a fool's musings

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Fool, said my muse to me,
look in thy heart and write...

Warning: Adult Content

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2002-04-13 - 12:10 a.m.

Remy as the Big Man & Logan plays Kay

Another small snippet before I head to bed:

Remy shook his head. "You really an old softie underneath all that hair, eh, mon ami?"

Logan growled. "I'm still not happy with you, Cajun. You upset Marie."

"You got it bad for le petite, Logan. You need to suck it up and tell her."

"She'd probably fling that coffee pot at my head."

"It's better than all this pining and brooding. Hank's ready to prescribe Prozac."

"What are you afraid of, Gumbo? That I'll steal your spot on the roof?"

Remy laughed. "With Ororo, it ain't gonna be like that. She already knows all my secrets, all the bad stuff. Been there through most of it."

"So why don't you call her?"

Remy glanced at the clock above the stove. "It's almost three. Too late to call now." Logan rolled his eyes. "If I call her now, she's just gonna yell at me. I don't want her to yell at me. I don't want to make her mad. I don't like to give people a reason to leave."

"So you're afraid she's going to leave you, huh?" Remy nodded and Logan leaned in conspiratorially. "But what if she doesn't? What if this is *it* -- 'til death do you part? That creates a bigger fear, huh?"

"Of what?" Remy asked, swallowing hard and raising his chin defiantly.

"Maybe she'll love you. Maybe she won't love you. Maybe you're not lovable. Maybe no one will ever love you again. Or maybe, Remy, she's the one."

Remy took a sip of beer, thinking about Logan's words. Finally, he ran a hand over his forehead and said, "I'm almost thirty, and I've done, I've seen a lot of things. I just want, I just want to make someone happy. To find someone who makes me happy." He laughed. "What a way to start a life with someone, hien? Dating."

"Dating is a form of self-destruction," Rogue announced.

***

And on that note, buona notte.

A domani.

~victoria
[current mood: tired, but pleased]
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2002-04-12 - 9:43 p.m.

Bow down before the one you serve

::whimpers::

No one is distracting me.

This means I'm going to have to actually write.

::whimpers::

This computer is so slooowwww....

Anyhow, enough whining.

Nestra jumps into the badfic/laziness debate and knocks it out of the park.

Sigh.

I dig Nestra.

And look at the pretty Hugh icon. *g*

And she quotes my new boyfriend, Neil Gaiman. He's up there with Omar G. now. *g*

Because Omar G. is so the boss of me. I want new Slashville eps just so I can read new recaps.

Anyhow, Nestra.

Give her love, people.

She says something I think is key, about *deserving* good fic.

It goes back to the "what do you owe fandom? and what does fandom owe you?" question, and eventually, I will bring out the theory I'm working on about this.

And remember, as I said over in the LJ any fic that results from this state of non-distraction from writing is all your fault.

At least the Mets are winning.

Let's hope they can hold on.

~victoria



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2002-04-12 - 5:04 p.m.

change in plans

On the spur of the moment, since my friday evening drinking plans were scuttled, I'm heading out to the parents'.

Without my laptop.

*sniff*

That means any email sent before this morning won't get an answer until Monday night at least. I can't access what I've already downloaded.

I apologize and prostrate myself before everyone to whom I owe email.

If you've sent an email sometime today, I will get to it. I'll just have to use Dad's PC.

::thinks::

I'm going to have to download AIM.

Although, if I don't, I might get more writing done.

Hmm...

As I'm eating a Krispy Kreme jelly donut, I'm not real worried about it.

Of course, my boss just gave me four freaking UPS packages to get ready, and it's almost 10 after 5, and I was planning to leave at 5:15 to catch the 5:41 express, so I'm fucked.

Grrr....

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~*~

2002-04-12 - 1:24 p.m.

snip alert!

Okay, all you people with code that crashes Netscape 4.7 - I hate you.

Not in a personal, "I want to kill you and seven generations of your family, grind all your bones and scatter the ashes to the winds" kind of way, but more in an "arrgh, I really want to step on your foot, hard" kind of way {thanks, DD, for that apt analogy}.

***

Let me add my guilt-tripping to Peggy's.

Claire, please finish your story soon. I desperately need new fic. It helps me write faster.

***

Speaking of fic, I've added that background to NotDL. Here's a snip of it, with the intervening stuff cut out:

Of course, since their big blow-out the other night over her dating choices, they hadn't spoken much. He speculated about how long it would be until he had to pick up the pieces for her again. All her relationships had ended badly, save the one with Bobby back when they were seniors in high school, and he was sure this one would be no different. It pissed him off that, time and again, she chose these losers who were no good for her, rather than himself, the one right under her nose, who'd never intentionally hurt her and, in fact, had nearly died to save her.

