On fanficcing and proficcing

[altariel]

Over at meta_writer, across the next couple of weeks, there is going to be a post a day on the subject of fanfic and profic, particularly on making the transition from one to the other.

My thoughts are here, and the rest of the series is shaping up to be an interesting read. Enjoy!

Comments

[ithilwen.livejournal.com]

What a great essay! And you've affirmed something that I've long suspected: fanfic and profic are different beasts, which require different skills and have different rewards. So the people who criticize fanfic writers for not "taking the training wheels off and writing something original" are missing the point entirely.

[altariel.livejournal.com]

Glad you enjoyed! And, yes, I completely agree that they are different beasts, and fanfiction is not (necessarily) a training ground: I think of them much more on a spectrum.

[ithilwen.livejournal.com]

I suppose if fanfic's a training ground for anything, it would be for historical fiction. But even there, there are differences; readers of fanfiction usually know a lot more about their favorite characters than readers of profic are likely to know about any given historical person, so a lot of the expository shortcuts we can use in fanfic would still have to be discarded.