In what world is “forbidden enemies to lovers angst” not a tragic drama about the conflict of the individual will and social customs? “Forbidden” implies the conflict of the individual will against social customs. “Angst” implies, but doesn’t guarantee, the tragic ending. There’s a way people do dialogue about fanfic tropes that does act as though it’s the same every time, and as though everything that could fall under one category is the same thing—but there are people who do that with things like “the hero’s journey” too.
Idk if I fall totally on either “side” here but I don’t really like the implication that fanfiction itself never explores deep themes. I’ve read fanfiction that made me sit down with myself and ask questions about how exactly I was defining myself relative to my experiences. Fanfiction writers are writers, writing about human experiences and societal themes whether they mean to or not, and not every instance is successful, but not every book is successful.
People knowing there are certain emotions that tend to pull them into stories isn’t new. I’ve had books recommended to me because someone knows how I feel about characters who were doomed before a story starts, or stories with unconventional ways of wrangling with death.
I think it’s okay if people recommend their friend a book because “you’ll like this character because they really want to prove themself,” the way casual book recs tend to go, latching onto something you know is an emotional hook your friend likes exploring. I see literally no problem, then, with the equally brief and snappy selling point being “you’ll like this because you like enemies to lovers angst.”
I get frustrated by posts that reduce the concept of a recurring theme or trope to something that just goes the same way every time, sure. And yet: recommending each other books via AO3 tags is “I think you will like this book because it contains something you like.” People are seeking the emotions they want from literature, and some are using familiar language to draw themself into a different set of media that they want to get to know better. (Others are probably already reading a lot of published books!)
I see no conflict with wanting to read a certain kind of story because you like that kind of story. We’ve acknowledged, in fact, that anything describable as “enemies to lovers angst” won’t, in fact, be that simple. So reading a lot of books that qualify as that will explore different themes and angles every time, right? This is as ~doomsday~ as me wanting to read a lot of books about characters navigating whether or not they’re their world’s definition of human and whether or not that matters.
We all have stories we like to seek out. We all already use labels that do not fully represent the complexity of the stories within them: I want to read a tragic romance, a comedy of errors, a bildungsroman. Chill out.
Edit, I figured out what bugged me: Recommendations are not analysis.
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