Not that he would ever bring that up, or begrudge her the use of his healing factor. It was one of the rare things that made being a mutant bearable, the way he could heal her if she got hurt.

He wondered again if a break in the weather was the way to her heart.

He tried to keep his voice level. "Is that so?"

Scott glanced at him. "Yeah. Dwight wants her to go back to Mississippi with him."

*Snikt*

Scott raised an eyebrow. "Sorry. I figured you knew."

Logan retracted the claws, relishing the sting. Most people didn't realize they hurt just as much going in as they did coming out. He sighed. "Nah. We haven't spoken since--"

Scott nodded. Everyone in the house had heard the fight. Logan and Rogue were many things, but subtle and quiet had never been part of their repertoire.

[...]

[Logan] shook his head. "I thought, I figured, after she graduated from college, that I could show her. I mean, I wasn't looking to jump her bones when she was seventeen, you know? Then she got older and I realized how I felt. But she-- she stopped wearing the dog tags. She stopped just hanging around and started paying attention to all those jerks who came sniffing around."

"She grew up."

"Yeah." Logan closed his eyes. "Yeah," he said again, this time more firmly. "She did. I wasn't ready for how I'd, you know, feel about that."

Over the years, he'd tried to figure out just what he'd been thinking the last time they'd touched, that night on the Statue of Liberty, and why she didn't know how he felt about her.

It never occurred to him that the thoughts and feelings she'd pulled from him hadn't changed and grown along with the ones currently in his head and in his heart. It hurt more than he'd thought possible that she kept choosing other men when he was right there, waiting.

"You were used to being the most important thing in her life."

"Yeah."

"And now you're not."

"No shit, Sherlock."

***

And more background:

"I'm gonna go call Stormy," Remy said, backing out of the kitchen before he got involved in another discussion of Rogue's twisted love life.

~Don't leave me,~ Jean pleaded with him telepathically, but he ignored her. She couldn't take another round of Rogue-angst. The girl had the worst taste in men Jean had ever encountered.

They'd had a running joke at the mansion that she and Logan would be joined at the hip once he realized she wasn't a little girl anymore, but it hadn't happened. Jean didn't understand how the girl -- woman now -- could be so dense.

Anyone with eyes could see that Logan was desperately in love with her, and she with him, yet she continued to date, and get hurt by, a string of losers that was broken only by that first brief liaison with Bobby, which they all knew was going nowhere once Logan returned from Canada.

The two women sat in silence for a moment, and Jean felt a faint surge of hope that Rogue wasn't going to bring up the current situation with her boyfriend and Logan.

"Dwight left this morning."

Jean's hope was now dead as the humid August air that hung in the kitchen. "That's too bad," Jean lied tiredly.

"No it's not. Y'all hated him, and he knew it."

"We didn't *hate* him, Rogue." Another lie. "We just felt he wasn't good enough for you." Finally, the truth.

Rogue snorted. "He wanted me to go to Mississippi with him."

"I know."

"Scott sucks at keeping secrets."

***

It's rough and needs work, but I think it's enough.

It doesn't give away that Rogue's the one who told him to hit the highway - that's the big revelation after the rant; all they know is that Dwight decamped earlier in the day, and Rogue's in a bad mood.

The way I figure he, she finally realized he was a jackass. She might even get to say that. So far, as I read this over, I realize that there's no Rogue POV.

In fact, there's not much but Logan and Jean POV. Most of it seems third person omniscient, which is what I was originally going for, because it's based on an episode of a television show which had an omniscient narrator in the camera.

Hmm...

***

I owe Jenn a fic. I have to find that sentence she gave me, and the little plot sketch I did. I need to get into the CLex groove, so I can at least finish Crossing Paths and Metropolitan. And When We Were Young, which I haven't even technically started, but... *g*

Then I can consider myself somewhat settled in Smallville fandom, even though I think I shot my wad there on "Caveat Emptor."

Lunch now.

Talk back!

stupid html

~victoria
[current mood: hungry]
[current music: If That's Your Boyfriend (He Wasn't Last Night) - Me'shell N'Degeocello (sp?)]

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2002-04-12 - 10:29 a.m.

What if...

Go read LaT. She's my new hero. *g*

She ups my woodworking analogy, and the thing is, she's right. And I think we all know it, even if some of us are loath to admit it.

