyon · 2016-01-27 02:04:32

bad writing is still bad writing even when it's about a new IP

One-Winged Eagle · 2016-01-27 02:31:33

Tachyon said:
bad writing is still bad writing even when it's about a new IP

Definitely, but I'll still choose that over fanfiction, because I have no attachment to any community and thus no tolerance for that genre's trappings.

This is something that makes or breaks it for me.

Sredni Vashtar · 2016-01-27 06:40:18

The thing is, even "fanfiction" in the strictest sense far predates the Internet.

Tachyon · 2016-01-27 11:03:47

Sredni Vashtar said:
The thing is, even "fanfiction" in the strictest sense far predates the Internet.

well yes, that's true, but it's closely tied to the fandom as a cultural phenomenon, which didn't exist prior to published fiction as a commodity, meaning even at the most generous estimates it's a modern phenomenon

i feel there's decent grounds to consider fanfiction to begin with the invention of the fanzine, which would make earlier, similar texts proto-fanfiction, but if you referred to an older text created by a fan using characters and ideas from an existing published work of fiction as 'fanfic', i wouldn't correct you

still, fanfiction in the modern sense has definitely adapted itself to an online format

The Aeneid and the Inferno were not fanfics

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