On Fanfiction, Authorial Disapproval, and Respect

[kitewithfish]

Apocalypos of LJ posted here about a post Diana Gabaldon, author of Outlander and other novels, made in her blog, Fan-Fiction [sic] and Moral Conundrums

Ms. Gabaldon begins inauspiciously:
"OK, my position on fan-fic is pretty clear: I think it’s immoral, I _know_ it’s illegal, and it makes me want to barf whenever I’ve inadvertently encountered some of it involving my characters."  The rest of the post is in a similar vein- read it if you have the time.

I replied with this post:  (When I started writing, there were 83 responses. When I posted, there were 96. There are now 116 posts and growing)

It's your books, characters, and story. If you want to keep others from using them, that's your choice. Most archives and authors will respect that- I suggest you inform them.

My bias: I read fanfic, and I deeply enjoy it, and I will confess that I frequently enjoy fanfic without having encountered the source material before I read the fanfic. Several times, fanfic has inspired me to find the original source, and other times it hasn't. Sometimes I get to the source material and find the fanfic more literary, funnier, and just more enjoyable than the original materials, and I don't bother with the original anymore. Reading good Outlander fanfic might have made me want to buy your books, or it might not. Reading bad Outlander fanfic would certainly have had no effect on my attitude towards your novels.

On the issue of legality: A number of others have posted, far more knowledgeably and eloquently, about the complexity of law regarding fair use and copyrighted materials. Read their posts if you like, but please take away at least the information that it's much more complicated than "It's stealing or "It's illegal under International Copyright Law." Declaring that the issue is really simple is not going to make it simple. It's is misleading and disingenuous to say so.

I've read Outlander. It was fun. It was enjoyable and I might have continued the series. There are authors I read that don't like fanfic of their work, and make that known, and I can respect that and continue to enjoy their works. (George RR Martin comes to mind.) However, there are ways to be respectful towards fans when making your dislike of fanfiction known, and I do not think that you behaved respectfully towards your fic-author fans in this post, and that is going to color my attitude towards your work in the future. I will probably not read your books in the future.

Good luck in your writing,
Sincerely,
Kite With-Fish

Needless to say, I think Ms. Gabaldon is within her rights as an author and creator to ask for no fanfiction of her work, but I don't agree with her characterization of fic authors.
If you feel moved to comment, please be respectful in tone if not in mind.

Comments

[healingmirth]

I am somewhat nauseated by the number of people on that page who find the idea of fanfiction nauseating.

I don't self-identify as a writer the way I assume Diana Gabaldon does. It's not my passion, and it's never going to be my profession. If she really does have such a viscerally upsetting reaction to people celebrating her characters, then fine. She's as welcome to ask them to stop and anyone else is welcome to ask people to stop doing things.

I'm sort of amused by her suggestion that if people must use her characters, that they find-and-replace the names before going looking for an audience to praise them, to see if their writing is good enough. That crystallizes her lack of understanding of fandom, for me. I wish she could just take pride in having created characters that inspired people to tell stories.

Oh, well. I stopped reading her books when I was a teenager, anyway.

[mab_browne]

I gave away my Outlander books a couple of years ago, although I kept the John Gray stories. It clearly is a visceral reaction on her part, but not the best from a PR pov, and the illegality part is nonsense. There's a different between not 'validated as legal', and illegal, and someone of Ms Gabaldon's intelligence should recognise that. ::sigh::

[kitewithfish]

I read the first Outlander book, and I would have read more if I had access at the time- they were fun and she seemed like she might be able to carry off the historical bent of the books for a good long while without getting boring. I had it on a sticky-note in the back of my mind to find the next book in the series, but her attitude was kind of off-putting. I would shy from making this comparison on her blog, but after reading her article, I felt much the way I did after finding out that Orsen Scott Card supported sodomy laws- I couldn't read his books happily anymore because I couldn't divest enough from the author.

Whenever an author does this, I'm always so perplexed by their stance. The first word of the genre is *fan*- authors who aggressively go after fanficcers are going after the people most likely to buy their books/dvds, purchase related material, pay money to go to cons, and follow a series even if it goes sour. Alienating those people is just... not smart.

Anyhoo, I was kind of proud of my little post and I have inadvertently signed myself up to receive all the posts that came after, so I have been thinking about this a lot today... :)

[thelauderdale.livejournal.com]

Wow. Thanks for linking this in lj. I followed it last night and have been watching this hot mess ever since. (Ended up posting in the morass as well.)

She's posted a follow-up but it's kind of a non-response, really. She acknowledges that she "buys" the "love angle" for writing fanfic, and thanks people for bringing it to her attention. [facepalm] Well DUH. If she didn't even understand that when she made her original post... o_0

[elspethdixon]

It makes me sad ): I've loved Outlander since I was eleven, when I read it at the height of my celtophile phase and dicovered h/c gold (heavy on the hurt, just the way I like it). Coincidentally, reading it was also how I learned about the existance of gay sex, so I guess I can blame all the slash I've ever written on her *grin*.

edit: am random person from metafandom, btw

[kitewithfish]

I know! I always picture authors of slightly-trashy books to be cool and a little ironic about their work- it's porny fun! I was inclined to like her, but this is just kind of... blech.

Don't know if it frosts your cookie, but I'm musing a little on the terminology used in conversations about fanfic here- stop by if you have thoughts. http://kitewithfish.dreamwidth.org/347853.html

[kitewithfish]

Oh, thanks for letting me know. I will probably saunter over there are see to roast some marshmallows on the flames.