And apparently, I was channeling her when I wrote *my* rant, because I didn't know about hers, and yet... deathbed ranting about time wasted on bad!fic.

Hive Mind at work again. *g*

I bow in worship at her feet.

"We're not worthy! We're not worthy!"

***

Also, read Unskilled and Unaware, which posits the idea that the more incompetent one is at something, the more one believes one does it well.

I'll probably have more to say on that later.

***

So, okay, another of the betas has weighed in and doesn't like the Rogue tantrum.

I normally automatically do about 80% of what my betas say, and if more than one of them says it, that percentage goes up to probably 97%.

But...

But...

I can't take out that rant.

I love that rant.

Part of the whole point of writing the fic was to put those words in someone's mouth, someone who wasn't Logan, since it seems like a clichéd kind of thing Logan, Mr. Trail of Broken Hearts and One-Night Stands, would say.

So giving it to Rogue - I'm definitely trying for a harsher, less sweet-girl Rogue.

She's 25 years old. She's been around the block. She's got Logan and Erik and god knows who else in her head by now. Maybe I'm letting the Evo and the comics versions - both of whom are more sarcastic than fanon makes Movie!Rogue [she does, after all, sass Logan in the truck].

So while I will add some more background to the narrative about Rogue's fucked up romantic history. I will attempt, without disrupting the flow of Munch's words, to characterize her ranting so it's obvious that she's talking about herself and not Remy.

But I'm not taking it out and I'm not rewriting it.

Now, as a rule, for me, I find Rogue to be the wildcard in any fic I'm writing. The others, even in the sketchy way the movie portrayed everyone-not-Wolvie, are pretty archetypal.

Jean is the healer and peacemaker; Scott, the cocky but concerned leader; Storm the elegant and powerful goddess; Logan the badass loner who finally starts to care again.

Rogue, however, is sassy and flirty before she devolves into a shrieking mess after the coma-kiss, and she's obviously got some sort of wanderlust and adventurous spirit.

When we next see her, she's been on the road X number of weeks/months [the movie never specifies, though I believe the excised scene with Storm mentions 8 months], which means she's fairly resilient and wily, if she's gotten so far on no money and no skills, in a world that would be dangerous and hostile to her even if she *weren't* a mutant. She still appears innocent, though we don't know if she actually is or not.

She's obviously brave, because she hitches a ride with Wolverine, even after seeing the claws and the growling. Again, in excised dialogue, she says something about them being the same [which is picked up in his "People like us" comment on the train. Notice how she looks up at him when he says it, confirming what he'd previously denied], and she has the nerve to call him on the debt she believes he owes her.

Then, she sasses him in the truck, with "what kind of name is Wolverine?"

So she's still got a little bit of the feisty flirtatiousness, even after being on her own [or not. We don't know the story of that 8 months. I refuse to believe the movie tie-in comic on the subject], and being broke and hungry and dirty and scared and what-have-you.

We were discussing swearing in fic on zendom, and which typically-PG characters could we see as having R-rated mouths, and the question of Rogue was raised.

This is what I wrote in response:

That's the thing I love about Movie!Rogue.

We know canonically that she took on a few of Wolverine's "more charming traits" while he was out cold, and she's got Magneto in her head as well, so I'd say she *can* swear, and probably in German, Yiddish and Polish (and possibly Japanese, depending on what background they give Movie!Logan *g*) as well as English. So if you want to say that the Logan-absorption had more long-term effects on her personality, then yes, she would swear like a sailor. After all, she does say, "I can feel you in my head" [QFM]. If not, and you wanted to stick with the apparently more innocent Marie of the movie, then no, not much. Not more than a typical Southern teenage girl in this day and age.

Since we don't see much of the "real" Rogue after the first scene where her mutation manifests, she's a fun character to play with. She's obviously flirtatious, and at least a little feisty, a trait of core-comic!Rogue that many comics fans *claim* is missing from movie!Rogue, but I disagree.

She does sass Logan a little in the truck. You have to remember her circumstances at that point - she's been on the road for a while (8 months according to the novelization and a deleted scene in the movie), she's just seen this guy slice through a shotgun with his claws (and seen him take remarkable beatings without a mark to show for it), she's hungry and broke. I don't know how feisty I'd be at that point, either, if I were dependent on a stranger, and I've got a smart mouth under most circumstances. *g*

Let's just say that there's a lot of room for interpretation in her character, since we only really see her under extreme circumstances in the movie, and cannot know what her "normal" or typical behavior is.

So, if I'm in the mood and it suits the story, she's got a potty mouth, and I've used the running gag of people telling her to watch her language (even as they swear themselves).

What I didn't say there [because I think the people on zendom are smart enough to figure it out themselves] but I will say here, is that even though there's lots of room for interpretation in Rogue's character, if it's not backed up in the story itself, it won't work.

In various fics I've written, I've made Rogue a hooker, a stripper, a potential drug addict, a lunatic, an angry, bitter young woman.

As you can see from my whinge above, I apparently haven't built up her background sufficiently for this angry/bitter characterization to work for my betas.

Which means I've got to go back and fill in some of that where I can.

Otherwise, the story is a failure, because the reader will sit there and say, WTF? Who is this person? She in no way resembles the Rogue I know and love.

Now, I've mentioned repeatedly that I dislike a lot of the fanon about Rogue. I think she's just as flawed as everyone else is, and this perfect, patient, emotionally mature, crying at the drop of a hat Marie irks me after too many stories.

That's, of course, a matter of personal preference, but I think writing a character the same exact way in so many different circumstances can also be a crutch.

Part of the fun of fanfic, and writing in general, and Marie's character in particular, is going, "What if?" and taking what we *know* of her from canon and extrapolating.

What if she wasn't as pure and innocent as everyone thinks she is? What if she had to do some pretty ugly things to survive while on the road? What if she picked up a taste for rotgut and cigars and rough sex from Logan and that never went away, though the outright buttslapping and running around half-naked did? What if she developed a taste for chess and Xavier after being touched for so long by Magneto? What if her family accepted her, but then got killed for it, so she ran? What if her family didn't accept her, so she ran? What if ... What if... What if...

I've gone on about this long enough.

***

As we head into sandal season, I plead with all of you out there: No stockings under sandals! Please!

Also, EVOL!. I almost died laughing.

I will get my revenge, Bethy. I just have to think of something that equals the evolocity of mpreg.

There might be hobbit slash in your future, my dear. Or, if I can bring myself to do it, over the objections of my stomach and good sense at Hasselhoff-sex, MK/KITT.

~victoria
[current mood: persecuted]
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2002-04-12 - 1:29 a.m.

It's FaulkNer, dammit!

New entry, because I can!

Quote for the moment:

"I go online sometimes, but everyone's spelling is really bad. It's depressing." Tara, _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_

And really, this article at FF.net makes me so angry; it makes me want to beat this so-called writer with a Louisville Slugger.

And that's just for misspelling FaulkNer.

Gack.

I should go to bed.

~victoria

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2002-04-11 - 11:50 p.m.

sweet, sweet candy

Woohoo!

You're back. My sweet sweet addictive mistress, diaryland...

I did not handle the downtime well at all.

This is what I was writing over in the LJ, but didn't post and then diaryland came back and... whee! So just going to post quiz results over there. *g*

***

Just ate a whole sleeve of Thin Mints.

There's nothing quite like Thin Mints. God bless the little homophobic capitalist tools who sell them, eh?

I've got to stop with the napping when I get home from work. It's one thing when you sleep for an hour from 6:30 to 7:30.

it's a whole different kettle of fish when you sleep from 7:30 until 10:30. And then stay up til 2 am. And sleep for four hours.

Sigh.

~*~

Read Jenn's rant from earlier this evening.

~*~

So, I knew it was going to happen, but it came from an unexpected source.

Yes, Rogue is very cranky in NotDL. So is most everyone else. This was deliberate. It was also a function of making over a Homicide ep, because most everyone on H:LotS was cranky most of the time. *g* That's one of the things I loved about the show. It didn't work hard to make you love the characters. They were there, and you either loved them or you didn't, but they were *real*. They had flaws and foibles and sometimes you just wanted to smack them for the way they behaved (towards each other, towards their families/SOs, etc.), but through it all, they were themselves.

At least until S6 and Dullzone showed up. But let's not get into that.

So I'm making the characters unsympathetic. Or that's what the beta tells me. And really, like I said, I kind of expected that reaction, even though to me, they're totally sympathetic. I mean, I know why they're acting the way they are, and I believe it comes through in the story, but that could also be because I simultaneously have the episode playing in the background in my head.

I really hope it comes through in the story.

Here's the disputed scene, for those who are interested:

"I'm gonna call 'Roro now," Remy announced as the women bustled around the kitchen. "I don't care if I wake her up. I need to know she's not mad at me."

"You want my advice?" Rogue said.

"No!" Remy exclaimed.

"I'm your best friend and you don't want my advice?"

"No!" Rogue's mouth opened in shock and hurt, and Remy hurried to rectify his mistake. "I mean, you're one of my best friends, yes, but no, I don't want your advice--"

"Fine," Rogue snapped. "Be that way. I was just going to offer my advice on relationships."

"And you've been so successful," Logan snorted, putting the fan down on the table with a thunk.

"Hey, I don't think you're exactly one to talk, either," Rogue replied. She turned back to Remy. "All I was gonna say is, what are you gonna call her for? Say you go out. You're a saint. You're everything you can be in a perfect world. So you sleep together. After the third time you do it, it's actually good instead of just saying it is. But how could it not be good? It's sex.

"So you get intimate. You get real close. You talk about your childhood, your parents, your broken dreams. You talk about relationships that didn't work out. You get so intimate, you tell her your problems. You get loose, rude, a little insensitive. You're not a saint anymore. And one day, she goes, 'I don't know who you are. You're not the guy I got involved with.' You apologize. You realize you've actually spent the last six months apologizing for who you were the first two weeks.

"Then, in the middle of some night, she leaves you. In the dark. Nice, huh? That's what you want?"

"I know why he left you," Remy muttered. "I mean, you don't know when to shut up."

"Dwight didn't leave me, dammit!" Rogue shouted. The baby began crying and she realized she was upsetting him with her tantrum. After a few moments of murmuring, little Sean settled down and Rogue said softly, "I left him."

Then she got up and rushed out, taking the baby with her.

***

It's Munch! Maybe that's what's wrong. I'm expecting Munch's words to work for a character other than Munch, and that's probably impossible.

But I love that little speech, and to have Logan give it seems so cliched.

Ah well, what are you gonna do?

Logan's just given Bobby advice. He already straightened Scott out, and now he's going to work on Remy.

He's... Ann Landers! *g*

Oh god, I should probably be shot for doing that, but... it's nice to have a clueful Logan and a clueless Rogue for once. And he does call Scott a dumbass, and tell Bobby his head's up his ass. Sort of...

Ah well, I think he'll talk to Remy now, then Scott and Jean will make up, and then Santa and the water gun...

~victoria
pondering



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2002-04-11 - 11:25 a.m.

you get what you pay for

I was talking with one of the women I work with here about watches. She was telling me the guy on the corner sells watches for $10 and they're really fashionable and pretty etc.

And that's so.

But do you know how often she has to buy a new watch?

I, on the other hand, shelled out $150 for a nice Citizen two years ago, to replace the one I lost on the plane to Denver, which had lasted me from Christmas 1985. Yes, you read that right. I had that watch 14 years and replaced the battery 3 times. It came with me to Denver, to Mexico, to San Francisco, to Florida. I never took it off when I traveled. I wore it in the ocean, the pool and the shower.

I know that my "new" Citizen will probably last at least 10 years. So instead of having to shell out $10 every 8-12 months for a new watch, I've got one that will last me quite a while, which to me is worth every penny that I spent.

See, there's a reason some brands cost more money than others, and a reason that the originals are more expensive than the knock-offs.

And while it's partially our celebrity culture (paying to wear someone's name on your ass or your feet because XYZ celeb does), partially an obscene markup so the seller makes money on the deal as well as the manufacturer (or vice versa - I'm no econ major) and partially consumerist/capitalist greed, part of it is dependent on quality.

I buy a Coach bag, I know that, for the rest of my life, I can send that bag back to them if it gets damaged or the hardware breaks. I know women who've had the same Coach bag for the past 20 years, and it still looks good.

You get what you pay for.

A quality item like a Coach bag or a Movado watch (I own one of those, too, and it was many times more expensive than the Citizen, but worth it because of how much I wanted it, and also because I got it at a pretty good discount *g*) is well-made. The makers take pride in putting their names on the finished product, and are embarrassed should it turn out to be faulty.

How, you're asking, how does this apply to fanfic? (Or maybe you're not. Maybe you don't care. Or maybe you already see where I'm going with this. It's not really rocket science, now, is it.)

Sure, we don't *pay* for fanfic in the same way we pay for a leather bag or a gold watch, but still, we do "pay" in the form of fic taxes, that is, time.

To quote Jemima:
In fandom, we pay in time, not dollars. We fritter it away surfing the web and slogging through over-stuffed mailboxes. Then we turn around, make more web sites and send more multiple emails.

Now, I don't know about you, but I think my time is pretty valuable.

I've been heard to utter the immortal words of John Munch upon watching a movie or show that was complete and utter pants (GM, I hope you're reading this. *g* Smoochies and gratuitious gropes if you are): "There's an hour of my life I'll never get back again." Or, like Meldrick Lewis, bemoaning the loss of time and knowing that, "When I'm on my deathbed... dying..." I'll be wishing I still had the time I spent on crap (and believe me, I've spent a lot of time on crap, from cheesy bad movies to endless and unwinnable arguments (both online and off-) to suckass sports teams to crappy fanfic).

So what I'm saying is this - the reason I get all fartoyched [for those of you lacking the Yiddish, that means, "all in a tizzy" or getting your knickers in a twist] about badfic is because it's a request of my time - and my critical faculties in the event that the author asks for feedback - and when it's bad, it's not worth the time. It's not worth the phosphor in which it's set.

And yet, you're asking me to spend it, when it's obvious that you haven't spent any yourself. You haven't even taken the 45 seconds it takes to run spell check, but I'm supposed to spend 15 minutes reading your opus and then another 10-15 composing praise for it?

Shyeah, right.

When I was young and new in fandom, maybe I would have. (For all you know, maybe I did. *g*) I'd have said, "Ooh, I really like this line, but you know, this and this were spelled wrong, and it's 'between him and me,' not 'between him and I', and the possessive of 'it' does not take an apostrophe," etc.

But I don't have time for that now. Especially not for people who can't be bothered to try to learn and improve.

You have to give respect to get it, and badfic shows an appalling lack of respect for the reader, the craft of writing, the English language, and the characters about whom you are writing.

Teague and Lori (in two entries, here and here) were discussing the apparent lack of confidence in many stunningly good fanfic writers [they didn't tackle the apparently commensurate *overconfidence* of many crappy fanfic writers, but that's a topic for another day, I think] that their writing is any good.

I agree with Lori in that I view writing as a continuing process of improvement, and, even though I think I did really good work on my very first finished fic, I do think I've improved notably since then, with almost every serious effort I've finished.

I've become more aware of POV and tense and all sorts of things that don't really register when you're not writing and reading critically, but are *huge* when you are.

Now, like Lori, I am considering myself a good writer. Not simply because *I* think so [though I do, actually], but because people whose opinions I trust on the matter, and who have no vested emotional interest in stroking my ego, have told me so. I pull out their praise whenever I have a crise des nerfs, usually before posting something new and different.

I also tend to doubt myself most when reading something by other people, writers I consider better than I, and I like what Lori has to say about this:

[...] they could be comparing themselves to some other writer they believe is better than they -- that's an easy enough trap to fall into. Comparisons can be deadly and I don't recommend them. I can compare the work of two other writers without much trouble, but comparing my own work to someone else's will only get me started on listing my deficiencies and miring myself in insecurities I shouldn't cultivate.

It's always easier to list one's faults than one's strengths (which is why I hate those stupid interview questions with a passion - you mask all your stregnths as flaws, and then are left with meaningless phrases like, "detail-oriented, hard-working self-starter" which is all well and good, but come on! every interviewee has said the same damned thing).

It's always easier to say, "She's better than I at this, so I'm just going to give up trying to get better. After all, it's just fanfic."

About this phenomenon, Lori says,
There may also be an "it's only fanfic" attitude in those authors whose writing you enjoy so much, slightly different than the one that allows the badfic to proliferate -- the idea that simply because they are borrowing a universe, their story is inherently flawed, or they can't take ownership of it.

And I do know a few people with this attitude - only they don't write fanfic and they look down on it, despite my best efforts to convince them that some fanfic is definitely worthy of publication far more than a lot of shite that gets published.

Anyhow, it may just be fanfic, but we're still paying for it, with our time and attention, and to expect people to give that up simply because you demand it, without providing quality goods in return, is ridiculous.

Just like I don't want a watch that breaks after a month of wearing it, I don't want to read a story that makes me say, "There's 30 minutes of my life I'll never get back again."

So I don't. I no longer patronize the watch guy on the corner, and I no longer read fic that makes me angry in its lack of respect for the audience or the art and craft of writing or the characters being written about.

There's more I want to say, about the discussion Claire and Peggy were having about lush v. tight prose, and also to comment on the all the discussion of squicky plots etc, as mentioned by Peggy, Jenn and others.

But I really think I ought to do some work, or at least check out the rest of blogland first. *g*

Talk back!

~victoria
[current mood: pedantic]
[current music: The Logical Song - Supertramp]

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~*~

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